Now that I've sold my '05 MCS and am waiting for my '08, I have nothing to do but obsess about future mods and ask a few questions. I've been wondering two things:

1) What's the deal with the scoops? They're fully closed? Does opening them provide any real benefit?

2) Will the mats, front floor, boot and folded down seats from my R53 fit my R56?

TIA,

Richard

 

The newer R56s have semi-opened scoops (about 1/2 the holes are open)

 

With the DDM CAI, the scoop is actually used for something

You can either remove the scoop grille, replace it with some other mesh, or dremel open all the blocked holes.

 

Thanks. The DDM looks nice, not sure that it has much practical benefit in street form. Has anyone tried it? Any issues with things like torrential rain?

 

I have a DDM CAI. I think it has some benefit at the track at the higher speeds and rpm. Nothing on the street. This is the only motor mod. As for the water, the CAI has 2 exits. The second exit is for the water that is dumped out behind the motor. Since the water is heavier than the air, the water bypasses the first exit to the air cleaner and exits on the 2nd exit. I would not park the car on a steep hill pointed up hill in a heavy ran.

 

I have the DDM "Full Race" CAI and it does help on the street in my opinion.

 

We installed several of the Race DDM intakes at the Dragon and they work great. If your concerned about the scoop and duct you can get just the DDM race or street intake without the duct. We run the full race intake on our test car.

 

Good questions! As mentioned above the scoops don't function in the same way on the R56 as the R53. Of course on the R53 the goal is to help cool the intercooler. On the R56 the intercooler is located in the front bumper area and thus the scoop doesn't do anything there.

What the scoop does help with on the R56 (and one of the reasons why BMW opened the scoops on later production cars) is help ventilate the heat created by the turbo etc. As witnessed on early cars where the OEM hood scoop was warping from the heat.

for intake systems the dyno shows (hood shut with fans) that the scoop doesn't make a dramatic difference in the Hp gains and that they are realized by the reduction in restriction etc. More info on that on our site.

The other thing is that the plates and scoops that direct air flow back to the filter area, MAY in fact cause other issues as again the heat generated from the turbo is again not allowed to be vented through the scoop. Our opinion is that extensive testing would be needed before that area is blocked, as the benefits to HP have not been shown.

on the mats: Close, but not perfect! New car = new mats. Splurge on your new toy!

Let me know if I can help in anyway further!

 

He're my scoop opened up. I used one of my dental drills and it took quite a bit of time as the plastic is sort of hard. It was pretty easy to remove and reassemble, however. I also have more pics if you need them! Good luck!

 

A dremmel does the trick quite nicely if you are lacking in the dental tool department.

 

Does anyone make a finished looking open scoop insert? Just removing it leaves it looking a bit unfinished.

 

anything disadvantagious if water enters that opened scoop?

Car wash incidents?

 

Does anyone know where you can pick up a finished looking fully open mesh scoop insert? Just removing it leaves it looking a bit unfinished and drilling it out still looks tacky up close. I am looking to add this to the DDM intake I have on the car.

 

Mine's had no scoop insert since November. It's rained a bit on it, and it's been through a touch free car wash. No issues so far. The only issue I could see might be the iron turbo getting cooled too quickly, and a part shrinking down on another too quickly. That's less of a concern with the heat shield over it, and the opening is not that direct. Anything going in there is likely to be slowed down a lot.

 

got some stretched metal from home depot, cut it with some tin snips, primered it and painted flat black with high heat spray paint. Looks nice. . .did the same with my grille bezel. only difference was wet sanded bezel more times and used primer for plastics.

I have a DIY CAI and have opened up the scoop entirely. I have not had any problems with water and I have driven in South Florida rain.

Pics to come. . .

 

Sorry for this "noobie" question, but I went to pull out the mesh from the scoop and it obviously only comes out with the removal of the scoop? If so, how do you remove the scoop from the hood without tearing it up? I would assume there are no tricks to re-installing the scoop as well? Thanks!

 

I like this solution. You should post a few pix of this. How did you keep it in place within the scoop?

 

I'll get some pics this weekend.

 

I think what I plan on doing is having two scoop grills. The stock one for winter use and a modified (home depot version) for spring + summer. I live in California, -we only get like 3 months of rain season.