Does it do a good job at mitigating inside wheelspin?

I had a 2011 MCS and that inside front wheel just sang during slower/tighter turns.

Is this system only found in JCW Mini's?

aaron

 

I'm not sure how good a job it does, I can get lots of wheelspin and I'm not sure if its one or two wheels.

Its part of DTC, you can add it to any MINI, we're getting it on our next Cooper.

 

In my country (not usa) this is only available on the JCW models, it is NOT available on cooper S, even if specced with DTC. Not sure about US.

Also be aware the diff is only active in DSC fully off mode. It is not active with DSC on or in DTC mode. With the GP there is a GP mode instead of DTC, and it is active in this mode on the GP.

I believe it is very effective. As a background I do a lot of racing and rallying, and I am a very experienced and competitive driver. I have R53 racecar with quaife LSD as well as a R56 racecar.

IMHO the E diff on the JCW is superior to the quaife on my R53

Robbo

 

No way! That's a great bit of news!

Do you find that the front brakes become overheated during hot-lapping because of the E diff?

Aaron

 

My MCCS has the sport package, which includes eLSD functionality. Personally, i find it a bit of a drag to drive in any other mode. I feel that it operates somewhat less predictably in turns than the Quaife that I had on my MK5 GTI which was, in turn, somewhat less predictable than the clutch-style diff i had in my Scirocco. As far as eliminating wheelspin during straight-line acceleration is concerned, though, I find it to be pretty much on-par with mechanical diffs (with sticky summer tires at any rate).

I also find that it is sensitive to brake part choices. I currently have off-the-shelf JCW Brembos, and find that it is noticeably more effective than the 12.19 Wilwood w/BP10 pad setup i previously had installed. I'm not aware of any "tunability"in the eLSD, but it would probably help with non-stock brakes. You obviously wouldn't have issues like this with a mechanical diff.

--Matt

 

On US models you either have the e-diff or you don't. It can't be turned on or off. DTC and DSC can also affect acceleration and can each be turned off except for DSC in extreme driving conditions when it will intervene anyway. Sport mode does not affect any of them.

 

I'm not sure if that was directed at me but when i said "Personally, i find it a bit of a drag to drive in any other mode", I was referring to "race" mode - or whatever you call the mode that is invoked by holding down the DSC button for ~15 seconds.

Sport mode, indeed, has no effect on traction or stability control. The weightier steering certainly helps the overall feel of the car though.

--Matt

 

Well the front brakes do overheat, but not sure how much that is just braking and how much it is the ediff working, hard to tell.

I have the JCW brembos. This pistons in these are PLASTIC, and they melted and collapsed in my rally car, so we had to rebuild them with metal pistons.

Robbo

 

Plastic pistons? Holy mini!

 

My post was not directed at anyone, but meant for clarification of how the nannies work.

 

We've been autocrossing our JCW pretty heavily the past 2.5 years and the e-diff has been able to mostly keep up. It's not an OS Giken but it certainly helps. The auto-x this past weekend was really the first time I felt like the e-diff really couldn't cut it. I don't know if it was the surface or the course design or what but I was getting some wheelspin coming out of the corners.

The brakes certainly heat up as a result of the e-diff. After having mini replace the brakes 3 times we finally just decided to get aftermarket pads that could handle the heat. The car is a fJCW.

Basically... unless you're really looking to build the ultimate racecar I wouldn't put the diff too high up on the priority list. There are many other things in the car you could improve on before the diff needs looking at.

 

Even running sticky racing tires there is tons of front wheel spin coming out of the corners. You have to turn the DTC completely off for the computer not to kick in. Just clicking it off helps a little but it jsut slows you down. Hold the button down for 5 seconds and it will completely turn off. Only way to turn it back on is restarting the car.

That being said tracking the car the stock pads are not enough. Have Carbo Tech X10's in front and X-8's in the rear. They are a bit touchy and loud but a good street track mix. If I stand on them at the track I can get them to the melt zone.

