The current Ranger, the Transit and the Amarok that shares the Ranger’s platform are the most requested vans and pickups in our file service. The engine side has been covered for a while. What has been missing is the rest of the driveline, and August brought two OBD protocols that fill the gap.
The gearbox
The Continental UTCU4 is the controller for Ford’s 10-speed automatic (10R80 and the 10R140 in the heavy Super Duty trucks) and the 8-speed SelectShift. From 21 August it can be read and written through the OBD port, no bench work, and the earlier UTCU3 in the 2017 to 2022 cars went on OBD and bench a month before it. That means a gearbox file to go with the engine file: higher torque limits so the tune is not clipped by the transmission, faster shifts, and firmer lock-up. It covers the Ranger, Transit, Tourneo, Kuga, Focus, Mustang, Bronco, Explorer, F-150 and Super Duty, the Lincoln Navigator and the VW Amarok, from 2017 on, with the 1.5, 2.0, 2.3, 2.7, 3.0 and 3.5 EcoBoost, the 1.5 and 2.0 EcoBlue, the 5.0 V8 and the 6.7 Power Stroke.
The AdBlue module
On the 2023-on 2.0 EcoBlue Ranger, Transit and Amarok the AdBlue dosing is handled by a separate Bosch VD1CP110 module rather than the engine ECU. From 24 August that module is on OBD too. For us that is mainly a repair tool: when the SCR system throws a fault and the countdown to no-start begins, we can now get into the module that is complaining. Read what we can and cannot do for a road car on the AdBlue page.
What we already offer on these vans
A Stage 1 on the 2.0 EcoBlue takes the 170 PS Ranger and Transit to around 210 PS and 480 Nm; the 205 PS bi-turbo goes to around 240 PS and 520 Nm. Now the gearbox can be matched. See the Transit case study or put your registration into the tuning builder.
Dealers: both protocols are on KESS3 and CMD, and gearbox files for the UTCU4 are in the file price list from £50.
