where can i look for power ... M30 ... need good ideas =]

[bahnstormer]

hello guys

i've read www.bmwe34.net's "reciepe for power" but there are some
people on the board that disagree, or have different ideas...

so i'd like everyone's opinion on the best path to take for more power :D


i have a 91 535i 5spd approaching 160,000 miles.
EAT chip, 3.64LSD are the extent of my power bolt ons

I was strongly considering ireland engineering's headers, which
are a copy of RD headers....but for only 300 bucks

then i wanted to get the eisenmann race muffler and run that
with straightpipes to my cat.

on the intake side the dinan intake manifold came into play,
but bill r said it wasn't a good idea...that i should just send
my manifold to extrude honing

as far as the intake itself goes, well there is a company
here in my state, modern performance inc that was in the february
issue of grassroots motor sports

they have a MAF conversion, with open air cone filter that
showed a 25hp gain on a m5 motor....at the wheels...and
the cool thing about that was u could tune it with your laptop
so if u saw a rich condition at full throttle at 5700rpm, u could
lean it out a bit...

now this setup cost clost to $1000 dollars, but i think that it
has great expandability - so when i'm ready to move up to a turbo
then i'll have a lot of use for it...

my last idea was to get rid of the stupid dual mass flywheel....
this too though, would be an expensive job....


so what do you think i should do? in what order? let me
know any ideas comments you might have...thanks guys!

-martin

[Jose]

Your dual mass flywheel can easily be replaced by a single unit from a E28, bolts right on and should save alot of weight. As to pumping out raw power, there is no substitute for a turbo conversion. We installed a kit on a 535 e28 last weekend for a Belgian customer using a Garret GT35 turbo and huge intercooler fo which we had to some cutting and welding but the end result was ballistic. A friend of ours owns all M3 up to date and he challenged the 28 with his 2003 M3 and was not able to get passed, that should give you an idea wat too expect.

There'sonly one downside in using such a large turbo and that is turbolag. You could add NOS to the package, that completly kills the lag.

[kyleN20]

how much would a turbo kit cost, and im not talking about the 745i conversion, im talking pure proformance turbo kits. like you were talking jose. but on that note, how much will a 745i kit cost? how much power will it give, will a chiped 535i with a 745i turbo be at m5 level?'

thanks

kyle

[632 Regal]

will help get the car moving then put on a 250HP No2 kit for mid to top end.


hello guys

i've read www.bmwe34.net's "reciepe for power" but there are some
people on the board that disagree, or have different ideas...

so i'd like everyone's opinion on the best path to take for more power :D


i have a 91 535i 5spd approaching 160,000 miles.
EAT chip, 3.64LSD are the extent of my power bolt ons

I was strongly considering ireland engineering's headers, which
are a copy of RD headers....but for only 300 bucks

then i wanted to get the eisenmann race muffler and run that
with straightpipes to my cat.

on the intake side the dinan intake manifold came into play,
but bill r said it wasn't a good idea...that i should just send
my manifold to extrude honing

as far as the intake itself goes, well there is a company
here in my state, modern performance inc that was in the february
issue of grassroots motor sports

they have a MAF conversion, with open air cone filter that
showed a 25hp gain on a m5 motor....at the wheels...and
the cool thing about that was u could tune it with your laptop
so if u saw a rich condition at full throttle at 5700rpm, u could
lean it out a bit...

now this setup cost clost to $1000 dollars, but i think that it
has great expandability - so when i'm ready to move up to a turbo
then i'll have a lot of use for it...

my last idea was to get rid of the stupid dual mass flywheel....
this too though, would be an expensive job....


so what do you think i should do? in what order? let me
know any ideas comments you might have...thanks guys!

-martin

[bahnstormer]

TCD's turbo kit prices out to around 7k for thier stage two, which
is at 11psi, approx 330 wheel horse.. the problem with that is
i'd need to upgrade, brakes, exhaust, driveshafts, clutches, engine
management etc etc, so it'd be closer to 10 grand for a PROPERLY
done job....

i WILL eventually do this, but i wanna see how far i can push the m30
NA....

