[sear]

With big single turbo kits just around the corner the N54 platform is likely to be challenged in many new and exciting ways. And although big power can bring big excitment, IMO it can also bring many risks.

From one member's perspective, it appears that the general risks of tuning on the N54 platform to date have been so minimized that reliability isn't really even a big concern for the majority of the tuning/ bolt on options availble to date. A scenario that IMO isn't really the norm accross all platforms espcially when you consider the $/hp cost of a FBO + tune N54 overall.

I'm guessing that the big single game is going to be very new to the general N54 community in that many of the new platform limits are really going to be unknown until adequate amounts of testing can be done with each of the configurations being asked about under a variety of conditions. This new teritory is inherently going to come with some risks. This IMO will just take some time to get clear answers to the many platform limits questions that keep coming up in every big single thread. If you are a consumer that needs predictabiliy to consider a purchase. The good news is the revolution of the platform is in full swing and much more about where the N54 can go will be known VERY soon

What are your thoughts on the subject of N54 tuning risks pre big single ERA vs post big single ERA?

Sorry for the separate post on this topic , but watching history unfold with the Vishnu setup in these last few weeks I couldn't help but think that a few posters were still considering how they might take their car in for warranty service with a big single on it

[Beemw335]

Every engine has its limits, the first people to push the cars are you to find thise limits, its risky but someones gotta do it..

[wren57]

I don't understand this thread. Is there a question associated? Of course there are risks when venturing into new territory (whether it be mods, finding America, going to the Moon, or eating a 2 week old deviled egg). Thankfully we have very smart people on the cutting edge who can work out the kinks before delivering the product to the customer base.

[sear]

Originally Posted by wren57

I don't understand this thread. Is there a question associated? Of course there are risks when venturing into new territory (whether it be mods, finding America, going to the Moon, or eating a 2 week old deviled egg). Thankfully we have very smart people on the cutting edge who can work out the kinks before delivering the product to the customer base.

Its as arbitrary a post as 85% of the posts in this section.

Seriously, the intention of this post was to discuss the relative differneces in mod risk with a big single vs not. This may sound obvious, but spend a few hours reading all of the recent dyno, road test, and airstrip threads and read the questions posed in those threads. I agree that the increased risks should be a no brainer, but my interpretation of many of the questions seemed to some from a perspective of the big single just being another bolt on. Sorry if I offended your quest to consider eating that 2 week old deviled egg, LOL. Those things are nasty even on the first day.

Also note that many who read Shiv and HPFs updates understand what prototype and prototype testing means in terms of longer term riliability and permutations of other testing factors. I'm willing to bet that all don't. So questions like:
Whats the most HP that can be had on 91 octane only? OR How will the xi transfer case hold up or 6AT hold up? Can I run a big single with one meth nozzle? Can I still run RFTs with a big single? ...
All can have expert opinion answers about the limits of the other system components, but unless they've done serious engineering analysis on each of those components the vast majority of these kinds of questions won't have true low risk answers until a reasonable sample of testing hours in put in on multiple sample cars under a variety of operating conditions.

[Carl Morris]

IMO a big understressed turbo makes you less likely to break stuff than when you're pushing a small turbo(s) to absolute maximum. When you're underturboed you're usually tuning to the ragged edge and launching as hard as you possibly can looking for that extra tenth. With a big turbo you run a more conservative tune and just add a couple more psi if you need to go faster. Sure, you'll eventually break it if you go far enough, but I think it's a less breakage prone mindset.

[MilehighM3]

IMO, all mods will have a higher risk of a failure when depending on piggy back tunes to run them vs a proper custom flash. I know this will open the flood gates for flames and fan boys, but it's the truth. Until you have full control of the dme internally, you can not properly remove the associated risks with a 3rd party control unit. Especially one wired in full of various resistors and signal modifying components. For those who are about to start hating, How many high horse power cars do you see long term running piggys? All of the S/C M cars are flashed. Other makes and models with high power outputs use either flash tunes or stand alone systems such as a AEM EMS, Motec, etc.
That being said, a stand alone for this type of car is probably near impossible. With all of the injector variations, vanos, can bus etc that this engine has associated with it. Customs flashes are nearing the real world user just around the corner. Why run a really extensive list of mods with a bandaid for engine management?
One more thing for those who are curious, at the moment I do run a piggyback system. Probably one of the least popular systems, but it's enough for me and offers good power output as well as some versatility. Some day soon I'll update it, but I've been running it for 2 years with no issues. I'm not about the 1/4 mile or trap speeds, I perfer mountain roads and road coarses. Which is more of what BMW's are made for.

Let's try to keep this thread as civilized as possible...

[OpenFlash]

wowza

[kenneth]

Anything past stock is risky, to me there's no big divide between upgraded twins and big singles, they are both in the risky zone. At the lack of good example, say upgraded twins causes some sort of failure in 5% of cases, whereas a big single either fail less (say 3%) or fail more (say 7%). In the end, it's all in the same territory.....If you are worried of failure, neither is better than the other, IMHO!!!

