Just got my Feb 07 issue of Motor Trend. On page 21 in their "we hear" column, they have this little blurb:

"Don't go looking for a quick way to hop up your new MINI Cooper S. The new 175-hp Cooper S engine, which features a variable geometry turbocharger, direct injection, and variable valve timing, will be more difficult for tuners to improve on, say MINI insiders. Don't despair, though: A new John Cooper Works version is in the pipeline and power is promised to be in excess of 200 horses."

I thought the general feeling was the turbo would be easier to tune than the original supercharged engine. I'm curious to know if the tuners really think they can't get much more out of the new engines.

 

I mentioned this in a previous post and I agree with the concensus... The aftermarket is fully of very talented people, and they will certainly be able to crack the ECU and re-map the system to get more power out of these cars. I wouldn't be too worried about the aftermarket not being able to create power-adders.... it's just a matter of time.

Besides, the lucky dogs in Europe and a few other areas have been tinkering with the R56 for a couple of months now, so I wouldn't be shocked if they offered some performance goodies by the time the R56 hits our dealerships.

Drew

 

Isn't that an oxymoron? The JCW version is just a tuned version too. If history serves, and it usually, does, what was it: CAI, catback and flash. (forget about the head)

Really? I thought the 05/06 ECU was NOT cracked. Has this changed?

 

Good point Chow - if JCW can get 20-30 HP, why can't any other vendor?

It may not be as easy as a reduction pulley + CAI to give people some good gains for not much money, but the other vendors will find something to sell us I'm sure.

 

JCW kept the "good stuff" for themselves, like the headers you could not get in the US.

Most any car can benefit from a good set of headers and a decent catback. You know very well that OEM is going to be quiet for the masses.

Same on the air intake.

Chipping, not sure ... I dont think its all that easy to just crack the ECU. Might take time

I thought most turbo HP increases just meant increasing the stock boost. Thats all as pulley does anyway, more compressed air. Crank up the boost ... at the cost of the engine, of course. there is no free ride.

Want more power? I guess someone will sell beefed up internals ... pistons, etc to take advantage of more boost.

You can probably take it to the bank, tuners will do their thing

 

Pulleys are for Supercharged cars... so you won't see a pulley doing much good... other than lightened crank pulleys and maybe alternator pulleys.

Just looking at VW/Audi cars for an example...
A chip/ECU/Piggyback unit is always a GREAT way to increase power. By playing with the computer you can adjust the timing, the fuel curve, the boost pressure, and probably plenty of other things too. This is why so many VW guys can get such big HP gains from their cars. We're not talking 20hp either... I'm talking about 50-100hp, and that's just on a non-built motor.

IF the aftermarket is able to do the same things with the new R56 motor... we'll be looking at plenty of cheaply modded MINIs that are running in excess of 250hp.

I wouldn't be surprised if some of the other Euro tuners start making parts for the R56 too. They recently figured out direct injection on the 2.0T motors in VW/Audi, why not use that knowledge on the new MINI?

Drew

 

But how reliable without beefing up the internals. So much for any warranty.

 

Think about this... the "internals" of my MCS are the same as the GP car. My MCS came with 168hp... the GP has 218 with the same warranty. When MINI builds these motors, they are planning on extra power. I feel safe building my motor to 200+whp based on the fact that MINI will still offer a full 50k mile warranty on 2,000 of these 218hp beasts.

The same goes for the new JCW car... Aren't rumors stating 230hp? If MINI puts 230hp through it and feels secure offering a full warranty... I'm not afraid of 250.

See what I mean?

Drew

 

No. Big difference.

going from 167 to 210 (JCW) meant all bolt-ons ...

CAI, Catback, injectors, small head work, new sw, and a BIT more boost.

going from 210 - 218 (GP) meant a bigger IC and SW.

Bolt-ons are never an issue.

Adding 50HP from increasing the boost Drastically is MUCH different.

In the bolt-on case, you gaining bits of power where the engine was inefficient. By adding Turbo boost your throwing ALL the increase into the internals (can the pistons handle it?)

