Looking to replace my time machine

Catanonia

Catanonia

Catanonia

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Santas Grotto
I currently have this beast.

DSC08050.jpg


A 2006 BMW 335i with all options added.

It is also chipped with a Burgur Tuning ECU bypass harness from the states and is currently kicking out 420BHP and is a time machine. 0-6 in 4 seconds and never been brave enough to max it past 160 (delimited)

The problem is that I used to run it on my employers old fuel card for 3 years and I have now left the company and found a contract that will be averaging 450 miles a week that will come out of my pocket :(

I currently get about 300miles to the tank and mid 20's MPG.

So it looks like she has to go. I will buy another car and then probably force myself to sell this beast. Will hopefully sell it with the ECU harness for about 11k

I have a budge of 9k and want something that is good on MPG, but comfortable, reliable and still fun.

Obviously I am not going to get the same performance, but that is a hit I will have to take.

Also consider diesel, as long as it has some poke.

Any ideas ?
 
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melchy said:
Out of interest what mods are you running to get 420 BHP. Is it a JB3/JB4?
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JB3 JuiceBox and twin cone filters running at setting 5 out of 9. It is the setting that doesn't throw any codes at me constantly.

Completely eliminates turbo lag and gives the engine the breathing room it needs. The engine in this car is stonking and massively undertunned so as not to compete with a M3. Can have a M3 off the lights due to the fact it is a straight 6 light engine and the car is very light compared to an M3. But the M3 will easily have it on the corners.

It is a sweet car, but at 80k these 335i fetch only 10 - 12k private, but I may get more for it as it has been tuned correctly if sold to the right person.

I am in two minds, the contract is good money, but the mileage and cost :(

I could

1. Buy a cheap diesel and keep here. But I may as well spend the money on the additional petrol for the difference it would make.

2. Buy a decent diesel and then sell her, that would save me over £70 a week on petrol alone.

Problem is I have no idea what I would get.
 
[TW]Fox;23049691 said:
It's not as if the 335i had much noticeable turbo lag in the first place?



What figures are you using? Have you taken into account the fact you'd get different fuel economy from your 335i once your usage profile changes?
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It has noticeable turbo lag with the 2 turbos' especially in higher gears.

With the ECU harness, I can be travelling in 6th at 80, drop it 2 gears with paddles to 4th and accelerate to 120+ within about 5 seconds. Nice ;)

I am averaging 27mpg motorway cruising 80 - 90 Mph
 
To be clear, I have been driving it very tamely since loosing the fuel card, it is amazing how much it hurts when you pay for the fuel yourself. :)

Careful driving on the motorway 70 - 80 with careful acceleration gives me the 27MPG. Sorry if I worded it wrong before and sounded like I batted around at 90 all the time.

Common sense tells me to sell it and get a diesel, break even on the swap and get cheaper fuel. The other half of me says keep it and spend the extra ££ to have a nice car and forget the hassle of swapping over. The contract is 3 - 6 months and most likely will extend beyond that being government.

Unfortunately, with my payment / tax methods, I cannot claim for fuel expenses so it will come out of my pocket.

Decisions. At the moment I have no idea what to replace it with, and being me, I will probably keep it until it starts to hurt.

On the turbo lag, when I switch off the JB3, I really notice the turbo lag. It isn't much, but it is definately there. Map 5 is higher boost and reduced turbo lag. Also I need to see what MPG it does with the JB3 switched off. Not tried it yet and it actually might be the answer to everything.

Oh it is an auto btw so lower MPG, but I tend to paddle shift all the time.
 
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Third Opinion said:
Might help if we know what sort of MPG you would find acceptable.

Maybe a BMW 3 litre of some kind? The book and reviews say they can get in the late 30's in MPG on a run. At 230bhp it will be fun too. Doubt you will get anything near that MPG with the performance to match.

If it is Diesel then maybe a Alfa 159 2.4JTDm 210bhp and 51mpg on a run. 42mpg combined.

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classif...radius/1500/postcode/rh130ql/page/5?logcode=p
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mmm, that looks nice, thanks.
 
Conanius said:
If all you have done is a remap I'd have thought the loss on MPG with the cruise control on at 70 would be much less than you are suggesting.

I found that using cruise control made a significant difference to not using it and just maintaining the speed manually. You have to concentrate a lot harder to get good fuel economy when not using cruise. Over long distances this isn't always hugely achievable.

I did 3 months of 220 + miles/4 hours drive to and from work late last year. Using cruise set at 60 mph the best I managed was 56.6MPG from my vRS (180 BHP twincharged 1.4) Using no cruise and just 'going with the flow of traffic doing 70-80 it was mid 30's. A huge huge difference. The best bit was, even over that distance, the time difference was barely worth the extra effort of 'going with the flow'.

Try doing the journey next week with the cruise set to 60 and no hooliganism from junctions or on sliproads. I'd be amazed if you can't get that MPG up.
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Thanks,

I start a week on Monday up and down the M6, so will switch of the JB3 boost and try the cruise control method.
 
Update.

Ok switched off the JB3, stuck the car in auto shift and used the cruise control to maintain 75mph where possible depending on traffic on the M6 in the morning. The journey is 70 miles each way, 60 of which is motorway. Guessing I am about 80% of time on cruise control on the motorway section with the traffic congestion.

Results on 2 days worth are an average of 34MPG with me a 12 stone person in the drivers seat only.

Not too bad, but not brilliant.
 
Brookert said:
Can you not drop it down to sub 70?
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Hardly makes any difference and becomes annoying with below average flow of traffic at the times I travel. Constantly having to adjust the cruise which dangerous trying to control car acceleration like this prolong, we have all tried it :) Either that or having to constantly brake and accelerate to keep out of the way of slightly faster traffic.

75 seems to be the average comfortable speed and decent gains in MPG and length of journey
 
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