BMW 135i N54 vs. BMW 135i N55: Round 2

I feel as though this debate will rage on with 1 and 3 series owners for years to come. N54 vs. N55. In a previous post 2009 BMW 135i N54 vs. 2011 BMW 135i N55: Round 1 I gave some background and showed a dyno comparison plus a first blood street race result. The information I'm about to spew forth muddies the waters just a tad.

Cavalier 2.4 LD9 Boosted!

Some fun time pictures of the recent weekend adventure!

Untouched by man until recently.

Dude, the engine is to the left a little more.

Giving it the finger for good measure.

I have a few more pictures but I guess I reached my limit for the day.  Enjoy the fat!

I really need to be doing something else....PSYCHE! IT'S EPIC BLOG TIME!

I'm just kidding, there isn't anything epic about having to change intake manifold gaskets but I took a couple pictures along the way to maybe help you guys out.  This is on my '96 S10 2wd.  The engine is actually from a '99 Blazer but the procedure is identical.  I'm going to be lazy and post the pictures and just put my comments in under the pictures.  Torque everything to manufacturers specs and enjoy!

This is prior to starting any major work.  The intake tubing has been removed and  that's about it.  The fan belt needs to be removed as well as the idler pulley near the EGR which is the pulley pictured above.  I have an electric fan (trick of course) but you might have the stock mechanical clutch fan on your S10 which may be in the way so you might think about removing that too.  Also think about replacing the little crossover hose that runs into the front of the intake manifold because it's going to be a lot easier to do now instead of alongside the road in the future.  That little sucker hose is about $15 though!

This pays dividends!  Instead of removing the power steering/ ac compressor mount I simply notched the ac mount to gain access to this bolt which holds the intake manifold in place.  My professional opinion is that this notch doesn't compromise the structural integrity of the mount at all.  Word of advice is to measure twice and cut once but if tape measures confuse you than use a sharpie to outline where you want to cut. 

More after the jump

Cavalier engine removal reality

Andreé has a new project and I decided to play photographer while I wasn't wrenching. He bought a 2000 Cavalier, factory supercharged, for 500 bucks. The motor doesn't stay running. It sounds like a rod is shot or something along those lines. He's probably going to sell off the speed parts then get a salvage yard engine. In the mean time the supercharger is going to get sold to recoup the vehicle cost. Not a bad winter beater to use so that the BMW doesn't get ruined by the nasty PA winters. I took some decent pictures and videos of the engine getting pulled out. This goes to show it isn't as easy as it looks sometimes to get an engine out of a car. Hit the jump for more pictures and a video.

The 1 is hibernating for winter (Sweet pic of it in storage)

It's a sad day. The car is officially put away for winter. I have shop rags stuffed in the tail pipes and the battery is in the house. I went to PepBoys (who I tend to stay away from usually) and purchased a California Car Duster. Not a bad product. I'll probably come out once every couple weeks to dust off the paint and roll the car forward or back a couple feet to prevent flat spots. Now I just need to figure out how to open the trunk without electric power before Spring comes.

I decided to play around with my camera tonight and I got a really cool picture of it as it sits in the garage (seen above). It's nothing special, a Canon SD1300 IS but it can take some excellent pictures if you play with the settings. It was really dark in the garage. The lighting is poor to begin with plus the florescent bulb above the car is burned out. I used a shovel as a tripod :-p.

P.S. After looking at this picture I really need to find a new place for that precarious ladder.

Prepare yourselves for an EPIC blog.

Prepare yourselves for an EPIC blog from this guy right here in the next few days.  I'm about halfway through another project and I have my camera on rapid fire so keep your heads down and get to da choppa! 

2012 Best exhaust goes to...

Without a doubt the best exhaust system of 2012 goes to the Porsche 918 Spyder. Although this car is going to be a 2013 / 2014 model it can't be denied that this has to be the most perfect outlet location up to this point. Well, maybe Shelby was close but this is better. Just look at it.

Even the concept car that was debuted at the Geneva Motor Show in 2010 didn't have this treatment. How cool would it be to be driving along silently in full electric mode and then press the sport button. The 9,000 RPM V8 comes to life and belts out a scream from the exhaust system that lies just above the engine.

This does make one wonder though. What if Porsche decided to forgo the hybrid power plant of the 918 and go conventional with the same level of obsessive weight savings. Instead of a 767 horsepower, 3,700 pound car they might be releasing a 580 horsepower 2600 pound car. Which would you rather have? Me...I'd take the dino burning 2600 pound monster all day long.

