Which one is faster the 53 with a JCW At 210 hp or the new r56's with the turbo? Straight line 0-60 or Quarter mile or on a track like Seca?

 

Very close called.
It's depending on which driver will make a mistake first.

 

I did thrust curves for both cars, and the turbo ought to be about a second faster to 60. BUT a few car magazines are finding that they're closer than that. This has me baffled, as the only way the car can have that much more torque and still be the same speed is if drivetrain losses are much larger on the new car, and I find that unlikely. For the track, no clue, as that's more suspension than power.

Matt

 

D'oh! Here we go again...

 

the mags are getting nearly the same times out of the cars. Something isn't right....

Matt

 

Perhaps if you re-do the thrust curves using dyno data? That way, if the reason for the disparity is in the driveline losses, it will show up in the dyno curves for the two vehicles.

Of course, since you're trying to isolate a small variance, it would require plots for a stock R53 and a stock R56, taken one right after the other on the same dyno.

I agree with you, though - looking at the area under the torque curve for both engines, and taking the gearing into account, the R56 should be faster than the times the magazines have been getting out of it.

 

I have driven both and I would have to say the turbo R56 is faster and trust me that makes me very sad:-( The R56 even becomes faster after 5,000 miles put on it.

 

I wonder if the magazine drivers left the traction control on when they tested the JCW...

Motortrend & Road & Track post almost the same 1/4 mile ET for the JCW as the standard S?!?

These magazines also drive heavier FWD cars with less horsepower yet turn quicker times!!!

I'm not into conspiracy theories, but what gives!?!

 

people call themselves "pro" drivers.

Just like "professional graphic artists"

the word Pro really sux in this day and age. Everyone who's mother commended them for an ugly painting at age 8 thinks they are pro's.

Take a person who has driven a mini for 2 years who knows how to max it vs a guy who has 1/2 hour to max it. yeah. pro.

 

neither, the r50 ftw

 

technically, IF I payed a guy 2 dollars an hour to autocross my car he would be a professional haha

 

Do you happen to remember what the numbers were? They might not have been that far out-of-line. Elapsed times in the quarter-mile vary with the cube-root of horsepower, so to make a significant difference in elapsed times requires a *really* big difference in horsepower.

As an example, to go from a 14-second quarter-mile to a 7-second quarter mile requires about *eight* times as much horsepower, with all else being equal (vehicle weight, drag coefficient, gearing, etcetera).

That's also partly why a 500+ horsepower Dodge Viper is "only" about three seconds faster in the quarter-mile than a Cooper S with a little more than 1/3 the horsepower. (That, plus a big weight difference) Huge differences in power turn into relatively-small differences at the dragstrip.

 

You don't think any of the reviewers ever drive MINIs, except for the test sessions?

I'm not saying that every one of them is a consummate professional, but they're able to get repeatable times very close to the car's maximum performance after only a short familiarization period. Sure, they probably won't be able to wring the final tenth of a second out of it, but if you're going for the *absolute fastest* quarter-mile time possible, you start having to worry about things like atmospheric conditions, the weight of the driver, how much gas is in the tank, and how much you're willing to abuse the clutch.

Put a professional reviewer and a long-time owner behind the wheel of two identical cars, and I'd bet that the quarter-mile times for the two drivers would be within one or two tenths after a dozen passes or so.

 

If I come across a few dyno plots, I'll give it a shot. But really, I'm baffled by the differences.

As far as experience of the testers, I think an excellent drag racer would learn how to launch the Mini after a few pulls better than a bad racer who had owned the car for a while....

We'll just have to see what pans out here.

And FWIW, the fastest mini in the Auto X at the Western Automotive Journalists Mini sponsored AutoX at the Laguna Event was an 07 auto cooper! Go figure!

Matt

 

Keep in mind that at the drag strip, the r's are kept over 5000 rpm where the R53 JCW will have the 35 horse edge. The R56 has the big advantage in 1st gear only. The R53 will make up a bunch in 2nd. I'd be interested to see the 0-100 elapsed time. I think the JCW would show much stronger against the R56 in that venue. Anybody want to go out to the strip to play? Paper racing and butt dynos just don't answer the question.

