I had the SK (the true sports package) installed on my '06 MC at the dealer before taking delivery. It includes a warranty, cat-back exhaust with JCW tip, intake that draws extra air from the cowl and projects sound to the cabin, high flow re-washable filter, ECU mod, engine cover and badge of course. The kit itself doesn't add a lot of HP but the ECU upgrade gave it better response, a sportier character and the sound is soo nice.

Inspired by Ords and a couple UKers I started to ponder putting a JCW head on. I motored with this for a year till I stumbled upon a guy selling his JCW Head w/~5000 miles and was "going big" with Mini-Madness down in Portland, OR. Since he was going with bigger valves, I also inherited the JCW valves with the head. My wife and I headed down on the 10th and dropped off Pepe at Mini-Madness. Hopped the light rail and went sightseeing while the work was being done. The install went without a hitch, ~5 hours labor.

Total tone deepened and engine is a bit louder but not too loud. The oomph kicks in instantly with no more hesitation. We took off to the pacific coast the next day and then back to Seattle the day after. The trip was a total joy and the new sound turned some heads. I still have to get used to it a bit as the exhaust now has some competition. OBC had me over 38 MPG for our road trip after the install so around 36 actual. I'm totally satisfied.

Total install for parts and labor came to $947.
The sound kit was $1300 installed.

A bit of history, the first JCW Coopers were the MC with the tuning kit from '02'-04, few of which made it to the US, and very similar to what I did here but with the intake vs only a drop in filter and a more impressive exhaust. It was rated at 126 HP and $2600 before install. I would imagine I'm at around 128-132ish.

 

Nice to see you made the leap over.

 

Oooo very nice!!!! It's great to hear when someone does something like this to a COOPER. Warms my heart!!!

 

I really didn't plan on doing it but $300 for the head and valves with the seller and tuner (relatively) local was too tempting. The only thing left is wider tires as I'm still running the OEM 175s, yikes.

 

I have been tossing around the sound kit myself ever since I took delivery but other things have taken priority. Glad to hear that your happy with yours...puts me one step closer to having it installed on mine.

 

Sounds like a real deal!!!

 

Thanks for the link of pics, I actually found them the other day while searching for things on the forum, great pics, and helped alot. I was also pondering a JCW head from an s, but figured iwould just build my own, but glad to hear you did it. I was going to order the SK this week, but if any of you looked in the suspension section lately, you would know i bent the heck out of my front suspension on sunday. I guess i have to wait for the sk a while, unfortunatly. Glad to hear your happy with it, great job

Beecher

 

JCW Cooper S or the 2004 JCW Cooper tunning kit? I'm interested because I was planning to install the 2004 tuning kit on my 2006 Cooper until I found out that it was out of production and only for cars 2002-04 . Now I'm aslo wanting to do the sound kit with a head to get the performance that I wanted from the start. Can anyone confirm with PROOF that the jcw cylinder head in the Cooper S tuning kit and the head from the 2004 JCW Cooper tuning kit are the same? Or are they tuned the same but made with different material around the valves?
And do you have any updates on the feel / sound of the car now that you've had it for a bit Cursoe? Thanks in advance.

 

FANTASTIC! Sounds like a great upgrade for little cash.

 

www.realOEM.com has different part numbers for the two (non-S, S). But the only difference between the heads are the valve material. The S gets inconel valves, the MC doesn't. BTW, heads from 02'-06' (and 07' cabbie) will fit manual AND automatic. The kit would fit same years, with the exception of the redesigned intake filter(to clear the different tranny).

 

I got it off a factory JCW S with valves. Gecho4, the sound kit and a JCW S head is a better path and could be cheaper. It's intake is a better design, the exhaust is better and the ECU software is compatible and essential. I think the only thing you could use effectively off the tuning kit is the cylinder head.

Power comes on strong through 1700-3000 RPMs, then it's similar to what it was with out the head from 3-4000 RPMS, 4000+ it's dynamite. Sound is deeper and a few decibels louder. "city driving" MPG was slightly better than normal at 32.1 actual.
Also had a club member help me put on a rear sway, when pulling in his garage he really like the car's tone and complimented accordingly. He's a S driver coming from running a porche racing team.
Makes me only want to listen to music on the hwy.