Hey everyone, I have a 97 M3 ( 5 speed) with some bolt-ons and I have recently reached the realization that NA isn't going to cut it for me anymore. I just can't justified spending hundreds(sometimes thousands) on bolt-ons that give me 10hp.. So I decided that forced induction is the best thing to do. I've been reading this "Forced Induction" forum since it first started so I've done quite a bit of reading as to all the different systems available for the E36 M3. As much as I would love to have a high horsepower turbocharged M3, thats just not practical for me. I have requirements that must be met. First, budget. As much as I would love to blow 15k+ on a high hp system, I just don't have the cash or want for such a system. I would like to stay in the 6-7k range, and I would be doing the installation. In that 7k or so, 1100 would go to a UUC stage II flywheel/M5 combo. So in theory, that leaves me with about 5-6k for the forced induction kit itself. The 2nd requirement I have is reliability. I would like a kit that is as reliable as possible. During certain months of the year, I use my car as a commuter, so I'll put on 500 miles per week. I can't afford nor wish to be bothered with a car that will be in the shop more than I can drive it. I want a kit that will be essentially "worry-free". I understand that a forced induction car requires a more attention than a NA car, but some of my friends have some wild turbo cars that are in the shop every week. The next requirement I have is drivability. I love power delivery of the car now. I can putter around town at 2-3k RPMs all day if I want and still be happy with the torque that is available. And if I want to have some fun, I can let her rip to redline and enjoy the smooth progressive power of BMW's inline-six. I've been in some pretty fast turbo cars before, and although the power they make is awesome, its just simply a little to "on/off" for me. Granted you can drive a turbo car around all day off boost and be happy, I just don't like the transition from no boost to full boost. I've been in civics with turbos and the transition seemed too abrupt and dangerous to me, I can only imagine what its like in a much more powerful M3 on a rainy day. As I said before, I love the power delivery of a stock M3, I just wish it was "amplified". I also like to auto-x my car when I get a chance and I just think that a turbo would be too much for me to handle. I'm sure you can get use to it after a while, but i'm no michael schumacher and don't pretend to be. The last thing I "want" but don't really need is upgradability. As much as I would like to deny it, power is addiciting. And although I can say all day that I'll be happy with a "basic supercharger kit", chances are, I won't be for very long. So heres some of the options I came up with and some pros and cons:

AA S/C Kit

Pros: Fits my "budget", makes respectable power, AA is known for their quality products, FMIC for consistent power.
Cons: I hear that the Rotrex blower they are using is pretty much maxed out at their current boost level and I haven't heard anything about AA upgrading the blower or offering any power upgrade kits.

RMS Stage II:
Pros: Also fits my "budget" on their "sale price". Comes with an aftercooler so power will be respectable. Makes impressive "claimed" HP figures. Quality of the kit seems to be very good. Uses the Vortech supercharger unit, which means the boost can be upgraded with just a pulley swap.
Cons: RMS hasn't had the best track record in the past. Although I hear recently that they've been straightening up their act, I still need further evidence that if I give them my business, I will be 110% satisified with the product I'm receiving. I also hear that RMS software isn't exactly the best, but I hear that AA makes a software program for RMS superchargers.

Stimpee/Eurosport Twin Screw:
Pros: Instant Torque on demand. Kit is intercooled, so power will be there whether its hot or cold. From what I hear, twin screw cars drive like they have a bigger displacement motor and that their power is very predicatable. Software is being developed by Jim C., one of the few people that actually understands BMW's ECU.
Cons: Since no pictures are available, I can't comment on the quality of the kit. Impressive dyno figures have been given, but I will reserve judgment until I see independent dynos from owners (Shark Injector owners know what I mean). No real price figures have been given. Some ball park figures of 7-8k have been thrown out, but "ball park" figures aren't good enough for me. Not sure if I like how much torque is available at low RPMs(eg. might be dangerous in the rain).

Custom Turbo:

I've spoken to a few different board members about building a "low boost" turbo kit for my car and the verdict seems that for ~6k, I can have a fairly nice low boost turbo kit.
Pros: Probably fits my price range, impressive hp and torque figures, intercooled. Quality components.
Cons: Don't like power delivery of turbo cars, however, I have never driven/been in a low boost turbo M3. Maybe I've had bad experiences and turbo M3s are different. Since this will be a "custom" kit, that means no warranty and no one to turn to if I encounter a problem. And since this is really not a "kit", fabrication and "downtime" will be unavoidable. Another problem is software. Although I think I have found a source for turbo M3 software, the fact of the matter is, i don't want to spend hours on a dyno tuning my car run right. I want something I can bolt on and just work from the start.