[zygoteer]

... You could add NOS to the package, that completly kills the lag.

hmmmm ... and maybe the motor too ????

[crashnburn80]

TCD's turbo kit prices out to around 7k for thier stage two, which
is at 11psi, approx 330 wheel horse.. the problem with that is
i'd need to upgrade, brakes, exhaust, driveshafts, clutches, engine
management etc etc, so it'd be closer to 10 grand for a PROPERLY
done job....

i WILL eventually do this, but i wanna see how far i can push the m30
NA....

TCD recomends not switching to a MAF because they claim its much harder to tune to their turbo kits. So I wouldn't spend $1k on one just to take it off later.

[Craig]

Unless you're on the track you probably don't need to worry about an intercooler. Water injection is a good comprimise (I have it) and it's not expensive either.

I would highly recommend their turbo exhaust too, it makes installation sooo much easier that it's totally worth it for that reason alone, not to mention the better power.

You may need to upgrade stuff, you may not. You won't need to do anything to the engine electronics if you stay within mild boost levels. I made 282rwhp/291rwtq at 8psi non-intercooled and it's pretty damn fast. For comparison there was an E34 M5 there that day putting down 273rwhp/235rwtq.

[bahnstormer]

yeah i mean 330 wheel at 11psi intercooled is just an awesome amount for a 3500 lb car...i'd be faster than a e46 m3....

[Jeff N.]

Cheapest bang for the buck is a turbo. End of story.

I have tinkered with everything else with marginal results. Cam.. CAI... ported head ... maf ... lighter flywheel ... gearing, you name it. Next will be a 3.7 short block to go with metric mechanic head.

Problem becomes tuning the car as the ECU is a black box and you just can't tweek it to adjust to the mods.

Want power? Buy a chip. Then gear the car. If that isn't good enough, turbo it.

Cheers!

Jeff

[bahnstormer]

thanks jeff
i've already got the eat in and the 3.64
it is faster, but never enough =]

have u tried headers jeff?
i'm not looking for cheap bang for buck
i want to make this m30 respectable on
NA

did u read my thing about modern performance?
do u have access to february's grassroots magazine?

[Ted K]

Unless you're on the track you probably don't need to worry about an intercooler. Water injection is a good comprimise (I have it) and it's not expensive either.

I would highly recommend their turbo exhaust too, it makes installation sooo much easier that it's totally worth it for that reason alone, not to mention the better power.

You may need to upgrade stuff, you may not. You won't need to do anything to the engine electronics if you stay within mild boost levels. I made 282rwhp/291rwtq at 8psi non-intercooled and it's pretty damn fast. For comparison there was an E34 M5 there that day putting down 273rwhp/235rwtq.

Have any pictures? Did you do the work yourself?

[crashnburn80]

I was strongly considering ireland engineering's headers, which
are a copy of RD headers....but for only 300 bucks


Where can you get these?

Also www.bavengine.com sells a performance M30 engine thats supposed to put down 250hp prior to chip/mods for a very reasonable price. It has light weight pistons, CNC P&P head, performance cam and balanced for less than $4800, with no core exchange.

I think someone on this forum is running one of these performance engines, I recall he was selling a custom supercharger kit from his 535i in the classifieds a while back.

[Craig]

Have any pictures? Did you do the work yourself?

I suck at remembering to take good pictures. There are a few randomly organized here (http://www.535i.net/random/BMW/turbo/TCD_kit/) and here (http://www.535i.net/random/BMW/turbo/).

The second one includes some pictures of my first attempt with some 745i parts that didn't pan out.

[Jeff N.]

Modern performance sells a MAF unit. I have one of the Pro-M racing maf's on my car which is similar to the modern performance unit. Martin has one too.

I think you get some bump at the top end and it drives a bit better than the VAF meter. However, it's tricky to tune and you seem to have to keep dinking with it at the ambient temp changes. Not worth the cashola on a stock motor methinks. Once the big breather gets in, i think it will payoff at that time.

Chip is basically retuned mixture and timing. Better way to tinker.

