Finally found my new (to me) car

[Carl Morris]

After more than a year of watching nationwide I got lucky today and found exactly what I wanted just down the street. Brought home a white 335xi 4dr with a manual transmission and black interior, all the packages and options, at at least as good a price as I'd seen anywhere else and at 0.9% financing. Pretty psyched.

[rodent]

Nice! What year and what kind of price are those catching these days?

[Carl Morris]

It's an 08. Unfortunately for me they haven't gone down much in the last year or two, I paid 26k with 55k miles. They tend to go for mid-high 20s depending on options and mileage.

[Scott Y]

Nice find, I think white is the best color for those.
Are you going to get silly with it, or leave it alone and hope it lasts forever?
After 12 years of sporting a DSM, I'm finding that if the fiscal winds don't completely melt down that we'll be looking for something nicer in the next 12 months too.
Feel free to share what you like/don'tlike about the car as your daily appliance.

[Carl Morris]

I don't think I'll be able to resist at least the piggyback to control boost, so that will probably happen sometime this year. Not sure I want to touch the exhaust or IC. Anyway, it will probably be "mostly stock" for a few years until somebody comes out with a good solution for the turbos and fuel system. Someday when fuel isn't an issue and I can run a big single I probably will.

[Carl Morris]

First impressions are that the sport package (seats, 18" wheels, 40/35 series tires) is more aggressive than I expected it to be. I thought this car would be the cushy alternative to the EVO, but I have to say if the EVO is much stiffer then I'm really glad I bought this car. It's been a while since I've driven a fairly low, stiff car and it's kind of strange to get used to. My Mustang SVO long ago when sort of like this, but this is even more aggressive.

Having said that, I really like the features of the car. The stick in the corners is amazing. The motor sounds good. It's not fast, but it's zippy. I'm thinking 95-96mph in the 1/4. The six speed manual feels really good compared to a DSM. I'm pretty psyched about it so far.

[Carl Morris]

One other first impression, the flywheel is way too heavy. When you make a redline shift you have to wait a *long* time for the revs to match up for the next gear if you don't want to force it in. I think it's significantly worse than a stock DSM. Makes it almost impossible for a noob to kill it trying to take off from a dead stop, though.

[Overkill]

I'm not to fond of the clutch engagement on the A4, but I think it has a dual mass flywheel and I am use to single mass flywheels. I wonder if the BMW has the same?

[Carl Morris]

No idea. I guess another thing I'll have to learn about someday. Hopefully this stock clutch lasts a long time, but I look forward to getting rid of this flywheel.

[rodent]

If I could afford one, I'd own one but for now, the Volvo S60 R will have to do.

I know Tobz has done some tuning on the newer BMW's with nice dyno results.

[Carl Morris]

I'd be curious to know what's being referred to as tuning. As far as I can tell, the BMW piggybacks do their own tuning and there's really no need for a shop to be involved.

[Scott Y]

are you sure it's the flywheel? Our E39 540i had a valve in the clutch hydraulics called a clutch delay valve that prevented the pressure plate from moving too fast, supposedly to save it from people who abuse clutches.
If you google bmw cdv and you'll see lots of links.

[Carl Morris]

Yeah, I'm talking about how slowly the rpms come down from redline. As far as the clutch not engaging or disengaging quickly enough, I don't think I've seen that yet. I know they have a restrictor like a stock DSM, but I doubt I'll ever remove it.

[rodent]

I'd be curious to know what's being referred to as tuning. As far as I can tell, the BMW piggybacks do their own tuning and there's really no need for a shop to be involved.
I'm pretty sure its a custom high altitude tune but I'd call him and ask. I believe he told me he was getting around 400whp on his Mustang dyno. I'd opt for a custom tune over a mail order tune any day.

[Carl Morris]

I don't know Tobz, but I've always been skeptical of tuners in general. All I really want is control of boost and the ability to see what's going on regarding knock, plus the usual stuff like a stutterbox. The conservative stock maps are fine with me.

[DemonStreetMachine]

Carl,

I have been working at Tobz for a few months. He has had a few of the turbo bmw's on the dyno for tuning and had good results. I am sure if you talk to him he can work with you on whatever you want.

Nick

[Carl Morris]

Holy cow Nick, what's up? Did you close the shop in Boulder? So what electronics does he use to "tune" BMWs with (Procede, JB4, Cobb)?

[DemonStreetMachine]

Ya the lease ended at that location and I used that as a good time to step away from the partnership. I think that place will be leveled in the next few months. We our working on a bunch of nice cars out at tobz and it has been nice to keep a little more normal schedule.

You will have to talk to Tobz about what software he has used. His number is on the website. www.tobzperformance.com

Nice choice btw!

Nick

[Mr. Moose]

Carl, going upscale! Congrats :)

I've never had personal contact with Tobz, but I have seen a number of posts from him or his customers on other boards flaming Lucas/Carz Performance, which left me with a strong negative opinion about Tobz's professionalism...

