Back on the road.

With so much work having gone into turning back time for Madeline, I though it was only fitting to finally post a few decent pics of her.

After my jog at a local park this evening, the summer sunset made for a nice backdrop.

 

Looks good!

Im only missing the Mini logo on the front. The badge is there, but without the Mini insert

 

August was a great month zipping around in Madeline.

We’re expecting our first baby soon, so you can imagine my priorities have been diverted elsewhere haha. I had a few parts in the shed that I’d picked up on super sale over the summer, and I found a day last weekend to crack back into the toolbox.

Most of it was just peace of mind preventative stuff:
- New belt tensioner assembly
- New timing chain tensioner
- New idler pulley
- New power steering fan assembly
- New radiator fan assembly
- Wheel stud conversion kit
- 3mm front wheel spacers (to fix the tiny rub on the BCs)

a few snaps from the day...


Old belt tensioner removed. Also pictured is the new top engine mount that wouldn’t upload in a previous post.




The new tensioner I bought was advertised as ACDelco brand, but what arrived was the exact OEM part. A nice surprise. It has the same “Litenz” markings as the MINI unit, and the strut Also has the OEM “stab-o-shoc” branding.




New belt tensioner and idler pulley installed.




New power steering fan installed. My old one was still running, but it had taken a beating and the blade bearings were just a tiny bit sandy feeling. Given my power steering gremlins, I figured a new unit was worth the peace of mind.




82mm wheel stud conversion in progress. A few of my wheel bolts were a little worse for wear and semi rounded when I got the car. Plus I didn’t enjoy how often I’ve been cranking these bolts out and back into my new hubs. The extended length of these studs also gave me the flexibility for any spacer size in the future with a new set of wheels.




Timing chain tensioner out. What a convenient location. I actually ended up NOT using a wobble extension, but a shallow 19mm socket and my bent-handle flex-head ratchet. That thing can fit anywhere. I also didn’t go in from the top, but from the side while I had the fender liner and belt out.




Yikes. New vs old. The old tensioner didn’t look great and had a hotspot from where it was vibrating against the guide rail over time.

 

You did some nice work

Good luck with the last steps regarding pregnancy, all the best!

 

Yay for babies! Lol sorry. I love kids, got two myself.
I love the preventive approach to maintenance. Car looks good!
I'll try to find who it was and how to post a link but another member on NAM made a guard for his ps fan. Looked like it'd work well at keeping the fan from getting beat so bad by road debris.

 

Found it.

 

@JerBear @nd-photo.nl Thanks so much for the well wishes guys

One day soon there’ll be a little orange glove in my pics next to mine

 

Finished up the rest of the work yesterday, and it was a beautiful day to be outside here in south Jersey. The only thing left to work on is the water/methanol injection kit sitting in my shed.

I want to take my time with that and have fun with the customization of it

Here are a few snaps from the day


Picked up some Bosch 380cc injectors. They’re Audi TT injectors but also a direct fit for my W11 recommended by a tuner. Made sure to use the hologram sticker to check the authenticity.




Bosch part number FYI




Compared to the old, quite corroded, OEM injectors. It was a challenge to pry the old ones out. Busted a knuckle or two, so wear your outer gloves, not just nitrile gloves like me.




Ugh. Tons of nasty grit built up around the port bore. This took a while to clean up.. I wanted to be very careful in order to minimize the amount of crap that fell into the manifold. Even had my house vacuum out in the driveway with me looking super ****.




So I currently run a Gates 535 Size belt which is supposed to be recommended for reduction pulleys.. but I don’t like how much my belt tensioner has to extend to tension it properly. I read that a 532 size will work for 17-19% pulleys, but I could NOT get this one on for the life of me. Sticking with my 535 until I look into it more. The 535 seems to be working just fine.




New radiator fan assy. My low speed wasn’t kicking on at the right temp, and this solved the issue.




New radiator as well. I can’t believe my cruising coolant temps dropped almost 12 degrees after swapping this in. Happy camper!




So shiny, and wow, SO much quieter than the OEM fan motor.

 

Nice! I also have this planned for the near future. I will probably put the Fletcher aluminium radiator in.

 

Quick update on the tune. I’m reading through some MPPS tutorials tonight and hope to begin the process by the weekend.

I just have to get as far as copying my current tune as a backup, but this is totally the kind of thing I get sucked into. The thirst for more knowledge is real

 

New shoes

I’ve been researching R53 wheel fitment for the past couple months. There are just so many factors to consider and I’ve only fit a performance wheel setup on one other car, about ten years ago.

