Hey!

I have a 2006 R53 JCW and im really looking in to getting a smaller SC pulley. I just bought the car less then 5 months ago and im new to the brands and such. Its the 210bhp JCW kit becasue it has the 380cc injectors and all the other JCW goodies. What would be a good pulley that works well with the 210BHP JCW kit?

Brand?

Size? (15, 17, 19?)

Also i was watching a video saying that removing the stock JCW pulley is a B and requires it to be ground off?

Thanks in advance guys!

Nicholas

 

Brands are all about the same....17% IMO..(you already have ABOUT a 14% reduction)....but one tip...
Depending on HOW you drive, the JCW pulley is decent...
A smaller pulley makes more heat at higher rpms....and is not as efficient...
So for a good street car...the 17% is great.... But if you like to track/auto-x, might not be as good of an option due to time spent at redline.
19% were tried by many...overspend the sc too much...some folks had issues...too lean usually without a tune...
Yes...it generally needs to be cut off....there are mini specific pullers (genaric ones do not work), but the JCW sized ones are pretty rare....

 

Thank you for the ultra fast response!

I was looking in to the 17 percent pulleys and i might have to settle with one of those. I drive nothing but street for now. i was just hoping to gain a little umph! here and there Since the JCW come re mapped i should be fine with just swapping the pulley out and bam good to go? Also with a 17 is my JCW drive belt going to work? I just replaced the drive belt today and the new one is nice and tight, you see well past the first hole on the tension-er.

Thanks!

 

A belt is only $20....
A new JCW belt is kinda OK initially...BUT WILL START TO SLIP FAIRLY FAST....was used in the "early" pulley days...but not ideal....a 535 or even a 532 length belt (us sizing system) has proven better...tighter...less slip.

 

Perhaps look at ways to improve the efficiency of your existing set-up, rather than focusing on the cheapest way to stuff more air into your motor.

Everything I've seen states that the JCW pulley is 11.5% smaller than the stock R53 pulley. That being said, I'd go 15% if a pulley is what you're after. Me personally, I'd leave the pulley alone and look at a cam and header to help that car breath easier.


-Stock R53 pulley OD at 2.585
-JCW pulley OD at 2.285.

 

Heres the issue with me upgrading the manifold... i live in California and they are **** about there BS emissions laws. I wouldn't have a problem switching back to my stock manifold whenever i needed to have the car smogged, but like my previous vehicle (05 jetta GLI) that stock manifold just gets annoying hah! If i were to upgrade the manifold would i need an o2 spacer to trick the computer?

For now im probably just going to do the pulley, because its easy and not bad on this college kids wallet, but soon to come, that header is coming ,

Anyone have an specific brands of headers to look at?

Also which pulley company is crowned a "good" pulley, i see alta's pulleys, then i see other companies pulleys.

Thanks

 

Rather than spend the money on a pulley get it tuned. A tuned stock JCW made as much power as my modded S. This will give you much better drive ability if the car. Look up RMW for a good tune. He is based in CA.

 

Yea ill have to look in to that also now! Geez so many ideas going through my head!

I remember when i go my GLI tuned... jesus what a world of difference! but that was a turbo, and cost me 700 bones haha. Ill look in to the tune also! what does the tunes usually run?

 

+1
R53 tunes tend to run $350 or so...
Remember..the jcw210 kit is 210 TO THE CRANK...
Most moderaly modified/tuned S's run about 200 HP to the wheels....

 

I have an 03' JCW R53......and I went from the jcw pulley (14%) to a 17% pulley......and to be perfectly honest, I didn't really notice much of a HP increase. It "may" have a little more mid range pull....but that's about it. The boost is definitely up....the car was making 13psi with the JCW pulley, and it's making 15psi with the 17% pulley....not much of a change.

Keep in mind....the stock MCS's make 10psi boost, and have a stock (0%) pulley......when you jump up to a 15% or 17% pulley...that's a BIG increase in boost, and how soon the boost comes in. When you already have a JCW pulley (14%)....it's not much of a difference going to a 17%.

If I had to do it again......I would probably just leave the JCW pulley on the car.

 

Maybe if you can find a "tune party"......but for most people it's $350 for the module you need to upload the tune, $300 for the tune, and if you need to put the car on a dyno (most do)...that's another $100 per hour. So when it's all said and done....unless you have a shop nearbuy that can do the tune for you, expect to pay $850+ by the time it's all said and done.

 

Using simple math, a JCW pulley is 11.6% smaller than a base R53, not 14%. Just a heads-up for folks.

 

The op is a few hours drive from RMW/Jan...
Good excuse for a road trip!!

 

Yea SoCal Pasadena area!

Im going to need to look in to the tune.

 

I have an 06 JCW r52 and went with a 16% pulley and an RMW tune. Love it. JCW pulley removal tools are like mythical unicorns, often referenced but never obtainable. I cut mine off.

 

If you have an 06' Mini Cooper S.....it's an R53....right?

 

Cabrio S (r52) HAS the same motor as the r53.........

 

^No, he has a JCW convertible, R52.

 

Not to confuse the issue but even more but an r52 can have either the justa engine or the supercharged S engine. The difference between the r50 and the r53 is the engine the r52 refers only to the roof. Odd fact.

 

i have an 06 jcw.
had to cut off the stock pulley. put on a 17% at 60k miles. currently at 106k with no issues, except i want more power

 

I had to cut mine off also....it was a royal pain in the a$$

 

If you do get the pulley changed take it to a shop that knows MINIs. Because the JCW version needs to be cut off a shop could mess up the shaft on the supercharger.

 

First off, yes, if you decide to do a pulley swap, do the 17% there's not enough difference between the 15% and the JCW for the amount of effort it takes to remove the JCW pulley.

As far as pulley-vs-tune, you can look at it this way, figured on a scale of 1 to 10 the gains sort of stack up like this:

Stock Pulley vs 15% or 17% = 7
Stock Pulley w/ a custom tune = 5
15% or 17% Pulley w/ custom tune = 10
JCW Pulley vs 17% Pulley = 4-5
JCW Pulley w/ custom tune = 8-9

Or there abouts, hope this helps.

 

Nothing quite like creating a totally subjective and arbitrary scale. Though, somehow, I totally agree with the assessment, haha.

I know that your original question pertained to pulley choices, but I still want to stress that a camshaft would do nice things on that car of yours. A car that has a lightly tuned head, intake, exhaust and smaller pulley would really wake-up with an aftermarket camshaft.

You can jam all the air in the world into that intake manifold, but without a better way of getting it into the combustion chambers, you're just pissing in the wind. GL!

 

I changed my JCW pulley to a 17% pulley....and didn't really notice much difference. If I knew how much of a pain it was to cut the JCW pulley off and how little power was really going to be gained.....I probably would have just left the JCW pulley on there.