[Vince S]

Hey all,

This is my first official post here, besides the other post in the classifieds. I am quite new E9X but certainly not new to BMWs and oil cooling. I have in the past contributed a lot of R&D work into putting a kit for the E46, ie benchmarking, measuring flow-rate, oil pressure drop across the coolers and through each cooler line (length of lines are important), air flow pressure drop as measured from front to back of the cooler fins in relation to BTU/hr, track/street testing, controlled environment testing etc. Pitot tubes, pressure sensors, flow-rate sensors, K,J type thermocouples, RTDs, thermistors. You name it, I probably have used it.

I dig a little further on aftermarket oil cooler kits. Everyone seems to be offering Setrab oil coolers, which is a good choice. Setrab has always been the OEM choice of top performance cars.

I have worked quite closely with Setrab as well, hence very familiar with their line. I have used/seen Setrab SLM, COM series and even customized coolers made for BMW WTCC cars that probably will never set foot in the US market.

From what I can tell just by looking at the pictures, Dinan is offering the so called Setrab 625. VK has the same Setrab 625. AR has the Setrab 619 on their site and lately updated to a Setrab 915 in a groupbuy somewhere. And of course there is the table that compares the surface area, size etc of each kit. Not quite the BTU/hr (or rate of temperature drop) at what air velocity, data logging from actual track or controlled environment testing or the entry and exit (louvre design) flow rate/pressure information I was looking for. But that's fine, since setting a testing environment can be costly and time consuming.

Still, my question is what makes one kit better than the other? Is it really the shroud entry flow design and/or the angle of the louvres? Or that maybe one kit has a more polished internal hose fitting to enhance oil flow?

Would like to hear honest, unbiased comments from owners who are currently using any of the kit.

Thanks for reading.

[JoeyFiasco]

I'm not even going to pretend to be knowledgeable. I would say their decisions were based on the quality/availability of the Setrab cores over other manufacturers, and whether they planned on replacing the OEM intercooler for a larger single (like Dinan and VK) or supplement the OEM (like AR) by adding a second. Hopefully I got the breakdown correctly on the vendors.

Question for you though, you mentioned you worked with Setrab cores before. Do you have any experience with the 625 and 619/915 cores?

[2wheelsrbetter]

I'm in the process of installing an aftermarket cooler. My car was missing the factory cooler from an accident, so I was given a clean slate to choose a model. I won't be tracking the car so it sounds like the oem would be fine, but wanted to upgrade slightly. I spoke with Setrab this week and they recommended the usual suspects: 625, 915, and 920. They said the 915 would be fine and was the most economincal, more expensive for them to build taller cores like the 625.
I couldn't see a difference between kits as far as performance/cooling ability, and simply want to keep the car under the avg temp. I went with a B&M Racing unit about the same dimensions as the 915 but about 1/2 the price, still bigger and better than stock. Vince - do you know btu/hr specs on the stock unit? I think the one I got is rated 15,000-30,000 if I remember correctly. I need to make mounting brackets for it, and plan on fabricating an intake shround also. Probably won't be for a month or more, so everyone please don't ride me for results... Also Vince - what was your change of mind with the 920 if I can ask?

[twinturbopg]

bump this thread...I want to know if anybody has any insight about this.