Afternoon everyone! I am in the process of adding a few items to the wife's Mini next week and wanted to get some advice from anyone with experience on these parts or similar items. Currently she has a stock 2016 Mini Cooper S with an axle back Dinan exhaust. I recently purchased the following parts and should have them in the car in a week or so as weather permits:

Racing Dynamics Charge and Boost pipe kit
Modsport Catless Downpipe
Rev9 Intercooler
Burger Motorsports billet CAI
JB4 tuner with bluetooth

She is wanting to run this in the 14 second limited street class at Rocky Mountain Race Week this June and I am trying to get her ET's at least close to 14 without rebuilding the whole car. If you have any ideas on what else can be done to bring her car into or below the 14 second ET, that would be greatly appreciated! I ditched the Dunlop runflats (they road like a covered wagon!) for a set of Yokohama Advan Sport A/S+ 215/40R18 so traction is only AA so I know traction is going to not be the best on a prepped track. Any ideas on drag radials that will fit the factory 18" wheels would be awesome and keep me from having to buy two new ones would be great.

Also, I am looking for insights on is a good lowering kit. Cravenspeed has a set of coils for ~$200 that take it down 1.25" front and rear so any advice on setup or if these are good?

Other ideas: Colder sparkplugs, plug wire gauge, pulley change, fuel additives, etc.

Thanks in advance for any help you guys can lend me!

 

Cant speak to some of the mods because I either have not done them or I'm using something different. Plus I use mine on a road course not on the strip. The list sound solid and a good starting point.

I went with the Craven speed intake, JB4, the Dinan as you and H&R lowering springs. Will be doing an intercooler with upgraded plumbing once I finish doing my homework on what works best for my situation. No real interest in the down pipe...

For my track use it is working well, I'm using map 2 with the JB4 but if you want to really maximize the tune and get the most out of your mods you need an actual ECU tune. For me I want to avoid warranty issues since the car is new, so the JB meets that need. The springs dont lower the car 1.25, the H&R do 1.0. which are working well. The ride is still somewhat OK without dragging hard parts but of course stiffer. I do plan on going with coil overs next year to have adjustability. Using the JB4 I have not seen any grip issues, I'm using the Firestones Indy 500 tires in a 225 / 40 / 18. I think my next steps are to stiffen up the chassis with a couple of braces.

Lets us know how it works out.

 

Well that was frustrating...just typed an entire response just to have it disappear so I apologize if it pops up at some point. I digress.

Thanks for the feedback! I went with the JB4 over a flash because of the plug-n-play ability to use it on other cars and not locked like a flash tune. This may just be a fad for the wife and I don't want to go any faster than 14 seconds in the Mini! I misspoke and said it was for Limited Street when meant to say it was True Street 14 second class. If I can get the ET's to just under 14 that would be perfect. A mid 13 with a good DA on race day would be ideal. I believe the Cooper S 2.0L gets mid to upper 14's stock so here's to hoping. Anyway, I plan to test and tune the car post bolt-ons on Feb 20 and will post all info (time slips, traction, response, etc) so that others can learn what this thing will do from a dig. I have searched the internet but not seen anything definitive. Lot's of folks using their butt dynos and no data to back it up. I'm sure it's out there but there's a lot of noise as well and just ramblings.

I added the cat delete just to allow this thing to breathe a bit better. I may remove the driver side headlight on track day just to get more air into the engine bay but will make a game time decision after I see what it will do on each MAP. Speaking of which, do you have experience with the settings beyond MAP 2 in the JB4? Are you running yours on pump 91 gas or higher? n54tech is spotty on data but I know I can send them the logs and they will (hopefully) get back with me. There are a lot of dead threads with unanswered tech questions on the Mini board.

Thanks for the feedback on the lowering springs. These Mini's ride terrible from the factory so anything north of that is a good step for me. I may just wait and see how it feels on the track before I change anything. Anyway, I plan to post pics, etc here but feel free to follow my progress on instagram.com/redneck_roadshow/! I mainly just do demolition drag racing and old car stuff but am also building a burnout truck with a small block Ford rebuild at the moment.

