Italian E36 M42, NA 197hp, 168ft-lbs, E30 S14 ITBs...

[nuvolarossa]

Hi, I want to show you a thing that made me dream since 2004, year of this article. It's from a Italian tuning magazine.
The car is a M42 318is tuned by Franco Gatti, one of the best, if not the best italian BMW tuner (he built BMW race cars. But he died a year ago.

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Here is the mod list that magazine shows:
- lightened crankshaft
- CPS forged pistons, but not bored and not stroked, so oem displacement
- Schrick cams
- ported head, intake and exhaust holes, but not skinned
- Compression ratio 10,8:1
- flywheel lightened: minus 6,5kg from oem weight
- different oil pump, external oil filter and external oil radiator
- ITBs and airbox from 320iS E30 S14
- BMC CDA air filter
- Superprint exhaust, central and silencer pipe
- EFI race ecu, should be a standalone.
Power= 197hp at flywheel, 23,6 Kgm of torque (circa 168 ft-lbs).
rev limiter is slightly over 7000 rpms.
As you can see the e30 itb can be fitted!
To me the list is too short for 200hp...
no other infos of the car

[nuvolarossa]

Note that valves, hydraulic lifters, rods and more parts are stock unlike MM build...
and the CR is only 10.8:1 unlike 11.5:1 of MM rally engine!
:eek::biggrin:
Tell me what do you think!

[Boyracer]

Huh? How can it make that sort of power from stock displacement by revving only bit over 7000? :eek:

Torque has gone from stock 175 Nm -> 235 Nm which is over 130 Nm / liter!

Not even BMW Motorsport manage more than 105 Nm / Liter in S54 which was the last of M5X series motorsport engines. S54 has larger intake valves 35 mm vs 33 mm) and it too has ITB's, higher compression ratio etc. S50 3.0 which was from period of M42 managed even worse...

Integra type R with same displacement had torque of 134 ft lbs (182 Nm) which is barely over 100 Nm / liter.

Smells a bit fishy I must say, maybe dyno operator fiddled a bit with driveline loss correction?

[Boyracer]

Out of interest, I digged out some numbers from S42, race version of M42 used 1994 onwards:

S42/95 FIA 2.0 L 300 hp - 255 Nm BMW ECU
S42/96 FIA 2.0 L 308 hp - 260 Nm BMW ECU
S42/97 FIA 2.0 L 315 hp - 260 Nm BMW ECU

So best of them after 3 years of development got 130 Nm / liter, still bit worse than the civillian car on article

And those engines had everything optimized. Huge valves, top notch porting job, compression around 13:1, cams around 300 degrees, Alpha N...

[nuvolarossa]

Huh? How can it make that sort of power from stock displacement by revving only bit over 7000? :eek:
 
Smells a bit fishy I must say, maybe dyno operator fiddled a bit with driveline loss correction?

Maybe it's very modded and the magazine listed only a little part of the engine mods? But it says that displacement is stock... and cr is only 10,8:1:eek::confused:

[nuvolarossa]

Out of interest, I digged out some numbers from S42, race version of M42 used 1994 onwards:
 
S42/95 FIA 2.0 L 300 hp - 255 Nm BMW ECU
S42/96 FIA 2.0 L 308 hp - 260 Nm BMW ECU
S42/97 FIA 2.0 L 315 hp - 260 Nm BMW ECU
 
So best of them after 3 years of development got 130 Nm / liter, still bit worse than the civillian car on article
 
And those engines had everything optimized. Huge valves, top notch porting job, compression around 13:1, cams around 300 degrees, Alpha N...

For what I can see this engine too is alpha n!
The tuner owned a BMW dealer and he worked and prepared race cars with S14s and S42s from 90 to 2004...

[Boyracer]

Well, 130 Nm / liter is possible as shown by the S42 race engine...  But I am bit sceptical same can be achieved on civillian car with those modifications. Maybe if it is really, really optimized (intake, exhaust, cam) to work on certain quite narrow rmp band.

