Performance Mods: Most Bang for your Buck

[RyanMBlue]

A question for those of you who have experience with R56 mods.

 

I drive a R56 MCS and am into acceleration and cornering above most other performance qualities.

 

I know the Mini wasn't really meant to be a "quick off the line" car as much as other quick cars, but if I were to get one modification that would change my car the most noticeably for the better, what would be the best "bang for your buck" mod I could get?

 

Preferably not along the lines of "Get the full JCW package!!!", but a more reasonably priced addition.

 

Thanks guys and gals! :motor:

[Scavenger]

A lot of people are seeing good results simply by getting a good tune. The trick is in finding a place. I'll let some of the other R56 owners who have actually done it take it from here.

[cmcveay]

Ryan,

Great improvements can be made with the tune, no doubt about it. That will give you more power and better mid/upper range performance. It's not cheap and, as Scavenger noted above, it's difficult to get it set up because there are only a couple of people tuning the R56 ECU.

 

If you are looking for improved handling, take a look at a rear sway bar (I went with the 22mm NM Engineering version) and then the front strut tower brace which stiffens up the front end.

 

I'm somewhat "down" on other mods like a cold air intake and exhaust. I've got both as well as the hot side boost tube and Riss Racing Downpipe and I'll be honest and tell you that I wasn't all that impressed with the dyno numbers for my baseline run a couple of weeks ago. The factory numbers for the MCS puts it at about 172HP at the crank and with all of that, I was looking at about 190 on the baseline run.

 

The custom tune gave me a 22hp gain and the torque gain was almost 10lbft.

 

The sway bar and front strut brace along with being lowered has made a huge difference in how the car handles.

 

Feel free to PM me if you have any specific questions.

 

Craig

[JustJAY]

Craig, Mach V's dyno was conservative. Prior to my tune, I pulled a 201. I have researched other Jan tunes on 1st Gen with my mods and they are also pulling around the 200ish range. I would go by the Butt-Dyno

[cmcveay]

Jay,

I am glad to hear that. The engine mods that I did before the tune did help and they did make the tune work better but they weren't anywhere near the "claimed" increases. I'll take the conservative dyno results though!

[tvrgeek]

Every dyno measures a bit different. You are best to measure changes based on a single dyno. RELATIVE changes, and don't worry about bragging numbers.

 

Of course, "improved" is a matter of what you want. If you want to be quicker off the line, you want lighter wheels and and a torsen. If "Improved" means more HP at 6000, then I would look to the classical air plumbing on both sides of the engine and then some dyno time (expensive). Never seen our head, so I don't know if a trip to Ladds should be high on the list or not. Did wonders on my Spit.

 

For me, "improved " is all about the chassis. #1 on my list is camber, except the S has bad habits of leaving tires in the air I need to fix first. If ultimate g-force is where you are at, wide gumballs is what you need, with all their other nasty problems.

 

So, to get bang for your buck, think about it. Read about it. ( Punn, Smith, Vizzard, Morrison) It is a matter of what tradeoffs YOU will put up with for what benefit you are trying to gain.

[e30r56]

Thats all you got for a gain Craig? My stock (intake, catback) r56 gained 17hp and 32lbft up at helix!

 

But to the op: Best bang for the buck would be a tune for power, and springs and a swaybar for handling.

[cmcveay]

I ended up at 188/203 (up from 167/190) at the end of the day so my HP gains was along the lines of yours but my torque gain seemed to be a little low. There's no doubt that it runs/pulls much, much stronger now. I'm looking at an intercooler as that seems to be the "bottleneck" now.

 

Craig

[Maxicooper]

Not the R56, but Maxi ('06 R53) gained quite a few whp from adding RMW tuning.

 

Baseline 191 whp, 183 ft/lb to 217 whp, 202 ft/lb.

That is 26 whp, 29 ft/lb and lots of this .

 

Just have Jan fine tuned Maxi again couple of weeks ago, just to fix a small dip on the curve at 4.2k - 4.25k. Now Maxi runs smoothly throughout the rev band. :top:

Edited May 9, 2010 by Maxicooper

[tvrgeek]

Thats all you got for a gain Craig? My stock (intake, catback) r56 gained 17hp and 32lbft up at helix!