Thanks!

 

Intake is a waste of cash, its just there for noise... Get a Drop in filter and call it a day. I have JB4, Catless DP, Dinan axle back with removed secondary cats, IC and charge pipes,. 94 octane Best I managed was 13.68@104 ish. Autogearbox with LC, spinning. These cars heat soak like crazy, keep that in mind I wrapped my inlet in goldfoil and IC bits in goldfoil as well.. F56 made springs will sit an F55 slightly lower just FYI.

You don't need any gimmick braces or such on these platforms. It's not a 1990 Honda Civic....

 

That's awesome! I know that the air intake is more gimmick than productive and I'm honestly not interested in the noise factor. I was going to look at a leaving the box open and headlight removal on the drivers side during hits to see if the slightly extra cool air would make the IAT's drop a bit. That mid 13 is very promising for what I want to do and if I can recreate your success, would put me in the money in a true street class with room to play given good a DA on race day. If you don't mind, can you tell me what tires you were running and if you stepped down on a colder plug? I know these NGK's are at a 7 or 8 heat range depending on who you buy your plug from but was looking at least a 9, maybe 10, to help alleviate knock and heat transfer in the cylinder.

Also, thanks for the feedback on the springs!

-RR

 

One last note, did you run with the secondary cat in at all or did you just remove everything at the same time? Straight piped or is there a resonator between the downpipe and the exhaust? I live in a county that requires emissions testing (ODB tests only) and am already playing with fire! Thanks! -RR

 

I'm running OEM plugs. I don't even know if there are other options as these plugs are indexed in the combustion chamber. I think you might be looking into this way too much for what are rather basic bolt ons. My data logs show nothing really out of the ordinary. Once warranty is over I'll get a proper flash as the JB4 doesn't control timing all that well actually it doesn't at all

Yea the springs I ended managing to find the correct ones for F55-57. The Craven speed ones I didn't enjoy. I have Firestone Indy 500s. Truth be told I'm not really into the 1320 all that much. I've gone a few times with the mini and when I had my Mustang.



I have this https://www.ecstuning.com/b-afe-part...-36323-rn~afe/

No emission testing here

 

I think you’re barking up the wrong tree trying to get a street tuned Mini down a drag strip, but I’ve always been a twisting road chaser...

To get IAT number low, an intake isn’t going to do much. Need a bigger, more efficient intercooler. The turbo adds so much heat to the intake charge, such that an intake wouldn’t make much difference on a drag strip. I would think you’d want to rig up some type of fluid cooler for the intercooler, and run ice water through it. Since the runs are so short on the strip, you would want cold right away.

 

Ha! I've got a Rev9 race spec intercooler going on it now. It's not a true 1320 car. Just a daily driver that we wanted to run in a 14 second class (very doable with a few bolt on mods) this coming June. If I wanted to to build a real drag car, the Mini wouldn't even make the list of top 20 cars to start with! Anyway, the IAT drops from the CAI is just throwing spaghetti at the wall in my opinion but all motors are just a big compressor. More efficient air in and more efficient air out all while trying to keep the boosted air cool is the objective. I'll fan it and ice it between hits. Anyway, I've never tackled a Mini so thought I would give it a shot. It's basically a giant go kart and super fun to drive!

 

It doesn't take much for these cars to get into the 13s. Bolt ons and dyno/OTS/piggyback tune of your choice will produce the results you want. I would also go with a wider (205-225 range) stickier set of tires

 

I just switched to a Helo HE907 18x8's with a 40mm offset so I am definitely wanting some wider/stickier tires. These 215/40r18's flattened out quite a bit from the OEM wheels! -RR

 

My next mod will be a water meth kit. The snow performance ones are very nice and something I install often on turbo 911s