My needs are about 70% performance, 30% style, so no donuts or dubs in my driveway... And I’m a bit too sensible for #stancenation lol.

I wanted to fit 225s on an 8in rim to maximize contact patch with an appropriate alignment. And I didn’t want the harshness or weight of 17s.

After more actual tire dimension research, I landed on the setup of 225/45-16 on 16x8s.

Adding the factors of lightweight and offset into the mix.. I wanted each wheel under 16lb, and an offset that produced as minimal poke as possible.

Behold, the super light, very handsome, Konig Dekagram...



Ordered just one to test fit before committing. As soon as I picked up the box on my porch I was grinning. These are stupid light compared to my S-lites. They tip the scale at 14.8lb.




For 16in wheels, they clear my JCW brake kit with ease. I wrote back and forth with the Konig fitment team over the past two weeks to get every clearance estimate I could. They were great to work with, and provided a guide to inform me on exactly the measurements I needed to provide them.

PS, the color matches my Swift springs so well! I didn’t plan on that, but a very nice bonus.




I love the flat face design, despite a moderate offset (35). My stud conversion measurements came out perfectly too. The end of the 82mm studs sit exactly flush with the wheel face.




I kept my 3mm spacer on for the test fit. SO snug, but just enough for the tire to clear the shock body (I hope). I might have to add 1-2mm of spacers depending on the actual tire section with. But I’m happy when I’m thinking about 1mm adjustments. It just means my homework was correct haha.




Wheel face is about 3-5mm past the fender trim here, but remember this is on a Jack, negating camber accuracy. I think this setup with 225s will be as dang flush as I can get it. That’s the goal at least.




What a beautiful bronze fleck finish.



I was really surprised how difficult it was to find other R53s with 16x8 setups. Tons of Rotas, but not much else, especially when factoring in JCW brakes under 16s.

I’m going to pair these with Dunlop Direzza ZIII Toyo R1R tires for a near track setup that won’t turn the tarmac into a skating rink with moderate rain.

 

Also quick shoutout to @scotty_r56s and @Eddie07S . Our exchange was brief in another thread, but that’s all I needed to not wimp out on a 7in wide setup.

 

They look stunning!

 

Dam those are pretty!!! I love Konig's. I'm looking at a set of Konig Lockouts myself.

 

Finally broke out the old HP, upgraded to Windows 10 and got MPPS v18 up and running.

Duping my stock tune before I’m off to the tuner. Progress!





@JerBear @nd-photo.nl And thanks guys! Getting a 225/45-16 Toyo R1R delivered this week to complete the test fitment with actual rubber.

I decided on Toyo’s over the aforementioned Dunlop’s after reading a few more first hand accounts of how good the Toyo’s are.

 

Today kicked off the weekend well. Two major steps accomplished:

1. Finalizing my tune
2. Getting a new windshield installed
3. 

Earlier in the summer some d*ckhead M3 driver whipped around me on the shoulder of I295 and chucked a sizable rock into the passengers side of my windshield. At first the crack was 5-6” in length, but over the hot summer days the expansion and contraction grew the split to 18-20” or so, and I no longer felt safe driving with that.

I found a great local shop to come out to my house in South Jersey and install the new windshield in 45min or so.

The installer was also nice enough to knock some off of the price since I removed all the trim myself, knowing how notorious the R53 windshield trim is.



Dan was a friendly fellow. He also used to own an R53 and was quite aware of how notorious these trim pieces are haha. He took no offense to me removing the trim before he got there, and commended me for not breaking anything.




Look ma, no glass.




Look ma, NEW glass.




Later on I was able to write my new tune via MPPS. I have yet to drive it tuned, but the idle is as buttery as ever.


Tomorrow afternoon I’m picking up my mounted Toyo R1R for test fitment, and I’ll give her a good old fashioned Italian tune-up to feel out the new tune.

 

A new windshield on an older car is the best... I can see again
Some good with the bad on that one...

I’m impressed with your willingness to just “broke out the old HP”, update it and then go muck with the heart of your car... The last time I had my laptop update it no longer would read thumb drives... And no one could fix it... I should have left it with Vista. Doesn’t give me a lot of confidence for tuning a car...

So - Go You...

Hope the figment check goes well with your tire/wheel. From what i have heard the Toyo are really good, especially in the wet. I see a lot of their new R888Rs at the track, if you want to go really sticky. Other really good tires are the Bridgestone RE71Rs, Yokohama A052 and the Falken 660.

