M50 turbo or supercharged???

[1991318is]

I finished my m50 swap last summer. Now i'm looking to get a bit more power not that the m50 is'int good enough but i feel it's got potential for more. I'm just curious about turbocharging or supercharged, i've read that this engine already has a forged crank. Some people say that you only need to change the head gasket to lower the compression and that's all basicly you need to do to the engine for some psi boost. I dont really feel to confident about this but if it's possibly true how much psi boost can you run and what HP will you gain in the end? Also is there any difference in vanos or none vanos engines? If let's say you do it this way, for the money would it be worth it, compare to modifying the engine, like m3 cams, headers, chip, nitrous.... How do we tell if the vanos is still working properly like it's supose to. When the engine gets warm enough and beaten, i listen near the valve cover where the vanos is located and when reving hi, there is a lound knocking sound coming out of there??
Thanks,

[325Projectz]

If you're not to familar with turbocharging or don't want to blow up your motor because of it, you'd be better off with a s/c from aa, dinan, etc...

[raimo]

turbocharging and daily driving is not easy and not cheap.
by doing it cheap, you can run about 0,6-0,7 psi boost safely, which actually isnt anything more than a vacuum leak. real power needs a lot of cash. the strenght of your cranck is the least to worrie about.
seen dozen of projects done cheap, in the end, they blow up or they end up taken apart.


sounds like you vanos unit is dead or close to it

[1991318is]

I am familiar with turbocharging. What i'm asking out of curiosity is if anyone has any info or has any experience with the M50 engine. If you ask me what i think, well i would say that turbocharging is costly and if not done the proper way, well you will end up with internal engine damage. But if you take every step carefully you will end up with a crazy HP and torque, but you will need to do lot's of ajustements and be patient. I know! why do i bother asking questions if i'm familiar with turbo's? Well, first off i would like to find out and clarify what people write about m50 turbocharged, if their information is true or not, cause if it is true, it's intresting for my knowledge. Second, well i've searched and hav'ent found lot's of information. Third, it's intresting to start a thread to this forum with this title wich will help others, like myself, get informed and help them with their project's like mine... By the way r3vlimited is the source to my m50 project :-)
Just some regular BMW e30 guy

[1991318is]

turbocharging and daily driving is not easy and not cheap.
by doing it cheap, you can run about 0,6-0,7 psi boost safely, which actually isnt anything more than a vacuum leak. real power needs a lot of cash. the strenght of your cranck is the least to worrie about.
seen dozen of projects done cheap, in the end, they blow up or they end up taken apart.


sounds like you vanos unit is dead or close to it

Thanks raimo it all makes sense...

[bimmers4life]

go to bimmerforums.com and look at there forced inductiuon section. Lots of info about super and turbo charging m50's.

[KangamangusDriver]

https://www.boostjunky.com

[1991318is]

Very intresting...

[ehlpitel]

Yeah, some guy over on bimmerforums is making 543rwhp on a m52 with only studs and a head gasket

[1991318is]

That's crazy. I've read that also. Seem's like lots of people just change there head gasket for a thicker one and studs but they dont seem to run into any internal damage. That's where i'm curious, are the internals of m50 and familly engines that strong?

[X2theZ3]

btw, people change their headgaskets in favor of thicker ones to hold up to the boost, not to lower compression ratio (which it does not).

[ehlpitel]

It appears that the internals ARE that strong, if anything use an M50 and if it blows it'll be less expensive to replace and that way you could build up the internals.

[Addissimo]

btw, people change their headgaskets in favor of thicker ones to hold up to the boost, not to lower compression ratio (which it does not).

Most we tod did quote of the year.

Right here.

Suck it in.

Enjoy it.

Enjoy it.

Oh, I'm enjoying it.

This is glorious.

Alright.

I'm spent.

Man, I'm glad you're letting everybody know that a thicker head gasket does not lower the compression ratio. I bet they were getting confused there, thinking that it does lower the compression ratio- because like you said, it doesn't.

[bimmerphile]

Most we tod did quote of the year.

Right here.

Suck it in.

Enjoy it.

Enjoy it.

Oh, I'm enjoying it.

This is glorious.

Alright.

I'm spent.

Man, I'm glad you're letting everybody know that a thicker head gasket does not lower the compression ratio. I bet they were getting confused there, thinking that it does lower the compression ratio- because like you said, it doesn't.

It does, however, compatabilize your boost ratio.

[FredK]

But what if I'm running a Tornado electric supercharger? Do I need a MLS or Cometic headgasket? I don't want detunashun r hot spotz.