 

I've driven both and I think the R56 MCS is as fast.

Put on decent tires for both and I think they would be about even or very close.

With stock tires, it depends on which tires and wheels you give them. Lighter rims and sticker rubber will win.

More chance for wheel spin with the R56- could make it harder to drive smoothly.

 

well, I havn't driven a jcw, but I drove a r56 and a gp. I think that the r56 is faster in first gear and you can definatly feel a difference in power at low rpms(r56 taking the gp there). BUT the gp is alittle faster. im not sure the actuall difference between the gp and jcw mini being I havnt driven one.

 

Why in the world are you guys comparing a stock (i.e. non-JCW) R56 to a JCW R53 (an OEM mod that costs $6,000!)? Wouldn't it be more fair to compare the stock R56 to the stock R53? Or better yet, wait for the JCW stage I kit to come out for the R56 and then see how well the JCW R53 does against it.

This is just plain silly IMHO. Oy!

 

No, looking for a "fair" fight. Not silly at all. Go for a test driver, see for yourself.

Stock R56 MCS beats any R53 MCS in stock trim. Both with manual transmission.

After driving it, I think the stock R56 MCS quickness equals my mid modded R53 MCS which is pretty good for a stock MINI. However my suspension has been tuned and is a lot better than the stock R56. Thank goodness.

 

Soon, you'll have your wish... in the best possible situation... same day, same dyno, all 100% stock MINIs.

Mach V Dyno Project! TOTALLY STOCK MINIs

I've been wanting this to happen for a long time, if only to help eliminate variables! Yep!Agreed, but raw data gathered in a neutral environment has value... and that can only truly be done in a same day, same dyno test.

 

Auto journalists do this for a living. I am sure they have tested far more cars than the average person sees in their lifetime. I'm sure the average person driving a MINI for two years (and most probably have never been near 9/10s) can get "max" more than the auto testers for car magazine.

http://www.roadandtrack.com/assets/d...anel-fixed.pdf JCW 210

http://www.roadandtrack.com/assets/d...pockets_dp.pdf
R56

JCW 210

0 - 60 6.3
0 - 110 - 21.1
1/4 mile 14.9 @ 95.6
.86 skidpad
66.2 mph slalom

R56

0 - 60 6.2
0 - 110 - 20.7
1/4 mile 14.9 @ 94.8
.87 skidpad
68.6 mph slalom

Here is a nice online calculator to determine the amount of HP to turn a specific time.

Plug the numbers in for the test weights in the test and you get

R53 JCW = 167.9 hp
R56 = 161.3 hp

 

if you look at the torque curve, and the gear ratios, a lot of the extra HP in the JCW comes on after the shift points.

But I hearily disagree with the simulation is useless. Guess how the Saturn V rockets made it to space... It sure wasn't trial and error. The Boing 777 was completed and tested virtually before a single part was made. While many of us don't give credit to simulation, I'd venture that what's really up is we don't give credit to crappy simulation. Accurate modeling ought to get the numbers to better than a percent of real world behaviours.....

As far as a fair fight, that doesn't matter either. Some people want to know how an apple compares to an orange! That's OK with me.

Matt

 

Not on the same day, but these were both on our dyno. The red is a 2006 MCS convertible (NOT a JCW), manual trans. The blue is our '07 MCS.



As mentioned above, in a few weeks we'll have a same-day comparison.

--Dan
Mach V
FastMINI.net

 

I don't need a thrust curve to tell me that! But when I have a bit of time I'll analize these....

Matt

 

That's a no-brainer. The real meat of the matter is the JCW (or the GP even) vs the R56.

I think we should hold off on much more speculation until the stock dyno shootout, so we have apples to apples comparisons of them all.

Also, unless I'm mistaken, the Mach V R56 mule has been modified already - we'll want a totally stock one for the shootout.