Porsche 918 with KERS
Power:     767 HP
Weight:    3,700 lbs
HP / ton   415

Porsche 918 with only a bad ass high revving V8
Power:     580 HP
Weight:    2,600 lbs
HP / ton  446 = BETTER

It still has the best exhaust though.

Cars at Team Blue: Part 1

I like going to the Team Blue car wash sometimes just to see the sweet cars that show up. I went there a couple weeks ago and saw a Lamborghini Gallardo Superleggera and a dirty, murdered out Ferrari 458 Italia. There was also a Sakhir Orange Metallic BMW M6, and Mineral White Metallic M3 there. I didn't want to look like a total tool so I didn't get pictures of them. Maybe next time.

The coolest thing happened as I was getting in my car to leave. An employee was starting up the Ferrari to pull it in. He rolled down the window and said, "Hey, that's a nice BMW". That pretty much made my day. A dude that was sitting in a Ferrari said he likes my car. Good stuff.

Oil changes are getting more expensive

I was writing an article containing tips for storing your vehicle for winter and decided to spin this off into another post. I also want to bring attention to the fact that luxury brands need to quit being so "exclusive" with every component. An oil change is the most basic maintenance one can do to keep their car tip top. All of a sudden European manufactures decided that we need custom oil, custom filters, impossible to get to filters, bespoke wrenches, etc. WTF? I say this is not necessary.

Some people will say that you should change the oil and filter before parking the car for the winter months. I disagree with this, under certain circumstances. Here's the reason why. If you have a sweet muscle car, jacked up truck, LS powered beast, yes you should change your oil before winter. It will cost you at most 40 bucks. Just do it. You'll have fresh oil in the spring. When the first warm day comes around you can rest assured that when you put the pedal down with an oil temp of 160+ degrees that everything will be adequately lubricated.

The problem is that not all cars are that simple to perform an oil change on. Now days even Mazda has specialized oil filters. BMW requires a "BMW specification" oil. A Porsche 911 GT3 needs 9.5 quarts of oil. Very few people would attempt to perform an oil change on a Lamborghini. In fact this crazy bastard was so concerned that he flew his car to London to have one done. Most expensive oil change. In the BBC show Top Gear Series 7 Episode 4 Clarkson, Hammond, and May tried the DIY oil change on a Maserati, Ferrari, and Lamborghini. They just don't think about the do-it-yourselfer anymore. An oil change for my BMW 135i can run up to $300 due to specialized oil and filters.

Me, I think I'll be waiting until Spring. When the first months begin to show green and when I stuff the pampered, trickle charged battery back into the trunk I'll take it easy on my way to the shitty local BMW dealer so I can have my fresh petrol product replaced for the cost of a case of Scotch.

: /

Winter time, the cool cars are going away

It's only a matter of time until the salt trucks spray crap all over the road and ruin the road surface for another 4 months. The clocks are about to shift forward causing the daylight to be completely relegated to exist on Saturday and Sunday, for those of us that are stuck inside the office 8-5.

The days of coming home from work, going to the gym, and still having time to wash the car are gone. The days of rushing home from work so you can get that exhaust hooked up while there's still some light will need to wait until March 10th when this "savings time" is over.

The leaves have fallen. The first frost has frozen. The kids have their candy. Now is the time to finish preparing to hide away your prized treasure so it can remain pristine, sheltered from the elements.

Here are some tips for the fellow OCD car nuts that will be stowing away their vehicles for the winter...

S-10 Foglight mod worth 8-9HP. I'm SERIOUS!!

Check it out folks!  I just installed a set of factory foglights last week and couldn't wait to get the hole-saw valance off and the right valance on.  I'm not required to run a front plate so finding a valance without the cutouts for the plate bracket was a no-brainer....and a huge p.i.t.a. but worth the effort. I knew they existed and after numerous e-mails and hours spent searching the web I found what I was looking for. Partsgeek.com had the hookup.  Powering the fogs I used a switched relay wired off of the battery.  To bad I didn't take a picture of the foglight harness I made because it looks sooo sexy and fits juuust right.  Giggity-giggity....


Please ignore my improvised temporary foglight holes on the top valance and draw your eyes towards the center of it.  See those small rectangular holes?  How is a guy supposed to get a good night of sleep knowing that these holes exist and serve no other purpose to me except looking ugly.  Thank the almighty Flying Spaghetti Monster for Partsgeek!

