To Dinan Elite -- or not?
 

I've had my '19 JCW for a month / 900 miles now, and I've got a shiny new JCW Dinan Elite sitting in a box waiting to release another 30-40HP from their cage.
My question is: I'm going to keep this car for 100+k miles, am I putting it at risk by adding the Elite? I know the warranty will be there at first, but I'm planning on a long, happy relationship with my JCW.
My 2005 Cooper S has 140+k miles on it and is still running strong, I honestly don't know if it would have gotten there if I'd put the pulley on it (as tempting as it was at the time).
So, opinions please -- install the Elite and drive it like I stole it, or enjoy my stock JCW as-is? Which is pretty darned nice, by the way.

I enjoy mine on an S, so can't speak directly to the JCW version. I felt a bit more comfortable with the fact that the Elite is 50 state emissions approved, so obviously they aren't putting the car through the ringer to squeeze out the added HP. These engines (B48) are used in higher HP situations already. Enjoy the car in the present and don't worry about the long term would be my advice.

If this is a true ECU tune (which is what I have, different brand) I love mine. No "stuff" clipped onto the engine, no zip ties, no gerryrigging. The guy who did mine said many of his customers already had the clipon units like the JB4.

Dinan Elite is a piggyback tune, not ECU. They don't claim to be.

Oh Mario, don't tease me, I'm in Camarillo just down the road from you and it would be so easy to go to the dark side.
Questions:

• With an ECU tune what happens when it's time to have the car smogged here in California?
• My car is brand new and will be going to the dealer for service and, likely, factory flashes as they revise the software for the car -- does the ECU tune survive this?
• What happens if there's a warranty claim and the dealer says "Well, you had an ECU tune and that's why the transmission blew up"?

I have the NM module on my 2016 F56 JCW and it added 30 HP and corresponding torque numbers. I think the Dinan is about the same. I have had the module on the car for 38,000 miles of twisting with no issues to-date. I have tried it on high with TORCO octane booster and it feels torquier with the high setting, but I have not put it on a dyno. 269 HP and 285 FT LBS of torque in sport mode. It is a daily driver as well.

Still lovin' my Dinan Sport. Just enough extra to tell me it's there. No issues coming up on 2 years and about 12,000 miles continuous use. No hassle from the dealer when I went in for 10,000 mile service. They just wanted to drive it and they were impressed. Cheeeep thrills.

My dinan elite has been on the car for around 1100 miles. Love it completely, zero regrets. Drives like stock with more power and super smooth.

I don't know about the clutch specifically, but in general yeah when adding power you definitely run the risk of breaking things. I went with the Dinan Elite for the warranty and it is a little more conservative than a stand alone tune or the JB4+.

On my mazdaspeed 3, doing a tune mean't you needed to upgrade the high pressure fuel pump and you ran the risk of burning up the stock turbo since it was running out of its efficiency range at higher rpms.

Normtrum,

I think you'll get a broader response if you start your own thread.

I'll agree with G26okie that as you increase the power various things will break -- turbos (but you're swapping yours out), fuel pumps, clutches, transmissions, CV joints, at some point you'll grenade the engine.
I'm not sure what you're going for, perhaps you could explain. If you just want short bursts of power perhaps a nitrous kit would be the way to go.

There are reports that at somewhere north of 300HP the car becomes unmanageable due to torque steer.

Rumor has it that there will be 300HP JCWs in our future, but I haven't heard anyone claim that the 2-door coupe is going there, just the larger models.

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.nor...11e8e10466.jpg
2018 JCW, Dinan Elite

Note that the Mustang Dyno measures HP and TQ at the wheel. Front wheel drive trains lose an average of 10% from flywheel to drive wheel.

Heat soak reduces available power over successive runs, as the IAT (Intake Air Temp) sensor causes the ECM to pull timing.

Looking at the graph above, I guess I have more learning to do. Seems odd that the peak hp would come within the first few seconds of the run. Torque I could understand. This just goes against everything I "though" I knew about turbo and supercharger. Spin the turbo faster = more air = more hp. Hmmm.

Those lines in the graph are not whp or torque, they are something else, but the y axis isn't showing what it is. The torque are the lines that ramp up high at 3200rpm, and the whp are the lines getting higher towards the right side of the graph.

Thanks guys. Guess I wasn't paying close enough attention. Makes more sense now.

I have an appointment with RRT Racing in VA next Friday to have the Elite installed on my 2019 F56 JCW. I will contribute once I have had a few days with it.

Zero regrets with Dinan Elite. I put it on one a week after I got the car. Lots of torque for city driving and I expect I ran the car hard enough that I'd expose any tuning flaws (like 9/10ths driving up Mt Palomar on a warm day). Just as driveable as a stock car.

Shameless plug: took off the box to trade in my car and am selling it: https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...ml#post4449421

I say do it as well. But like Minnie my experience with the Dinan Elite has been with an S.

I definitely plan on hitting you up once my warranty runs out next year.

I've been more than pleased with my ManicMini ECU tune for a couple years. The guy who did my tune in Tempe, AZ said the same thing MarioKart said: over half his customers had already bought a "clip on box" tune like the Dinan or JB. And I think mine was only like $500 too.