TEAMREDLINE

Hi I Am New To This Site.. I Have A 2003 C230 Coupe 1.8. To Me This Car With 19" Wheels Is Pretty Slow. If Anyone Has Any True Horsepower Number Please Post And By How Did You Get The Horsepower ( Header, Intake, Pulley Kit, Nitrous) Etc..

I Am Thinking Of Turbo Charging This Car> Lol.. Has Anyone Did This Yet? I Want At Least 300hp From This Engine.. Is This Possible? Does Anyone Have 300 +, What Is The Highest Out There?
I Worked For Honda For The Last 15 Years.. And The Honda 1.8 Engines With Turbo Can Produce 300 Plus Without Interanls( Pistons, Rods, Cams) Just Bolt On..

Any Info And Suggestions Will Help.. Ty

Boom vang

for the amount of money that you would spend in getting an engine to that target you would be better off buying a used C32. In the end it will give you more power, cheaper, and way more reliable, not to mention a better power band and better driveability and the whole package is designed with that goal. The rest of the car is designed to take that power, in your C230 on the otherhand you will be putting extra stress on a drivetrain, suspension, gearbox, that it was not intended for as with other components in the car.

I never understand the ricer movement trying to get as much power out of their Civic or Integra when for less money they could buy a used M3 and in stock would be a better drive. The difference quite honestly is backyard Frankenstein vs engineered with a proper R&D team and huge budgets in testing and refining.

It is not unusual to see $40,000 CIVIC's and in the end it is still a CIVIC

BadAssC230k

people have tried with turbos. requires A LOT of time and money. Even then its not quite right and problematic. I, personally havent heard of anyone pushin 300hp from the m271... well.. Yet. only 300+ w203's i've seen are AMG's.

Headers, pulley, custom intake, pulley, bored throttle body, exhaust, hi flow cat, may be the ways to go, but dont expect it to be gentle on your bank account. There really isnt a 'market' for the w203, as far as engine mods go.

Talk to drex[drexappeal]/flip [mig888], they've done extensive engine work, mainly on drex's car.

Good Luck!

kompressor85

CHA CHING SWING BATTA BATTA SWINGGGGG

kompressor85

dude, if you're going to modify your c230 for some extra power, just do what i (and many others) did- pulley, air filter, cat-back exhaust, cat delete (havent done that myself), and chip. what sets my car apart is the fact that i have methanol/water injection setup on mine. i'd reccommend it, the M111 (my engine) isnt known for running slightly lean at higher boost, but the M271 (your engine) is. i'd even hold you down and force you to buy it if you live in a warm climate.

heres the breakdown:
pulley- if you can find one. for me it was $600 including the $300 core fee. i kept my stock one. but remember- we have different engines.
muffler replacement/catback- a cat delete is no problem..... cheap as *****. catback systems are about $600.
alcohol/methanol/water injection- $260 including a two quart tank.
chip- i think its upsolute who makes a $300 chip for this biotch. not 100% on that.

as far as turbocharging.....sigh.... it can be really inexpensive if you source all your parts correctly... however i'm not 100% sure of all the systems on this vehicle, gotta remember that about 10,000 times the amount of research, care, and time was done in building this car over a honda or most other cars near its class.

turbo- $500 for a good one. s/c delete? yikes. not 100% on that setup, espeically cause our engines are different.
intercooler- $600-700.
piping-tricky to do but you can keep it under $200
couplings/hoseclamps- if sourced correctly u can keep it under $50
exhaust header- youch. big spender. prolly $700 or higher for a local custom race car place to hand bend you one.
ecu tune- figure around $300-400.
fuel pump- generic items,see jegs or the like.
rising rate fpr- jegs. forget how much.
fuel injectors- $600 on up for a set, $600 being the low end.
BOV-couple hundred. they vary.

all in all, its not worth it. it'd be unique and fun, neat project- but its a one of a kind, project car. just do the basic bolt-ons.

"it is what it is"

OzAcOmOtOrSpOrt

i really dont think its possible to do a turbo on a c230 m271 it can only do 12 pounds of boost anything higher then that youll blow the engine
i was planning on doing a costum turbo and running it with a supercharge but keep it stock i also herd all those after market pulleys give u problems down the road thats why I THINK every body stop selling. If there is a possible way of us getting new pistins rods and boring out the cylinders then there might be a possibility of running high boost meaning more power.

advans

D-R-E-X robot in disguise!

Tangerine

Because of customization. What is the point in modding a car then? Eventually its going to depreciate in value. If you spend 40k on a Mercedes in aftermarket parts its still going to make it a Mercedes... Civic is a Civic, unless your looking down on them.

Boom vang

All I am saying is that you can get a vehicle that gives you all the power you need right out of the box, no fuss, no bother and engineered that way for about the same cost of doing extensive engine work on a motor that was never designed for it.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Merce...spagenameZWDVW

For $23,000 you can have what you are looking for and in the long run it will be cheaper than spending trying to make your car something that it is not the real thing

SeaCoupe

Boom;

I understand your point of pointing to a car that can do what you want out of the box. But what I don't get, is why a guy who suffers a Triumph, doesn't understand the love of a chassis. They guy likes the look of the car, and wants to make it go faster.

Seems like he of all the people who have inquired on what has been done has some experience in his 15 years of Honda work.

Break ground good man, share with us what you find out and do.