[sear]

Originally Posted by Bmw135er

IMO, all mods will have a higher risk of a failure when depending on piggy back tunes to run them vs a proper custom flash. I know this will open the flood gates for flames and fan boys, but it's the truth. Until you have full control of the dme internally, you can not properly remove the associated risks with a 3rd party control unit. Especially one wired in full of various resistors and signal modifying components. For those who are about to start hating, How many high horse power cars do you see long term running piggys? All of the S/C M cars are flashed. Other makes and models with high power outputs use either flash tunes or stand alone systems such as a AEM EMS, Motec, etc.
That being said, a stand alone for this type of car is probably near impossible. With all of the injector variations, vanos, can bus etc that this engine has associated with it. Customs flashes are nearing the real world user just around the corner. Why run a really extensive list of mods with a bandaid for engine management?
One more thing for those who are curious, at the moment I do run a piggyback system. Probably one of the least popular systems, but it's enough for me and offers good power output as well as some versatility. Some day soon I'll update it, but I've been running it for 2 years with no issues. I'm not about the 1/4 mile or trap speeds, I perfer mountain roads and road coarses. Which is more of what BMW's are made for.

Let's try to keep this thread as civilized as possible...

Simple answer to why to run a piggy is for the near term, "because its the only game in town and so far it definately seems to be working" In the longer run there might be some other options, but thats not likely until there are some new HW released for the flash tuners to work with.

[sear]

Originally Posted by kenneth

Anything past stock is risky, to me there's no big divide between upgraded twins and big singles, they are both in the risky zone. At the lack of good example, say upgraded twins causes some sort of failure in 5% of cases, whereas a big single either fail less (say 3%) or fail more (say 7%). In the end, it's all in the same territory.....If you are worried of failure, neither is better than the other, IMHO!!!

I'm with you as long as the big singles stay mildly tuned (roughly where vishnu has their setup now), but it seems hard to believe that ~20psi is where these kits are going to end up being run once they are released. Sure 20psi on a better breathing big single can be easier on the motor than 20psi upgraded twins, but the real question is what about at 25psi, 30psi, or more? Many more unknowns IMO, but awesome that this new territory is now being charted.

[OpenFlash]

Originally Posted by sear

Simple answer to why to run a piggy is for the near term, "because its the only game in town and so far it definately seems to be working" In the longer run there might be some other options, but thats not likely until there are some new HW released for the flash tuners to work with.

A Procede is doing things that I don't see a reflash ever doing with regards to single turbo tuning.

[themyst]

Originally Posted by sear

Simple answer to why to run a piggy is for the near term, "because its the only game in town and so far it definately seems to be working" In the longer run there might be some other options, but thats not likely until there are some new HW released for the flash tuners to work with.

It's like any other platform, piggybacks come first, then comes handheld flash tuning, then comes custom flash tuning (ATP/ATR), then comes OpenECU. This platform will be no different.

With respect to piggybacks on stock turbos, both major options have been proven to be more than adequate for them, which account for 99.5% of all tuned N54s out there. Are they the best options? No.

And it's only a matter of time someone comes out with a similarly designed single turbo kit and get Cobb to tune it.

[MilehighM3]

Originally Posted by themyst

It's like any other platform, piggybacks come first, then comes handheld flash tuning, then comes custom flash tuning (ATP/ATR), then comes OpenECU. This platform will be no different.

With respect to piggybacks on stock turbos, both major options have been proven to be more than adequate for them, which account for 99.5% of all tuned N54s out there. Are they the best options? No.

And it's only a matter of time someone comes out with a similarly designed single turbo kit and get Cobb to tune it.

Exactly. I'm curious to see the numbers and power curves from the Cobb RB turbo tuning. Unless I've missed them? I don't keep up with it that well, but they should do well with it...

[themyst]

Originally Posted by Bmw135er

Exactly. I'm curious to see the numbers and power curves from the Cobb RB turbo tuning. Unless I've missed them? I don't keep up with it that well, but they should do well with it...

They are doing well Results will be coming out very shortly.

[pentaxis]

Originally Posted by Bmw135er

IMO, all mods will have a higher risk of a failure when depending on piggy back tunes to run them vs a proper custom flash. I know this will open the flood gates for flames and fan boys, but it's the truth. Until you have full control of the dme internally, you can not properly remove the associated risks with a 3rd party control unit. Especially one wired in full of various resistors and signal modifying components. For those who are about to start hating, How many high horse power cars do you see long term running piggys? All of the S/C M cars are flashed. Other makes and models with high power outputs use either flash tunes or stand alone systems such as a AEM EMS, Motec, etc.
That being said, a stand alone for this type of car is probably near impossible. With all of the injector variations, vanos, can bus etc that this engine has associated with it. Customs flashes are nearing the real world user just around the corner. Why run a really extensive list of mods with a bandaid for engine management?
One more thing for those who are curious, at the moment I do run a piggyback system. Probably one of the least popular systems, but it's enough for me and offers good power output as well as some versatility. Some day soon I'll update it, but I've been running it for 2 years with no issues. I'm not about the 1/4 mile or trap speeds, I perfer mountain roads and road coarses. Which is more of what BMW's are made for.

