I have a Mini Cooper S facelift with Minispeed Stage 2 upgrade installed by me, here in Greece, plus some other things. Scorpion cutback, OBX manifold, GTT intercooler, custom OCC with breather filter and NGK spark plugs are some of them. I had no problem with my car exept for the ASC light coming on at high boost situations

On a highway drive two days ago, I decided to open it up a bit. At about 220+ Km/h the engine sound changed and engine fault light lit up along with the ASC one. I pulled over and run a diagnostics check with my on board PC and OBDII cable. "Cylinder 3, misfire detected" was the error code reported. The car got towed to a BMW service center were the the first thing noticed was no compression to the No3 cylinder and a melted spark plug. After removing the upper part of the head we found a melted exhaust valve end a deep scar on the inside of the cylinder of the valve (not inside the cylinder).
http://www.mini2.com/galleries/data/538/thumbs/Melted_Plug.JPG (http://www.mini2.com/galleries/data/538/Melted_Plug.JPG)
http://www.mini2.com/galleries/data/538/thumbs/Melted_Valve_Inside.JPG (http://www.mini2.com/galleries/data/538/Melted_Valve_Inside.JPG)
http://www.mini2.com/galleries/data/538/thumbs/Melted_Valve_Outside.JPG (http://www.mini2.com/galleries/data/538/Melted_Valve_Outside.JPG)
http://www.mini2.com/galleries/data/538/thumbs/Melted_Head_Inside.JPG (http://www.mini2.com/galleries/data/538/Melted_Head_Inside.JPG)

A new cylinder head is needed plus a valve. Seams that the mixture got lean and melted both of them. My first thought is that an injector did not work very well. Second thought is a valve did not fully opened and last but most likely by many, the program did not work well.

I am still under warranty but of course BMW will not repair it under it as many modifications have been made to the car. I knew that when I made the mods and I do not have a problem with that.

My problem is with Superchips and Bluefin at the moment as I also think that that is problem with my setup.
I worry cause BMW will fix my car but the problem could appear again with maybe bigger damage to the engine. I will send an email about my situation to them (Superchips)and I will see what they have to say about it.
In the mean time, has anyone else had this or similar problem with his car and if yes does he have a solution or clues to the cause of it? I already know a similar situation that occurred to a member here few months ago but found no solution to his thread either.

Thank you all in advance and excuse my English

oh dear! Poor MINI! Hope it gets sorted!

Oh no!!! The risks of doing any modifications to a car.

I feel your pain, i got a sound install on my cooper and it caught a light 6 months later. Insurance and the installers did not want to pay and BMW said that was not there problem!!!

That's very unfortunate, but as you point out, the risk of tuning. I wish you good luck with the repairs.

I now have 237 dyno hp, but also got custom made software to prevent these kind of things, but one is never 100% certain. I'm also in the process of getting a air/fuel mixture measurement device to detect unwanted lean fuel conditions, it also measures air temp in the manifold. I'm happy my head still looks good (I hope) :)

http://www.mini2.com/galleries/data/538/thumbs/174.jpg (http://www.mini2.com/galleries/data/538/174.jpg) http://www.mini2.com/galleries/data/538/thumbs/247.jpg (http://www.mini2.com/galleries/data/538/247.jpg)

Doh! However I have heard not so good things about the minisport stuff, as well as thier fitting, so this doesn't totally surprise me. Plus your car sounds quite well specced and the superchips map is standard bluefin ? or a special map for MINIsport like Lohens bluefin ? Could have been what made the difference, especially as your plugs look all to hell and filthy with carbon deposits as if the car has not been fuelking right.

If you go this way with mods it's important to have a custom map for it, not an off the shelf one.

..thats 3 engines I know of with Bluefin that have let go. I'd be very interested to try a Bluefined MCS myself on the road at WOT with a proper widebeand O2 sensor/digital meter with it SCREWED into the exhaust BEFORE the cat. If you tune/adjust fuelling based on readings on a Rolling Road with the sensor shoved 6 inches up the tailpipe (and therefore AFTER the cat !) , its never going to be right. Or to put it another way its always going to be wrong!
Ive taken the trouble to compare the results (same car) using the 2 methods above . The results are very different! You also need to keep the A/F ratio near the richest end of the 'band' that gives peak power,not near the weakest end that gives peak power. That way it gives headroom for variations in the injectors consistancy and even spikes& dips in the signal voltage from the T map sensor. This is partly because the stock T map sensor & even the Siemens injectors are not particularly great.
We are now running different make (much better spec) Map sensor & Injectors on our car. This is in preparation of our GTT300 Turbo conversion,but tbh even with the supercharger the results are astonishing.
Best Regards Roland GTT:smile:

GTT300 TURBO CONVERSION :aargh:

Im guessing this is for the R56 Roland? :(

Nope I think its Rolands R53 twin turbo or an R53 with big turbo and Super charger removed. Theres a post about said kit on scnm.net

R

Yes thats right its for the R53 model (supercharged model) .
It uses a roller bering turbo, (no supercharger),big front mount intercooler, big top mount airfilter/box ,electric waterpump with revised block entry point (much better & equal cooling across all 4 cylinders), upgraded fuel managment with mapping to 30psi boost, new manifolds (two) ,incar fully variable boost control.....& more
Weve made good progress with it (theres a lot of things to cover) but Im still confident of being on the road by end March:D .....updates on Mini2 & SCNM coming soon.
Best Regards Roland GTT:smile:

