[mattoak]

I have about 150k on my 2006 325i, do all my own maintenance and take very good car of the motor/car. (although I've been neglecting the steering and suspension, I will be doing a full refresh this fall/winter).

Anyway, if I plan on keeping the car until 200k or so, what are some opinions on now adding a 3 stage intake manifold? I'm thinking of doing the 3 stage manifold, intake, and cat back exhaust with possible 2nd cat bypass later on, plus a tune. I'm just not sure if its worth the ~$1500 or so to add that extra power to a motor of this age. What do you all think? Should I just save my money or would it still be a good upgrade for the next few years in the 150-200k mile range? Thanks

[Black widow]

I would say save you $ for your next car. The more you drive the less money you will get when you sold it then you will need to part out la the mods. Its a waste of time. It has pretty high km, something might* come up any time that would cost $$$$ to fix

[hassmaschine]

since you have MSV70, swap the manifold and do the flash yourself. Pick up a $40 BDM100 clone, take the 330i file and change the powerclass byte. You'll get the 40hp gain without the added cost of an aftermarket tune. You can even clone your DME onto a used one and keep the stock one as a backup.

[W37V]

3 stake intake manifold can be purchased for less than $200. look on car-part . com

Imo, 50k miles of enjoyment might be worth $200 investment in parts.

For intake, don't even bother. cut out the charcoal filter. you can do dinan mod (search for it).

Also, don't forget to do regular maintenance on it - plugs, etc. It might give it extra oomph.

[blindrooster]

forget about money, the enjoyment will be worth it. Throw in a $100 muffler delete and you'll be stomping on the pedal every chance you get.

[rjahl]

Originally Posted by blindrooster

forget about money, the enjoyment will be worth it. Throw in a $100 muffler delete and you'll be stomping on the pedal every chance you get.

You'll save money. You will enjoy your car enough to keep it for a few more years.

[mattoak]

Originally Posted by W37V

3 stake intake manifold can be purchased for less than $200. look on car-part . com

Imo, 50k miles of enjoyment might be worth $200 investment in parts.

For intake, don't even bother. cut out the charcoal filter. you can do dinan mod (search for it).

Also, don't forget to do regular maintenance on it - plugs, etc. It might give it extra oomph.

Thanks for the car-part . com suggestion, found one local for $175 (gonna try for $150 cash) at a used parts store. Sounds like a solid deal.

I may do the charcoal delete and throw in a K&N but if I can find a used intake cheap I'll go that route so I can at least sell it when I get rid of the car.

Is the muffler delete a DIY project (I have access to a TIG welder)?

As for maintenance,
Did plugs at 95k (before a cross country moving trip) so they are still fine. Do all fluids regularly and keep everything in tip top shape, just did water pump and t-stat, power steering fluid, coolant, about to do brake fluid trans fluid and diff fluid. Probably worth keeping if I sink $1000 into the suspension and steering (just refreshing all bushings, shocks, etc). Buying a new car is expensive and we have to replace my wife's daily driver this fall anyway, so my ride needs to last a few more years. Might as well spend 1-2k to make it drive like new and also boost the power a bit. I just want to make sure the engine isn't going to start losing its grit soon. How many miles have people taken the E90's to?

[W37V]

Originally Posted by mattoak

Thanks for the car-part . com suggestion, found one local for $175 (gonna try for $150 cash) at a used parts store. Sounds like a solid deal.

I may do the charcoal delete and throw in a K&N but if I can find a used intake cheap I'll go that route so I can at least sell it when I get rid of the car.

Is the muffler delete a DIY project (I have access to a TIG welder)?

As for maintenance,
Did plugs at 95k (before a cross country moving trip) so they are still fine. Do all fluids regularly and keep everything in tip top shape, just did water pump and t-stat, power steering fluid, coolant, about to do brake fluid trans fluid and diff fluid. Probably worth keeping if I sink $1000 into the suspension and steering (just refreshing all bushings, shocks, etc). Buying a new car is expensive and we have to replace my wife's daily driver this fall anyway, so my ride needs to last a few more years. Might as well spend 1-2k to make it drive like new and also boost the power a bit. I just want to make sure the engine isn't going to start losing its grit soon. How many miles have people taken the E90's to?

1. Don't bother with K&N. Since it's oiled filter it might cause your MAF to foul up. Keep the BMW one.

2. Muffler delete can be DIY project - what really isn't?

3. For suspension refresh you can do Bilstein b4 shocks for about $300.

4. There is a guy here with over 300,000 miles on his 325i. Plenty more with over 200k.

5. Like hass said, you can do the tune yourself. I am sure he can walk you through it. Just buy the man a case of beer or his preferred drink.