[rodent]

Carl, going upscale! Congrats :)

I've never had personal contact with Tobz, but I have seen a number of posts from him or his customers on other boards flaming Lucas/Carz Performance, which left me with a strong negative opinion about Tobz's professionalism...

I've never seen Brian (Tobz) personally flame Lucas but I have seen his customers do this. If you know of a thread that Brian himself is doing that I'd like to see it. You're always going to have the shop vs shop BS happen with the customers and its almost impossible to prevent. Sometimes its just a customer being immature about something stupid. I've dealt with both shops tuning my car and like them both. If I was looking for a place to tune a BMW, I'd go to the shop with the most experience and check out the any dyno graphs to show what they can do (before/after results). Also talk to any customers if possible.

[Mr. Moose]

Like I said, I've never had any personal contact with Tobz. Frankly, I didn't even know his real name :) I do tend to place responsibility on shops for what their customers say, though, since it seems like most trash talking customers simply reflect the mindset of the shop they are promoting, and conversely, if a shop owner tells a customer that what he's doing is not good for reputation or business, they generally listen... :)

Back on topic, I agree that doing your homework is a good idea...

[bringit]

Where are the pictures?

[Carl Morris]

They're on Facebook, this board isn't set up to host pictures. It's just a white 4dr 335 with the 18" wheels due to the sport package.

[Carl Morris]

Just another report after a couple of weeks of ownership...

Good news, the first prototype big single turbo system hit the streets this weekend (Vishnu). Looking pretty good so far. Running close to 20psi, making a ton of power, and hasn't hit the limit of the stock fuel system yet. Probably making about 500whp right now, planning to continue slowly turning it up over the next few weeks until they hit a limit or break something. They're not saying what the turbo is, but it's probably a GT35R.

I'm still stock :-), the weird thing is that what the motor sound and feel reminds me the most of is driving a 5.0 Mustang in the late 80s. Overall my biggest surprise has been the handling. I'm still amazed by it when I go into a corner hard.

[bringit]

Do you really want to mod that car to that extent? If I had a car like that I would keep it very lightly modified. Nothing like paying on a car that you have to work on like it was a DSM. Peace of mind in a good looking relatively quick car is priceless.

[Carl Morris]

I go back and forth, but I don't think I can own an AWD car with a Supra style motor in it without taking advantage of that :-). Hopefully if I spent the money to do it right it wouldn't be a giant hassle.

[Carl Morris]

One more observation: While I like the handling, there's a downside to it besides a stiff ride. I had gotten used to a driving style of tiptoeing around the corners and then blasting down the straights in the GVR4. It was easy to slide it around a bit at relatively low speeds and have fun. With the new car, it takes a lot of speed to do that...more than I'm really comfortable with on public roads. They improved the corners on Valmont east of Boulder and with this car I was coming out of them at 90 and still not triggering the super-nanny traction control. I want to slide around but I don't want to go that fast on public roads :-).

Speaking of which Shiv posted a new video of himself on the big single turbo sliding his car around on public roads at high speed and it makes me uncomfortable just to watch.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=N8tSnnyIOvU

[Carl Morris]

Signed up for private track day on April 7th hosted by Boulder Nissan. They still have slots if anybody is interested...

[Kibo]

What track?

[Overkill]

Bandimere

[rodent]

Confirmed with Tobz he does custom tune them and holds the hp record for that model.

[Carl Morris]

Yeah, Bandimere. What hp record are you talking about?

[rodent]

Highest HP dyno from a tune in Colorado.

[Carl Morris]

On a 335? Or something else? As far as I can tell the Procede (and I think the JB4) pretty much tune themselves...it's just how good of fuel you want to run. But regardless, everything is turbo limited to the point that who can squeeze a few more hp than everybody else on the stock turbos doesn't really matter to me. If it's upgraded turbos not many people have them yet so it's not apples to apples.

[Carl Morris]

Couldn't take it any more and bought a used Cobb and flashed my ECU today. Still easy to flash back for baseline runs on April 7th. The boost level and timing intended for all-stock hardware was a little anemic in my opinion. So I put a few gallons of E85 in it and ran boost and timing intended for use with an upgraded intercooler. :-) Starting to feel like a turbo car instead of an 87 5.0 Mustang now...

[Overkill]

So it begins...

[Carl Morris]

One problem with a 10:1 motor that runs pretty lean (they use widebands and run closed loop all the time) is that it can misfire pretty easily at higher boost levels if everything isn't perfect. With my 20% E85 mix I've got misfire issues when the engine isn't warmed up and the boost starts to come on. Retail on the plugs from the dealer is $26/ea ?!?!? :-)

[Scott Y]

A coworker has an '08 535, and is very interested in how the whole Cobb thing goes for you.

[Carl Morris]

The Cobb isn't as fast as the Procede and the JB4 right now. It's very convenient, though, and I like their approach. I have no complaints with it so far (other than the misfire issue when cold), it's pretty zippy and it'll be very convenient to uninstall when I take it to the dealership.