Hey guys.. I have a R55 S with a Helix innercooler (otherwise bone stock).. I was going to get a JCW kit.. But Mini has made me a little upset, so I am going to vote with my wallet.. And as such I am looking for the best way to spend $2000 ~ $2500 on NOT Mini parts/tunes to make my car more fun..

I am eying a DoS intake & perhaps NM downpipe but thats where my thoughts end (and those aren't written in stone).. I'm looking for fun city driving, not killing my gas mileage, not throwing CEL and for the purposes of this conversation, we can ignore my warranty or what might "kill it"

So ideas, suggestions, thoughts.
Thanks

 

rear sway bar and sticky tires.

 

RMW tune!!

 

RMW Tune...and the DoS intake, and an exhaust. If you don't want to mess with CEL's then don't get a downpipe...

 

Car payments. I'm not kidding.

 

Downpipe and a tune from RMW. That is your best bet, I would also get the NM hard pipes.

 

another vote for a jan tune.

 

Sticky tires… nice.
You can get some really nice sticky tires from Discount Tire (or tirerack… whatever) for ~$600, installed. I got a set of Potenza RE760 Sport tires and it was night-and-day compared with the Goodyear Eagle's I had initially replaced my runflats with. Completely changed the feel of the car (in a good way).

And, yeah, spend the rest on car payments.

 

6 ferrets
Eightball of coke
Video camera
Warehouse rental for 8hrs

Just remember to give the ferrets coke AFTER you get to the warehouse not before. You won't be disappointed.

Rest on carpayments

 

+1
But I was thinking for city driving spend it all on Xanx cause you are going to strees during the drive. But if you are looking for performance that won't kill your mileage. I am not going to say brnads but, types of parts. Intake, Exhaust, Hard pipes(coldside and hotside), and a tune. The only problem is all of that is going to cost you over your stated budget.

 

Now this is funny

 

Depending on your area you could substitute for wild bobcats and pcp. Although if you do that I highly advise some sort of caged area for you to watch

Tires, brakes, sprintbooster, and a car payments. You'll be happy I think

 

I thought about that.. But I'm opting to spend the money on the Clubman instead.. While Ferrets + coke is fun, it just doesn't have the lasting effects I am looking for.

 

I'll try this again. The best 2K you can spend to make any car more fun to drive anywhere is professional instruction at your local track. All those pipes and airflow rob low end torque to give a bit of high end HP. Not what I want on the street. SHOCKS and tires will make the biggest mechanical effect, decamber next. These are huge differences, where all the CAI stuff is trivial.

 

Thats why I only recommended a downpipe and tune, You wont loose any low end torque from removing the "noisemaker" and the sound muffler. Now if you replace the intake with an open one or add a larger diameter exhaust you will loose low end torque.

I agree with the driving school

 

Just wondering. What would SMALLER pipes do? Look at how kinked the upper tube on the passenger side is leading to the manifold. If one determined the minimum effective cross section of that pipe, and redid them all with smooth and even tubes of that size, it would lower the mass, and have more consistent velocity within the inlet tract. This might give slight improvements across the board in response. Still, the auto transmission delays are the biggest problem anyway.

 

I must be confusing, sorry about that. I never meant that "smaller pipes" would do anything. I do believe that moving to a 3" exhaust lowers your low end tourqe, I say that from my own experiences. I think sticking with the works exhaust is probably your best idea for performance or another 2.5 exhaust.

As you know the hotside pipe has a turbo muffler on it that was designed to lower the sound of the sucking "whoosh" That I think you do get some amount "small" of gains from removing.

Then the Noisemaker, not to be confused with the diverter valve or a BOV wich our cars dont have. The noisemaker is just a tube that ports noise into the cabin of the car, because it was to quiet in there. That tube is of no use, and should be yanked out, in my opinion.

 

tvrgeek,

I agree with the driving instruction and the suspension upgrade advice. Drive it, know it, and control it better. This is the foundation of a good driver and a car that handles like its on rails. Good stuff.

