For decades, many of us have followed the same practice with project cars. Typically, the first parts we pick up are an intake and exhaust. However, performance software became a hugely popular mod, particularly with turbo engines such as VW’s 1.8T. The total cost of these upgrades could reach $2000, while power typically increased by as much as 40whp, depending on the application. But did these parts give us the most for our money?
Ultimately, we want the maximum horsepower per dollar. And after spending an afternoon with Snow Performance, they got us thinking about a more cost-efficient way to accomplish this with water-methanol injection.
Snow
Snow Performance isn’t your run-of- the-mill tuner shop. They consist of engineers specializing in mad science, fancy equations and product design. Matt Snow started the company in 2000 after a personal experience with his supercharged Mustang. He blew head gaskets left and right, so started playing with water injection to remove his detonation problems and added more than 100hp to his ’Stang. The business was established and water-meth took off from there.
Now headquartered in Colorado, Snow develops water-meth components, controllers and complete kits. Whether Euro, JDM, domestic or diesel, Snow has it covered, along with dyno tests and detailed instructions for almost every application.
What’s Meth?
Methanol is a high-octane chemical with heat properties that allow it to act like an air charge-cooler. When blended with water, the mixture is injected into the engine’s fuel and air mixture before it reaches the combustion chamber. The methanol evaporates under the high temperatures of a firing cylinder, causing heat to be pulled away from the incoming air.
This cooling process allows an engine to safely run more advanced ignition timing and boost, hence making more horsepower. It simulates an octane boosting effect on the fuel and reduces detonation. Also, meth can clean carbon deposits from the combustion chamber.
N54 3.0L turbo motor spun the dyno to 131.43whp over stock thanks to piggyback ECU, Snow w
BMW N54
If you’ve thought about buying a BMW in the last five years, chances are you had your eye on the N54 engine in the 135i, 335i and 535i (plus X6 and Z4). These models sported the attractive 3.0-liter twin-turbo straight-six rated at 300hp and 300 lb-ft of torque. The engine packed an explosive punch with little sign of lag. The power was instantaneous and rewarding, more entertaining than comparable engines.
For being BMWs first turbo engine in decades, tuners were chomping at the bit to unlock the N54’s ECU and squeeze more power from it. In fact, tuners were seeing impressive gains with both software flashes and piggyback systems.
In et 2/10, we flash-tuned our belated Project 135i with a GIAC stage 1 software. Tested on the dyno, we gained 41whp and the car was noticeably quicker. Snow Performance realized the benefits of chip-tuning and took it a step further.
The Test
To get familiar with the N54, Matt Snow picked up this clean ’08 135i as a new project car. Virtually stock except for lowering springs, the real magic is hidden. This 1er pushed 131.43whp more than its baseline dyno thanks to a software upgrade, water-meth injection and nitrous. Best of all, the conversion is safe, costs under $1500 and is reliable enough for Matt to let his wife drive it everyday without breaking a sweat.
The first order of business was a Burger Motorsports JB3 module. This Juice Box is a plug-n-play solution that works alongside the stock ECU. It overcomes the hidden “tuner detection” codes and adjusts boost, timing and other parameters to enhance performance. The module has safety nets to protect the engine from boost spikes to preserve reliability. The module can also be unplugged whenever you want and costs around $500.
Monitoring the chipped 135i on the dyno, Snow recorded a 25.8whp gain, taking it to 321.85hp from the stock 296.02whp. The results were adequate but after making several runs, they noticed some spark knock. The ECU was pulling timing because the motor was pushed passed the safety limits dictated by the factory closed-loop knock control on standard 91-octane fuel. It was time to introduce water-meth…