More Power Cap’n
The local BMW club arranged a Dyno day down at York Auto which is just down the street from GeorgeCo world headquarters. Now that the GeorgeCo E30 has a fresh coat of paint, we figured it was time to dial up some power. Since good tuning starts with a good baseline, we backed the E30 on to the Dyno and made a couple of pulls to see what we had. The GeorgeCo E30 left the factory in Regensberg 22 years ago with about 170 hp at the crank. Assuming a 15% driveline loss, that should translate into about 144 hp at the wheels. Given that this engine has over 230K miles and very little modification, we were hoping to get 135 hp on the dyno. The only mods are a cold air intake (which really doesn’t help the E30 but looks good); a header; and a “performance” chip from a reputable supplier who shall remain nameless.
After a couple of runs to calibrate the Dyno, the results came in at only 125 hp. That’s a 14% loss from new and a bit disappointing. It turns out the air/fuel ratio (AFR) was way out of tolerance. In naturally aspirated engines powered, maximum power is frequently reached at AFRs ranging from 12.5 – 13.3:1 or lambda of 0.850 – 0.901. The AFR runs rich to 5000 RPM then lean to redline. The risk in running too rich is that the combustion chamber is washed by the excess gasoline, effectively cooling the burn (reducing efficiency) but also washing away the lubrication protecting the cylinder walls. As it leans out, it could damage the engine because of pre-detonation.
What’s the solution? The WAR Chip by Miller Peformance. WAR stands for Write and Remap. It is an infinitely rewritable chip solution for ECU tuning. It can be tuned from a laptop PC via USB and can store 4 separate tunes that can be switched on the fly without a laptop. We installed the chip following the simple instructions that were included and turned the car over to York Auto to dial in the AFR and put it back on the dyno. Initial results were promising with the preloaded tune from Miller Performance getting up to 135 whp out of the box.
Then when we broke the intake rocker on #6 cylinder and put a halt to progress. Since we have to take the timing belt and cam gear off to get to the rocker, it’s going to be a while before the GeorgeCo E30 is back on the track.
Window Tint and Dent Masters
GeorgeCo has been taking a couple of days off ahead of the Easter Holiday here in the U.S., using the free time to catch up on some garage and basement cleaning (more room for spare parts and tires) as well as taking care of a few odds and ends that GeorgeCo can’t get done when working 9 to 5 — things like paintless dent removal and window tinting.
The GeorgeCo MINI powered by Beano has done pretty well in the door ding department. After 7 and one-half years of motoring and 140,000 plus miles — only 3 dings of any significance to date. One of which was from a shelf full of GeorgeCo spare parts that fell on the car while safely parked in the GeorgeCo Garagemahal. The other two were likely earned while parked in the underground parking garage at the undisclosed GeorgeCo work-site location near the nation’s capital.
So we made an appointment with the Maryland Dent Masters location in Rockville. Cyress did a great job. No grinding, painting, or putty and the dents were history before you knew it. The three dings took about an hour to erase and you can’t even tell they were there when he was done. Highly recommended.
Before:
After:
We also got the GeorgeCo E30 back from the tint shop as well. Since it no longer has AC, we need all the protection we can get from the sun. Decided to go with the max tint allowed by the Great State of Maryland (50%).
New Paint for the Stealth BMW
We got the GeorgeCo Stealth E30 back from the paint shop yesterday but didn’t really get to take a good look at it because we were dodging thunderstorms and tornado warnings. Today we rolled it out into the sunlight and to paraphrase Fernando Lamas “it looks mahvelous.” The paint still needs some time to cure, but so far, we’re really happy with it. And the price was right too. Click either the photo above or below for the complete slideshow. Can’t really call it the Stealth anymore.
