For those of you who may be thinking of going to BBR GTi and having either the Super 180 conversion or the full Cosworth Supercharger conversion - well in my view you should have both!! I took my 2009 20i Sport Mk 3 up to BBR at Easter for the Super 180 Conversion and was so impressed with the workmanship and results by Neil at BBR that I immediately signed up to take it back a few weeks later to have a Cosworth Supercharger fitted.  Whilst the Super 180 stage conversion takes the power from 158bhp to circa 180bhp (obvious, of course!), and that is a decent upgrade in itself, adding the Cosworth Supercharger takes the car into a different league - I’m now getting 255bhp, 0 - 60mph circa 5 seconds! Just blistering - but most importantly, it feels like the brilliant MX-5 chassis and driving dynmaincs now have the torque they deserve (and a great sound to-boot!). Great job once again from Neil at BBR (many thanks, Neil) - I would recommend anyone who is thinking of a conversion to go and see them. (Neil - I assume that you read the Forum pages - I tried to download to this note the PowerGraph for my MX-5 but have found difficulty in doing so - if you wished to do so, you have my permission to post it on the Forum pages).
Talking to MX5parts at the Spring Rally, their Cosworth Supercharged Mk3, with Cosworth internals, has blown with a knackered crank and big ends. They aren’t going there again.
I wonder if BBR do something different to the Cosworth internals
I think there has to be a clear definition made here, as far as I am aware the MX5 Parts Mk3 that was supercharged was an early days Cosworth only project, that distinction must be made as comparing this to the BBR kit is like chalk and cheese. Cosworth as many know were involved in the initial development of the supercharger kit of the Mk3 and were tasked with fitting an Eatom MP62 and the associated kit onto the cold, (inlet) side of the MZR engine, they did a great job in terms of packaging the kit that cannot be disputed. Cosworth however appeared to have had major issues with getting the mapping/fueling right and as I understand it ended up with a pretty major compromise on that front this led to a number of engine failures, some at a very early stage of their life.
BBR-GTi picked up the pieces of this project and made changes to elements of the hardware and made major strides in the software side of the kit.
I installed the BBR-GTi kit including the exhaust manifold at home during Aprl this year and whilst this is a big ontake for the home mechanic the way everything slots into place is a credit to both Cosworth as the initial developer and BBR-GTi for taking it all to the next level. The software side i.e. engine mapping does no longer rely on piggy back ECUs or suchlike, instead the original ECU is re-mapped using mapping developed by BBR-GTi and downloaded via laptop to the ECU.
Before I went down this route I did a lot of research, parting with a large sum of cash into something that may not last is not my thing and if I thought that there would be issues with this installation I would simply not have gone down this route. I have spoken with people who have had the installation carried out by BBR-GTi (NOT Cosworth) and have racked up tens of thousands of miles with no issues whatsoever, this and many discussions with Neil at BBR-GTi gave me the confidence to part with my hard earned and take delivery of the kit.BTW, there are no changes to the internals required at this stage of tune, the BBR-GTi kit is fitted to the stock engine on both Mk3 and 3.5 variants.
Half the problem here is that the Cosworth installation got a bad reputation, (deservedly so as they appeared to be selling a poorly/part developed kit), for destroying engines, I think it is important to give a clear and up to date picture of just how far on this kit has come on since those days. In part this can be shown simply by the way the car runs, it feels and sounds entirely OEM, in fact I don’t know if the OP would agree with me but the installation has actually made the engine smoother, the harshness associated with the 2.0 MZR engine is gone but stick the foot down and watch the car take of like a scalded cat but equally there is just no drama when it does so.
