Hey :)

Have been reading up a lot recently about GTT and the different kits that they have to offer, and am very interested in going for the full 220 conversion on my 05 cooper S ^.^

Thus far my car is totally standard except for the Milltek Cat back i had put on it recently :) Was just wondering if there is anything i should really be uprating first before i add all that power to my car ? ^.^ In particular i was concerned about the clutch, brakes and cooling!

I brought the car used and have had it for around 3 months and it has done 40k miles - So I am guessing it still has the same clutch it came out the factory with! My only fear is that i will spend like £1200 getting the kit and then within a few 100 miles i will be hit with the expensive job of needing a new clutch :O

I should add that i don't rag the car hard by any means, and i don't use it for track days or anything like that ^.^ Just spirited road driving :)

Any advice would be appreciated :) Thanks guys :D

SHORT VERSION:

SHOULD I UPRATE THE CLUTCH/COOLING/BRAKES BEFORE I GO FOR THE GTT220 CONVERSION OR CAN IT BE RUN ON A STANDARD COOPER S?

Glad you got the Milltek and enjoying it. Re clutch, you might not know how the previous owner/s treated it. Mine disintegrated without warning when the car was 4 years old and only 18k miles! I'd had the car 6 months and hadn't abused it at all.

Choosing a tuner is a tricky one. I know GTT stuff isn't well thought of on other forums as he has never produced dyno sheets proving he can make these figures and every car is different so you shouldn't really remap the ECU without doing it on a dyno. His filter is an open style one as well which will just suffer with heat soak.

I travelled over from Guernsey and drove up to 1320 to get one of their engine packages done. They do a health check first and will not do anything to your car if it shows up any problems. For £399 I got dyno runs before and after, 15% pulley, shorter belt, colder plugs and Superflex front bushes fitted.

To put it in perspective - GTT wanted to charge me £350 just for fitting a pulley and then extra for the plugs. My local dealer quoted £250 just for replacing my worn front bushes with replacement OEM ones.

Before pulley my car with Milltek exhaust and manifold and JCW intake made 179.5 at the wheels and after made 192. They say it is roughly 15% difference between power at the wheels and actual BHP at the crank so that roughly equates to 220BHP.

I'm happy with that and will probably just upgrade the front brakes as it is not really worth doing the rears.

In short, don't spend all that money on this conversion. Get a pulley as this is best bang for buck. Look for a second hand JCW intake or get a Dave F. Getting front bushes done improves handling greatly

Other places offer better value upgrades. Where abouts are you?

Once you start upgrading you're power, the next step is an intercooler, either a GRS or oem GP

Totally agree with the 2 posts above :wink:

Oh gosh, another thread bashing GT Tuning and pushing 1320! Ignore them, especially the completely unfounded cobblers about heat soak on the GT induction kit!!

Go and visit GT Tuning and one other and then discount which ever tuner that spens their time slagging off the competition and go with whichever one can make the best case for themselves; preferably the tuner that designs and makes most of their own parts, rather than one that buys in the same generic parts that you can get virtually anywhere.

Your R53 is not in its first flush of youth and parts may fail, though it's still an excellent basis for tuning. Get GT Tuning to replace the coolant header tank with a metal one (before the plastic one splits) and seriously consider getting them to brace the car while you're there; not just the obvious top brace, but the two underneath as well.

Never bashed anyone, just gave an opinion of what I experienced when looking to spend money on my car.

The OP can go wherever he chooses (Lohen, Minicraft, Coastal Racing etc) they will all do what he requires. All I said was I contacted EVERYBODY and 1320 gave me the best value for money AND were most helpful.

I didn't need to spend well over a £1000 to get the performance Meldarion is after and you don't need an ECU remap when fitting a pulley. I would like to know how you do an ECU remap without a dyno to get the AFRs correct?

For the record, 1320 never slagged of anybody while I was there. I got a quote off GTT and sorry but £350 just for fitting a pulley and then another £40 on top for the colder plugs and then VAT added - no thanks!

That being the case Gooner, why didn't you just highlight the good experience you had with 1320? After answering the question about what else to upgrade...

:)

But back to topic: WHat history has the car got? There are bits that get tired with age/use that it would be good to replace, but they may already have been done.

The front wishbone bushes are one area to check, as is the serpentine belt and the plugs (both due to be changed at Inspection 2). Any oil leaks, and the service history of the brakes and maybe the clutch are also worth a look.