 

But to the op: Best bang for the buck would be a tune for power, and springs and a swaybar for handling.

 

Where are the gains? The stock ECU is set up up provide big low end torque, but modest high end HP. Exactlly what I want on the street. Maybe not what someone else wants on the strip or on the track. Throwing peak numbers out there is meaningless. My last car put out 210 stock out of 2L. Same weight as the Mini. It did it all at 6000 and up. It had half the torque of the mini at 1500 or 2000 where one starts to accelerate on the street. It was still flat at 3000. I will take the low peak HP, but big flat torque from the Mini any dat. It is much, much quicker. What I am saying is the shape of the torque curve is far more important than some peak number. I am NOT discrediting your tune. It may be fantastic as the cars are set from the factory to work at -30 in Alaska and overloaded speeding up a 8000' mountain at 120 degrees. Very conservative, so there are gains if you don't live in the extreme.

So, show us the graphs and what you were trying to achieve. Then we can be really amazed.

[cmcveay]

Okay, I wasn't going to post it but here it is. This is my dyno sheet.

 

It makes good torque low and has a very wide power band.

[LV2CRNR]

Springs and rear sway bar, CAI and catback and a BOV makes you think its quicker with the sound and it does make my JCW spool faster. Helix BOV and DDM CAI from Helix was 420 shipped to my door. Also to drop my car with Eobach pro kit springs installed was just over 800. When I'm back in town next week you can check my mini out to see what you want to do. I have a Helix short throw shifter that was only 45 from Helix motorsports.

[RyanMBlue]

Springs and rear sway bar, CAI and catback and a BOV makes you think its quicker with the sound and it does make my JCW spool faster. Helix BOV and DDM CAI from Helix was 420 shipped to my door. Also to drop my car with Eobach pro kit springs installed was just over 800. When I'm back in town next week you can check my mini out to see what you want to do. I have a Helix short throw shifter that was only 45 from Helix motorsports.

 

Those are a few of the things I have thought about. I have heard that a CAI is always a good thing to start with, considering it is a decent part to help your engine run better, and its a relatively cheap upgrade. Helix BOV? I am guessing BOV is a blowoff valve? I have no clue as to the importance/function of those, so you would have to give me a quick lesson

[cmcveay]

Ryan,

Jason quoted pretty much exactly what I did as well. I'll be back on the 21st and at the scavenger hunt if I'm not totally jet lagged and you are welcome to give mine a test drive as well.

 

I'll add one item that Jason left off that I had installed at MOTD. Go for one of the engine torque arm bushings! I've got the NM bushing installed and dang! Does it make a difference when you are putting the power down. No more "rubber band" kind of feeling.

 

I also added a Craven Speed adjustable shifter and I like the way it's made the shifting nice and "crisp".

 

I'm sure I'll miss something but this is basically my list of performance/handling mods in the order I did them:

Lowere (M7 springs), 22mm NM sway bar, M7 STD's and strut brace, DDM Street CAI, M7 Hot side boost tube, Borla (sport) cat back exhaust, Wilwood big brake kit and all braided brake lines, Riss Racing Catted/Coated DP, NM Torque arm insert, Craven Speed shifter and shiftwell cover, Alta adjustable rear sway bar endlinks. And then of course, the RMW tune.

 

I'm running a set of Rota Torque wheels (17x8.5 and +45 offset) with Kumho Ecsta ASX tires in P235/40R-17.

 

Lots of other mods to the exterior to "unbling" the car - I have no exterior Chrome, Joey Mod'd Xenon Headlights and blue LED interior lights.

 

Give me a shout at our next run if you'd like to give it a whirl to see what you do/don't like about it.

 

Craig

[RyanMBlue]

I also added a Craven Speed adjustable shifter and I like the way it's made the shifting nice and "crisp".

 

 

I left this off at the beginning because I didn't want to get ragged on :hahaha:, but I went with the automatic MCS with the paddle/bump shift.

 

If I was to do it all again now, 6 months later, I would have stuck with a stick like all my previous cars, but I was thinking that the paddle shifters would be enough excitement for me. The paddle shifters are nice, but its not the same.

 

So the long and short of it is that the shifter is not as big a priority for me :laugh:

 

Go for one of the engine torque arm bushings! I've got the NM bushing installed and dang! Does it make a difference when you are putting the power down. No more "rubber band" kind of feeling.

