The new Sports Car International has an article and driving impression on the works mini. Several comments are of interest to me.

1.Cooper claims extensive testing and finally a head with 15% better flow.
Why, most everyone is not getting head work done (don't need it?) But couldn't you have it taken off and flowed for way less than $1800 or whatever this costs new?

2. Cooper claims the stock supercharger is not good for more than 200h.p. (maybe reliability problems etc?) Couldn't this supercharger be modified somehow or the better model bought outright from the manufacturer. Modified version sports ceramic coatings differant internals and better heat capability for increase in boost.

3. SS cat back exhaust - No biggy there many systems are up to the task.

4.Smaller pulley - Again many to choose from...not a problem.

5. ECU mod. Readily available again without too much problem.

That leaves me with number 1 and 2. My feeling is that the works kit is conservative and with head work and an upgraded supercharger (like the works..) 220-240 is not unrealistic. I like so many others would like to get a works kit...if it were 3k maybe. There must be other sources for the same mods........240 reliable h.p. anyone??

 

alright minifletch, hang onto your seat...

#1. The cylinder head, ported, polished, larger valves, 7-angle valve job, blah blah blah, is good for 10HP max. Aftermarket price? A bit north of 3-grand. Madness is working on their head too, which will be available in Stages. Expect the $1800 you're thinking of as a base price.

#2. The Eaton M45 is virtually identical in the MCS and the JCW, the difference being the coating on the rotor vanes. In the stock MCS, the vanes are ceramic-coated, whereas on the JCW kit, the MCS supercharger is rebuilt with graphite-coated vanes. That's the only difference, really.

You're on target for the rest of the numbers.
Remember, you can have the horsepower of your dreams, but be prepared to compromise drivability, fuel mileage, and reliability.

Good luck,
Ryan

 

>>here's an e-mail that SMKKVK sent me regarding the MCS vs. JCW M45's.<<

Motor-On, boosted of course,
Ryan

 

I agree with Ryan's assessment.

To address your questions as well though, here are some thoughts:

#1 The max you will see is 7 hp from the upgrades JCW has done to the head (which only include porting, no change to the cam or valve size).

#2 After talking with Eaton sources, the graphite is just about identical to the efficiency rates of the epoxy coating the stock M45 uses. The other difference in the supercharger is the pulley size of 2.21 inches (the aftermarket pulleys are all 2.18 inches, so the reduction is almost identical). As far as what the limit of the supercharger is for horsepower gains, maybe they meant that the most you could net from the supercharger change alone is 200 hp. It seems that's really all you could comment on considering the vast amount of other efficiency changes that could be made to the motor that make additional power.

The celing is really only based on dollars. If you want to get 300 hp, I'm sure it's possible with the M45 in place, but the gearbox isn't going to like it much .

I will only build kits to 230 horsepower for that reason; I think it's a balanced package that doesn't require any other mods to the drivetrain, and it maintains reliability. Right now, the car is at 206 at the wheels, and that is a screamer! I usually just recommend folks start out with 200 hp and see if they are happy - it is a lot cheaper than eeking out the last little bit without going internal.

Hope that helps.

Randy

 

Right now, the car is at 206 at the wheels, and that is a screamer!

care to share what the performance numbers are compared to the works which are pretty commonplace now compared to the stock MCS, especially also torque gains....screamer is kinda of subjective......thanks.

 

Wow...230. Randy when you say you rec. 200h.p. to start are you talking crank or wheel h.p.? What package gets you approx 200h.p. at the wheels??

Thanks Randy

P.S. Which package gives 207 at the wheels...?

 

Has anyone dyno'd a Works yet? If you get 7 hp from the head, the same gain from the pulley as the aftermarket, 1-3 hp off maybe from a Borla, similar if not identical gains from the ecu revision, it seems like the only thing missing from the Works is an air intake.

I think MINI might be lowballing the Works. It is a nice round number tho isn't it?

 

>>#1. The cylinder head, ported, polished, larger valves, 7-angle valve job, blah blah blah, is good for 10HP max. Aftermarket price? A bit north of 3-grand. Madness is working on their head too, which will be available in Stages. Expect the $1800 you're thinking of as a base price.

With a proper job on the heads and a better cam, you could get more than 10 hp quite handily... of course it would cost more, but still. From what I can tell, the exhaust valves seem way too small even for the stock head.

Anyway, I foresee many people experimenting with heads in the very near future, including some people in our local club with lots of spare time and a spare head or two... Same thing goes for cams...

 

What have you done to get 206 hp at the wheels? What does your 230 hp kit cost?

 

Torque steer & power mods:
-IMO the Cooper S with enough mods to raise the torque & HP to the level of the Works Kit is approaching the limits of driver pleasurability for a front wheel drive sports car.
-As the owner of a Works Cooper(w/ additional mods) I can express my concern about a host of Torque Steer related issues:
-In most heavy acceleration there is pronounced TS, drive-wheel pull and the tendency for torque steer to dominate the feel & character of the driving experience (this waas not the case in the stock Cooper S.)
-In Autocross & track racing context, more powerfull Cooper & the related steering changes creates a host of different & challenging driving experiences (not all of which are charming or positive in a competetive driving context.)
-The additiional torque & drive wheel "Pull" demands a differernt driving response, driving style, skill-sest & training/experience: the learning curve is not necessarly fast & some drivers learn the hardway (newbie street racers & overly confident types beware!)
Question: What is the best/ultimate power level (200HP or more) for a "High Performance" Cooper before the front drive design becomes a critical (negative) variable? I think the current Works Kit (or something comprable) is very close to the real-world "Power Ceiling" of this car: anything much beyond is going to be freakish.
PS: When fully broken-in the Works Kit w/ a good intake make for a very exciting ride: even more low-end grunt than I expected and slightly improved fuel economy to boot.

