Supercharge the Z ?

IMZ4N

Senior member
 Orange County CA
Has anyone supercharged their Z. Thoughts?

I know I will still need to be able to smog the car and am looking into that later today.
 
i don't think there will ever be a smog approved supercharger kit for the Z4. companies have been promising this since 3-4 years ago and till today, nothing....

which kit are you getting?
 
well, VF have a good reputation (i'm considering their kit for my 996 as well) but i believe the kit for the Z4 isn't intercooled.

i would suggest looking for an intercooled kit if you can afford one, especially if you intend to take the car to the track. while the dyno numbers may be similar to kits with an intercooler, it will heat soak a lot faster and you'll notice that the power will drop off pretty quickly after repeated dyno runs, this will translate into inconsistent lap times at the track.

cheers
 
gwatson forum member has done his 3.0i with an ESS kit, his car is currently up for sale on pistonheads..
 
Yep I have a Lysholm twinscrew supercharger from ESS it's the TS2+ upgrade kit with new camshafts, 410hp/480nm (engine power). And all I can say is that i LOVE IT BEST MOD EVER AND WORTH EVERY PENNY :evil:

a short vid:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=Wlm-wPs8_sU
 
ProStarscream said:
Yep I have a Lysholm twinscrew supercharger from ESS it's the TS2+ upgrade kit with new camshafts, 410hp/480nm (engine power). And all I can say is that i LOVE IT BEST MOD EVER AND WORTH EVERY PENNY :evil:

a short vid:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=Wlm-wPs8_sU

Oh that's so nice, so very very nice :thumbsup:
 
8) , me want.... :)

also like the AC Schnitzer rear spoilers, mine are at the paint shop at the moment, hope to fit next week... :thumbsup:
 
IMZ4N said:
Has anyone supercharged their Z. Thoughts?

I know I will still need to be able to smog the car and am looking into that later today.

Hey IMZ4N,
I recently read on another Z4 forum (zpost, or bimmerforums?) that VF is looking for Z4s with certain engines (i think yours) to do testing and tuning. They will need your car for awhile, but you get a free install and a 20% discount on the supercharger.
 
ProStarscream said:
Yep I have a Lysholm twinscrew supercharger from ESS it's the TS2+ upgrade kit with new camshafts, 410hp/480nm (engine power). And all I can say is that i LOVE IT BEST MOD EVER AND WORTH EVERY PENNY :evil:

a short vid:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=Wlm-wPs8_sU

very nice!

i was one of the earliest ones to contact ESS about that kit but gave up after waiting far too long for its release. they even charged my credit card for it without informing me beforehand.... they did eventually refund me the amount but not before i lost a sizeable chunk due to the exchange rate.

do i like that kit? yes... would i ever buy anything from ESS? not likely....
 
I have had my eye on a Z3 M Coupe which has been completely modified from the crankshaft up. It's been for sale on ebay. The car has a Dinan supercharger. My friend and BMW mechanic went out to test drive it because his shop is near where the car is located. He told me the car was great, but the problem was that the supercharger revved the engine too quickly. During aggressive acceleration, you were always hitting the red line before any real speed happened. Just a thought for those of you who are thinking about FI. (He said you could alleviate, but not totally fix, the problem by changing the gearing in the differential-maybe down to 2.73.)
 
VF Engineering is what got this all started. Sounded like a grest deal at first. However, in California you must look before you leap. Too many miles on my car for the testing and my car will be due for smog this year. Pay a good price to be installed then possibably need to pay to be removed for smog then put it back on. I wait until I can just do it once. Thanks for all the input.
 
California Air Resources Board (CARB)

The emission control devices installed on our cars become less effective with time and the amount of miles driven. With as many miles on my car and the control devices not working as well, getting the certification would be much harder to obtain, smaller tolerences to work in.

The newer the car and less milage, makes it easier to obtain performance within the range specified by CARB.

When certification is given, anything older then automatically qualifies. So if my car is used, being an 04, that would be good for say 4,000 cars. If a newer car is used, say an 06, that would then cover say 8,000 cars. The numbers were just picked from the sky as an example. It is in VF's best interest to get something newer and therefore easier to get certification to cover more cars, more people to sell to.

This is not a cheep thing to do, getting CARB approval, why get approval for 4,000 and need to do it again to cover newer cars. Just makes good business sense to me.

Nik was very nice to talk with and business savy. I, being an ex business owner understand all the reasons for the choices made, by him and myself. There is no promise to get this cert. after the install. Nik's and my crystal ball broke many years ago. I'm sure Nik's group will get the cert. at some point, I just don't know if that would be before I would need to have the car smogged or not.

I hope this helps explain why.

This is just the price we Califorians pay to have the great weather. It's all about keeping the air we breathe at a level that makes sense and legal.
 
Back
Top Bottom