Oh gosh, another thread bashing GT Tuning and pushing 1320!

I've not bashed GTT, but speaking from experience there is better value out there.

I did go down the GTT 220 route many years ago and have the uprated idler pulleys he offers fitted too, along with his inter(heater)cooler, I now run a GRS for a reason...it works!

The uprated idler pullies, they both failed but fortunately I saw them going before any damage done http://www.mini2.com/forum/first-generation-mini-tuning/187023-gtt-idler-pullies-fail.html

The tensioner safety bar, that wore out and rattled like hell.

The filter I got rid of because it's not fully enclosed, now run the JCW box deflapped with ITG filter.

The map he supposedly supplies, he didn't do it on mine as he felt it didn't need it, he even admitted he often didn't do it as it wasn't necessary. So anyone going for the package thinking they would get it automatically, often then didn't get it. Not due to hard facts but just because he 'thought' that was for the best!

He does do a few good bits, but also things not worth bothering with.

The actual reduction pulley he supplies is a good one and I still have that.
His braces, I have those.

The rest of his stuff all got dumped over time not because it was GTT but either it failed or there was/is better/better value products out there.

He also claims to sell belts at a special 'customer friendly' price.......same belts are far cheaper at camskill!

Hey all (Sorry for the delay in posting back!)

First of all, i want to thank you for all of your responses :) It has been great to hear a mix of opinions, and it has certainly given me a lot to think about ! But i appreciate the help a lot :D

I myself am located in the East midlands, so 1320 mini and Lohen are both much more local to me than GTT (Which is approx a 7 hour round trip there and back!)

As for my car history - Well i had it fully serviced a couple of months back in January and the only corcerns were regarding my brake discs and pads. At that time i had not long purchased the car and the discs had corroded quite badly from lack of use whilst at the garage! The fronts were noted as poor and the backs were 'ok' but they are in the process of being changed now :) Just waiting for some nice dry weather !

Other than that i am not aware of any other issues ! Except i have a bit of 'clutch paranoia' at the moment >.< My clutch just feels very 'bumpy'/jolty to me sometimes when i change gears! Have tried altering my driving style; Trying to clutch up slower and also clutching up faster but it seems to make little difference (I tend to favour quicker as I imagine this is less wearing, so long as you aren't whipping it up!). Generally the jolting is worse in lower gears (1st to 2nd and 2nd to 3rd mainly) you just feel it as you pull the clutch up. I also find that it is a lot worse when the car is cold, generally it isn't too bad when the car is warm and particularly if you hit the revs a bit more so i don't worry toooo much!

Other than that, i have no trouble getting into gear, no slipping or anything! Though it feels like i have to be pretty gentle pulling off, or the car will judder like there is no tomorrow !

Either way, i am thinking a good plan is to head down to 1320 sometime and for the money it would cost for the 220 conversion i could have a new clutch/flywheel and probably sort the pulley and plugs aswell :) I certainly would feel better knowing that transmission had been looked over and then i will at least have some idea how many miles my clutch has covered ^.^

Will keep you updated though :)

Oh gosh, another thread bashing GT Tuning and pushing 1320! Ignore them, especially the completely unfounded cobblers about heat soak on the GT induction kit!!

Go and visit GT Tuning and one other and then discount which ever tuner that spens their time slagging off the competition and go with whichever one can make the best case for themselves; preferably the tuner that designs and makes most of their own parts, rather than one that buys in the same generic parts that you can get virtually anywhere.

Your R53 is not in its first flush of youth and parts may fail, though it's still an excellent basis for tuning. Get GT Tuning to replace the coolant header tank with a metal one (before the plastic one splits) and seriously consider getting them to brace the car while you're there; not just the obvious top brace, but the two underneath as well.

Not everyone on the forum has got ££££££ coming out there ears, all we are saying is there are much better value for money (& proven) alternatives out there, & also these alternative tuning packages make the bhp they are quoting because the have a rolling road to prove it:wink:.

I thought you were retiring after 5000 posts anyway :rolleyes:

You know, I was, but sometimes it's nice to pop by and see how things are going and make the occasional contribution. I'm sure you'll probably feel the same when you eventually move on to something else yourself.

Having made over 5,000 posts, been around for nearly 8 years and having spent some considerable time and effort modifying MINI's, I'd hoped I might have something useful to add. Unfortunately, there is so much complete and utter cobblers spoken about tuning (especially with individual allegiances to favoured tuners) that it's really not worth the agro of getting involved. Sensible and enlightening debate I can handle, but there's little point getting involved with entrenched (and usually ill informed) opinion.