To sum up, there are so many variables involved here that it would be an unfair assumption that the BBR-GTi installation will go the way that MX5 Parts Cosworth car went. How often was the car serviced, what engine oil was used, what was the car used for, did MX5 Parts ever speak with BBR-GTi to see if there had been any upgrades that could be applied to their installation knowing that there were issues with the Cosworth cars? The issues with the Cosworth cars was well enough documented after all. I hope this puts some clarity to the sometimes perceived issues of supercharging the MZR engine.
it is a fantastic conversion isn’t it? Sounds like you have gone down the same route as me then, charger and exhaust manifold, I also fitted the BBR GT rear silencer, the car had an ILM silencer fitted pre charger installation but the ILM had to come off it was just stupid loud and not even a pleasant tone either, it also limited the driving of the car to short trips due to the awful resonance coming from the ILM, thankfully the GT silencer gives no resonance but produces a quite amazing sound, best likened to the car sounding like it has a six cylinder engine fitted, lovely.
From my personal experience installing the kit at home in April this year, BBR and Neil have been frankly amazing with the level of support provided, I had a few little niggles during the installation, well, I have been off the tools for some 17 years now and the last 10 of them I’ve barely lifted a spanner to the cars due to ill health but Neil was always at the end of the 'phone to provide advice and support. For anyone interested here is a link to the installation process
The end reult is as you describe it, blistering, yes but you have also picked up on one of the most important aspects of this installation, that being the way that the chassis soaks it up and handles nigh on 260 bhp with ease, I have lowered mine on the Eibach -30mm plus stiffer ARBs and the handling and sheer driveability has been transformed. I took a biker mate of mine, who also has a Mk3.5 MX5 out in it and his description was that it was “insane” but in a good way.
Enjoy your transformed '5 Mark but watch that licence, as you will know all to well, the added performance very quickly becomes normal and you find yourself driving at silly speeds all to easily. My wife drove it for the first time last week and she thought it was pretty damn good too, docile as you want it to be but with a real punch, her advice to me was "you watch your licence, because I know what you are like!"Actually a bit harsh despite what I said above I have realistically found myself driving a bit slower overall, I don’t know if it is just down to being aware that it’s there if and when I want it, anyway, as I say, enjoy.
I’d have no confidence in the Cosworth SC at all !!!
It blew my pals brand new MK3’s engine to bits and that was after Cosworth issued up rated parts and his car was off the road for months while Cosworh were looking at the problems with SC.
Check out Mark Talbot on MX5. com it’s well documented from day one and he lost thousands of pounds and the car later sold for next to nothing, £22K for the car and 6K plus for the SC car off the road for months.
Hope you have better luck than Mark had with his SC …
the key word you have used here is COSWORTH. Please read my first post on this thread in some detail. I too steered well away from the Cosworth supercharger too for all the reasons you have stated, Mark Talbot’s car was converted by Cosworth, BBR-GTi had no hand in this installation or the subsequent destruction of the engine, re-build with stronger parts etc. The issues are not allied to an inherrent flaw in the MZR engine or indeed the supercharger installation as such, the problems in the main stemmed from a complete lack of competance/interest from Cosworth in terms of getting their heads around mapping the ECU in a proper fashion, it was always a bit chewing gum and string. I watched the whole thing unfold with great interest as over this period I had a Mk3 and a Mk3.5 which I wanted to get more out of but when I saw the issues that Mark and others were having I held back.
Enter BBR-GTi, a tuning company with some reputation it’s fair to say and certainly more that some passing experience with designing and installing forced induction kit to Mazdas albeit the earlier 1.6/1.8 engines. As I have already stated BBR-GTi did a huge amount of development work on the abandoned Cosworth project and are producing a kit that is mapped correctly drives like it was a factory car and has a well proven reliability record.
Don’t tar the BBR-GTi kit with the reputation of another company’s failings, it is both unfair and unwarranted, the Cosworth issues are ancient history, Marks issues all kicked off some 4-5 years ago and as already stated this was not related to BBR-GTi. I know of one guy who had his installation, (BY BBR-GTi, Cosworth have no hand in this now), carried out some 30k miles + ago, he has toured in Europe and doesn’t exactly spare the horses, no issues with his car in that time frame, he isn’t alone in his experience. Go figure, looks like Cosworth were the duds here a number of years ago, roll forward to 2012/2013 and BBR-GTi have got this kit just right so let’s not live in the past and let’s not put Cosworth’s poor rep on this installation onto BBR-GTi.