Also there is few things that do not make sense. If you have custom pistons, why only 10.8:1 compressions? You could go safely up to 11.5 with pistons and gain more torque.

And why not rev the engine higher than 7000, certainly the engine could take it?

Also, only shrick M42 cam I know is mild 256 degree, unless it is completely custom made.

Need more info, that mod list really is bit too short to explain the torque :confused:

[nobrakese36]

I have schrick 282's!

[fliplap]

Maybe it's very modded and the magazine listed only a little part of the engine mods?

That, or they got the power wrong. Tuner magazines regularly get details wrong, whether it be power numbers or mods. I suppose magazine don't regularly see the amount of outspoken criticism that a forum does over what could be considered a small mistake.

[D. Clay]

It would be some very good head work and as mentioned, could have a very limited power band. Not always a drawback for racing engines. I really like the strut tower brace and intake manifold fabrication. The special pistons could be for exotic fuel. The quick and dirty way to more power. The fuel especially is something that a magazine could easily be faked out by. This was crankshaft horsepower so the engine was on a dyno. This gives you a lot more to play with than RWHP actually in a car. You can cool intake air outside the building and all anyone sees is the duct work coming in. I've been around motor builders and they have a lot of tricks to juice the numbers on a dyno.

[Alpine003]

It would be some very good head work and as mentioned, could have a very limited power band.

Don't forget a non streetable idle at like 2k or something if his cam specs are some crazy specs.

The fan shroud is pretty cool. I don't think I've seen a deep one like that before and it appears to be a bmw part.

[Cristian G in Oz]

Out of interest, I digged out some numbers from S42, race version of M42 used 1994 onwards:

S42/95 FIA 2.0 L 300 hp - 255 Nm BMW ECU
S42/96 FIA 2.0 L 308 hp - 260 Nm BMW ECU
S42/97 FIA 2.0 L 315 hp - 260 Nm BMW ECU

So best of them after 3 years of development got 130 Nm / liter, still bit worse than the civillian car on article

And those engines had everything optimized. Huge valves, top notch porting job, compression around 13:1, cams around 300 degrees, Alpha N...

Hey Boyracer,

Don't forget that the S42 ( and S14) race engines were built for HP not torque. When the engines rev high and make power you usually loose out in torque.

I know the S14 that I built for a group A M3 runs for power. It has nothing down low but really comes alive over 5K.

His custom pistons could be for exotic fuel "try Elf" but they could also be made to be much lighter than OE. A group A S14 piston looks nothing like a roadcar S14 piston and is light as a feather when compared.  We got 289hp at the wheels for our 2.3ltr Group A (1987 spec) S14. We could gain another 40HP if we swapped to the later DTM exhaust.  
All this from an engine that is built to last. We can't afford to rebuild and retune after each round.

You are right the power and torque seem a little high but it may be possible, we just don't have enough info.

Cristian

[16v of Fury]

Hey Boyracer,

Don't forget that the S42 ( and S14) race engines were built for HP not torque. When the engines rev high and make power you usually loose out in torque.

I know the S14 that I built for a group A M3 runs for power. It has nothing down low but really comes alive over 5K.

His custom pistons could be for exotic fuel "try Elf" but they could also be made to be much lighter than OE. A group A S14 piston looks nothing like a roadcar S14 piston and is light as a feather when compared.  We got 289hp at the wheels for our 2.3ltr Group A (1987 spec) S14. We could gain another 40HP if we swapped to the later DTM exhaust.  
All this from an engine that is built to last. We can't afford to rebuild and retune after each round.

You are right the power and torque seem a little high but it may be possible, we just don't have enough info.

Cristian

Wow, Cristian.

Can I send you the S14 out of my '88 M3... ?  I'd like to see another 100hp out of my motor, reliably!

[Alpine003]

We could gain another 40HP if we swapped to the later DTM exhaust.

Sounds like something you'd hear among the big 8 cylinder muscle cars and not normally associated with 4 cylinder engines.

[nobrakese36]

S14 throttles converted to m42, old pics i have from some one who did it!