Big difference.

There is a thread here somewhere about a Turbo Esprit. Normal 9 pounds of boost. Somebody increased it to 27 pounds. I bet its a sunday driver unless the owners beefed up the internals.

TPC Racing makes supercharger and turbo kits for p-cars. Their turbo kits are MUCH more expensive than superchargers. Why? because they beef up the internals. I am by no means an expert on any of this but I am going to bet its not as simple as you think, if you want to maintain any kind of reliability.

 

just like to point out that a lot of people said that you wouldn't get any more power out of the 1st Gen, and look what happened ?

 

Who said you couldnt get more power? You mean the article?

You can always get more power with $$$

 

u kno wut guys....MotorTrend said the same thing about the Mitsubishi Evo 8. They were saying something like, you wouldnt be able to get over 300hp. That the engine was maxxed out and there wasnt sufficient space to do anything upon anything to that car....yea, now look, you have 500-900hp Evo's pulling 7 sec quarter miles all day long. MotorTrend, seems to me, like they dont kno jack squat about aftermarket possabilities.....so fret not my friends, MOD AWAY ^_^!!!!

 

You gotta be kidding...it's an internal combustion engine....there is a ton that can be done...... all it takes is $$$$$$$

 

I don't know how much of a difference this has made, but with VW/Audi people can use VAG software and such to access the programming, whereas BMW/MINI programming is kept for the dealers only. It takes some time for aftermarket companies to tune programs for the ECU, and even those that do it run into ongoing issues when BMW changes them it seems (based on the difficulties I recall Dinan, Shark, etc having). BMW even has quite a time figuring out their own ECUs and sorting out programming issues

 

I can't dispute anything you've said, but Gabe from MotoringFile has been told by his sources that the R56 motor has been designed to "handle" up to 300 HP. He did stress though, that we should not expect to see anything close to that from MINI.

 

The problem is, I dont know what that means.

Does it mean 300HP via normal means? Or 300HP via boost only?

 

I have MTH on my 06. I think it was Dinan that took forever to release their 05 version, but they also finally succeeded.

 

the new car uses direct injection. The fuel pressures needed are HUGE! So the ideas about what we do (larger injectors blah blah blah) aren't as easy in the new car.

As far as the ECU, it's going to be the same family at least. But I was reading on some Auto Tech stuff and the ECUs are getting encrypted (not for the Mini, as far as I know, but versions of the ECU are being done by Siemens that have encryption in them). While the current level of reduncany in the ECU makes changes complicated, encryption would be a whone nother ball of wax!

So it's easy to lie to the ECU to get it to increase boost, but if that sensor is also the one that tells the car how much fuel to squirt, problems will show up. Also with all the variable stuff on the car, there's a lot more interaction to work out for maximum benefit. Like the article says , it WILL be harder. But that's what modding is all about. It will take a bit of time, but stuff will pop up to help out those looking for more.....

Matt

 

Pfft. I recall the early days when people were pondering increasing the boost via a pulley and worrying that the engine would grenade at the slightest increase. If it wouldnt grenade, then the ECU would not play nice. It was discovered that the engine thrived on pulley increases without needing to touch the ECU. The engine could live at 250+hp levels stock, more with a simple change of pistons. We have it pretty good IMO.

What all the current models are running though is yestertech compared to the new setup. There is a lot of race-inspired tech waiting to be tapped, the real roadblock is going to be getting into the ECU. That will take the most time and effort compared to the mechanical stuff. How well the new engine internals handle power increases will remain to be seen. The Gen 1 engine benefitted from being a sturdy cast iron block with forged rods and crank, and a bedplate style main bearing girdle. The head is unremarkable, but can be fixed up a bit. The new engine is all aluminum, but does have forged rods and crank and a similar bedplate main setup. The head and variable valve timing is unexplored territory for us, but not for your average Honda tuner. The direct injection is very new, but if my experiences with modern common-rail diesel engines is any indicator, this is not going to be an issue. In fact, there should be a lot of nascent potential already there. Same with the variable geometry turbo. Take control of what's already in place, and you can make some big gains.