 

Also, not a huge car fanatic, so the general stuff (sway bars, CAI, exhaust) I know a bit about function and such, but things such as this, I am clueless. The only things I could find online were people selling these, no good descriptions of function

[cmcveay]

Ryan,

Automatic transmissions have their place in life and the world. All of the "cool kids" used to give me a hard time about having an automatic in my CJ-7 --- Until we went out to the desert and started running sand dunes that is. I'd fly up/down hills and they were toasting clutches and warping flywheels 'cause the sand will kill your momentum in a heartbeat.

 

Don't worry about not being a "car fanatic", you are among friends and any of us is willing to sit discuss the function of a part or system at a level you want so you can make an informed decision on what you want to do. Speaking for myself and, from my experience, the rest of DCMM, if you ask questions, you'll get answers.

 

Those are best left to PM's, emails or discussions at a run or a meet and greet although there are lots of "lurkers" out there who read the forums and learn from them.

 

Don't be bashful, shy or intimidated though! I had a fellow R56 owner ask me where they should buy a pulley for their car since there was lots of discussion about it. It made me smile and I explained why we (the 2nd Gen MINI's) didn't need the same type of pulley as the 1st Gen cars.

 

The offer still stands though. If you'd like to take Kooper for a twirl just to see what some of the mods will do, just give me a shout.

 

Craig

[MMatarella]

A question for those of you who have experience with R56 mods.

 

I drive a R56 MCS and am into acceleration and cornering above most other performance qualities.

 

OK, I'm only a Gen 1 guy but this still applys gen 1 or gen 2. Given your premise I'll be the dissenting vote and say in my opinion the best bang for the buck you can get if you're into acceleration AND cornering is to invest in TIRES. It's not as much fun as discussing other mod's and tweaks but if you have stock OEM tires I don't think there's anything you can do for the same money that will give as great a difference in handling as some really good tires. And if you do the research the wonderful thing is they don't have to cost a arm and a leg.

 

I did my first and second upgrades at once. Tires plus MUCH lighter wheels (16LB 6 oz each in 17 x 7). That big a reduction in unsprung weight not only improves ride and handling, but acceleration off the line a little bit too. (much less rotating mass). It cracks me up a little that people will spend huge money on something like a lightweight flywheel and be running around with close to 30 LB each wheels. The wheels also don't have to be that expensive though they certainly can be depending on what you choose.

 

I believe at the time I got 4 Kosei 17 x 7 wheels and 4 Goodyear F1 GS-D3's (215/45 17) for about $1150 mounted, balanced, and delivered from Tirerack.

 

Whatever path you choose have fun! It's a slippery slope down the mod hill but fun! :top:

[tvrgeek]

Nice fat torque above 4K. Pretty impressive. A little flatter too.

Was this just Mach V tuning the ECU, a chip, or was there hardware change?

[Edge]

Nice fat torque above 4K. Pretty impressive. A little flatter too.

Was this just Mach V tuning the ECU, a chip, or was there hardware change?

Tuning of the ECU only (I'll get around to posting my dyno graph at some point, although since it's for an R53 JCW, you may not be as interested).

 

The actual ECU tuning was not done by Mach V, it was done by Jan Breugemann of Revolution Motor Works, who is well recognized in the wider MINI community for his MINI ECU tuning talent. He came in from California especially for the tuning event. The tuning was done at Mach V, using their (very conservative) dyno.

 

If they end up doing another joint tuning event as Dan has indicated, I can't recommend it highly enough - provided of course that you feel you've done all of the engine mods you think you'll be doing. (Naturally, tuning works best when it's the last step and there are no more hardware changes planned).

 

EDIT: I have posted the dyno graphs (and Mach Vs video of one of my pulls) here.

Edited May 19, 2010 by Edge
Added link to dyno graphs & video

[tvrgeek]

A great place for automatics, yea get a bit older with knees worn out running cross-country. The fairly snappy automatic transmission is exactly why I bought the Mini. Otherwise I would have kept my old fleet: RSX, Spit, TVR, Mog....

I was stuck in traffic coming back from Carlisle and realized enough was enough.

For me, the thrill is driving well, not necessary fast, but quick. Of course, when you drive well, it is pretty fast