Mod options ?

[Suffolk944]

Having decided I can't really bring myself to sell the car at the moment my thoughts have turned to plans B and C. Plan B is to plough some more money into modding her further. For a long while have thought about getting (even) more power but shifting up to the next level of comfortably over 300bhp is going to get very expensive. Also as am unlikely to end up at any track days am not sure whether I will get much benefit from an extra say 40bhp other than in willy-waving at a dyno day.

So am thinking maybe the money would be better spent on KW suspension, big black brakes and maybe a MAF to make her that much more enjoyable/capable in "real life" day to day driving. What do my fellow modders reckon ?

and yes I know there are those who will tell me that to mod anything away from the unimpeachable perfection of the original is blasphemy, but I have long since commited that cardinal sin and am beyond redemption in this matter []

 

[944 man]

I agree; but Id suggest looking into the cost of a replacement ECU (completely seperate, not a piggy-back device that interferes with the DME signals), perhaps one running on a MAP sensor. You should be able to get one fitted and mapped for not very much more than the MAF kits that Ive seen. Thisll see more power as well as far better running, killing two birds with one stone and it will cost a relatively similar amount.

 

[John Sims]

You would be very lucky to get a workable stand alone solution installed, running and mapped by a competent professional for under £2500 - £3000. It might see you 50 or 60 bhp if you are lucky. Studying Ricks site will confirm this to be the case.

Stand alone is far more of an investment that just the box. Years ago Pectel offered me a stand alone unit for free but I couldn't afford to use it. If you can get a workable base map you will still need hours on the dyno to optimise it. You also end up in territory where, if it goes wrong, there are very few people who can help you and any that can are likely to be at a premium.

If I were you I'd tick the following boxes:-

Medium blacks with good pads, fluid and braided hoses - Big Blacks are only better if you track the car and kill brakes - if you have never had brake fade you don't need bigger brakes.
KW suspension.
Bigger injectors.
Electronic Boost Controller and good dual port wastegate
Remap to optimies the above

Job done.

MAP is brilliant because you can blow off boost pipes and keep going. The Link system I have is fine now I have learnt how to work with it. Unfortunately it is obsolete (poor manufacturing quality and people not knowing how to work with it). Aside the boost pipe issue it has no advantage over MAF so you could look at a MAF kit. A good system will piggy back IMHO as it is only replicating the signal the ECU would have recived from the barn door.

You could go for a bigger turbo but, if you have a 26/8 I wouldn't bother assuming it is within its service life. A 26/6 is worth replacing as it wont maintain 1 bar boost above 5000 rpm

 

[TTM]

I entirely agree with upgrading the suspension first (KW, additionnal ARB brackets, solid mounts, upper and lower strut braces, bigger ARBs, etc).
By then you will certainly find your current level of power far more enjoyable with a more modern, more refined chassis set up than even with fresh M030 stuff, and probably feel your car underpowered and begin considering spending silly amounts []

 

[Suffolk944]

Thanks for the replies chaps.

Are medium blacks the "standard" Mo30 250bhp brakes ?

I have the EBC and DP wastegate so thats fine and dandy as maybe is the 26/8. Will increasing the injector size without changing the turbo offer an appreciable gain ?

 

[John Sims]

No gain at all aside potentially being able to run higher boost without going lean and blowing your head gasket (at best).

You probably have Medium Blacks. Are your disks 32mm thick?

 

[edh]

I think you're going to need a bigger turbo to get appreciably more power - and that'll be the point to go with a vitesse setup. I can't see much value in a power hike on a road car though

Agree with the KW's - only driven them for a short distance on the road, but they do a good job in making the car feel lighter & more modern.

 

[944 man]

ORIGINAL: John Sims

You would be very lucky to get a workable stand alone solution installed, running and mapped by a competent professional for under £2500 - £3000. It might see you 50 or 60 bhp if you are lucky. Studying Ricks site will confirm this to be the case.