However, some of your comments feel like you're putting vendors that produce CAI kits in an unnecessary crosshairs.

DoS's last few years of 2nd Gen MCS-Specific R&D, multiple dyno testing days, & experiences with customers owning relatively stock and heavily tuned MINIs show that the DoS CAI does not " . . .rob low end torque to give a bit of high end HP . . ," as you've mentioned above and in at least one other NAM thread. I know that you have experience with CAI kits on other cars that you've owned and experienced, but results vary from brand to brand and kit-to kit. We know our parts consistently provide hp and torque gains for the Gen 2 MCS with or w/o tune throughout the power band.

It's totally OK that you have your own opinion on what CAI's will and will not do for the 2nd gen MCS. I still truly respect many of your other posts. However, it would be much better for the NAM community in general if we all could refer to repeatable, R55, R56, and R57 MCS-specific data instead of posting hearsay.

(Side Note: DoS is fine with the NAM members pushing for more data. This improves the NAM community and the quality of the aftermarket wares from its vendors. DoS and other shops advertising here are committed to posting more digestable data, charts, and general info than we have in the past for NAM members. Definitely prod the vendors for data and explanation. Call us, email us, ask us to post more info. That makes us all more informed consumers! )

Respectfully,

-Clint Cope
Defenders of Speed, LLC

 

I don't mean at all to "put you in the crosshairs". Especially DoS, Very nice kit. I do mean to help people understand the physics, and what to expect from changing their intake system. I frequently suggest the audience read some of the foundation work, such as Smith and Morrison, so they understand what trade-offs are being made. What do you gain with a given system, and what do you loose. No free lunch, just different choices. If it was free, the OEM would have done so. They are not always fools, just have different top priorities. ( Well, the folks who designed the AC controls and dashboard may qualify) Cost being one. EU noise standards another.

As a most general statement, a larger diameter and/or shorter intake tract will shift the maximum power band up. Understood for a good 75 years at least. This is highly desirable for a great many of the readers. I caution not to be surprised if it reduces low end torque. It almost certainty will all things being equal. I am trying to dispel the "bigger is better" as we both know that is not true; bigger is different.

I could be contributing to confusion by my definition of low end. I consider 2000 torque more important to street fun factor than 3500 and above. I may be saying low a lot lower than you are thinking. Loosing 2 HP at 2000 to gain 10 at 5000 is the wrong tradoff for me. My choice. It may be totally the opposite for others. If one were doing Friday-at-the-track anything below 4500 is a joke. Different choices, different needs.

As you are fully aware, this is as much of an acoustic problem as it is a fluids problem. There is nothing unique to the MCS. It is very modern and well thought out for the intended tradeoffs. You offer different tradeoffs. I almost bought one of yours actually, but settled on just an K&N in the stock box as it fits my performance requirements better.

 

Yes, definitely true. When it comes to performance parts, the thought of bigger is not always better is very hard to defend at times. Folks want to buy intake or exhaust systems with larger tubing or a bigger filter thinking that it will velocity, capacity, and flow. Too often, the engine can't use that additional tubing capacity effectively due to the limits of its input and output.

Potential customers sometimes pass by our filter and housing kit because it does not appear to be very large. However, we picked that filter size specifically because it enables us to use a velocity stack style inlet that is the same size as the factory inlet plumbing and has a housing mouth that is not so large that you lose low end torque at the expense of high-end HP.

It's truly a delicate dance to improve upon OEM. tvrgeek, thanks for clarifying your stance on things. It is appreciated.

-Clint

 

K&N now makes an intake for the R56 which comes with the intake heat shield and a hard turbo intake pipe which helps insulate and eliminates bottlenecks while using the fresh air source from the front of the car. How can I forget the all-famouse K&N cone filter


All for $279.99. I enjoy it after dumping my Alta intake. K&N also has another intake which is connected to the fresh air source ONLY but that was the older intake they sold. IMO their newest design is more superior.