You can’t compare apples to bananas and that is what is happening here.
Following Mark’s email pointing me to his complementary post
(thanks Mark) I thought I’d better sign up (hadn’t realized I had already registered
years ago to view a classified), say hello and post Mark’s dyno graphs. Lowest
power run is with our full exhaust system installed pre map, second run is with
our StarChip Software (custom mapped) and third highest graph is with our stage
two supercharger conversion (supercharger plus our full exhaust). Mark has a
MK3 2.0l model.
Jo/Steve many thanks for your kind words, hope your both
well and enjoying your BBR MX5’s!
Jeff/Richard where have you been? This is very old news…
To cut a very long story short back in early 2010 we
received a Supercharger kit from Cosworth as we could not believe these
failures as stated. After a great deal of development/testing we addressed the
major hardware and software issues that we found lead to these very unfortunate
failures (please be careful as unbelievably this hardware is still for sale
elsewhere with the original problems). One of the issues that we found would
easily lead to an engine failure; all 3 together were just a time bomb (forged
internals or standard)!
We then covered over 10K miles in our first supercharged development car with increased
boost pressure, repeated 40-150MPH plus runs in 6th gear and track
testing over a 10-12 month period, (we knew our conversion had to be bullet
proof) before issuing a press release in late 2010 and marketing our BBR
Cosworth Supercharged conversion. Please see http://www.bbrgti.com/road_tests.php
every major motoring magazine and online publication drove this car, we have
even taken this car or our 1.8 or later 2.0 supercharged cars (sometimes two) to
OC/MX5 meetings, don’t know how you missed them! Our original car is still
going strong with over 30K converted miles, early clients converted cars have
covered over 40K now! Since late 2010 we have sold over 60 conversions without
a single failure, correctly modified the late MX5 engine is not a weak engine
at all. Our big mistake was to still use the Cosworth name on this conversion
as it has led to an awful lot of misunderstanding/confusion.
BBR Supercharged conversions are available for all
MK3/3.5/3.75 models 1.8/2.0 auto/manual, with/without A/C, most impressive in
overall gains are with the 1.8 engine, peak engine power rises from 120BHP @
7000RPM to 235BHP with our stage two package, almost twice standard power!
Mike watch this space, a BBR turbo conversion for MK3/3.5/3.75
models is not too far away now (conversion complete, testing in progress). Fully
developed in house BBR turbo conversion with our own manifolds (two stages) and
compressor housing, looks extremely OEM, even uses the original air box! Power
gains are very impressive at low boost pressure; we hope to release our turbo conversion
in two stages late summer.
good to see that you have posted up and hopefully will have finally nailed a coffin lid shut that some people appeared to want to continue prying open. As we discussed a few weeks ago, these stories were still actively circulating in circles that we thought they ought not to have been, a lack of knowledge/research or just living on old news, who knows.Â
Hopefully your post will be sufficient for people to realise that a number of years have passed them by in terms of the development of the kit and software, as we both know, even a “distance” home installation was extremely well supported and the car fired up on the first turn of the key and has run sweet ever since.
Dont compare the 2 setups even if they are based on the same route.
The Mark Talbot car was brought by P Roddison after the engine had been rebuilt at cost By Cosworth…It Blew!
The charger now sits sad and lonely in his workshop and he has decided to try a different route to get Big power from a Mk3.
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The BBr-Gti has a good reutation so far and Ive even seen a few on trackdays…
Only time will tell. But fingers crossed that some one got to the bottom of the issues (which I believe were lean running from no 2nd Lambda sensor on the Brach manifolds people were fitting with the Cosworth Kit)
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Good Power Hikes can be gained from fitting a good 4Â branch Manifold. I gained 17 HP on the race car just from this one mod.
absolutely, looks like you have done your homework and kept up with current developments.
I can also confirm that the exhaust manifold change makes big differences, part one of my conversion was to fit a BBR 4-1 manifold + map with quite striking results.
