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Thread: Upgrading My M60B30 to an M60B40 intake manifold - quick Q about ASC+T

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    Upgrading My M60B30 to an M60B40 intake manifold - quick Q about ASC+T

    Hey everyone,

    Well I finally found some wreckers within range that have a few E38's running 1995 M60B40's that I can pull the intake manifold from. Price isn't quite as low as I'd hoped ($330 delivered for the intake manifold + throttle body + intake boot), but I don't want to pass up the chance... finding these parts here in AUS is just a nightmare. My question is with regards to the whole ASC+T thing. I've been doing a little research and as I understand it, an M60B40 with ASC+T equipped will have that extra 'elbow' on the throttle body right, like this?



    I've read a LOT of threads on the B30 to B40 manifold upgrade, and I believe someone mentioned that having that elbow is generally considered better as it aids in improving airflow? What I'm wondering though, as my car doesn't have ASC+T, could I still make use of that elbow or would it require stuffing around with all of my throttle cables or something. Or, if I were sent a throttle body that had that elbow, could I just unbolt that extra bit and and use the 'stock' section of the throttle body, or would doing that leave me without a throttle plate, or does a TB like the pic above have TWO throttle plates inside? I can see what looks like two throttle position sensors... I'm just trying to understand what the best option is as I've never seen these parts in person and don't want to buy a 'dud' so to speak.

    I'm also thinking that if I got a TB that didn't have the elbow already, I could just re-use my existing intake boot anyway, right? Hmm. These guys are ready to ship me what I need so I just need to make a choice!

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    Show me your manifold. I dont think its any different.
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    Strangely I don't actually have any pictures of my own manifold, it's the one thing I never bothered to photograph. I can confirm though that mine has the thinner diameter runners like all B30's, as in this picture;



    I was just reading elsewhere with regards to this upgrade that if you don't have ASC, then just unbolt that part of the throttle body. So I guess in my case I should just look for a TB that doesn't have the additional elbow, as I'll just be throwing money away.

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    Im not sure youd see any improvement...(I wasnt even sure you had the smaller manifold)

    But basically Im wondering if you could even use the large displacement manifold on a much smaller engine and gain any performance....

    I personally think its not going to be good...especially for that money...but..you can sure try.
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    I'm willing to give it a shot. Seems to be one of the most common 'upgrades' for anyone with an M60B30, specially with the E34 crowd. I don't stick much faith in any one person's claims, but many claim very noticeable improvements to the low end on the B30's (butt dyno of course), and the M62 folk seem to get some improvements in the top end from throwing this manifold on theirs, as the later M62's all use the same smaller manifold my B30 is using in the pic above. One person did this swap on his B30 E34 and had his car dyno'd at a little over 250hp - more than 30hp above the stock rating. Sadly no one else that I can find has done a before and after dyno, so it's hard to determine the accuracy of that claim.

    But I'm up for it. I'll try and knock the price down a bit and see how it goes. This also includes the larger diameter throttle body too, so it should breathe overall better. Worst case scenario, nothing much changes... No big deal really.

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    Yes, it will work. Yes, you will notice the power gains, especially at a higher RPM.
    You can just leave that traction control elbow in place without hooking up the actuator cable and tps plug to it. Your car won't know that it's there. If possible, remove the throttle plate so that it won't be a restriction since you won't need it anymore. If you leave the plate there, make absolutely sure that it's open all the way.
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    Sounds good. I just shot them an email a short while ago saying I'd prefer one without the elbow, but that if that's all they've got I'll run with that too. We'll see what they say... If I did go down that path I would definitely attempt to remove the second throttle plate altogether, as I'd like it to flow as smoothly and possible and without any risk of future problems.

    Dima, regarding your DUDMD chips for the M60B30's, I believe in my case being a 95 build I would have to send you everything and have you install it if I wanted to go down that path, correct? May be something I'll be looking at in the very near future.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Parts ordered, should have them mid next week. They're sending the ASC throttle body and intake manifold - either throttle body was the same cost so I just said to go with the ASC one.
    Last edited by Sobek; 04-12-2013 at 12:05 AM.

