"e" to " i " cam swap and others

[C ///M]

Don't fucking roll your eyes at me, and claim I am clueless. I make one fucking comment and you jump at me? back the fuck off, jesus

I personally would not want to rev an engine with a 4800rpm redline to 6500, especially considering most of these engines have upwards of 175K - 200K miles.

If you think it is an okay risk to rev that engine higher, then by all means, prove me wrong, but I would never rev an ETA past 5500rpm, new cam/valve springs or not.


Its not about doing it cheap, its about doing it correctly, you have done this, and thats fine... would I recommend it to anybody? probably not....What are you even dynoing at?


The stroke on these motors is way different then the M20B25, and spinning at 6500rpm for amounts of time is certainly going to cause an engine failure.


And beileve me, I have considered doing this, I have all the parts for it in my damn garage, but after weighing out the pro's and con's, and discussing it with several engine builders, I decided not to do it, the general concenses was engine failure.

If it lasts fine, but when I have enough people telling me bad idea, I tend to agree with them

Jesus, grow some skin. People who have absolutely no idea what they're talking about on a given subject shouldn't make statements that would disuade someone for doing an upgrade for absolutely no reason. Grow up and realize this. Use some common sense. "If Nando can do it, so can you." (In best Martin Yan voice, cooking TV show.."if Yan can do it, so can you." If you've never heard it then disregard poor attempt at humor).

[James Crivellone]

james, if the E bottom end couldn't handle 6500+rpm, then how do people get away with using it in a stroker motor? :roll:

not that it matters anyway.. the E valves and head are much more restrictive than the i, and won't hardly make any power in the higher RPMs anyway. IMO, spend $500 on a used M20B25 and just drop it in. modding an E motor is pretty pointless (aside from a chip).

So your telling me you have no issue with revving a engine with a ton of miles almost 2000rpm above the factory redline without any bottom end work?

Alright, thats your decision

And yes, that is the other point, why not just drop in a damn M20B25 and be done with it, the engines don't cost that much, and the swap is easy as hell, minus some light electrical work.

[James Crivellone]

Don't fucking roll your eyes at me, and claim I am clueless. I make one fucking comment and you jump at me? back the fuck off, jesus

I personally would not want to rev an engine with a 4800rpm redline to 6500, especially considering most of these engines have upwards of 175K - 200K miles.

If you think it is an okay risk to rev that engine higher, then by all means, prove me wrong, but I would never rev an ETA past 5500rpm, new cam/valve springs or not.


Its not about doing it cheap, its about doing it correctly, you have done this, and thats fine... would I recommend it to anybody? probably not....What are you even dynoing at?


The stroke on these motors is way different then the M20B25, and spinning at 6500rpm for amounts of time is certainly going to cause an engine failure.


And beileve me, I have considered doing this, I have all the parts for it in my damn garage, but after weighing out the pro's and con's, and discussing it with several engine builders, I decided not to do it, the general concenses was engine failure.

If it lasts fine, but when I have enough people telling me bad idea, I tend to agree with them

Jesus, grow some skin. People who have absolutely no idea what they're talking about on a given subject shouldn't make statements that would disuade someone for doing an upgrade for absolutely no reason. Grow up and realize this. Use some common sense. "If Nando can do it, so can you." (In best Martin Yan voice, cooking TV show.."if Yan can do it, so can you." If you've never heard it then disregard poor attempt at humor).

I don't feel the risks are worth it without a bottom end rebuild, I am posting my opinion and knowledge on the subject, don't like it, then ignore it

And you jumped at me, do you always get this heated when somebody does not agree with yout?

And you didn't answer me, what are you dynoing at?

[EverWiser]

Re: valves

does anybody know ? if there is any difference between the " i " valves and the " e " valves ?

The "i" valves are 2mm larger in diameter for both the intake and exhaust but the stem sizes are the same. If you recut the valve seats the "i" valves will fit fine. I ended up bringing this up on bf.c and it ended up being a fairly long thread. I'm planning on doing the same thing with mine so don't let anyone dissaude you.

I've compared the heads and if you're willing to do most of the work yourself it won't be too expensive. From my comparison the "i" head is an "e" head with the extra cam oiling, larger valves, double springs, higher revving cam, and opened up combustion chambers and ports. I'm pretty sure they opened up the combustion chamber to minimize detonation so you'll probably want to experiment with differenct octanes of fuel once you get it up and running.

[qimis]

i didn't read the whole thing, but this might catch your interest too.