[bahnstormer]

thanks for letting me know about bav engine

i was considering either korman kormanfastbmw.com
or metric mechanic for a built motor....the headers
are available at irelandengineering.com (if i didn't spell
it right just search)

[Jason]

and from what i have read in MM's ads it doesn't seem like youre getting a real bargain from them either. Having said this, I had the pleasure of driving an E28 w/ a 3.6 L euro motor, ported polished head, MAF, larger injectors etc etc etc and what an awesome time that thing was. it makes it seem worth it. i would seriously like to build that motor in my car. but like Jeff said, the bang for the buck is in the turbo.

[Robin-535im]

I bought a 90 535im with the BEE performance motor - my previous ride was a 91 535 mostly stock. HP on the Bav Engine is no where near 250! Mine dyno'd at 175 with an EAT chip and lightweight flywheel.

With the e28 flywheel it revs faster as a unit but I don't know how much of that is the engine, how much is the flywheel.

The BEE performance engine is stronger at mid range, but weaker at the high end than a stock (no chip) M30. I've had a few "roll on" type challenges with other 535's and they always pull away toward the higher end of the RPM's. You can feel it peter out at about 5k RPM. Off the line it's tight but you have to shift way before redline to get max torque.

They sleeve their blocks, which allows them to, as the Bav Engine guy told me, "Use cheaper pistons." Now I think he meant to say "better" instead of "cheaper"... I hope!

Oh yeah - with 55k miles on it, it burns a quart of synthetic every 1000 miles, but doesn't burn dino at all... go figure!

So... I think Jeff's right on to build a 3.7... after he works out all the kinks I think I'll follow suit.

[Oldgreene34]

yeah i mean 330 wheel at 11psi intercooled is just an awesome amount for a 3500 lb car...i'd be faster than a e46 m3....

You guys havn't heard from me for awhile, but thought I should jump in and let you know that last fall my TCD equipped car E34 put 305 HP and a bit higher number torque to the Dynojuet roller at about 12psi.

A few weeks later at about 13 psi on the Mosport track I was able to out power a new E46 M3 over and over...he was able to out corner me!

I have now tuned to just under 15 psi and will get on the dyno as soon as the snow tires are off of the car. I have tuned for drivability and so don't expect much more than say 340 at the wheels .... but the dyno is a great humbler.

The car is clearly faster than it was last fall.

So, my advice is to simply call Todd and buy the full kit....don't spend all the time and cash to squeeze a few incremental improvements, when you can vastly improve your car in one step, over one weekend!

Cheers,
Dave

[Craig]

Dave,

Didn't you put in a water injection system?

[Oldgreene34]

Dave,

Didn't you put in a water injection system?

I added a two stage single nozzle water system running on a 65psi pump. I start the water at about 4 psi and go to full flow at 7 or so. The thing is my own design.

Dave

[Craig]

Cool. I bought an ebay kit and am having it activate at 4psi too. Seems to help.

Have you done any temp measurements?

[John in CT]

a 1995 M60 540 six speed, no fuss, no dirty fingernails plus you get to debate Nikasil issues 'till the cows come home....

Seriously, they are stupid cheap cars compared to what you are contemplating IMHO. Plus they were fully engineered, not a kit...

Best,

John in CT
1995 525im

[Incantation]

do you have pics? i would love to see the install.. where did you put the intercooler?!?

[Incantation]

what is water injection?

[bahnstormer]

spray water onto the intercooler,
or into the intake to lower temperatures

[Jon K]

spray water onto the intercooler,
or into the intake to lower temperatures


You don't spray water onto the intercooler. For actual gain from that you spray N20 on the intercooler. Water injection is thru the intake manifold in amounts that vaporize upon combustion and lower temperatures. It's a good idea, but you need to constantly monitor your water levels and pressure else you can detonate should water stop.