So from what it seems, a centrifigal supercharger seems to be my best bet. I know that a centrifigal supercharger is the most "undesirable" form of forced induction for the hardcore HP and Torque guys, but it seems to fit what I need quite well.

Well, I'm open to advice, thanks for listening to my rambling.... Let's try to keep this a constructive thread for future use, I really don't want to get into any "turbos are better than supercharger" debates or "twin screws are better than centrifigal" debates. I've read all those already.

Right now, I'm thinking the AA S/C fits me well, but I'm open to other superchargers as long as they have some sort of intercooling(aftercooler or W/I Injection). Can some of you guys post your impressions of how you feel about your supercharger kits? Are you happy with them? Would you do it again if you could? Should I forget about FI and invest in another car?

What I'm most interested in is dynos. If you guys have dynos of your cars, I'd love to see them. I've already seen a handful of dynos using the search feature, but i'm sure I havent seen them all. I'm most interested in M3s with AA S/C's (i'd like to see modified M3s w/ AA s/c).

Thanks guys, happy motoring!

Honestly I think your missing out the one choice that you really ought to consider and that's Dinan. Paul E has over 40k miles on his Dinan blower, even with the boost bump and has had zero issues with it.

It's not intercooled, but you can add water injection or an aftercooler later on when you have more $$ available. You'll get a proven product with good support and a platform that is readily upgradable.

Barring that, the AA is probably the next best choice, unless RMS can step it up in the customer service arena.

The reason I didnt include Dinan was a.) its not intercooled, but like you said, I can always add that and b.) i hate the only dinan dealer in NJ and from what i understand, you can't order Dinan products thru an out of state dealer and have them shipped to your house. I have been following Paul E for quite some time, I've seen that his kit has been pretty much flawless. I am a little dissappointed by how Dinan reacted when Paul E tried to make a warranty claim with his Dinan Exhaust and they denied him for having increased his boost. I don't like a company that is run like that and I have been mistreated at my local Dinan dealer multiple times because I am younger than most of their "usual" buyers..(I'm 20..)

Do not rule out the RMS, I think you would be making a mistake doing that.
My car has his programming and all of his goodies,it runs great.
Marco

>> i hate the only dinan dealer in NJ and from what i understand, you can't order Dinan products thru an out of state dealer and have them shipped to your house.<<

Advant, I respect the amount of reading/research youve done, and the studied way youre approaching things. First, I dont think that this is true that dinan wont sell you directly. They may not sell to a non dinan dealer, but they certainly will sell to you, and for the software, you can send your ecu to them directly and they will load the software. You can then take the kit to whomever you want to install . So you can bypass that local problem dealer.

as for reliability, as Doc says, my SC system is the most reliable part of my car, and always has been, even with the boost bump +3 psi done 2 years ago!

Now, if it were me, I would probably wind up waiting to see what the Josh and Jim show finally bring out before I did anything. From the advance dyno numbers, this kit, in terms of power for the boost delivered, looks to take the cake. Docs suggestion of getting the dinan kit and then adding winjection as a cheap but effective intercooler, and bumping the boost has worked out well for me. I just got back from the dyno, and recorded an excellent (as a percentage of HP) peak torqe value of 286 ft lbs, using AA software. But, you can even keep the stock dinan software and still make about 20-40 more hp and ft lbs than the standard dinan system will make. I give the range, because Ive seen out of the box dinan systems dyno anywhere from 265 rwhp to 305sae rwhp. But, it is a robust system, tuned conservatively, and pretty trouble free.

I also like the RMS stage II kit. That aftercooler is very effective, and, because it uses water to air, it brings the cooling to the air, instead of the air to the cooling, which means you dont have to route the air all over the place, in a cramped compartment, to get it cooled.

Truth is, now is a very nice time to be into FI for the M3s. Back in '99 when my car was still new, my choices were very limited, and, I had to pay for the nose to get them. The same dinan kit you can buy today was a grand more expensive back then. RMS didnt have a sale, AA SC hadnt been put together yet, and twin screws were used only on other cars.

I envy you and your choices. REally, I dont think there is a bad choice among them. Good luck with whatever you do, and you can be sure youll find plenty of feedback around here :)

Aren't you a gentlemen, you said a nice thing about everybody..
Paul, I think you should run for president, If you did I would vote for you. It would give you something to do and less time obsessing about every orifice of your car!!!
But you are right, every company has something good to offer in their own right.

Now Paul, tell us about your dyno run today already!!!Marco

[i] I just got back from the dyno, and recorded an excellent (as a percentage of HP) peak torqe value of 286 ft lbs, using AA software. .