The change is all the more dramatic when you compare with what we started with back in 2008:
Summit Point in the Rain, April 2011
The Colonial Challenge Cup, a local charity group, hosted another track day at Summit Point Main Circuit in West Virginia. I had a chance again this year to instruct and drive during the event. Today was a wonderful sunny Spring day here in the Mid-Atlantic region. Unfortunately, the event was yesterday. Yesterday was cold and wet. I love driving in the rain, but I always approach the CCC events with some trepidation: To say they are a bit organizationally challenged is an understatement. Running an event with little structure in the rain, well let’s just say it paid to keep your guard up.
The GeorgeCo MINI and all GeorgeCo instructed students completed the day with both their egos and cars intact. That can’t be said for all participants. There were three run groups and a small group of instructors, maybe 35 cars on the track if you added up all of the groups. This group attracts all levels of drivers and a wide range of cars from an old Austin Healey to an Aston Martin Vantage; Subaru Imprezas to Ford GTs, with a smattering of M3s and MINIs thrown in for good luck.
The casualty list was also impressive: Acura NSX, E36 M3, Ford GT, and a Subaru Impreza all individually put into tire walls at some point in separate one-car incidents (no one was hurt.) The most amazing (and no doubt costly) crash was the Ford GT. After completing what appeared to be a very high speed lap in the rain (picture above), the driver (not the owner I believe) was exiting turn 10 at about 3/4 the speed of the previous lap, was in the center of the track, got back on the power, and immediately spun off toward the inside tire wall; hitting the tires backwards and bouncing back out onto the track in the direction of traffic. Fortunately the Aston Martin it had just passed had pulled into the pits or he would have collected him up as well. The car limped back to the pits. I’m sure there isn’t anything on this car that’s inexpensive to fix. The one I really felt for was the Subaru driver — you can’t go to the track with a car you can’t afford to lose. Especially when the conditions are like this:
Still, there is great educational value in driving on the track in the rain. A slick track really rewards smooth driving. All of your inputs must be smooth or the punishment is immediate. If you’re smart, you’re running at slower speeds so the penalty for not being smooth is lower than in the dry — maybe not everyone got the memo on the “slower” part of driving in the rain. There was zero grip on this track. You had to try to maintain your entry speed because it was impossible to try to put power down exiting any of the corners. All of my students were very timid under braking and afraid of pushing through turn-in, but it was the exits that caught out the ones that crashed. I don’t know where the Subi ran off, but the Acura want off at the exit of 9; the Ford GT at the exit of 10; and the M3 at the exit of 2. More photos here.
Well, speaking of cars you CAN afford to lose, the GeorgeCo E30 powered by Beano is due back from the paint shop on Saturday. We took it to the local paint shop that repaired our Subaru last Fall and said we wanted a basic “scuff & spray.” That may have offended them, as they came back with an estimate that was about $500 more than the book value of the car. Undeterred, and determined to get a professional hack spray job, we headed off to the local Maaco. (No Earl Scheib around here.) Hello Ambassador Paint Service. Nothing like a new coat of paint to show off the new bits: new hood, fenders, side skirts, and deck spoiler. That just about completes the pile of discarded parts which was the original car. All we need to do now is replace the rear main seal and it will be just about time to sell the car and look for a new project. Will post photos when we get it back.
End of an Era. Sold the E30 Convertible Today.
We sold the convertible today. I hope the new owners like it as much as we did. For four years we really enjoyed the car and top-down motoring, but it was starting to demand more attention than the crack GeorgeCo mechanical staff was up to providing. At some point, you just need to make a clean break, and divert your energies to other projects. Someone else is picking up the hard-top next weekend. We sold it for about what we paid for it in 2006, so for the price of four years of maintenance (and countless boxes of parts from Bavauto and PelicanParts.com) we got to have the wind in our hair (GeorgeCo less than the others…) and the sun on our faces.
Update: December 11, 2011
Longtime readers will recall we sold the GeorgeCo convertible last Spring as pictured above. We hoped to find someone who would take the time to restore it. This week we got an update: Not yet complete, but so far, nicely done. About the only bits we recognize are the seat covers.