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    FYI to anyone with a B30 looking to do this mod - no need to swap out anything besides the intake manifold and throttle body it seems. I took my existing intake boot and tried it with the B40 throttle body for size, and it's a perfect fit. What I see is that while they're the same diameter, the B30 throttle body has this odd sort of 'cone' shape to it, so it starts out as wide as the B40, but very quickly cones down to a much smaller size. Also, the B30 has the most wickedly thick plates bolted onto the throttle plate... wow.

    So it looks like I'm good to go, as the new TB and PCV gaskets just arrived. I just need to decide if I'm going to replace the camshaft sensor or not, it reads the correct ohms and I can't see any issues, but I have a suspicion there's a problem with it, perhaps intermittently with no codes being thrown. We'll see - come on weather stop raining for a day!!!

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    get some pics comin soon~

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    Will do. I'm actually working on it right now... And rather interestingly, I was doing some more reading on other forums and came across a bit of information I wish I'd known sooner - apparently those Bosch Design III injectors that were just misfiring and flooding my engine do that when first installed. I came across 3 separate people who did the same upgrade and complained of misfires, and in each case they were told to let the car idle for 5 to 10 minutes so it could 'adapt' and then run normally. Surprise surprise, they did that and the car sorted itself out. I never let mine idle for more than maybe a minute, and why would I if it was missing and running rich!!! So the idea of giving those injectors one more try is in the back of my mind, just not today though. It does explain why they were all tested 100% working and flowing normally - the car just hadn't adapted to them.

    Something for another day. Time to go get my hands dirty

    - - - Updated - - -

    Well, all done! I don't know what to say - I had very mixed expectations going into this as I've heard responses ranging from "changed nothing" to "made an incredible difference right across the power band!!". My thoughts? Massive improvement, right across the power band. That dyno report where it supposedly tested at 250hp doesn't feel far off the mark, honestly... The very first thing I noticed was just how rev-happy it was, I had to keep adjusting how I pressed the throttle as the slightest touch made it want to jump and take off - it's like the difference from going to a cable driven throttle to fly by wire, it's just that touchy. But holy cow, I can't believe how much more responsive and powerful the engine feels now!!! Normally it's sluggish until I hit around 3000rpm, then it starts to build and goes into rocket ship mode at 4000rpm+ - now it just flies right off the line, and putting your foot down just keeps giving more and more. There's this on-ramp that I use every day to go to work, and I'm intimately familiar with how my car handles that at the usual speeds and throttle... well, I shocked myself tonight because without even realising it I was going twice as fast up there and it just kept revving and revving right onto the motorway. Normally I'd go through a gear or two heading up that ramp but this stuck to one gear and just FLOORED it up there with barely any effort, and before I knew it I was on the motorway doing 130km/h with room to spare.

    It really is that different, I cannot believe what a change it's made. Like a whole new car. Had a hard time starting it after the work, once again my fuel rail seemed to depressurise, despite me keeping the injectors attached in an attempt to avoid that. Maybe my fuel pressure regulator just isn't doing it's job - or is it normal for the fuel rail to drain back out if you keep it propped out while swapping the manifold? I figured it SHOULD maintain pressure for an easy start again. Anyway, here's a few pics I snapped, nothing you haven't seen before;

    First, the teeny tiny B30 throttle body;



    And this is the (scummy looking) B40 throttle body, huge difference in size and the bolted on plates are WAY thinner than the B30;



    The two manifolds side by side, not hard to guess which is which;



    Old manifold out;



    New manifold in;



    I finally wired up my own solution to the dodgy throttle cables since the clips are stupidly expensive and hard to find;



    And another little surprise - I've been driving the car much more spiritedly since I last had the manifold out, and upon inspection this time, almost every cylinder port had SIGNIFICANTLY less carbon deposits in it. Awesome! These were all caked in a fine layer of carbon previously, really wish I had a before pic!