 

>>Has anyone dyno'd a Works yet? If you get 7 hp from the head, the same gain from the pulley as the aftermarket, 1-3 hp off maybe from a Borla, similar if not identical gains from the ecu revision, it seems like the only thing missing from the Works is an air intake.
>>
>>I think MINI might be lowballing the Works. It is a nice round number tho isn't it?


The JCW exhaust I don't believe gives much HP. Certainly NOTHING like the magnaflow or quicksilver. Maybe a couple but no more than the Borla (probably less). Although I can't be positive on this, it's my belief that the JCW ECU doesn't do a whole lot either as ALL of the JCW torque gains can be accounted for with just the pulley and head. I bet a MINI with a pulley and exhaust or one with a pulley and intake would feel identical to the JCW b/c of having the same torque. Add the EVOTECH ECU for the pulley on top of that and you should have a noticeably faster MCS with higher torque numbers. Just my opinion.

 

marksmith (or anyone):
can you elaborate on the mechanics of "torque steer"? The term is confusing.

 

>>marksmith (or anyone):
>>can you elaborate on the mechanics of "torque steer"? The term is confusing.

I found the term torque steer on the MINIUSA.com site.

Go to Our Cars
Then select "Master the Asphalt Arts" from the dropdown
Then select #5 of 7 features

That should explain it a little bit for you.

 

torque steer == mash the gas pedal and the steering wheels moves left/right to some degree

Another form of torque steer is when you are turning and mash the gas pedal and the steering wheel does not want to return to center on its own.

Basically, the power going to the wheels causes the steering to be affected.

 

I've never been convinced that "torque steer" is anything but a fundamental part of front wheel drive, especially using Sleepless' definition "Basically, the power going to the wheels causes the steering to be affected."

TS can be adversely increased if one driveline can twist under drive torsion more than the other (hence the MINIUSA blab about equal length drivelines), but the affect on steering due to applied power is due to FWD.

the LSD (or lack of it), caster setting and Ackerman are probably more important than the equal length driveline concept.

 

keep in mind that ackerman is only a throw curve delta between sides, and has nothing to do with torque-steer directly.

however, a relevant consideration is scrub radius. If I remember correct, having a kingpin pivot outside the center of the contact patch (beyond the track) will reduce torque-steer potential, I believe by increasing the mechanical advantage on the contact patch by the steering rack.

Seasoned chassis dynamicists please confirm. :smile:
Cheers,
Ryan

 

>>keep in mind that ackerman is only a throw curve delta between sides, and has nothing to do with torque-steer directly.
>>
>>however, a relevant consideration is scrub radius. If I remember correct, having a kingpin pivot outside the center of the contact patch (beyond the track) will reduce torque-steer potential, I believe by increasing the mechanical advantage on the contact patch by the steering rack.
>>
>>Seasoned chassis dynamicists please confirm. :smile:
>>Cheers,
>>Ryan

Ryan is that scrub radius talk associated with caster?

 

they are similar, but different.
caster has the effect of placing the contact point behind the projected steering axis, to give the wheel a self centering effect.

Scrub radius describes the placement of the steering axis projection inside of the contact point (imagine adding wheel spacers...you increase the scrub radius.)

I thought Ackerman was the guy who invented the concept of minimizing the scrub radius back when wheels were mounted 5" ouside of the steering hubs on wagons. Didn't he come up with the extended steering hub idea?

found this, at Longacre racing:
"Ackerman is the difference in turn radius between the front tires. On oval track cars it can be desirable to create a situation where the left front tire turns faster than the right front tire. The Ackerman effect can help the car turn better through the center of the turn. You can measure the amount of Ackerman you currently have by using a set of turn plates. Typically, Ackerman is measured by turning the right front 10 degrees to the left. If you have Ackerman, the left front will travel further than the right front. A typical amount would be three degrees in 10 degrees of steering. To simplify, moving the right front from zero through 10 degrees of steering will cause the left front to move say 13 degrees in this scenario."

 

excellent find on the definition of Ackerman jlm, I couldn't have phrased it better

now, if everyone wants a taste of excessive torque-steer, go drive a Dodge SRT-4! Even my brothers' base model Neon has a ton of torque-steer, it's totally poor design. My old generation Neon did not have the amount of torque-steer the new chassis has. Talk about reverse-evolution.

To be honest, my observation of torque-steer on the MINI is that is has relatively little. Increased horsepower (like a JCW kit) results in a proportional increase in torque-steer. That proportional increase is typically inherent, and is not really a problem, but an annoyance.

Hey, I always say, if you want more performance, you have to sacrifice something.
Cheers,
Ryan

 

>>Has anyone dyno'd a Works yet? If you get 7 hp from the head, the same gain from the pulley as the aftermarket, 1-3 hp off maybe from a Borla, similar if not identical gains from the ecu revision, it seems like the only thing missing from the Works is an air intake.

I'm hoping Andy at Ross-Tech gets his hands on one and throw his considerable data logging expertise to shed some light on what they might be doing for the works ECU upgrade.

It might be interesting, too, to use the AmD/Stratosphere plug in dyno mod, and swap the JCW ECU tuning for Stratosphere's (or if you could figure out a way to do it, swap JCW for stock) to see what component of the power is derived strictly from the ECU.

Just idle minds wondering....

Jeff