We all have our own particular favourite tuners for one reason or another, in my own case I bought my car already fitted with the 200bhp Hartge tuning package, Hartge also fitted the Milltek exhaust & manifold at the same time.

I have researched on line/talked to owners about further tuning & have since added a GRS TM Intercooler, did have a Dave F hybrid airbox but have recently changed it for an Alta, i wasn't that bothered about the extra few bhp the Dave F is guaranteed to give, I wanted more 'whine'.

The reason for posting all these details of the parts on my own car is that I've seen you post before about so called 'mismatched' parts, well yes, granted, they haven't got the same company name on them but they are tried & tested to all work in harmony together, can be bought at reasonable prices on the second hand market & since I've had them fitted (for almost 5 years) the car has been on 3 different dyno's (1320, AMD & Evolve) & made virtually the same power, give or take 6 bhp. The car has been one of the most reliable I've ever had so far, last year completeing 51 laps at Brands & about 25 quarter mile runs at Santa Pod with no problems at all.

I've got no alligiance to any particluar tuner, my car has been worked on by 1320, Minicraft & MiniProUK. Check out my window stickers
http://i1105.photobucket.com/albums/h360/Hartge220/002-2.jpg

I just like to help promote 1320 on here because they are a great bunch of guys, do some top work for very reasonable prices, & they are forum sponsors :wink:.

Just my 2p on the subject :wink:

We here at 1320 push to make all of our customers happy, we prove everything we fit/sell before selling, wether it be dyno runs or suspension fitted to our own cars and so on.

Why shouldn't people talk about good times at other tuners, when answering questions asked?

Having looked over the different packages and prices available from a number of tuners, i am thinking of going for :

1320 Cooper s Performance Package 1 with the added options of a Janspeed manifold and the optimisied bypass valve :)

My only concern is that i have heard mixed opinions about running an uprated pulley without a remap; Apparently it can upset the air to fuel ratio and it causes your engine to run lean which then burns out your exhaust valves and can damage your engine chambers o_O

Of course i wouldn't want to risk damaging the car ! So is it worth me saving up a little more and having a remap done at the same time ? Or is it something that can be solved my simply resetting the ECU?

Thanks guys :) - I appreciate all the responses :D

The Works kit came with different injectors to minimise the risk of this.

The other route to consider is fitting a GP intercooler.

Having looked over the different packages and prices available from a number of tuners, i am thinking of going for :

1320 Cooper s Performance Package 1 with the added options of a Janspeed manifold and the optimisied bypass valve :)

My only concern is that i have heard mixed opinions about running an uprated pulley without a remap; Apparently it can upset the air to fuel ratio and it causes your engine to run lean which then burns out your exhaust valves and can damage your engine chambers o_O

Of course i wouldn't want to risk damaging the car ! So is it worth me saving up a little more and having a remap done at the same time ? Or is it something that can be solved my simply resetting the ECU?

Thanks guys :) - I appreciate all the responses :D


Normally we run a car on the dyno before fit the pulley and the run again,

A stock car will be around 10:1 air fuel, this is very rich even for a boosted car.
With a pulley fitted it will normally only change the fueling a couple of points.
This normally moves the AFR's to the 11's which is plenty safe.

Air intake's temps and too much timing can be a cause of burnt vavles,

Normally we run a car on the dyno before fit the pulley and the run again,

A stock car will be around 10:1 air fuel, this is very rich even for a boosted car.
With a pulley fitted it will normally only change the fueling a couple of points.
This normally moves the AFR's to the 11's which is plenty safe.

Air intake's temps and too much timing can be a cause of burnt vavles,

I see :)

So all in all, it is more than safe to do it without the remap then ? :)

Would only go for the 15% pulley aswell, so nothing too drastic =]

Reckon it would be safe to run that with the standard intercooler ?

At least that is one bonus of our weather being so terrible :P Only 1 day of sunshine a year to add heat to the car xD

Thanks for the reply btw :)

We often fit 15% to standard intercooler cars, never had problems.

I also agree, uk weather is brilliant, for making power and thats about it , he he

We here at 1320 push to make all of our customers happy(?), we prove everything....

Why shouldn't people talk about good times at other tuners, when answering questions asked?

...and the bad times too