Tuning options

[toydestroy]

Ok haven't been around here for a while so some back story. I have owned a Pure Silver MCS which I've loved and looked after for the past two years. Yesterday a friend of mine brought a JCW (a year or so older than mine) round that he's planning on buying and he let me take it for a spin to see if I thought it was much different to mine. The difference was very noticeable which has given me the bug right back.

Half of the difference was the handling which I know is down to the one he had having less miles and never being drove stupidly like mine. The second was the access to power which although not massive is really noticeable and the whine really started to make me jealous so its time to sort mine out .

Handling: I'm getting a MOT done this week so am going to have them check over the bushes, ball joints, tracking (I know I've smacked the front right pretty hard once misjudging a round about ops) and so on. I'm going to get this all sorted out before playing about with the engine as theres no point making it go faster until I lose the loose feeling the car currently has. But..........

I've just got my hands on a new JCW charger, head and injectors. So I'm thinking right I can bolt these on (with new gaskets, plugs, belts etc) and bobs your uncle I go faster without much cost. But I also think while I'm going to have the car apart is there anything else to be done thats cheap bank for the buck. Also anyone have any idea how much a decent garage would charge to fit just the bits I have?

[BigShow]

Cam would help and bigger I/C... but if you follow this guide you can't really go wrong:

http://www.mini2.com/forum/1320autos...-s-tuning.html

Also if you want a less baggy feeling car then polybushes are the way forward.

[toydestroy]

Cheers, read that earlier today and has lots of good info. Any ideas on fitting prices of the parts I already have?

[BigShow]

Quote: Originally Posted by toydestroy (original)

Cheers, read that earlier today and has lots of good info. Any ideas on fitting prices of the parts I already have?

Well doing the cam wouldn't be anymore expensive if you're doing the head. Best thing to do is find your closest tuner and get a quote for fitting the parts you have. I'd defo recommend a leakdown test and dyno run before the mods are done so you can check engine health before doing the mods and see gains.

1320 could do all that lot in a day for sure and they have a RR so you could do everything in one place and they're highly thought of on here.

[Silent1]

1320 charge £160 to fit a new charger IIRC

Are you any good with a spanner and a torx screwdriver? Changing the injectors is a 15 minute job, anyone can do it. I've had my fuel rail off a few times now to tweak it about.

[toydestroy]

Yup pretty good with a spanner (brother and dad are mechanics, although they are more gearbox than engine people). For obvious reasons would rather someone with experience change the cambelt.

Been doing a bit of research today and thinking along with what I already have to go on the car a 103% crank pulley and maybe Newman cams (are they 150 for the pair from 1320?).

Uprated intercooler can wait (unless its going to be as nice as today until September ) as thats a relatively easy job to do.

[BigShow]

You only need one cam so its £200 and you won't need a cambelt either.

[toydestroy]

Learn something new everyday, never knew mini had a chain until now . Why just the one cam? Thought the mini was twin camed

[BigShow]

Nah, its only got one cam, oh and the 1320 cam costs £200 not £150

[Hyper Active]

I've just had the Superflex bushes fitted to the front wishbones by 1320 autos, and it's made the car feel brand new again . Every MCS should have these fitted .

[toydestroy]

Strange how I've always assumed it was twin cam, just take them for granted now.

I'm hearing nothing but praise for them, I think I might upgrade them even if the standard ones on my car are still ok. Local garage is doing the MOT on Friday so will ask them to check nothing is loose and the tracking. I think the problem is when you drive a car all the time you don't actually notice how much it looses its feel over time until you jump into one thats pretty much like new.

Any opinions on the 103% pulley? If I wasn't going to use the JCW pulley I wouldn't consider using one but it seems silly pulling it off (not to mention I've heard they can be a bugger to remove).

[sam_a156]

You mean +3% crank pulley? IMHO works well with JCW s/c. You get more midrange torque.

I am now planning to replace this setup with a 17% pulley + OEM crank though to better fit my tuning plans (already have a large valve head fitted). But if you do not plan to progress much further (head+cam etc), I believe that this is a quite nice setup.

[Hyper Active]

Personally i wouldn't touch either a lightened crank pulley , or an oversized lightened crank pulley with a barge pole .

[Jaw_F430]

+1 for what he ^said

[sam_a156]

There are 10s and 10s of pages in NAM on this topic and no conclusive evidence of the problems related to crank pulleys.

I guess it really depends on the application and how extreme you are planning to go. If you are tracking your car regularly with a 7800 rev limit then you should probably rather err on the conservative side. As I stated, I am planning to remove mine and go back to OEM (and -17% s/c) because I am planning to raise the rev limit and push the setup further (with an oversized crank and higher rev limit, you are also overspinning everything else incl. alternator...)

But I stand by my words that if you have a JCW setup already, this is a relatively easy and non-intrusive mod. If you want to play safe, you can naturally always stick to JCW