My Cooper has been through 118,000 miles. Three seasons of track days and autocrosses. Lots of bounces off the rev limiter. The engine is still going. It does use a little oil now, but that's acceptable to me. I had a little mishap with it at the end of the last track season, but it will be rebuilt and back out there in the spring.

So, there's nothing wrong with hitting the redline. If you're going to be doing it "regularly", you need to be extra diligent with the maintenance.

 

It appears that you have enough money in that car to have bought a BMW 335i or a Porsche Cayman

 

If hitting redline was abusing the car they would have moved the redline even lower. I'm sure you could raise the redline at least 500 or even 1000, hit it every day and still not have any problem in overall engine life.

 

and these are defined as when a part goes past it's plastic deformation limit, ie won't return to shape on it's own, wear goes approximately with the square of the speed. So things wear faster at higher speeds, but don't brake.

Matt

 

Your final sentence up to the word Speeds is understandable. The rest seems strange to this 67 year old brain.

 

There’s no damage done by running up to the redline. As others have mentioned, however, engine wear is accelerated at high speeds. It can be fun to wind your engine out when going through the gears but there is rarely an instance where that improves performance. If you study horsepower and torque curves along with transmission ratios it gets easier to understand why the optimal shift point is almost never at the redline

 

Break not brake.

 

Does the 07 MCS have the "black box" that records engine parameters for warranty claims?

 

is at ~7000, the rest are lower. I plotted out all the thrust curves for the R50,R53 and R56...

Matt

 

Thanks for doing the work on that.

 

Yes the Mini does have a computer that will keep track of the rpm.
The only way you are going to over rev the engine and void a warenty would be by over reving on an inapropiate down shift.
I am surprized there is so many replies on this subject.
I guess I could have been clearer on my post, I don't hit red line on a daily basis, but ocasionally on a freeway on ramp etc, deffinatey on track days and ocassionally on autocross days.
I try not to abuse my Mini, I resently retired and it would be a bit of a burden if I blew it up, but have found after a couple high speed driving schools that I do really enjoy track time. After all I am not ready for the rocking chair.
Dennis

 

Which gets me back to my question on Post #13. I have to believe that the design of the supercharged (1st Gen) and turbocharged (2nd Gen) engines/trannys have just a bit more margin in them because of the inherently higher horsepower. That would lead me to believe that they can take the sustained periods of high rpms and speed more than the NA MINIs without experiencing accelerated wear and tear.

A logical extension of this thinking is that those who are continually stressing their NA engines by bouncing off the red line on a regular basis are wearing out their engines at a higher rate than if they were displaying the same driving habits with an "S" engine.

I hope I'm wrong, since I have an MC (even though I stress the suspension in the twisties far more than the engine in revs).

 

the boosted motors generate higher mean pressures on the pistons (this is how they make more HP). In the supercharged version, there is a forged crank, piston oil squirters and the like to make it better able to take the forces generated. Not sure what exactly is different in the S prince engine, but they do the same types of things as well. That said, piston rings or crank bearings will get more of a workout due to the larger forces and the like.

Just know that both engines are designed to deal with the forces that they experience while used within the designed performance envelope. But there is no "clean and simple" answer to your question.

Matt

 

look at the power curve, theres no reason to redline, float some valves. Your power tops off before redline so no need to go there

 

for maximum thrust, it takes time to shift gears. If the next "event" you have to deal with happes sooner than you can "catch up" to the decreased thrust of not changing gears, you're slower to change gears. Two examples of this would be shifting to the next gear right before a turn where you need to slow down, or a run to a speed or distance where you can get the speed or distance right at red-line, but shifting would be a big hit, effectively coasting, right before the checkered flag or whatever.

There's no fixed rule here, like all things in cars, there are compramises all over.

Matt

 

Is there any point shifting above the point where the next gear will be at torque peak? IIRC, that would be somewhere around 5,500 rpm.

With the JCW Stage I, the higher revs would be more useful, but doesn't the standard MCS run out of breath around redline?

 

What you do is you plot wheel torque vs gear. When the curve for the next gear crosses over the previous gear, you shift. It may or may not be at the torque peak, as this depends on the shape of the torque curve and the gear ratios.

But like I posted above, there is a "shift time" that is effectively coasting, so even if you increase torque, it takes some time to gain back the lost thrust. Any event that would occure before this time elapses would mean that staying in gear, even if it's not at maximum potential torque, would be the smart move.

Matt

 

This is pretty close to the 02 MC thrust curve (the torque profile is close to the factory numbers, and there are a few fudge factors in caluculating the graph).

The only red-line shift is the 1-2 shift. Most others are significantly below that. But note that the shifts don't go to the torque max of the next gear.

Hope this helps....

Matt