Some new potential will be how the direct injection system will alleviate a lot of the problems due to detonation in 'regular' FI engines. Being able to run a high static compression ratio with boost has a lot of performance and efficiency potential. Where high IATs can cause detonation in typical engines, it's not an issue with the DI engine, since there is no fuel present in the chamber until ignition.

He who cracks the ECU code will own the modding potential in the R56s.

 

Yup, only time will tell. With hope BMW won't change the ECU too, that can prove to be a real hindrance for the aftermarket; when I was still on the 3 series boards I remember the fact that they switched the ECU during production (more then once on the same model I think) being the bane of things for some people.

 

Question for the great one ... The only torque chart I see is here http://www.motoringfile.com/files/3_...1102934639.pdf

last page. But I dont even think thats the 170HP version

Anyway, I thought you "accelerated" along the Torque Curve. This is very flat and drops like a rock at 3500. Is that telling me accelerations gets really bad beyond 3500

With separate coils, thats going to put Kingsbourne and Screamin Demons out of business!!!

And what about 20K mile oil changes??? how is that going to be accepted?

 

That is actually quite typical a torque curve for an engine. Most engines experience a drop-off in torque beyond a certain RPM point. The flatter, the better. Since horsepower is a calculated value of torque versus RPM (this, by reduction, is the standard measure of power being force over a period of time), an engine that will make even a dropping amount of torque will still continue to make increasing horsepower until the torque begins dropping too fast, taking HP with it. The old bench racer's saying that 'torque gets you started, horsepower makes you fast' actually applies. While the actual torque production begins to fall well before redline, the fact that an engine still makes meaningful torque up near or to redline means you will still have plenty of power and still feel good acceleration at that RPM. Take an engine past it's HP peak by a large amount and you will feel the sag in acceleration.

Here is an interesting tidbit about engine dyno charts. A dyno can only measure torque. The torque, factored in with the RPMs by calculation, gives you the horsepower. When reading a graph of lb/ft torque and horsepower, the torque will always equal horsepower at 5252rpm (if an engine can in fact rev that high). When graphing Nm vs. KW (newton-meters vs kilowatts) the intersectio is always around 2400rpm. People will sometimes claim that an engine built for stupid-high redline (think F-1) can in no way be similar to a stock small-block Chevy in their power graphs. Of course they're not. But if it makes torque at 5252rpm, the HP will always be the same. By contrast, most diesel engines make tons of torque at low RPMs and often redline at 3000rpm or less. This is where you will find the torque spec higher than the horsepower spec, where as the majority of modern gas engines have their HP figures higher than the torque numbers. This is why you can buy a diesel powered pickup that has a respectable 325 horsepower, but a colossal 650 lb-ft of torque.

The stock MCS engine is 167hp. My '89 Dodge Cummins has only 160hp (stock, which is no longer the case now). Of course, the MINI does not have the stock 400 lb-ft of torque the truck does. It's due to the 2900rpm maximum governed engine speed. 400lb/ft in a MINI would be very cool though.

 

Thank You!

i can find only one tuner thread with any resemblence of meaningful info in it http://www.mini2.com/forum/2nd-gen-e...uning-r56.html

And that only from Roland and Ryephile.

Again, its mostly all increase the boost via the ECU.

 

Solution to your problem. NEVER read Motor Trend. Even if they send it for free. And I try not to listen to Chubby Chetta, Broccoli Yates, Jer"I"/"Me" Clarkson, or that windbag Satchmo Carlson. They all got lost along the way and their egos clouded their judgement on most things automotive long ago.

I much prefer Peter Egan or Burt Levy.
-kARL

 

Ha, yeah, but since it is free, I at least like to look at the photos. The way the piece I referenced was written, the comments seem to come from somebody at MINI, so it's not necessarily just gainsay from the boys at eMpTy.

The issue did have a positive review of the R56, so you take the good w/ the bad I guess.