European legal mods

[Gladi]

Dear friends,

I'm planning to buy a mk5 supra soon, I've been doing some research and decided to ask for some help you guys who might have more experience on the topic.
First of all, I would have loved to tune and mod my supra to get some more HP out of it, have it look even more amazing & generally have a great sounding car. However the possibility of tuning seems to go out the window when I realised that the insurance might withdraw upon an accident if they find out your car has a lot more power than stock & it's pretty much impossible to adjust the official papers of the car which state the power it has, which would be needed for the insurance to cover you.
I'm from Belgium myself and we also have a yearly mandatory vehicle inspection, for this you are only allowed to have EC approved parts on your car, I suppose exhausts also need to be equipped with OPF filters. I figured I might be able to fit a special exhaust (non EC) and change this exhaust every year back to stock to go get the vehicle inspected but I don't know how feasible this is since i'm not really an experienced mechanic. I think we have a 5% deviation allowed above the stock power so the bit of extra power wouldn't be an issue normally for the insurance. Would love to hear the opinion of other people who do this or have tried, do I for example need special tunes every time I switch back to my ''special exhaust''. In case this is all too difficult, do people have suggestions for EC approved exhausts that have an OPF and still produce a beautiful sound compared to the stock exhaust (which is a lot more quiet than the USA version because of OPF)? Thanks!

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[geert.bieseman]

Hello @Gladi and welcome to the forum.
Do mind that you require the law specifically for Belgium and not Europe (each country has its own laws).

To answer your question regarding engine performance mods: 100% illegal
Regarding catless & OPF, yes you would require to go back to stock each year.
(same as aftermarket carbon & aluminium parts are not allowed)

You are right about the insurance, that they can classify you as uninsured when an accident occurs. However they can only do that, when they can prove that the tuning caused the accident.
For example, with a stock car... you can still hit somebody at 70km/h. So if you hit a car at that speed with a tuned car, its not that big of a deal.
Also note, they require to prove that your car has more horsepower then stock (bigger turbo can still be tuned to just stock power values). And there is no calibrated dyno available.
Let alone if you are in a huge accident... your parts & ecu will be totally smashed to pieces, so no way that car can even be put on a dyno.
Off course they can measure the speed you are going and over which distance

As always, big power comes with big responsibility. It is not for everybody, you do require a brain to know when you can and can't put that power down. This supra still is a short wheelbased, RWD, tailhappy & high-torque at low RPM car when tuned.
Always drive responsible on the road. Go for track days when you want to push your car.


Just as extra information, there is a whatsapp group which contains only Belgium's MKV Supra owners. Some are tuned (engine only, exhaust, exterior only, mixed) and some are stock.