I used to have a local intersection that was a really good Woop-dee-do to go over. There were a lot of scrape marks on it from where cars had bottomed out on it. This is where I would check for rubbing when checking out tire/wheel figment. At 30 mph over this, it would compress the suspension to the end without crashing it. It was a good test. This is where I found out that 225-45x17 on 7” wide ET38 wheels would significantly rub in the rear wheel wells of my R56. At the time it was the only way I could think of to get everything compressed to the limits... Then I thought that in the rear I could have just pull the spring off the shock and compress it with a jack...

 

Hey @Eddie07S haha thanks for the whoop-dee-do notion. I’ll have to find a good one around here.

I hope I didn’t come across as irresponsible with my tuning LOL! I certainly followed best practices by having batt charger connected at all time and checksum-ing my files. Once upon a time I used to work in IT so I’m just as comfortable with software as I am with a set of sockets.

I’m glad my tire choice checks out! Most of my miles will not be on a track, so I shied away from the R888Rs, but man they do look great. I chose the R1R specifically because it’s relatively street-able, and performs well in the wet.

 

I must have stopped by the butcher shop by the looks of that MEAT.








(Nervous laughter...)

 

Front fitment check.


Checking that fat tread view with a little help from my friend Mr. Grasshopper. He says it’s chunky!




Injection hairs tickling the shock body lol. This is still with my 3mm spacers installed. I don’t think I can go down to a 1-2mm.




Just a smidge of poke... I can live with that.
or perhaps I’ll adjust camber to avoid issues once I find them.




Damn they look just as good as I imagined.


Very happy to report no issues with rubbing the fender liner at full lock in either direction

Right now my ride height is high enough that I don’t think the tire tread will connect with the wheel arch. My BC struts are also set to 15/30 stiffness, which is fairly stiff. If I bring the ride height down .25-.50 inches I’d start trimming the fenders. That’s my guess anyway, but only a little real world driving will tell.

 

Rear fitment.


Rear fitment with no spacers. No issues on the body side at all. The bottom control arm bolt is the closest clearance inside thee rim at ~18mm.




I can def take some of that camber out hah. Looking a little too diagonal for my liking. I’d guess I can pull the top of the tire toward the fender another 10mm without running into major rubbing issues. The plastic fender trim should self adjust if it needs to, but I don’t foresee any contact with the body panel.




Just a good looking piece that should stick my butt to the road

 

Oh, no... anything but. I am impressed you are willing to tackle that project. That it is beyond what I have confidence to do... And, that is good to be able to go from sparks to hammer...

As for rubbing. Remember, changing the ride height with those shocks doesn’t change where in the wheel well the tire will stop. That point fixed by the travel of the shock. So, if you raise the car, you will have more travel before getting to that point, and it will be harder to get to that point (more spring compression), but it will still get there with enough force. That is why it is import to have a good way to fully compress the suspension to see if the tire rubs.

All of that said, I do believe you will be ok... I have a friend with an R53 running 225-45x17, which is a 1/2” taller tire than what you have and he doesn’t rub. And I have seen a number of people with R53s running 225-45x15 on 8” wheels with no issues. Also, the R1Rs are a bit narrow on tread width compared to other 225s, which will help.

 

@Eddie07S Great to know you’ve witnessed 225/45-17s without much issue, that gives me a big boost of confidence!

I totally agree testing on full compression is needed, and I do plan on figuring that out sooner rather than later.

One note here though, my coilovers are double adjustable, so I actually can adjust ride height independently of compression/droop travel. Doing so will change where the tire stops in the wheel well.

I’d be foolish to rely on that single aspect of adjustability to solve issues alone, but i wanted to point it out

 

Sorry I missed that about your shocks. I did look at the picture, but missed the second set of adjuster and lock rings. Is the bottom set for raising height? Who makes those?

So may of the coilovers are preload only. And a lot of people will raise the car using preload to deal with rubbing, but find it is only somewhat effective. It was wishful thinking that my JCW Pro coilovers would have that ability. But no. Hence some of the rubbing issues I am dealing. A thought about my issue that came to mind while writing this. Could I actually be dealing with wheel and/or suspension flex... Hmmmmm

 

All good!
They’re made by BC Racing. I installed their BR Series coilovers with a custom Swift spring setup - 7k front and 5k rear. (A touch higher spring rate than the 5k default). All in all they’re super affordable for the value they deliver.