hi all just recently purchased a 2006 mini cooper s. was just wondering if its possible to remove the sc and bolt on a t4 turbo onto a customer manifold? i know ill need to get an electric water pump but just need to know if its possible and if so how much boost i could run?
thanks

 

anything is possible. A T4 turbo is way overkill for a 1.6L. If you are ready to spend the money for a custom turbo only setup then do a twinscroll GT3076. That would be pretty sweet.

 

what about a t3/t4 off a escort rs turbo?

 

just to gauge, how much do you think this project will cost? I have a number in my head, Im just curious what you are thinking.

 

how much do you think? not really to worrried as its an on going project

 

for a full custom setup with quality parts, tuning, and clutch upgrades. I would say 8-10k with labor. If you do all your own work you could under cut that but still its not cheap. Figure a good off the shelf turbo kit from full-race or peakboost is 5k+, it makes sense.

 

well i can get a decent turbo for £200, me dads a fabricator and i know someone that can do the mapping. what will the standard pistons take?

 

I assume you are form the UK since you are talking in pounds.... check out www.minitorque.com as there are a number of UK turboed R53's on that site, they are good guys and will hep you out

 

thats a good question all i can say is my stock pistons let go at 21 psi but i
was on track .having said that at that time lets just say it was not mapped correctly.if you are going to the all the trouble and work of putting
a turbo on you might as well go a bit further and do the pistons.

lee

 

yea mite do pistons but i dont see why everyone is saying its gonna cost like 10k to do it? i should imagine the engine can take a bit because the sc runs at like 15psi.

 

Stock Pistons can only take up to 20psi. Once you go over that you need to start looking at upgrading the internals

 

maybe or a stand alone ecu


lee

 

but why does everyone say its gonna cost 10k???

 

i think what they mean is cheap fast reliable is not going to happen


lee

 

Because not many people have done turbo conversion here. If you can do it all yourself the actual price shouldnt be anywhere near 10k for just the turbo conversion.

 

well if he does it all himself the biggest problems would be custom manifold to exhaust, electrical, tuning, gauges (those are just a pain sometimes) and deciding what turbo. Alta offered a GT30 as part of their twin charge kit but even that is a little on the big side for a 1.6L engine. another thing is the fine tuning for the turbo, cams would help a lot in this case cuz it's such a small engine, you'd need (in most cases) to run more air to make up for the lack of displacement to get your turbine spooling faster. port and polishing the head would help with that a bit... i'd suggest a Jesus head, the blocks in the R53 are extremely solid and in a few cases have held up to 480 whp, but that's fully built internals, which for the road is completely overkill IMHO.

now yes i own an R56, but i've helped install twin charged setups on the R53, the only two out there are Helix and Alta, Helix uses a disco potato for theirs (GT28RS), which is by reputation one of the fastest spooling and quickest response turbos out there... however you'd be limited to maybe 350 hp with it depending on what trim you get (there are slightly smaller and slightly bigger GT28RSs). if you're going to remove turbo all together but aren't looking for HUGE power, i suggest a GT2560R, K04 TwinScroll, or GT28RS. you can get around the supercharger with the twin charge kits i mentioned, but imo if you can have both, why not? supercharger takes care of the bottom end with a 17% pulley, grab a one bell exhaust or an aftermarket one, i'd definitely suggest an intercooler upgrade, i'd say the GP intercooler because unlike any of the aftermarket ones that are so often sought after, if you ever look inside, the factory puts little tiny tabs in the plate design to make air flow as high as possible and with little turbulence.
also if you ran turbo only, you could (since you'd need the custom work) make it so your boost tube hot side will run right to the upgraded intercooler on the car... might look a little funny without the supercharger below it, but it's something...

so IMHO as was said earlier, the T4 turbos are probably a little big for the R53 engine... hell they're too big for an R56 engine, and if you used one you probably wouldnt' make any power till 5000rpm, maybe start building boost at 3500 or 4000 but that power isn't usable on the streets and should be saved for drag cars (see youtube).

so that's my $0.02 , if it were my car, i'd modify suspension first, then id do basic bolt ons for the supercharger and a 2.5 in exhaust (just cuz 3 in on such a small engine doesn't help with power enough up top to offset torque lost down low...will elaborate on that more if need be), and if for some reason i couldn't get the power i wanted (which in terms of kits, there are plenty out there that'll give you a good 250hp maybe more with good tuning solutions) i'd twin charge it with the Helix TurboKompressor kit.

 

The quickest and easiest way is to just twincharge it. You would only need to fab up an exhaust manifold and charge piping to the throttle body, very simplistic. Now remving the SC adds a lot more fab work then you would think.

