Product Origin Story: Coil Grounding Kit

Hey Everyone! Dave here with another Technical Blog Post, but with a twist! 

Ever since the pre-order launched back in September of 2021, the EQT Coil grounding kit has been a hard product to keep in stock! And after speaking to many customers and those interested in the kit, I decided to talk a little bit about where it came from as I feel it has a pretty cool story.

Back in late August a customer local here in Colorado had just installed his Vortex XL turbo set up and was trying to chase down some misfires that just wouldn't seem to go away.

He had installed new plugs, swapped coil packs, checked the MPI Injectors, etc. Everything shy of replacing the Direct Injectors. Pretty common trouble shooting steps at the time.

Ever since meeting him, I knew this guy was gung-ho EQT. Every meet I saw him at, he was telling everyone all about how happy he was with his tune and the direction the car was going.

He and I ended up becoming friends so naturally, I wanted to help him resolve his misfire issue so I had him come by one day so I could take a look at the car and see what was going on.

It was immediately obvious once I popped the hood what was going on here. 

Two out of the four coil pack grounding bolts had been replaced with M6 All thread studs so I asked him what was going on there? 

Turns out, like many of you, the factory triangular hardware had chewed up the threads over the life of the car from being removed and reinstalled a dozen or more times

The all thread studs felt loose and not very secure so I had an idea to try and bypass them as a trouble shooting step to rule out of that being the issue.

At the time I was in the process of wiring up the Syvecs ECU for my personal car so I had plenty of wire, terminals, heat shrink, etc. just laying around the garage so the initial construction of what you all know now as the Coil Grounding Kit (CGK) emerged.

It took about an hour to get all the wire lengths right and find a solid grounding location that was away from heat, and try to make it somewhat presentable with some techflex sleeving.

The original CGK was made of some fairly cheap TXL automotive wire that I had in excess and some 3M Tin plated Ring Terminals. I made a quick run to the hardware store to get some M6 hardware to attach the new grounding harness to the existing coil pack grounding wires and we were off to the races.

Once it was all together, we took the car for a spin and started logging. I had no idea at the time if that was the issue, but based on the condition of the threads in the cylinder head I had a suspicion that it may be apart of, but maybe not the whole problem.

After a quick rip on the freeway and finding that his Knock Retard on all 4 cylinders had dropped from roughly -3.00 to -0.48 or so I was in awe that no one had come up with this simple solution and more so, that it actually worked.

After trialing the part on the car for a while and making sure it was actually the fix and not placebo the idea was brought up with management that we may be on to something here!

So the testing begun, I sourced an OE MQB ignition harness and started dissecting it and begun working on a better quality harness that would stand the test of time and provide a superior path to ground. 

Now that it was more than just a hunch, I wanted to make sure that the part held up to the quality and reputation associated with an EQT Product so the process of finding all the correct components begun.

The OE Terminal was removed and measured with a caliper and we were off to the races to find the right one that would fit in the OE Connector.

Well, the first terminal I tried was close but wrong in every dimension as seen here.

It was back to the drawing board! 

Meanwhile, the wire size was being determined as well as the material as I wasn't really happy with how small the TXL 20AWG wire originally used on the beta was compared to the OE grounding terminals.

So it was decided that if we're going to make a harness, it's going to be overkill so 14AWG Tefzel M22759 wire was decided upon.

Tefzel wire was appealing for its compact footprint and high amperage carrying capability.

Here we're looking at a strand of 16AWG Tefzel Wire next to 20AWG Regular Automotive TXL Wire commonly used in the industry. And it's obvious how by looking at it that the exterior dimensions were very similar but the inner core density was superior by far!

Tefzel wire is also the military standard for aircraft which made it very appealing as it was known to be robust, chemical and abrasion resistant and light weight.

At this point some spools of wire were ordered up from TE Connectivity as well as other parts from Mouser and the next harness was built to a higher quality and then tested on the mockup harness.



This was not the final product, but a step in the right direction utilizing Raychem high quality materials such as DR-25 and SCL.

The construction process was still being refined as this was now the 2nd ever CGK that was assembled as you can tell by some of the lengths and joints not being exact, nor the prettiest.

Now we fast forward to todays product where the process has been perfected, the appropriate materials chosen based off of the needs of the product and properly calculated Circular Mil Area.


With over 300 units sold, the EQT Coil Grounding Kit has to be one of the best selling, simple, easy to install, and effective products we have to date.

It solved a real world problem that had been an issue on these vehicles since 2015 when they first came to the United States and it does so at a price point that is affordable for everybody.

I hope you enjoyed the story and that you find a CGK under the hood of your car soon! 

- Dave

A Special Thank You goes out to Brayden Glueck (@Raven_573), the original beta tester!