First i dont think it should be fed through the hood scoop, there is just to much heat from the turbo. I like the Defenders of speed idea, right now i have a homemade version and it does a good job of pulling cold air from the firewall, but it is a bit noisy in the car. what if we make a sealed box that feeds right into the firewall just like the settup for the R53???

 

Think other side of engine compartment, move the expansion tank, eliminate the air duct build a heat shield. Not so very hard. Just need a harness to relocate the MAF sensor wiring. Almost done fabbing.

Neccesity is the mother of invention.

I started this after I realized why my "tuned" engine was throwing CEL's and having fits. It has to breath cold air, engine compartment air is too hot.


So got any tough problems to solve?

 

Nice, I like the idea. Im thinking that engine movement might be a problem. the intake tube will be so short and the engine jumps around so much, do you think that will be an issue?

 

You can allow for some flex, because the turn from turbo inlet is too sharp if you do not build space in. I figure the engine moves around a couple of inches, may have to accommodate more though, will find out soon.

 

Put a hump hose on the turbo connector and solid mount the rest of the intake or do as intake manufacturers do and use a vibramount .


What we all need is a reflash to get rid of the MAF

 

I have the unichip, I wonder if they can do that?? would the vehicle run as well?

 

ya it is the maf that is killing every one from making a good cai. to bad no one has came out with a new one

 

don't know about the unichip but the E-manage Ultimate, MapECU and MapECU2 are some piggybacks that I know can.


EDIT

From the looks of it the unichip can do it also, but the problem here is we don't have access to the tuning software......

 

on my saab, i installed a k&n filter that went right infront of the wheel, where the old airbox was. The filter is below the engine so there is an abundance of fresh flowing air that gets to the filter. Only problem is it is only about 5 inches from the ground, so i had to make a splash gaurd. I havent looked at the mini so im not sure if there is a good place on the underside of the car to put the filter, but i think that would solve a lot of the engine heat problems.

 

bump for updates! i tried the DIY route and although it was cool for a while, ive gone back to stock in hopes that someone will come out with a real CAI.

 

i am using a true cold air intake. I basically made the defenders of speed cold air intake from the K&N ram air system they made theirs from. I will take a picture and post it soon.

 

Update:

While going back to the stock intake certainly proved to abate some of the issues, it also means the intake needs to be thermally isolated from engine compartment, either by moving it out of the bay or heat sheilding it as far away as possible.

As everyone here knows and has mentioned, there is no safe place out of the engine bay. So my solution was to relocate the expansion tank to the back of the bay where the air intake once sat. This frees up some space up front, and once you clear the snorkel feeding the old stock system you have more space and a fresh air source. Aluminum plate makes an adequate heat shield up there, so that part needs to be fabricated. Here is the source fro couplers, tubing, and pipes I was going to use.

http://www.atpturbo.com/Merchant2/me...egory_Code=SIL

I got as far as drawing everything up, figuring the parts list. Then I thought about it. No tuners exist yet that give good reliable power of stock parts, and simple bolt ons. I sourced a bigger turbo, made a adapter plate to mount that, and am waiting for the internals from the Works motor to be commercially available, I even talked one of the shops here into slurry honing my heads.

Why?

A 2009 GTI is 23K, the APR kit to get over 400Hp out of the motor is 6K, christ I have more than that into JACE without breaking 200WHp.

A 2008 STI is over 300HP stock, +18% and reliable for 699 from CoBB. that is a total of 33K, roughly what I have into JACE.

So the solution as I see it is to sell JACE, and start again with a motor that can be tuned and built with off the shelve parts.

Don't get me wrong I like a challange, but you have to be realistic, there is nothing about a Mini that makes it worth this kinda of effort for such small return.

 

What about something along the lines of combining the M7 heat shield and DDM Works Race Intake? Maybe just wrapping the sccop portion in the same aerogel material would be enough to keep temps down.

 

There is a whole lot of heat in the back of the engine compartment. The DDM ram air system does feed nice fresh air, but the air filter box is siting right smack in the middle of dead hot stale air. Still gonna get heated up when you slow down. Not to mention the cost you gonna have to put that together... hell of a lot of money just to fix something so you spend money on marginal gain

 

I'm still surprised to see how much difficulty people are having with regard to wringing out huge power for the R56.

 

No one is putting enough money and effort into it like they have done in the R53 world....at least they haven't talked about it publicly if they are. And no, Alta and M7 doesn't count.

Once someone gets a good handle on the ECU things will be better. And things like the ported head 1FastMINI was working on are promising.

Maybe one day RMW will do everything they can possible do to an R53 and get bored and start working on R56's .

All just my opinion though.


Also, there are quite a few already running around with 210+ hp, 230+ ft-lbs to the wheels. Those numbers make for a pretty quick car. Keep in mind that stock, the R56's are as fast as an R53 JCW.

 

even before the tri teck motor was put in the r53 it was used in other cars. that being said there was a huge after market for it was used in the mini. the r56 motor is used in the mini and a pugeto that is it as far as i know. so that means that there is a small after market so all the big boys that worked on the r53 are recalulent to put money in to it when they might not get it back for some time. so intill there is numbers there will only be a trickle of stuuf for us

 

Why is the hood scoop not viable?

Make the ducting out of carbon and line the underside in gold.

That air will be ice cold, no heat from the exhaust.

 

Why is it so hard to get rid of the MAF when Australian R56 run MAFless intakes?

 

US spec cars require a MAF to be connected...the Australian r56 never had a MAF to begin with. i dont know what will happen if you simply disconnect it but most likely you will either run in limp mod, or throw in a CEL

 

Excuse my ignorance but is there any particular reason for US spec cars having MAF?

 

if possible the wheel well would be great, on my jetta the bottom of my filter is 3 in above bottom of body,never any problems, filter feeds into 3 in carbon fiber tube, carbino is the brand ,excellent product, i also remove the grid and screen in my still orig MAF as per article in autospeed on line mag

 

Sorry, but there was NOT a huge aftermarket for the R53 until a couple years went by. And the supercharged TriTec motor was NOT used in anything else except for the Cooper S.

Im positive in a year or so, R56 tuning products will really come up to speed, just like they did for the R53.

 

The solution to this is obvious; Make a new hood with a WRX style scoop directly above the intake. Have it seal off like the DDM race intake and there you have it. Direct cold air forced into the intake with a big ol' filter attached to the hood. Make the hood out of carbon fiber and you have the weight savings and style to boot. I have been thinking about making one. Think others would be interested in this?

 

I think they would be if it looks cool and if you sell the intake and the hood together. But thats a good idea.