E

drexappeal

Just an FYI, I doubt you'll be able to acheive 300+ w/o internals. Benz engines are 10X's more sensitive than Honda's. And there are 10X's less tuners willing to spend the time/money on R&D for the lowest of the MB lines (vs. Civic tuners that are ALL OVER the place and willing to invest the time/money/effort and at much less cost). Even with the parts that are currently available for the 1.8l m271, you still won't get close to the power you seek.

The AFR on the m271 is very high at stock setup, so I am currently running custom injectors to bring the number down. There's a trade-off there because even though my car is "safe" with more power, it's also burning a lot more gas and my gas mileage dropped significantly. I can't remember what my numbers came to. I know that my stock numbers were around 170 and I got a 3hp/5lb tq. increase from a bored throttle body alone. Headers bumped up the numbers by 10hp / 13lb. tq, but had to take them off cuz of an exhaust leak. I'm sure I gained power after the tuning and Renntech pulley kit install, but it was never established the exact amount. For the handful of people that have driven my car, they can automatically feel the difference. Kleemann is the only tuner that came up with a FPR (Fuel Pressure Regulator), which I was told was designed to even out the power band on the top end 5k rpm and up. Even with Kleemann Headers, Pulley Kit + K-box, I still haven't seen anybody break the 200+ whp barrier.

If you're considering swapping the supercharger w/ a turbo, I hope that you have a highly skilled shop that has worked with MB's before because this is definitely much different from a Honda and replacement parts for ANYTHING that goes wrong will be 3-4X's the amount normally spent on Honda's. Another thing is, if you do a Turbo swap, the only car to have done it was with a m111 engine (not really succesfully - cuz supposedly the car ran like crap), not a m271. To date, I don't know of any m271's that have done this (although I'm sure many tuners have contemplated a project of that nature). That being said, I wish you luck if you choose to venture that route. Just be aware that you are being pre-warned by many people who have experimented so far. I have yet to see ANYBODY post a car with over 200whp on the m271. I've seen some people post dynos that are close to 200, but not quite over. I have no clue where my car is at currently. Haven't had the time to get dyno tested since the projects got put on hold.

The projects I was donating my car for got put on hold when the secondary car I had to use got totalled (while parked). So that means no daily driver, which is a big issue for time donating my car with the tuner that was working on the projects. Hopefully, mig888 will be able to donate his car to get the ball rolling again.

drexappeal

Sorry to quote myself, but I also forgot to ask, how much $$$ do you plan on investing into this? If you're talking Honda money (i.e. 1-2K), I'd suggest you quit before you get stuck. If money is no object, go for it!

SeaCoupe

Hey Drex;

Where you been lately? Seems like I have not hung out with the gang in a while now.

You raise good points. Effectively, you are right. This has not been done, that I know of. Having said that. As the prices of the Coupes plummet, and boy did they. I think we will see people pick up and mod the heck out of the engines bays in there quest for power.

perhaps 350 engines, another C32 swap, or a built M111/M271. I think the car has a unique enough design that it will stand alone as worthy of attention for another 10 + years, and the accomanying development.

I hope.

E

kompressor85

why is that, are you talking about the limitations of the stock fuel system? head gaskets? spark knock? intercooler effeciency?

i'm not calling your bluff, just wondering where you came up with that number.

drexappeal

So far so good for me!

drexappeal

Been so busy at work, E. I really shouldn't be on here, but I feel like I've neglected the forums for a while, so I thought I'd make a quick cameo. My time on the message boards has been really limited cuz of work (new job responsibilities), but hoping I'll have a little downtime soon.

Here's the thing, there is A LOT of potential with these cars. The biggest problem I see is the fact that in order to do R&D and "really" push the limits of the m111 and m271, that would take someone with lots of $$$$ to say, "f' it" and dump a good chunk of that money into trial and error. Blow up an engine, oh well another $10K into getting another one. Not only that, but people who are knowledgable enough about Benz's and the capacity you can take them to without messing up the quirky ECU's, which are also $$$$ (the m271 replacement ECU is in the $2K range).

If this were a HONDA, well if you blow up an engine you could buy another engine 3 X's before you reach the same cost as one m271 replacement. So that puts A LOT into perspective. Is that really worth it to some people? Not to major tuners. Now, to a tuner that wants to make a "splash" in the industry as a company that can do unique things that nobody else has done?...that would definitely be a coup (which is why I ONLY go to my guy).

The best performance upgrades I've seen done to non-AMG w203's have been David's C43 AMG engine swap (240 Sedan) and Pshek's C32 AMG engine swap (320 coupe). Shows you what tuners would rather spend the time and effort on...engine swaps.

amdeutsch

Just to add. Going from memory since I've slept numerous times since then.
There was a Coupe that someone tried to modify with a turbo. Eventually they ran into issues and tried to sell here as well as on fleabay. STFF and you'll see some real issues when trying to mod a MB to specs.
HTH

drexappeal

Yup. That's the only one I remember also, amdeutsch. And that one was a m111 for sure.

amdeutsch

I guess that in this case 'redline' is a reference to financials instead of engine.

blackwidow99

for the guys who have modified their car,

what was your 1/4 mile run? and what would you estimate your 0-60 to be?

drexappeal

My car hasn't stepped on the track at all and even if I did a 1/4 mile time, it would still be nothing to sneeze at considering there are way more powerful engines for the w203 out there.

0-60 time? Faster than stock?