    And lastly, an interesting side effect of this upgrade, my gear shifts have become smoother. Any thoughts as to why that would be? They're still not perfect, but I was pushing it harder than usual and it was sailing through the gears smoother than ever. This upgrade was really worth it!!!

    Last edited by Sobek; 04-14-2013 at 05:15 AM.

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    Drove to work today... Still DEFINITELY shifting smoother since installing this manifold, there's no doubt about it. Is this some side affect of the computer controlled nature of these cars? That somehow the different a/fm going into the engine is causing the computer to alter the shift points or something? Very interesting. And very fun hahaha

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    Quote Originally Posted by Sobek View Post
    Drove to work today... Still DEFINITELY shifting smoother since installing this manifold, there's no doubt about it. Is this some side affect of the computer controlled nature of these cars? That somehow the different a/fm going into the engine is causing the computer to alter the shift points or something? Very interesting. And very fun hahaha
    It might be because you have been driving more spiritedly. Driving hard every so often cleans out carbon and exercises everything (transmission, suspension, etc). The computer will change the shift points depending on your driving style, as well as a lot of other things.

    Doing a WOT run at operating temperature every so often really helps manage carbon build up and keep your engine running smoothly.

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    Well that all makes sense of course, but the change in shifting smoothness was essentially instant. The night before it was the same as it always had been, then instantly after installing the manifold it was at least half as rough as it was previously. I've been 'giving it the berries mate' for quite a while now so I don't think it's just a coincidence of timing or anything.

    Maybe this is one of those things I just shouldn't question :P

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    so all i need just to be positive is the intake manifold and throttle body off a b40? i dont need the b40 maf? im doing some searching now for the parts im hoping they will not be expensive.

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    I would say to get the MAF too, if you can. I can't seem to get any concrete evidence on whether there is actually any difference between the B30 and B40 MAF's, but they DO have different part numbers. So either that was just BMW trying to charge more for the 4.0L MAF because they could, or there may be a genuine difference... wish I knew.

    Otherwise yes, just the intake manifold and throttle body is all you need. If you haven't done it previously though, I would naturally recommend you replace all of your intake manifold and throttle body / PCV gaskets while you've got this all out, and swap the PCV plate bolts over to hex heads!

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    just wanted to bump this up to add my .02 after completing this swap on my 530iT/5.
    i had been researching this upgrade a bit and although you hear good things, you still hear the nay-sayers so you just don't know what you might get.

    anyways, i would definitely recommend this upgrade. what happened for me is that it moved the power-band to the higher revs. instead of the car having the best acceleration between 2-3.5k, it acts more like a BMW inline 6, with the power from 3-6k. Keeps pulling hard almost right to redline, whereas before there was no point going past about 4k because it would just fall off. i can't tell if there was any overall HP gain, but there definitely was no loss. the engine feels better this way though, more sporty.

    my engine is 100% stock besides the manifold and throttle body.

    i tried the mod with both the b40 and b30 MAF, and the results felt the same either way, and both ways the car ran fine. i also tried swapping the sensor from the b30 maf housing to the b40 maf housing and that resulted in poor running and a CEL.

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    Hi,

    Sorry to revive an old thread as I am planning to go for similar route for my m60b30....already bought intake manifold and TB from M60b40...plan to get b40 MAF and tuning...I am just wondering if airbox from m60b40 is needed as part number is different. Any insight is highly appreciated.

    Thanks
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    I don't think there's actually any difference in 'tuning' between the two honestly... you should be fine without that need. The airbox is also the same, don't even worry about that, can't explain why the part number would be different unless one has the intake air temp sensor on it and the other doesn't. Either that or BMW just made them different because they could, to differentiate for reasons unknown. I used my stock 3.0L airbox and intake piping, it all bolts up just fine even with the larger throttle body as it's only bigger on the internal circumference, not the external. Sounds like you're good to go!