Martin,

just do a cam and exhaust/intake and wait until you can justify spending actual money on a forced induction system. I would recommend it custom. I have T3/T04E turbos for $600. 24# injectors for $170. Front mount intercoolers for $500. RRFPRS for like $130. Boost controllers for $200 and you could choose to bypass or blow off, either way it's around $300 for the valving. Exhaust manifolds for an M30 are easy to come by. You could do a full-setup for under or around $3k. I don't know why you keep factoring in these $7-10k price ranges. Everything you need is readily available. Just have faith that you can do it yourself, it's not like brain surgery. Over spring break I should be almost ready to put on my supercharger. You will need to come by our shop and get a ride. I am sure you will be swayed to just do it yourself :)

[Craig]

One the two M30 engines I've personally seen with aftermarket cams, there were little to no gains on the dyno over a stock, chipped M30.

I'm into my car for right around $10K, including the purchase price.

[Jon K]

One the two M30 engines I've personally seen with aftermarket cams, there were little to no gains on the dyno over a stock, chipped M30.

I'm into my car for right around $10K, including the purchase price.


Martin is figuring $10k in addition to purchase price. I will be right around $18k including purchase price, but that's including all audio/video and paintwork in addition to forced induction

[spoolinturbo]

so you can use a turbo set up from a 745i? what?

[Jon K]

so you can use a turbo set up from a 745i? what?

Yes, just use the exhaust manifold and such from the 745i. Add a boost controller and a blow off valve and push 400hp.

[Jason]

or did TCD use your car as a mule?

[bahnstormer]

yeah jon i remeber talking with you about a custom job for 4000 bucks,
which to be honest is awesome

what i meant when i said 10grand was that i'd have to go with a big brake
kit, guages, basically, all out on everything (carbon fiber driveshaft anyone?
eheheh)

[Craig]

what i meant when i said 10grand was that i'd have to go with a big brake
kit, guages, basically, all out on everything (carbon fiber driveshaft anyone?
eheheh)

TCD's kit is ~$4000. You think you'd spend another $6000 on other stuff? On a purely street driven car you don't need brakes, you have decent wheels and suspension parts so I don't see where you'd be spending the extra money.

[bahnstormer]

the tcd kit is not 4 thou

thier site seems to be broken now, but
i remeber that stage 2 intercooled, all
the parts nicely ceramic coated came out
to around 6 grand, and they wanted another
grand for installation....
so that is 7 right there.... a big brake kit will
set u back around 2 large, and the rest, well
there's your dyno tuning money =\

[Craig]

You don't need the intercooler for just driving around on the street. Sure it would be nice, but it's not necessary.

As for the big brake kit, again, on a street car why bother? Besides you can get E31 brakes for less than $600.

It's your money, but you can get the same results for a lot less than you think.

[spoolinturbo]

Yes, just use the exhaust manifold and such from the 745i. Add a boost controller and a blow off valve and push 400hp.

what years 735i? what about engine managment? or just use an SDS system?

[Jon K]

what years 735i? what about engine managment? or just use an SDS system?

E23

[alexcrofford]

Yes, just use the exhaust manifold and such from the 745i. Add a boost controller and a blow off valve and push 400hp.

I have a 93 535i, I just want 300hp, What would be the "best value" set up?

[Mobius]

You don't spray water onto the intercooler. For actual gain from that you spray N20 on the intercooler.For actual gain you spray n2o into the engine. The intercooler; you spray with water - unless you're just dying to use expensive nitrous in the most inefficient way possible.

In the same way that sweating cools skin off, the process of evaporating water cools surfaces as well.

See: Subaru STI.

There's also some good information on water injection (water injection - not intercooler misting) over at Aquamist's site (http://www.aquamist.co.uk/) under 'resources'.

[stx133]

intercoolers are free horsepower. for every psi increase in inlet pressure you get a increase in temp. this temp increase hurts power. go to a jap inport spares place and pich up an intercooler for a couple of hundred buks, forget all this water spray stuff, too much to set up and to go wrong.
i ran a turbo mazda rotary on LPG before my 540. turbo is beautiful fun but i am looking at supercharging the 540, more class. Look at the Whipple unit

[stx133]

hey guys, you need to get your chemistry cheched, H2O is water, NO2 is Nitrous. N20 is not a compound formulae