[/B]

Spill the beans Paul. I am not that active on the forums, but I do lurk quite a bit. Your posts and your experiences interest me greatly..Show us the dyno!:)

Paul, thanks for the advice. One of the reason I like this forum so much is because of people like you, DocWyte,Marco, Boris and whole bunch of other guys who add valuable information so that a buyer like me can made a educated decision. I also agree that right now is a great time for someone looking for a forced induction system. I am going to wait till stimpee/Eurosport "officially" comes out with their kit before I make any decisions. Worse comes to worse, if their kit really is worth the extra money, I will take the extra time needed to save up the extra cash and go for the positive displacement blower (which is really my first choice, but because of costs, i don't know if i can make it happen). If what you say about Dinan shipping out their kit to me is true, Dinan will definitely be an option. Right now, RMS and AA are at the top of my list though. I just wish AA would offer and upgraded blower so I could run more boost in the future if i needed it.

The Eurosport/Stimpee kits are very attractive looking..but they're not availible at this time.

I had the funds and the inclination to supercharge my car NOW. I didn't want to wait until next spring, six months is a long time, and I'd already "waited" six months to supercharge my car in the first place.

I think there's enough clues to figure out which route I took, and to date, I have no regrets and think I made the right choice for my situation.

If you're serious about a new Dinan kit, you can have one sitting on your doorstep in about two weeks, no need to go through your NJ dealer. Shipping will be a lot less than sales tax would be.

The kit comes with instructions and a form to send in to Dinan with your ECU if you need to get it flashed, ~48 hour turnaround time, which same process you'd have to go through with RMS or AA if you bought it direct from them.

Or you can also just drive it right to your local Dinan dealer and get the flash, since the software is paid for with the kit and they can remotely download it from Dinan, though they may hit you for a bit of labor for the flash if they didn't sell the kit to you.

If you wer to call and talk to the guys at AA, you would understand why they chose not to offer an blower upgrade. Their explanation is simply that they wanted to provide a kit for those looking for more but who are not quite prepared to shell out the money required to go turbo. This kit basically fills the void for them and gains them some market share. They definetely would not want to take away any potential turbo sales, but I'm sure they wouldn't mind stealing a few RMS or Dinan customers.. Now they apparently have lowered their stg 1 turbo to $8700. I plan on waiting to see how the twinscrew fairs upon its release before making my descision. If the twinscrew is 7k plus I really think that I would prefer the turbo. Time will tell.

Originally posted by ADVANT123
Paul, thanks for the advice. One of the reason I like this forum so much is because of people like you, DocWyte,Marco, Boris and whole bunch of other guys who add valuable information so that a buyer like me can made a educated decision. I also agree that right now is a great time for someone looking for a forced induction system. I am going to wait till stimpee/Eurosport "officially" comes out with their kit before I make any decisions. Worse comes to worse, if their kit really is worth the extra money, I will take the extra time needed to save up the extra cash and go for the positive displacement blower (which is really my first choice, but because of costs, i don't know if i can make it happen). If what you say about Dinan shipping out their kit to me is true, Dinan will definitely be an option. Right now, RMS and AA are at the top of my list though. I just wish AA would offer and upgraded blower so I could run more boost in the future if i needed it.

:az:

I disagree that the centrifugal supercharger is the worst type of system out there. In fact, I actually like the way it keeps the high-revving nature of the stock engine. Further, the torque peak is right where the stock one is (4000rpms). It's absolutely lovely to drive and I agree with you 100% regarding power delivery.

Add in H20/Alc injection for the hot months and you're home free. Do not tell Dinan (if you buy from them) that you are doing the H20/Alc kit though. They will void your warranty immediately. Dinan is very conservative in order to protect their image. Although, I'm sure most would agree, that this sometimes has the opposite effect. Whichever, they do have a very rock solid product.

I'd either go with AA or wait for the twin-screw. Dinan is solid, but so is AA. Neither will produce the fat torque curve of the twin-screw, though, so if you need it now I'd go with AA since it's cheaper and intercooled. However, ideally, I'd wait and see what develops with the twin-screw.

I was under the assumption that it's intercooled because it needs to be due to the compressor they are using. The Rotrex unit is causing the need for the intercooler.

From what I've seen, it is not producing any more power than the Dinan setup. Furthermore, the Rotrex unit is limited to 8psi. No room for future boost bumps together with custom software. In my mind, I have not seen any benefit from the AA solution except for another contender. But, due to the fact that the Rotrex requires the intercooler from its own inefficiency, plus the fact that it is capped at 8psi, and the fact that it is producing no more hp/tq than the other CF kits makes me think it isn't as much a contender to the CF kits. Just my 0.02