N52 intake shootout

[hoveringuy]

Hot dang man! That is really slick looking!

Adam's dyno results were really puzzling

The idea is that I have a "known good" motor so I can do baseline dynos on my dual-DISA manifold and then swap on the new one (and a different ECU) for a direct comparison.

We know that my motor pulled like crazy on the N54 manifold. I'm not sure we saw peak power... it was still building past 7500... we want most of that goodness with a civilized bottom-end.

My DISA mani runs out of breath at the track for sure.

Also, his body afforded room for the front-facing inlet. I want more M50-ish to make it broadly compatible (although a TB and MAF are basically optional on this motor....)

[adam.nonis]

Hot dang man! That is really slick looking!

Didn't work out as planned though. Steve is leveraging this to do V2 though. Good news is that the runners/flange can be reused and the plenum can go through variations.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

[HCMW Adam]

Hot dang man! That is really slick looking!

[adam.nonis]

I looks like the "flange" of the runner portion has plenty of meat to clamp to or run bolts through and attach a home-did aluminum plenum to the throttle body side. I might have one of these manifolds laying around. I might look at that area a little closer and see if it looks reasonable to attach to.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

[HCMW Adam]

I looks like the "flange" of the runner portion has plenty of meat to clamp to or run bolts through and attach a home-did aluminum plenum to the throttle body side. I might have one of these manifolds laying around. I might look at that area a little closer and see if it looks reasonable to attach to.

[hoveringuy]

I have a concept of a plan.

Utilizing the runners from a stock intake and lopping-off all the byzantine stuff behind it yields something that looks a lot like an M50 manifold, which is the O.G.

It would clear brake boosters and make a little better bottom-end than the N54 manifold.

[moatilliatta]

I was thinking of just coupling a hacked off N52 plastic manifold a few inches from the flange, Coupled up to the S54 airbox and just run valvetronic for your throttle..

Rabid Racing Development may have an N52 to S54 Itb in the works.

[hoveringuy]

Donkeyshins The S54 intake could be adaped, except the actuator or something on the forward runner interferes with the oil filter housing

Also, the magic of ITB is lost on the N52, because the N52 already has ITB's, the valves! The throttle body is actually just a safety backup and doesn't normally do shit.

But yeah, there needs to be an inbetween intake; the N54 one is optimized for forced induction and the DISA on for soccer moms with automatic transmissions.

I actually like the M50 intake a lot, I put that on my old M54, I see something similar.

[Donkeyshins]

Also, if you haven't seen it, 22RPD has a 3D printed intake manifold that gets rid of EVERYTHING and just runs in Alfa-N mode. https://22rpd.com/blog/the-future-of...esting-sign-up

Given the S54 vs. N52 intake port spacing should be close (since they're both 91mm cylinder spacing on-center and we know that with a flange replacement that the S54 exhaust manifold bolts right up to the N52 head) and given the >90% similar dimensions of the intake ports of the S54 (52mm x 33.5mm) and N52 (50.2mm x 30.2mm) cylinder heads, it would be nice if someone (22RPD, perhaps) could package together a complete intake system that combines an airbox, S54 ITBs (with adapter plate and bracket to mount the S54 throttle-by-wire actuator) and S54 MAF, and flow-optimized N52 intake runners into a complete package with associated tune.

[hoveringuy]

Just for the record, I got to literally run a few laps yesterday while I was being evaluated for instructor and managed to run-down a really nice E36 M3. https://youtu.be/2mdUblZVTh0

This was on the dual-DISA intake and I will admit that it runs out of breath starting at 6500 but is still pretty capable.

I got to ride in a few e36 M3's during my evaluation and I am so impressed by how PLANTED those cars are! I think my saving grace is lightness, braking, and I match them in power.

My winter project will be to follow adam.nonis in crafting an intake that's easily streetable while still wailing at the track.

[DesertBMW]

there is a small diamater booster made for hot rods that fit bigger V8 engine and it is only 7 inch in diameter, so use that and move it half inch, it looks like it will fit. Search Part Number: 965-G753709

or just the booster on amazon search 7 inch universal brake booster

[Northern]

Decided to come back to this thread to check out how the iBooster setup/boosterless brakes would work with the N52 and I actually had someone mention the E34 remote brake booster setup for other swaps, namely the V8 swaps since they have the same manifold to booster clearance issues. Has anyone looked into how that E34 remote brake booster setup would work with the N52 swaps or is there something else that I'm missing?

I would assume that there is some custom fabrication for proper fitment/geometry as some people have done for the V8 swaps, but I can't imagine how the ECU would communicate with ABS or any of the plumbing to either the E34 or maybe even the E90 brake booster if it can be done.
This could be a good alternative for people who might not want to use the iBooster or boosterless brakes but no idea just yet if it's worth it or doable!

I think very few people are willing to use the E34 swap now that the ibooster exists. It's massive, heavier than any other option, and an eyesore in the engine bay.

[Yo.goob]

Spoiler alert, before I bolted everything I test-fit a Tesla booster. Clears fine.
Note: All the cool kids are running the CR-V remote reservoir (there's a picture of an S54 car with that setup somewhere....) that gives even more room.

Decided to come back to this thread to check out how the iBooster setup/boosterless brakes would work with the N52 and I actually had someone mention the E34 remote brake booster setup for other swaps, namely the V8 swaps since they have the same manifold to booster clearance issues. Has anyone looked into how that E34 remote brake booster setup would work with the N52 swaps or is there something else that I'm missing?

I would assume that there is some custom fabrication for proper fitment/geometry as some people have done for the V8 swaps, but I can't imagine how the ECU would communicate with ABS or any of the plumbing to either the E34 or maybe even the E90 brake booster if it can be done.
This could be a good alternative for people who might not want to use the iBooster or boosterless brakes but no idea just yet if it's worth it or doable!

[moatilliatta]

Yes. Just toss on a s54 carbon box to n52 cut runners..

[hoveringuy]

The dual-DISA intake has been great! The car runs flawlessly and the torque for normal driving has been fantastic.

Inspired by adam.nonis I've been thinking about what a better intake would like like, one that didn't start choking by 6500 but would still be easily street-able. I cut-up my original non-DISA intake to start thinking about what it could look like; my thoughts going into this is that I still want the Throttle Body, MAF and cone filter, but including the throttle body adds a lot of constraints that make the design tougher.

The N52 throttle body is actually redundant because the VVL acts as the throttle, the TB is just a limp-home safety device in case the cam position sensor fails, so it can be deleted. To prove that to myself, I unplugged my TB and jammed it open with my German beer duck, then reconnected the intake and plugged in a second TB. As expected, the car ran just fine. I'll need to think about what the tradeoffs of not having any throttle body would be, does it just mean I couldn't drive the car home in limp mode or would it be an actual safety issue, like I would get runaway power when valves went to full lift??


The DISA and non-DISA runners are identical. You can see the perforated grid between #3 and #4, that's where one of the DISA valves would sit to open/close that passage.



the N52 thottle body is 76mm which is HUGE compared to an S50 (64mm), but the intake chokes at higher rpms because the piping directs the air in a complete 360. At the back of the throttle body the air splits 90 degrees to the left and right, then curves around again in the oval tubes.


Duck holding the throttle body open.


Engine running all "ducked-up.... TB is plugged-in but not actually doing anything. The intake is wide open.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/XHGjkFeAjGA

Also, if you haven't seen it, 22RPD has a 3D printed intake manifold that gets rid of EVERYTHING and just runs in Alfa-N mode. https://22rpd.com/blog/the-future-of...esting-sign-up