Let's try to keep this thread as civilized as possible...

Datalogs of every pertinent engine health metric point squarely to the fact that you obviously don't know what you are talking about.

[GmoBmw]

Originally Posted by Bmw135er

IMO, all mods will have a higher risk of a failure when depending on piggy back tunes to run them vs a proper custom flash. I know this will open the flood gates for flames and fan boys, but it's the truth. Until you have full control of the dme internally, you can not properly remove the associated risks with a 3rd party control unit. Especially one wired in full of various resistors and signal modifying components. For those who are about to start hating, How many high horse power cars do you see long term running piggys? All of the S/C M cars are flashed. Other makes and models with high power outputs use either flash tunes or stand alone systems such as a AEM EMS, Motec, etc.
That being said, a stand alone for this type of car is probably near impossible. With all of the injector variations, vanos, can bus etc that this engine has associated with it. Customs flashes are nearing the real world user just around the corner. Why run a really extensive list of mods with a bandaid for engine management?
One more thing for those who are curious, at the moment I do run a piggyback system. Probably one of the least popular systems, but it's enough for me and offers good power output as well as some versatility. Some day soon I'll update it, but I've been running it for 2 years with no issues. I'm not about the 1/4 mile or trap speeds, I perfer mountain roads and road coarses. Which is more of what BMW's are made for.

Let's try to keep this thread as civilized as possible...

Um... I think the highest HP 335i is a Piggyback...

[MilehighM3]

Originally Posted by pentaxis

Datalogs of every pertinent engine health metric point squarely to the fact that you obviously don't know what you are talking about.

Sure they do, those logs are processed signals by the piggy back. Not always an exact representation of the actual timing curve, boost curve etc. an example would be using the procede to display boost in the instrument cluster. It's a calculate boost display, not actual boost. Think I'm wrong? Ask anyone at a high altitude that's used an actual gauge to monitor boost and compare it to the procede. All you get is a display of te boost target, and the log will reflect this exactly.

[rader1]

Originally Posted by pentaxis

Datalogs of every pertinent engine health metric point squarely to the fact that you obviously don't know what you are talking about.

So, how's timing on cylinders 2-6 look on the datalog of a piggyback?

[themyst]

AFR, boost and "actual ignition advance" are calculations, not true values outputted by the DME on piggybacks. The other stuff like IAT, DME ignition, etc are read through CANbus or the sensor itself.

There is other cool stuff Cobb added as monitors in the recent beta like cylinder temps. Haven't bothered datalogging lately but I've seen them available.

[OpenFlash]

Originally Posted by Bmw135er

Sure they do, those logs are processed signals by the piggy back. Not always an exact representation of the actual timing curve, boost curve etc. an example would be using the procede to display boost in the instrument cluster. It's a calculate boost display, not actual boost. Think I'm wrong? Ask anyone at a high altitude that's used an actual gauge to monitor boost and compare it to the procede. All you get is a display of te boost target, and the log will reflect this exactly.

That's untrue. Procede displays actual charge pipe pressure measured by thr MAP sensor. Not a calculation. Not sure where you are getting your info.

Boost target is displayed in the logs as "Boost Control Setpoint". If they look the same, it's because the boost control is that effective.

[sear]

Originally Posted by Bmw135er

Sure they do, those logs are processed signals by the piggy back. Not always an exact representation of the actual timing curve, boost curve etc. an example would be using the procede to display boost in the instrument cluster. It's a calculate boost display, not actual boost. Think I'm wrong? Ask anyone at a high altitude that's used an actual gauge to monitor boost and compare it to the procede. All you get is a display of te boost target, and the log will reflect this exactly.

Just a guess on my part, but I believe the difference seen at altitude are for boost guages that are calibrated to 0psi for base atmospheric pressure. At the local dyno when I ran with their boost guage it read nearly 3psi higher than my V5 logs. This happens to be the same amount that base atmospheric pressure is here at 6k ft. The MAP sensor used by both the V5 and the DME is reading absolute pressure in the intake mani.

[OpenFlash]

Originally Posted by sear

Just a guess on my part, but I believe the difference seen at altitude are for boost guages that are calibrated to 0psi for base atmospheric pressure. At the local dyno when I ran with their boost guage it read nearly 3psi higher than my V5 logs. This happens to be the same amount that base atmospheric pressure is here at 6k ft. The MAP sensor used by both the V5 and the DME is reading absolute pressure in the intake mani.

That is absolutely correct.