It’s proved its worth before but can the Dtronic give Holden’s Rodeo a much-needed boost in the extra grunt stakes?

There’s nothing like seat-of-the-pants testing to confirm what the all-wheel dyno and gauges and graphs keep trying to tell you; a Safari Automotive Technologies’ Dtronic delivers extra grunt.

The Dtronic is so easy to connect and disconnect, you can drive the same section of road, only minutes apart, with or without the unit in action. This gives the driver a clear indication of just how much of a difference a Dtronic makes to power delivery. That’s what we did with our test Rodeo.

We first tried Dtronic in 2002 on its debut and it impressed us. Like its predecessor the Unichip, on which it is based, the Dtronic works off a set of three-dimensional ‘maps’ of 17rpm positions between idle and full revs and 12 load points between no throttle and full throttle. Each rpm position and load point (204 in all) is optimised for the quantity of fuel delivered and to match the exact second of injection timing.

Like the units we’ve tested more recently the unit fitted to the Rodeo is a fourth-generation Dtronic, which is physically smaller and has the added bonus feature of being able to monitor engine temperature.

With these latest units, as engine temperature increased due to work or environmental factors, engine power is progressively cut back to standard outputs to protect the engine from undue stress and strain.

The Dtronic is a small black box with a few plug-in leads and it is simple to fit once you’ve been shown how. Another advantage of these units is that if anything goes wrong with the fuel-injection system the Dtronic can be quickly isolated and the system reverted to normal, making fault-finding easier. And if in the unlikely event, the Dtronic unit becomes crook, the vehicle can be left to run in its normal mode.

In the case of the latest 3.0 litre turbo-diesel model (not a bad performer in standard guise) the Rodeo produces a claimed 96kW at 3800rpm with maximum torque of 280Nm at 2400rpm – these are flywheel figures under laboratory conditions. On a dyno we came up with maximum power of 70kW and maximum torque of 2800 Tractive Newtons at the rear wheels.

When we plugged in the Dtronic unit the Rodeo demonstrated a power step-up to 83kW and torque increased to 330Nm. In other words, power was up by 18.5 percent and torque up by 17.9 percent, and those gains were held over much of the rev band.

On the road, those gains equated to better off-the-mark performance, while mid-range urge-and-go were much improved resulting in few gear changes, especially in the Dandenong Ranges and in traffic.

We didn’t have the opportunity to test fuel economy but in previous testing we’ve seen slight improvements, but only if the vehicle is driven like it was before the Dtronic was fitted. Trouble is, most of us will use the extra power and torque for passing or towing and, as a result, fuel economy may suffer.

The Dtronic is an easy and effective way to achieve an instant improvement in your Rodeo’s performance, as well as many other modern, electronically controlled, turbo-diesel engines. With the added advantages of its quick and easy installation and removal, the Dtronic could later be re-used in an updated, same-vehicle model.

The units are readily available around Australia. For more information on the Dtronic contact Safari Automotive Technologies on (03) 9761-7244 or check the web at http://www.dtronic.com.