[Commanderfish]

Hi all,

My Brera 2.2 is now running Mango's induction, Red Dot custom remap and a straight through stainless exhaust with a Vortex chamber that spins up the gasses and reduces back pressure, increasing efficiency.

Results 250 miles after Vortex was fittted, compared to stock vehicle at 12,000 miles:

+32 BHP (+20%), +46 lbft (62 NM, +30%) torque and +4mpg (+20%)!! Weight estimated at -20kg.

Total (actual real rolling road figures, not claimed figures):
- a little shy of 200Bhp;
- 200 lbft of torque (271 NM) - 90% of this is available from 1500 revs all the way through to above 6000revs. This means you don't need to change gears to stay on the torque, meaning less power and time wasted on gear changes.
-25mpg in town/traffic, THIRTY (30) Mpg on a run!! That's about as good as my run-in GTV 2.0TS which had no low end torque, was a door-ding magnet and weighed 80KG less!!
- Weight approx 1450kg

The torque is great - car will reach 35 mph in first gear in about 2.5 secs!! Brilliant for town driving or pulling onto, well any type of road really. Lovely flat torque delivery, but there is a peak at 4,200 which means if you're doing at 80mph in sixth, you have peak torque available

It has done just 19,000 miles so has a bit of loosening up to come too. Exhaust is quiet on the inside but outside pulses like a V6 at idle. No crazy vortex whistling.

 

[cj romeo]

Was it originally rr'd in the summer?

 

[Seasider]

CF - I presume that's running on high octane ?

Any chance of PM'ing me the details (actual products, companies , costs, etc) just in case I fancy playing with my spider

 

[Commanderfish]

Was it originally rr'd in the summer?

Nope, last January (2009). It's not an air temp/density thing.

Nice work CF.

Have I missed something though ? Car is now running 200BHP which is +32 on the pre modded state. Does that mean it was running only 168 vs the factory stated 185 ?

RSK

Yep. To be fair, no engine runs the factory quoted figure, not even BMW or Audi. Also, the engine had barely reached 12,000 miles and the factory estimate has been revised to 182 bhp. Even now mine has loosening up to do, but the JTS engines are known to be slightly more under quoted figures than most engines are. 3-10% under factory figure is the typical actual figure across marques, someone posted a link to a good list of these figures last year.

I think the large percentage gain acheived for a naturally aspirated engine shows that (other than needing a lot of running in to reach peak), the stock exhaust and induction on the JTS are prohibitively restrictive. There's nothing wrong with the engine itself - it's actually a right corker once these 2 items are fixed.

Having seen the offending parts, I suspect that in the process of uping their game to compete with ze germans, Alfa totally overdid the noise redction on the induction and exhaust, thus blocking the true potential of the engines. Have to say though, they've really uped their game on build quality and ride comfort so it's 2 out of 3 really. 3 out of 3 once you've got that awful factory gubbins off!

Yes the figures are on Vpower. I believe quoted factory figures are also for 99RON, if anyone can confirm or disprove, please do...

 

[jbsmith1]

good power gain CF as you say, just shows how restrictive the stock exhaust and intake are.

 

[Commanderfish]

Yep that's just how it is.
By the way, the results of adding a vortex box to a turbo engine are supposed to be quite superb JB

 

[phil-gtv6]

Wasn't the quoted figures 185 PS = 182 BHP & 260PS = 256BHP for the 3.2

 

[jbsmith1]

Yep that's just how it is.
By the way, the results of adding a vortex box to a turbo engine are supposed to be quite superb JB

hmm, one of them centre boxs would slot nicely in where my dpf box sits...

 

[Commanderfish]

hmm, one of them centre boxs would slot nicely in where my dpf box sits...

Hahaha no regen problems and ENDLESS TORQUE!! At this rate your engine is going to tear your transmission a new ring piece!

Where are the sensors that trigger DPF regen? You'd have to make sure they wouldn't be triggered... probably it would never trigger as the air flow would be higher, not lower.

 

[jbsmith1]

Hahaha no regen problems and ENDLESS TORQUE!! At this rate your engine is going to tear your transmission a new ring piece!

Where are the sensors that trigger DPF regen? You'd have to make sure they wouldn't be triggered... probably it would never trigger as the air flow would be higher, not lower.

hahah I'll be gentle:cheese:...yes theres a pressure and temp sensor on the dpf box and some very complicated software to get around, but, I have a plan...