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2009 BMW 135i N54 vs. 2011 BMW 135i N55: Round 1

First I'll start with a little history. 

In the BMW 1 series enthusiast world the most debated subject seems to be what year of 135i to buy. For the US we got the 1 series starting in 2008. BMW had a beastly engine already developed to stuff in the small stubby chassis. It was a twin turbo charged, direct injection, 3 liter straight six that developed 300 horsepower and 300 lb/ft of torques (both under rated).

In 2011 BMW decided to switch the lump to the N55 engine that had been developed in 2009 and already doing duty in the 535i GT. This engine is rated at the same output, 300hp 300tq (Also under rated) but there are some key differences. First, the good. In addition to direct injection this version also adopted a technology referred to as Valvetronic. This is BMW's iteration of continuous and precise variable valve lift system. In combination with Double VANOS, continuously variable timing these systems allow for 15% improved fuel efficiency. Supposedly the N55 has less boost lag due to the twin scroll turbo design but I've driven both and I can tell you that's BS. Now, the bad. Because they went to a single turbo design it seems to be limited by the amount of air it can flow. This is evident on the dyno. Where the N54 starts slowly dropping off at high RPMs, the N55 crashes. This presents a problem when trying to get more boost.

Now the dyno runs

Mods:
2009 BMW 135i N54

• Burger Motorsports JB4 Tuner
• Injen Dual Cone air intake
• Berk Race axle back

2011 BMW 135i N55

• Burger Motorsports JB4 Tuner
• Burger Motorsports air intake
• Berk 4" catless down pipe
• Stock axle back

Baseline numbers were similar. I need to double check the exact numbers on the N54 but I believe they were slightly lower, especially in torque because the N55 was dyno'ed after the down pipe install. The baseline on the N55 with a downpipe was 289.6 hp and 301.0 tq. Once the tune was changed to map 2 the N55 put down 322 hp and 369 tq. Not bad, but...The N54 with stock catted down pipe on map 5 put down 343 hp and 370 tq.

N55

N54

The Race

Finally just the other day we got a chance to line them up, on a closed course with professional drivers...bwahaha. We both left some tire on the road in first but no smoke so I'd say we took off pretty well. The N54 pulled a slight lead. Near the top of 2nd gear the N55 started coming back. In to 3rd and the N54 lunged back ahead a few feet. Near the end of 3rd gear the N55 was pulling up to the door. We raced until the end of 3rd gear so about 110mph or so. It was so close but the N54 won by about 5 feet. This is the first time we ran them. Next Spring we'll be going to the drag strip to see what happens. I hate to make excuses but my N55 is still running worn out run flats. In the Spring I'll be getting new tires for sure. But then again the N54 may have down pipes and a larger intercooler too. We'll see. Videos will be taken for sure.

Bimmerfest 2012 was awesome!

Bimmerfest is the largest European car show on the East coast. They host it at Ripken Stadium in Aberdeen, MD. This was a great location. Easy to get in to and out of, hotels abound, not in a City.

Four of us decided to make the three and a half hour trip from central PA to Aberdeen. This was to be a Cannonball run. We took 2 BMW 135i's both easily capable of cruising at 155mph. There was going to need to be some preparation for this venture.

Prep: Our shopping list included performance parts, radar detectors, walkie talkies, and beer.
For more info and pictures follow the jump

Taking a huge lighter to a BMW

First Post! Wow!

Car: 2009 BMW 135i M Sport

Idea: Wire Dré's radar detector to a switch in the dash to avoid the need to use the cigarette lighter sock 

Approach: The US spec model of the 135i with the Sport and M Sport package has 2 non-functional buttons just to the right of the headlight knob. It seems as though buttons are blanks but if you take the switch apart you can cut the end off of a pen and stuff it in the back of the button to make it fully functional again. We were thinking we could find the power wire associated with this button and piggy back off of it to power the radar detector, using a screw close by for a ground.

Process: Dré removed the panels to get to the switch housing. Most of these have no screws. There is 1 Torx T-20 screw under the headlight switch, maybe 2. Everything else just needs to be pried off. As the plastic flexes and creaks under pressure you'll swear it is about to snap in half. Usually at about that point it breaks loose loudly causing an immediate reaction of frantically looking for broken plastic clips. If you're lucky there won't be any. In our case there was a couple heavily deformed plastic pieces but nothing was totally snapped off. That's just a byproduct of working on a Snap Tite car. Remember those car models they used to sell at Wal-Mart? Those were the business when I was a kid. Follow the jump to read more