Yes thats right its for the R53 model (supercharged model) .
It uses a roller bering turbo, (no supercharger),big front mount intercooler, big top mount airfilter/box ,electric waterpump with revised block entry point (much better & equal cooling across all 4 cylinders), upgraded fuel managment with mapping to 30psi boost, new manifolds (two) ,incar fully variable boost control.....& more
Weve made good progress with it (theres a lot of things to cover) but Im still confident of being on the road by end March:D .....updates on Mini2 & SCNM coming soon.
Best Regards Roland GTT:smile:

That's my 2008 Works order cancelled then Roland :D

Doh! However I have heard not so good things about the minisport stuff, as well as thier fitting, so this doesn't totally surprise me. Plus your car sounds quite well specced and the superchips map is standard bluefin ? or a special map for MINIsport like Lohens bluefin ? Could have been what made the difference, especially as your plugs look all to hell and filthy with carbon deposits as if the car has not been fuelking right.

The car mods have been made by me and not an other company . All stage 2 parts were bought from Minispeed UK.

The deposits are probably there or by bad fueling or from the car being driven for about 2 kilometers with three out of four cylinders working, as I had to get to a parking lot out of the highway.

After I came in contact with minispeed, informing them of my situation, they suggested I should upgrade my bluefin to suit the extra upgrades(intercooler, manifold, cutback) I made after the 2nd Stage installation (15% pulley, CAI, bluefin). They say that the program that I now use is only for stage 2. They also made a good offer on a used cylinder head for 150 pounds + shipping.

I am now thinking of upgrading by using a friends cylinder head that is ported and polished and has a Schrick camshaft installed. I am also thinking of using larger injectors but minispeed told me that the stock ones are good for up to 275hp.

Theses are the news about my situation. I will keep you informed of any changes.

Sorry, my fault I thought you said minisport not minispeed. Not tried or heard anything about minispeeds stuff. Sounds like they are looking after you though.

The stock 330 injectors are used on GTTs conversions upto 240+ At the 240+ or poss 260+ they switch to bigger ones I think...maybe the 380cc JCWs or custom ones. The stock injectors are a bit variable though and can underfuel on occassions but be fine on a different day....its the manufacturers design/quality fault not the injector size.

R

Stock injectors were originally fitted to our car and although producing 270bhp ,you can see it leaning off after 6500 as the injectors cant quite keep up. By 7000rpm its leaned too 13.5:1
bung a set of JCW injectors in would be my advice.
Best Regards Roland GTT

Roland you are crazy! :p ( in the nicest of ways!! )

Lookin forward to seein the demo car! :biggrin:

Another thing Roland do you think i should change the injectors in my car then?

I should be down to you end of next month so i just wanna know how much im gonna be spending! :rolleyes:

Hi Ryan no yours is fine. Im just guessing that the bluefin is programmed too lean at the top end ,and by fitting JCW injectors it will richen it a bit at the top end giving a better chance of not blowing up again.
Best Regards Roland GTT:smile:

thanks roland for your sound advice. i am running a bluefin ecu so to have peace of mind i will chance the injectors.;) ;)

..thats 3 engines I know of with Bluefin that have let go. I'd be very interested to try a Bluefined MCS myself on the road at WOT with a proper widebeand O2 sensor/digital meter with it SCREWED into the exhaust BEFORE the cat. If you tune/adjust fuelling based on readings on a Rolling Road with the sensor shoved 6 inches up the tailpipe (and therefore AFTER the cat !) , its never going to be right. Or to put it another way its always going to be wrong!
Ive taken the trouble to compare the results (same car) using the 2 methods above . The results are very different! You also need to keep the A/F ratio near the richest end of the 'band' that gives peak power,not near the weakest end that gives peak power. That way it gives headroom for variations in the injectors consistancy and even spikes& dips in the signal voltage from the T map sensor. This is partly because the stock T map sensor & even the Siemens injectors are not particularly great.
We are now running different make (much better spec) Map sensor & Injectors on our car. This is in preparation of our GTT300 Turbo conversion,but tbh even with the supercharger the results are astonishing.
Best Regards Roland GTT:smile:

Is this the reason you don't use a Superchips Bluefin remap on your performance packages ?. Do you not rate Bluefin's very much, or is it that other parts need changing for it to work safely ?.

I think the concept is ok, but judging by 3 blow ups I know of , its mapping obviously isnt right .(Cooper S) . You would think after the first one letting go both Superchips and the relavent tuners would get it right. I had heard (through the grape vine) that a second engine on one car went bang :aargh:
You need to 'Give the engine what it wants not what you think it should need ' (A/F ratio ,ignition advance etc...).
Best Regards Roland GTT:smile:

The car has now has been fixed and has the following upgrades:

15% pulley, modified cylinder head with stock valves, JCW injectors, 63mm throttle body, Alta CAI, OBX manifold, Scorpion exhaust, GTT intecooler, Schrick camshaft and program from MiniSpeed.UK.

Here are the dyno results plus A/F ratio and boost curves

130695 130696

Max power 236.9 Whp at 7400rpm.


I know I have a problem with my A/F ratio from around 2300-3500rpm and then from 6400rpm and up. I also have a very strange boost reading (black line) that can not figure out. I think I need a new program.

A/F reading was taken after the catalytic converter.



What do you guys think?

how much has it cost so far to get back on the road?

It has cost me to fix the car with a used cylinder head and valves around 1300 euros. All new upgrades cost me around 1500 more.