[mattoak]

Thanks.

1. So k&n not worth it due to oil, so either BMW or one of those dry performance filters? I've never heard the MAF fouling risk due to an oiled filter but it makes sense.

2. I was looking at videos of the muffler delete and would rather keep the sound quiet so I'll skip this. I guess I'll just stick to the stock setup.

3. B4's are what I'm getting. I actually bought a set of non-sport springs and will be swapping them with my sport springs, plus doing a couple other mods to get a few more cm's of ground clearance. (People please don't hate on this, I have good reason to want as much clearance as I can get out of my car. I don't drive like a mad man on twisty roads anyway - thats what my sport bike is for - and I don't think the non-sport springs plus B4's will be that much worse than the sport springs with shitty worn out shocks.

4. Good to know!

5. So with the 3 stage manifold and a charcoal filter delete plus the self tune, is there anything else that could add some extra performance? I assume without a custom tune a completely new intake / exhaust won't help much, so I should probably just save my money after those things?

[Taskmaster]

Do it, I did it just this weekend (as well as the valvetronic sensor)

[W37V]

Originally Posted by mattoak

Thanks.

1. So k&n not worth it due to oil, so either BMW or one of those dry performance filters? I've never heard the MAF fouling risk due to an oiled filter but it makes sense.

2. I was looking at videos of the muffler delete and would rather keep the sound quiet so I'll skip this. I guess I'll just stick to the stock setup.

3. B4's are what I'm getting. I actually bought a set of non-sport springs and will be swapping them with my sport springs, plus doing a couple other mods to get a few more cm's of ground clearance. (People please don't hate on this, I have good reason to want as much clearance as I can get out of my car. I don't drive like a mad man on twisty roads anyway - thats what my sport bike is for - and I don't think the non-sport springs plus B4's will be that much worse than the sport springs with shitty worn out shocks.

4. Good to know!

5. So with the 3 stage manifold and a charcoal filter delete plus the self tune, is there anything else that could add some extra performance? I assume without a custom tune a completely new intake / exhaust won't help much, so I should probably just save my money after those things?

1. Yes
2. Yes, they can be loud.
3.
4.
5. So the list of performance upgrades that give you more HP on N52 engines is: 3im or N54 intake, headers, exhaust, and a tune. Charcoal delete, dinan intake mod, revo hose might do something, but who knows. We are believers here, so we believe they do. Go figure If you want more power than what above provides, you will need to go FI way (supercharger, or eventually BPC turbo).

[Mavus]

Originally Posted by mattoak

Thanks.

1. So k&n not worth it due to oil, so either BMW or one of those dry performance filters? I've never heard the MAF fouling risk due to an oiled filter but it makes sense.

2. I was looking at videos of the muffler delete and would rather keep the sound quiet so I'll skip this. I guess I'll just stick to the stock setup.

3. B4's are what I'm getting. I actually bought a set of non-sport springs and will be swapping them with my sport springs, plus doing a couple other mods to get a few more cm's of ground clearance. (People please don't hate on this, I have good reason to want as much clearance as I can get out of my car. I don't drive like a mad man on twisty roads anyway - thats what my sport bike is for - and I don't think the non-sport springs plus B4's will be that much worse than the sport springs with shitty worn out shocks.

4. Good to know!

5. So with the 3 stage manifold and a charcoal filter delete plus the self tune, is there anything else that could add some extra performance? I assume without a custom tune a completely new intake / exhaust won't help much, so I should probably just save my money after those things?

If you plan on keeping her another 3y do it. Headers would give you nice power bump with tune. Supersprint are awesome but there are other options and there is no impact to reliability. The exhaust would get louder but should be perfectly fine with stock exhaust so you won't wake up the dead.

[4foothill]

Originally Posted by hassmaschine

since you have MSV70, swap the manifold and do the flash yourself. Pick up a $40 BDM100 clone, take the 330i file and change the powerclass byte. You'll get the 40hp gain without the added cost of an aftermarket tune. You can even clone your DME onto a used one and keep the stock one as a backup.

Definitely giving this a go. Is your thread about cloning your DME the best source on how to do this? Also since I have the MSV80 does it mean I'll need to find someone with a 330i that will let me pull their DME or can I dump it over ODB and flash it to my spare DME with the BDM?

