BMW E39 530d Power?

A little snippet from Total BMW's guide to the e39 5 Series.

Rechipping these often results in nasty fuel leaks from the injectors as well as blown autoboxes; you've been warned!
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May 2007 Issue, Page 87.
 
I wouldnt trust any of the BMW magazines buying guides as far as I could throw them. Every single one I have ever read about the E39 has been full of glaring inaccuracies. It's as if nobody bothers to proof read them or check any 'facts' before they publish them.

Having said that, there are mechanical weak spots on the 530d package.
 
jackoh said:
Fair enough, so the general concensus is to not bother with the remap given reliability issues?
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Whilst remapping certainly gives results, the potential for big bills out weighs any benefit imo.

Effectively, a remap removes safety margins built into engines by manufacturers.

A few years back I was driving for a company who had a Scania 420 that was remapped to produce 470BHP its economy improved by around 1MPG (which for an HGV is impressive) but, compared to the Scania 470 that they also ran, the remapped example did not pull anywhere near as strongly as the std 470 if you follow.

The remapped truck was in the end returned to standard after it developed an injector leak.

Personally, on a BMW diesel, I would not touch it.
 
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the 530d doesn't really need a remap though. it was a fantastic engine when it was new probably didn't even need a remap given the competition.

however, it's rather old now and it would strain and cause more problems to what can already be a problematic motor
 
Just a quick word on maps, if they're done right then theres no reason why they cannot improve the car and not alter the reliability.

It's mappers who don't know what they're doing, and generic maps that cause the problems. Every engine is slightly different and thus each map should be tailored to your car over the course of a couple of hours. None of this meeting up with some Barry in a car park while he downloads the map to the car.

If I was to get a BMW mapped I'd check through all the forums, chances are theres 2 or 3 companies per country that'll have a very good rep. It's worth driving the extra miles to get a custom map done well.

I drove a 100 mile round trip (considering there was a place 3 miles from me that could have done it) and was there from 11AM till just after 9.30PM. He fitted an induction kit, had a look over the engine, spent time working on the map, let me take it away for a drive for a bit and then altered the map again to get it just right.

Best £380 I could have spent.
 
Mapping can be great, I had my 330d 54 plate done a few months ago (the 204bhp engine). The mappers roller showed that at default it was kicking out around 218bhp & 340 lb/ft, the remap has taken it out to 275bhp & 460 lb/ft both at about 3,200rpm. It also produces over 340 lb/ft all the way from about 2,200rpm to 4,000 rpm. The engine goes higher than 4k but there's just no point in doing it, power and torque drop off pretty quickly.

This makes 3rd, 4th and 5th gear massive fun. 3rd pulls very very strong from something like 35 to 80 mph, 4th from about 50 through to 100+mph. This gives great overtaking ability and can be fun bating other cars.

The main issue is a lot of these motors are getting no a bit now, mines just passed 100k miles, that's nothing for the engine to cope with but turbo's do wear out. Mines started to smoke slightly on start up and on full throttle so the turbo will need to be replaced pretty soon. This would happen with a stock engine, the remap just exacerbates any issues and you really need to keep on top of fixing them.

There's a couple of car magazine reviews of the 330 E46 204bhp saloon cars being remapped, both reviews verified that the remaps where dropping 0-60mph from about 7 seconds to almost dead on 6 seconds, not bad for a car that sits mid 40 mpg on the motorway. Think most of my tanks average out to 35mpg with mixed driving or about 530 miles per tank.

Ninja edit, think my next car will be a petrol again ;)

http://www.evo.co.uk/carreviews/evocarreviews/53053/bmw_3series.html
http://www.autocar.co.uk/CarReviews/FirstDrives/BMW-3-Series-330Cd-DMS/211488/
 
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DanF said:
Mapping can be great, I had my 330d 54 plate done a few months ago (the 204bhp engine). The mappers roller showed that at default it was kicking out around 218bhp & 340 lb/ft, the remap has taken it out to 275bhp & 460 lb/ft both at about 3,200rpm.
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Surely not an E46?
 
[TW]Fox;14119168 said:
Surely not an E46?
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Yeah that's what the graph says, apparently most 330d's produce more stock than they are rated for, but as always tuners roller figures should be taken with a pinch of salt. It's more just to show what increase it had compared to itself. The DMS maps are meant to give more like 260bhp so it's probably nearer that :)
 
Stock figure is over reading by about 14bhp

so if the dyno was overreading that much, that would make the true remapped figure about 260 bhp :)
 
MrLOL said:
Stock figure is over reading by about 14bhp

so if the dyno was overreading that much, that would make the true remapped figure about 260 bhp :)
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Oh it might be a bit more than 260, the tuner was saying that they need to limit peak torque for the auto box cars, the 330cd that evo tested was an auto. The manual box can take more abuse and be pushed a bit further. On these engines peak torque and bhp are almost at the same point.

Ah and my clutch was slipping when it was done, the torque curve on the graph flat lines around 460 lb/ft for 500 rpm, it should have been a bit higher :o
 
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