[Stu]

James, you have a good point in that the 81mm 'e' crank, made of cast steel, won't like the crank/rod angles at much over 6000rpm--simply because the crank is not forged. This isn't too much of a problem if you're only going to go to 6500 rpm, but any higher and I would worry. This is the reason that the proper way to build these to 2.7 is to utilize the diesel crank (same 81mm stroke, but forged), and then it's 7000-7200 with no worries.

But, as M20's are cheaper, older motors that are readily available, using the 'e' crank is fine as long as you run the proper piston/head setup--and don't plan to rev it too deep.

[C ///M]

No prob. I have a brand new set of dual valve springs available. I also have an "i" intake manifold and valve cover (w/ new valve cover gasket), both in a black wrinkle finish, and also an "i" throttle body. And I'll have a complete "i" exhaust with Bosal "sport upgrade" muffler for sale this winter. *The intake manifold/valve cover/throttle body might be spoken for by Josh unless you're willing to "significantly" beat his amount.

I was going to do this exact swap for a while, but the s50 swap came up kind of fast and I never got around to doing it because I never picked up the cam (BavAuto has the brand new "i" cam for about $250 or something while the dealership even with CCA discount is over $300. I'm sure you could find a better deal, or just find one used for super cheap.

James, if you would bother to read posts in the thread, you'll realize that I never finished the swap, but have most of the parts, because the s50 swap arrived sooner than I thought. I figured why waste the time and money to do the cam swap to only have it for 2 months.

Secondly, I didn't jump on you. Again, grow some skin. People who have ZERO experience or don't have any knowlegdge on a particular swap/mod, SHOULDN'T bother post an opinion, especially in the manner you did. You make it sound like its the worst idea ever.

an ETA reving to 6500rpm? I don't think I would wanna do that

It's not a plain old ETA if you change all the components that LIMIT the engine to 5000rpm. Just use some common sense and don't be so defensive. I even acknowledged your experience with the e30 when i said:

I guess even the smart ones like to make statements with absolutely no relevance or any real reason behind it...

In this case, you have NO factual support, evidence, or experience to back "your opinion" (of which you stated very strongly to begin with.

As for the swap itself. I met with one person who completed the swap and got a chance to check out his car. He dynoed 149whp (maybe 147). I don't know if this was before or after his big six afm. He was also running a 3.73LS up from his stock 2.79 open rear end, his car was incredibly fun to be in.

P.S. All I'm doing is doing my best to stop misinformation and the disuasion of members from doing a great and inexpensive mod for absolutely no reason. Even experienced members let their pre-determinations and opinions get the best of common sense and judgement.

[DSchultz325e]

so are the eta and i cams really different? i've heard a lot of people say yes and no, and then i've heard that it was the gear that was different. i have no idea who to believe about this. also, trying to squash this, are the 325i and eta exhaust manifolds the same?

[C ///M]

Cams are very different. Exhaust manifolds have gone both ways. There are those that say they're different, and those that say they're the same. I've put manifolds off an "i" and "e" next to each other and they look exactly the same. The "i" and "e" catalytic coverters bolt up to both manifolds and I've seen some with the same part numbers and some with different part numbers. That said, I think they're identical, but some others say they're different. That's all I got.

[James Crivellone]

Cams are very different. Exhaust manifolds have gone both ways. There are those that say they're different, and those that say they're the same. I've put manifolds off an "i" and "e" next to each other and they look exactly the same. The "i" and "e" catalytic coverters bolt up to both manifolds and I've seen some with the same part numbers and some with different part numbers. That said, I think they're identical, but some others say they're different. That's all I got.

I also compared my M20B25 and M20B27 manifolds side by side and did not see any difference whatsoever.

[Stu]

Dschultz, as Chris mentioned, they are much different. The 'e' cam is 235 degrees in duration, whereas the 'i' is 264 (or 265). I'm unsure of the lift on the e/i cams.

[Digitalwave]

I have a complete M20B25 in my garage if any of you need parts off it.

[DSchultz325e]

ok since the cams are different, all that is needed is drilling of 2 additional oil journals and it's good to go?
btw tj how many miles are on the motor?

[James Crivellone]

ok since the cams are different, all that is needed is drilling of 2 additional oil journals and it's good to go?
btw tj how many miles are on the motor?

Yes, plus dual valve springs, the M20B25 cam of course. and a chip to allow the higher revs.


You could PROBABLY swap the M20B25 ECU/Harness over with some minor rewiring and save yourself the trouble of the custom chip, although I am not sure how well the engine would run

[rs4pro3]

The exhuast manifolds are different, look closely at the casting, You'll notice the eta steps down once it leaves the head, where as the 325i flows smoothly. They both interchange. They have different part number in the ETK also.