[hassmaschine]

you can't really DIY with MSV80. well, you can - but you need something like the OFT to flash it, and since I don't have MSV80, I haven't spent a ton of time working on the locations of the settings you need to change. I am close to being able to map most of it out but I took a break to work on some other things.

you can't copy the 330i DME directly to MSV80. While most of the maps are similar, they are all in different locations and in a different byte order (little endian vs big endian). MSV70 uses a PPC MPC563 CPU, while MSV80 uses a tri-core CPU. It's like reading the same book but it's in a different language.

Unless you are super comfortable with hex editing and working with binary files, with MSV80 you're best off just getting a tune from AA or BPC.

[W37V]

Originally Posted by TheAxiom

Do it, I did it just this weekend (as well as the valvetronic sensor)

How does it drive now? Do you feel the power increase? Did you get the new BPC tune as well?

[Taskmaster]

Originally Posted by W37V

How does it drive now? Do you feel the power increase? Did you get the new BPC tune as well?

I have the BPC tune already, but for the single stage (I need to request a new tune) but the car feels a LOT better. The valvetronic failed, so the fuel economy was piss-poor, the car would tremble at idle and felt like it was stalling when I shut it off - performance was decent, mainly because of the tune, though half the time the car wouldn't rev beyond 6500RPM.

Now it idles with uncanny smoothness, it purrs along the road at 85+mph and 35mpg, and wind it out and there is a noticeable increase in power up top and a little down low. Midrange seems a little flat though, likely due to a tune that isn't optimized for this manifold.

[mattoak]

Originally Posted by hassmaschine

since you have MSV70, swap the manifold and do the flash yourself. Pick up a $40 BDM100 clone, take the 330i file and change the powerclass byte. You'll get the 40hp gain without the added cost of an aftermarket tune. You can even clone your DME onto a used one and keep the stock one as a backup.

Where do I get the 330i file?

Also, I can only find the dinan intake mod kit, not a DIY mod. Does this exist? Is it just a copy of their kit?

And lastly (for now), if I reflashed the DME with a 330i file, do you think there would be any benefit of also adding a powerbox? Assuming it can be found for relatively cheap

[hassmaschine]

if you get the BDM100 unit (or another way to read/write) I can send one to you.

no, I don't think the PBX is worth it. I wouldn't use one if it were free..

[blindrooster]

IMO you're better off paying for a tune from BPC or AA.

[stewey]

Originally Posted by TheAxiom

I have the BPC tune already, but for the single stage (I need to request a new tune) but the car feels a LOT better. The valvetronic failed, so the fuel economy was piss-poor, the car would tremble at idle and felt like it was stalling when I shut it off - performance was decent, mainly because of the tune, though half the time the car wouldn't rev beyond 6500RPM.

Now it idles with uncanny smoothness, it purrs along the road at 85+mph and 35mpg, and wind it out and there is a noticeable increase in power up top and a little down low. Midrange seems a little flat though, likely due to a tune that isn't optimized for this manifold.

Hey Axiom, not to thread jack, but can you be more specific about what you replaced? I have the trembling idle and feels like it's stalling when you turn it off thing. Are you talking about the ESS? Something else?

Thanks!

[Taskmaster]

Originally Posted by stewey

Hey Axiom, not to thread jack, but can you be more specific about what you replaced? I have the trembling idle and feels like it's stalling when you turn it off thing. Are you talking about the ESS? Something else?

Thanks!

Yes, I replaced the eccentric shaft sensor while I upgraded the intake manifold.
For me (on both of my cars) the idle would sometimes hiccup, and it 'vibrated' more (could be felt through the steering wheel) When shutting it off, it would be more 'harsh' than normal - almost like it was stalling. The fuel economy was poor, low to mid 20s on the highway while I babied it.

Check the sensor for oil, I was able to clean mine out and the oil didn't come back, but the sensor was already failing at that point. Also, it will throw shadow codes that you can pick up with a scanner.


As for the OP - no reason not to do it. Buy the tune and install the manifold and enjoy a quicker car with no downsides.

[raleighBahn]

If you have any reservation about whether to tune an older car or not, you could get a compression and leak down test and see the motor health. If you find any of the cylinders are way off, probably not worth throwing more money in. On the flip side, if it looks healthy then have fun. The time to tune is usually post warranty, so if your motor is still healthy then go for it.

Another thing you can do is an oil analysis. Order a free kit from Blackstone lab and send an oil sample in after your next change. For $28 it will tell you quite a bit about the engine health (presence of metals, coolant, etc). http://m.blackstone-labs.com/OrderTestKit