My issue is throttle modulation. In sport mod the turbo just come on to fast and to hard to hook the tires up coming out of the corners. The longer travel of non sport makes it easier to feather the throttle to get hook up but you give up some of the faster spool up. My last session at the track I was just punishing the front tires. They are about done so I didn't really care. Way to much wheel spin so more power is not the answer except for the straight aways. Through the corners there too much power depending on the gear selection. I found my time getting faster by using the next higher gear and carrying more speed and letting the Turbo do the work. Less torq in the higher gear carrying more speed with less wheel spin = faster laps times. In reality it feels slower in the car becasue you are not wrestling the wheel spin trying to keep her straight and not just spinning away doing nothing. Takes a bit to get use too as you will run a completley different line. Biggest issue I had running a gear higher was not overbraking scrubbing off to much speed going into the corner. Key is setting up the car prior to the corner with the right line and trail breaking it throught corner. What I love about a day at the track. Learning new lines and exploring the limit of the car. My limiting factor now is the stock JCW suspenion. Rolls like a boat compared to modified MINI's. I can run close times but have to drive 10/10ths and use every inch of the track to do so which never a good long term plan. I had an 2010 S before the JCW and I will say it is greatly improved. Also for some reason the the large rims and JCW suspenion rides way smooth than my S. That one surprised me.

 

Pretty sure the ELSD only becomes active once you turn off all the traction control nannies

 

Island maser...

You are running a similar setup to what I was running in my 2011 MCS. I didn't have the r-comps but did have Carbotech XP10's and the 8's. I actually have a completely new set that I've not used yet.

Nonetheless, I'm glad you chimed in with the spinning front wheel. I was curious as to how well this ESLD worked in harder, more demanding situations.

Do you happen to have the JCW body kit? Curious to know if you feel a change in downforce from your 2010 MCS.

aaron

 

No body work on my car. I have driven a MINI with a very low splitter on it and
not sure if it helped or it was all the sorted out race suspension. If it did help it was after the high speed sections and keeping the down force on the fronts which are doing all the work. The car stuck like glue and had zero body roll and it would do just about anything you wanted with it. I wanted it until I thought about driving it everyday on the street. Bruttle at best. Everythings a trade off.
Use to worry about the wife driving it but she doesn't like it now how I have it set up. Too jerky for her and a bit haed to drive. I am sure the brakes have a bit to do with it also. They are a bit touchy on the street if you are not use to them.
My track rain set up is my street set up so you get the idea. Next week I am doing 1500 miles from AZ to SEattle. Suppose to be 24 hours and I did it in 20 hours including 4 gas stops and averaged 75 MPH including the stops. I have a more remote route planned this time. About the same distance but many more 5000 to 6000 foot passes to climb. Suppose to add 2 hours to the trip but I think I can do it in the same 20 hours. there are at least a dozen 5 mile straight run throught the middle of nowhere with no towns for a 100 miles. I will post up after the trip.

 

Wanted to update this thread after a few more auto-x events. I'm becoming less and less impressed with the e-diff. Like I mentioned it was fine for the first 2.5 years that we were auto-xing. However as we've gotten faster it's started to show it's limitations. Part of the problem is that I think the current set of tires we're on got heat cycled and killed at a test n tune we did. The less grippy tires are allowing for more inside wheelspin which is a problem we didn't use to have. I'll know for sure once we get a new set mounted here in a few weeks. It's just kind of irritating because the tires still have tread left but the grip levels have fallen off We didn't seem to have this issue with the Z1 star specs. Unfortunately I don't have a durometer to check hardness of the tire as we put runs on them.

I noticed at the last two events that in fast slaloms (where I wasn't lifting through the whole slalom) that the inside wheel would spin as I was going through the slalom. It was really irritating. There was also some minor wheelspin coming out of corners. In a straight line the e-diff works great. I had no issues doing burnouts at the DC ProSolo. Hopefully some new tires will cure the issue and if that doesn't fix it we're going to try a smaller front bar. Of course all of this may be moot as we might end up selling the mini to buy/build a BSP or DSP car.

Basically... the e-diff does a pretty good job.. but it's not perfect