 

[ALFA TUNER]

Hahaha no regen problems and ENDLESS TORQUE!! At this rate your engine is going to tear your transmission a new ring piece!

Where are the sensors that trigger DPF regen? You'd have to make sure they wouldn't be triggered... probably it would never trigger as the air flow would be higher, not lower.

:lol: oohh,yes it would,well start alarms ringing anyway,higher or lower.

 

[jbsmith1]

hey Gus, what do you reckon, worth replacing the dpf box with one of these with a remap? Looking for power past 4k?

 

[ukmike2008]

Even so that's pretty poor isn't it ? 168 bhp actual vs a 182 quoted figure. That would pee me off no end !

IIRC in days of old the old 2.0 TS was rated at 150 BHP but supposedly regularly churned out 160 or so so it's sad to see what is quite a sizeable negative disparity on the modern car.

Naughty AR PR people :tut:

The 1.9 diesels that have been on rolling roads all seem to give around 160 bhp against the factory 150 bhp too.

Maybe explains why a number of 2.2 owners were disappointed in the performance of their cars?
Naughty GM! :tut:

 

[Commanderfish]

Yes, it's known that the JTS are typically low against claimed figures. If you have a turbo like the JTDM then that should compensate for rubbish induction? In fact, is the induction even the same on the JTS and JTDM? Exhaust must be different to some extent to accomodate DPF, EGR etc.

Like I said, the stock induction and exhaust are rubbish, once they are off it runs higher than claimed figures - relatively big increase for a NA engine which tells you something about the stock induction and exhaust I reckon...

Still, the 1750 TBi should be capable of being modded much further, just don't know what will happen to engine, turbo and transmission reliability... feels much safer modding a naturally aspirated engine

 

[grande spud]

Hey CF, your mods sound like you've managed a big improvement for relatively little work/expense. :thumbs:
I'd love to compare performance/feel of our two to see how differing upgrades compare.
I've had the Mango's induction and mod 4 (fuel 'tweak') plus Raggazzon rear silencers, and whilst it improved the hesitation, it's still not as smooth as I'd like and certainly doesn't feel like a vast improvement in responsiveness. I'm coming to the conclusion that the ragazzons are a bit 'boomy' for my taste and it may be psycological, but the droning sound under acceleration almost makes it feel more sluggish!! Sounds a bit mad I know, but like I said it's probably more the imnpression it gives than reality. Perhaps a trip to a rolling road is in order and a dip into the wallet for a custom remap. What make is the vortex pipe you have? and isn't it loud if it's stright through?

 

[Commanderfish]

Hi Spud,

Are you coming to the World Record attempt in Epsom? Happy for you to try mine out then!

I don't think the back boxes alone would eliminate the problem though as you say may help. My exhaust system is stainless steel all the way from the cat backwards ("cat-back"), it has the vortex and 3 x "straight through" silencers, i.e. they are not big chambered boxes like the original, but the three of them are enough to eliminiate all droning but give the exhaust a pleasant V6 like pulse at idle.

 

[Commanderfish]

Took the car out today and what a difference. So quick. May "only" be 200 bhp but it's light (150 kgs or so less than 2.4 and 3.2 Q4), so a lovely power to weight ratio.

More important than the power is the torque, peak is 271 NM which is 41 more than the original claimed peak. It delivers 90% of that torque between about 1500 and 5500 revs - so it's delivering more than the original claimed peak torque across most of the rev range :thumbs:

This feels great

 

[Nev]

Sounds like it's now as good to drive in town as cruising.

It's a real pity that AR didn't sort the 2.2 out properly
It does seem to be a sturdy bit of kit in general and
just get a bit bogged down at the off in factory form.

And I think 200BHP sounds about the sweet spot for an engine
on the Brera. In terms of performance/weight/fuel economy.


A proper keeper CF.

 

[Squadrone Rosso]

Didn't Mangos quote 197bhp post mod 4 on their brand new 2.2Ti demo

 

[Commanderfish]

Didn't Mangos quote 197bhp post mod 4 on their brand new 2.2Ti demo

Yes but having had at least 3 different sessions on the Rolling road, and knowing most NA engines including the 2.2 are generally below claimed power, I can only assume that either:

1) Mango's figure is relative to manufacturer's claimed figure, i.e. you gain 15bhp more than you had; or
2) Red Dot's rolling road is a bit conservative/doesn't like the set up on my Brera (18" Pirelli P Zero Neros running 2.8 bar at front).