I cant argue because Ive been away from the cars for so long, however: Id expect to find a suitable ECU for under £1,000. A SimTek or Emerald ECU will certainly be up to the job and I believe that you can even trim each injector with the SimTek. Turn-key MS is a viable option thatll come in well under budget too and Id expect any decent mapper (Simon Roe, Andy Forrest, Bob Rawle etc) to be able to map any for £250. Its hardy a complicated car, after all.

In my, doubtless contentious, opinion, people seem to always look to the same tired places when looking to improve their cars. Usually America and frequently Lindsey Racing. These sources didnt exist when I owned my car, so Im looking at the problem now with a clean sheet. I stand by my original opinion, which was that you can replace the archaic DME and AFM with a thirty years newer ECU, which will give manifold benefits, for little more than the cost of a proprietary MAF solution. Of course, I might be wrong: but simply because my opinion differs with those expressed on an enthusiast site doesnt make me so...

I see your point about the base map. Mr Wilk has assured me that he can extract the original values from a 951 DME though and I believe that theyd be a suitable place to start with a standard capacity engine. You have to trust your mapper of course; and the people Ive mentioned above are some of, if not the, best.

With regards to turbochargers: Id be looking for a better and smaller turbo, rather than a bigger one..... []

Simon

 

[edh]

ORIGINAL: 944 man

With regards to turbochargers: Id be looking for a better and smaller turbo, rather than a bigger one..... []

Simon

I agree - might be an advantage in terms of making it a nicer road car, but it's not going to give you the extra power is it? it's a bit of a trade off - less so with a larger BB turbo I guess.

 

[944 man]

I was thinking about performance rather than manners Ed. A Mitsubishi TD05 20G hybrid will be good for over 400bhp and will be making over one bar of boost by 2500rpm. Thats able to pump far more air than the original KKK but with far better spool up too.

Simon

 

[Diver944]

ORIGINAL: Suffolk944

as am unlikely to end up at any track days am not sure whether I will get much benefit from an extra say 40bhp other than in willy-waving at a dyno day.

You're right. You already have plenty of power and don't really 'need' anymore (tho it's not stopped some of us [8|])

Big Blacks are certainly not necessary on a road car, the medium blacks you already have are more than up to the task if you keep them in fine fettle with fresh fuid.

My money would go on the KW's. The cars I have been in with KW fitted are just so much more comfortable, yet also so much more sporty than any other 944s I've been in

 

[edh]

ORIGINAL: 944 man

I was thinking about performance rather than manners Ed. A Mitsubishi TD05 20G hybrid will be good for over 400bhp and will be making over one bar of boost by 2500rpm. Thats able to pump far more air than the original KKK but with far better spool up too.

Simon

If it's able to pump more air, sounds like "bigger" to me []

 

[944 man]

I knew that I should have placed "smaller" in inverted commas... []

 

[944Turbo]

ORIGINAL: 944 man

ORIGINAL: John Sims

You would be very lucky to get a workable stand alone solution installed, running and mapped by a competent professional for under £2500 - £3000. It might see you 50 or 60 bhp if you are lucky. Studying Ricks site will confirm this to be the case.

I cant argue because Ive been away from the cars for so long, however: Id expect to find a suitable ECU for under £1,000.  A SimTek or Emerald ECU will certainly be up to the job and I believe that you can even trim each injector with the SimTek.  Turn-key MS is a viable option thatll come in well under budget too and Id expect any decent mapper (Simon Roe, Andy Forrest, Bob Rawle etc) to be able to map any for £250.  Its hardy a complicated car, after all.

In my, doubtless contentious, opinion, people seem to always look to the same tired places when looking to improve their cars.  Usually America and frequently Lindsey Racing.  These sources didnt exist when I owned my car, so Im looking at the problem now with a clean sheet.  I stand by my original opinion, which was that you can replace the archaic DME and AFM with a thirty years newer ECU, which will give manifold benefits, for little more than the cost of a proprietary MAF solution.  Of course, I might be wrong: but simply because my opinion differs with those expressed on an enthusiast site doesnt make me so...

I see your point about the base map.  Mr Wilk has assured me that he can extract the original values from a 951 DME though and I believe that theyd be a suitable place to start with a standard capacity engine.  You have to trust your mapper of course; and the people Ive mentioned above are some of, if not the, best.