Here is how I did it.
Built my own manifold to hold a T3 GT3071R in a manner that I could have easy access and high strength to support the turbo weight. It is extremely tight so I had to bend my brake lines for the DSC way back and protect them from the heat of the manifold and turbo. I also had to heat treat my valve cover since its plastic and that was accomplished by making a copper heat shield and insulation. Same goes for the downpipe. I ran my intake tubing in a manner that required a lot of fabricating for the front mount, but also gives a somewhat organized design. There just isnt allot of room. I went with a front mount IC and that required me to lose the AC condensor to allow it to fit. I lost the compressor as well, so then all I had was one accessory (alternator) to run off the crank. I decided to run the stock MC h2o pump instead of going the electric route to allow for a better accessory belt run. It required me moving the alternator to a new location(the same as a MC) and changing out the pulley on it to generate the correct voltage. I went with the stock MC belt tensioner as well and a custom 35.5" belt.

I had to fab up an adapter plate to connect the throttle body to the intake manifold since it is not connected in any manner in the stock setup. I had to do some intake manifold porting to really get it to size up just rite.

You will need to find a spot to pull a oil feed line for the turbo and a return as well. I went through a few renditions until I worked the bugs out, but basically I pulled the oil filter housing and welded a thicker plate and tap it for a fitting. On the oil return I am using a line that I adapted to the oil drain plug. Not completely happy with that, but there isnt much room to weld and run a new line. The biggest issue I kept coming up against is the lack of room. You will need to replumb where you pull your coolant feed and return to the turbo as well.

Once you get all the mechanical designed and figured out, you will need to not only tune it, but re-write the code in the ECM as it does not like the lack of pressure at idle that you get when running a supercharger. You will have every CODE imagineable coming across you ECM. Forget passing any emission related regulation tests.

Now, if you are very lucky and can get it all sorted and running, you will not be able at all to run on the stock flywheel/clutch combo as it can barely handle the stock power for period of time. You will need to beef that up as well, and you shouldnt even think of running in a NON LSD tranny. If you have the OEM LSD I honestly dont know how well it would handle the power before it would start slipping as it is a clutch style type LSD and not a geared LSD.

Not trying to be discouraging, but it is a major ordeal as compared to starting with a turbo car and updating the turbo. Feel free to check out my pix located on my photobucket link in my signature and feel free to ask away!

Oh and about the piston's...the stock pistons can really only handle aroudn 20psi as they have a very short upper ring landing to help pass certain emission ratings. Under heavy duress, these have been known to collapse above 20psi. That being said, When twincharged I ran mine up to 27psi on many occasion without failure, but I was fortunate. I did build a new engine for the turbo only configuration using CP pistons and the "Jesus" head that was spoke about. I kept the stock rods as they are plenty robust. I was making around 300whp when I was twincharged and I am looking for 400whp on the turbo only setup. As im sure you know you also need to add some larger spray pattern on the injectors and a larger fuel pump. The stock fueling system is a "deadhead" style delivery with no return. To really make decent power, you would need to build a return line so you can control your fuel pressures better. This is all of course if you want to make big power. If you only want 250whp (which tranforms the car from stock) you can do that on the stock supercharger and call it a day with much less headaches.

 

what inlet manifold did you use mate?

 

I used the stock intake manifold and ported it. I made an adapter plate to bolt the throttle body directly to the manifold.

If you check out the MINI engine swap folder on page 3 in my photobucket link, you will see the manifold, porting, and final powdercoating.

 

OK, I am not a boost expert, but I wanted to add a little to this thread. Please also excuse my domestic comparisons; I'm a motorhead at heart.

A larger, oversized turbo would defeat the overall efficiency of it. Eaton states the M45 supercharger used on the R53 is designed for 2.0-3.0L engines, so it's already overkill as it is (although it would probably take alot of work to design a supercharger that is even smaller in size). You can read more here: http://www.eaton.com/EatonCom/Produc...gers/index.htm. To really maximize its potential, you would need to increase the overall airflow through the engine, to include upgraded intake, ported/polished head, header, upgraded cam, upgraded exhaust, etc. The Thunderbird SC used an Eaton M90, and it's reported to be designed for 3.0-5.0L engines depending on application.

To put it another way, the Weiand 6-71 blower is really overkill for a small-block Chevrolet unless it's heavily modified. It's more applicable to use a 144 cubic-inch or 177-cubic inch model. Here's a link from Holley for the Weiand platform: http://www.holley.com/data/TechServi...ech%20Info.pdf. Centrifical superchargers are even more different (the design that looks like a turbo sitting at the front of the engine as opposed to being bolted on top). I think a common size for small-block Chevy's is the Novi 2000.

My turbo knowledge is more limited, but, to give you some perspective, I can at least tell you that a Garrett T3/T4 turbo is stock on a Buick Grand National, and that has a 3.8L V6 engine. From what I have read and heard, a more appropriate design for smaller 4-cylinder engines would be a Garrett T25 (or equivalent). It would also seam feasible that the smaller turbo would spool up quicker because of a reduction in mass.

Because superchargers and turbos perform best at top end, pick the size that can be maximized at top end.

 

JackFlash You may not be a boost expert but you pretty much hit the mark right in the center..... What you said reminds me of the M62 project here... there are countless Hondas out there, some here, that are over over boosted with BIG time tuning issues - Much like the M62 project.......... unless you have the skills Trickle X has....... I would not attemp that either