With regards to turbochargers: Id be looking for a better and smaller turbo, rather than a bigger one..... []

Simon

Experience has proved otherwise, the first round of dyno days there were some custom mapped cars (by a the then respected specialist) up against some cars with the same mods and off the shelf chips. You would expect the custom mapped cars to come out on top, but this proved to be incorrect - the one size fits all off the shelf chips did the business. I have concluded there are some little mapping tricks to get the best from these engines. I have since seen it happen with other standalone solutions being a little dissapointing in back to back tests with other cars. Rick got his to produce the goods in the end but spent a long time on the dyno (therefore cash) and road to get his car to where it is now. I have chosen the piggyback massaging of the original ecu. I dont doubt that it is possible to get better results with a standalone ECU but it will take lots of dyno time to get there.

Tony

 

[John Sims]

And Rick has done two head gaskets and Fen completely lunched his engine on stand alone so there are very real and expensive issues if you don't get it right. Even the, seeming god like, Wayne has something of a history of killing head gaskets and worse.

On the plus side Ricks engine runs beautifully now with Rolls Royce like tick over and the ability to pull at revs where I need to go down two more gears. And it is far more efficient than our engines as he has sequential injector control. 400+ bhp from a 2.5 is always going to make you smile but it took a great deal more than just stand alone engine management.

Tony is right there were some exceptional chips available - Guru Racing proved to be excellent under group test. Danno who produced them (in America [8|]) was a 944 Turbo nut. It would seem he spent far too long in the dyno cell and not long enough on his business and familly life. Those of us that got his chips were very lucky people.

 

[944Turbo]

The JMG chips also worked well in Davids car and the vittesse ones work well and offer the benefit of massaging with the piggyback, the maxhp and promax ones are also reputed to be good but not tried them. I would guess they had a good look at the code in the ones Danno used to produce.
Tony

 

[sawood12]

The one and only reason for going standalone ECU is if you want to take advantage of some feature that only standalone ECU can provide - e.g. water injection. The Vitesse MAF with Piggyback gives you 99% of the benefit of a standalone and is 100% off the shelf plug and play. In it's latest varient it can provide ignition timing via MAP and fuel metering via MAF and provide features such as multi maps for different fuels (i.e. E85) and I think boost control and other features are in the pipeline. All this for under £2k. There is no standalone on the market today can offer anywhere near that in terms of purchase cost, set up cost, ease of installation, safety and end results. If all you want is MAF/MAP then there is no point at all going stand-alone. If you want coil-over ignition (though wouldn't be surprised if John cracked this too), water injection and other bells and whistles then stand-alone is your only option.

Back on topic though. I'm pretty much where you are John. I can't speak highly enough of the BB's and KW (though not cheap - but these GAZ units may prove pretty good and more cost effective) and in reality they will allow you to go faster on track than another 50bhp easily. My only advice is maybe instead of the BB's why not consider BoxsterS/CaymanS setup. They are cheaper, lighter, and more than man enough for the task. If I were doing a brake upgrade again this is the route i'd go. Or alternatively if you want to willy wave go for the GT3mk2 6-pot setup!!

 

[John Sims]

The advantage of the Big Blacks is they are pretty much a bolt on swap with the M030 hubs. This may not be the case with Boxster / GT3 variants.

 

[333pg333]

On anything after the '86 model with MO30, they're (6 pots) not bolt on at all. Don't worry I've looked already. The Medium Blacks should be fine for now. They are on the 928 S4 and that's plenty heavier.
I would agree with Scott in saying the VR stuff is good straight out of the box and for these circumstances sound like they'd be fine. You could get a LINKG3+ with harness for about $2600US (I believe) which has a base map. This will open up your options for the future should you choose to modify further.

 

[sawood12]

ORIGINAL: John Sims

The advantage of the Big Blacks is they are pretty much a bolt on swap with the M030 hubs. This may not be the case with Boxster / GT3 variants.

That's true but adaptors are available for the modern calipers as well, even for the much bigger GT3 stuff.