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    To add to what sobek was saying, the 3.0l airbox, 3.0l maf and air intake hose will bolt up with the b40 throttle body no issues. Although the b40 air box has a slightly bigger internal diameter hole to cater for the b40 maf which has a slightly bigger diameter. The intake boot would be the same for both i believe, but the difference is that the b30 has a thick rubber sleeve around the maf connecting to the intake boot, which in effect thickens the b30 maf to fit to the intake boot, where as the b40 maf is large enough to not require the sleeve. That being said though, I've done the m62b44 manifold and M62b44 throttle body upgrade to my E38 m60b30 with the b30 maf and b30 airbox, and I've noticed a noticeable improvement in acceleration from a stop and overall acceleration while crusing, which is what i overall wanted from the mod, i could see it as being a restriction at the top end, but to what extent I'm not sure, as even the top end pulls harder.

    Cheers

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    Solid observation, thanks for adding! I had a differing experience with off the line power - I find it's significantly more sluggish down low with the big manifold on.

    So after years of toying with manifolds, throttle bodies etc, I've decided I'm going to stick with the smaller 3.0L (and 4.4L) manifold, but keep the larger throttle body. The 4.0 manifold doesn't really provide much if any benefit down low in my observation, it's mostly a top end improvement which for me is a bit redundant as I (and indeed most of us) rarely ever get to push these motors with the road laws being what they are these days. And I suppose there's a good reason why they would have put that smaller manifold on the later M62's, they'd likely want to get the power off the line a bit more aggressive so people on test drives or people more mechanically inclined would get that sense of snappy acceleration moreso than high speed in general. Makes sense to me at least. I like the smaller manifold, it's better for town cruising and anything sub-highway speeds, which is 99% of what I do anyway. The 4.0 manifold makes things noticeably slower to get going in my experience, and going full throttle from a dead stop has this big dead zone before things pick up - I don't get that on the 3.0 manifold. Maybe the B30 just can't chew through enough air to benefit from it entirely.

    The larger throttle body though is nice, cram more air into the smaller manifold as fast as you can, should give better flow overall. Certainly feels that way anyway. If the 4.0 MAF really is larger in diameter internally, I'd love to get one (maybe a $20 ebay cheapie) and transfer my 3.0 MAF into that housing. Hmmmmm.

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    My decision to actually put in the b40 manifold and b44 throttle body was based on your results you had with it when you first installed it, as well as another member who dynoed his b30 with the b40 intake and throttle body and showed him getting improved performance throughout the whole rev range. It was also a good opportunity for me to refresh all the intake gaskets, replace the fpr, upgrade to the M62 pcv with the internal piping inside the manifold to evenly distribute the blowby gasses, vs the m60 pcv which just let's all of it go to the back 2 cylinders. That being said, I've also replaced all my fuel injectors with the later Bosch design 3's that have the better spray pattern for better fuel atomization.i believe that helped with the throttle response also. I probably wouldn't go through the effort of swapping back in the b30 with the b44 throttle body to see if there's any further improvement in the low end, I'm satisfied with the performance of it now, except when using a/c it really takes a lot out of it.

  23. #23
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    Oh man, doesn't the A/C just kill the poor 3.0L hahaha.

    I too have done the gen 3 injector swap. That was a funny ordeal, I had a thread about it here somewhere... When I swapped, it was smoking like crazy, turns out with those injectors in there must be such a significant difference in the spray pattern or something, because since running those it basically cooked off all of the carbon that was built up on my pistons. I put a camera down the spark plug holes a few times and sure enough, each time there was less smoke and my pistons were getting cleaner and cleaner. Work that out! But they definitely made an actual noticeable difference to how the throttle response felt. The stock injectors are actually still 4 hole pintle injectors, but the pintle is recessed SO far up inside the injector, I imagine some amount of atomised fuel is just splashing against the inner walls of the injector and dribbling down. I'm actually having an argument with my gen 3 injectors right now, as I'm in the middle of pulling the whole intake and cleaning things up after the car has sat for a very extended period of time. They just don't seat properly in the fuel rail and can leak quite a bit if they don't sit perfectly once you bolt it all down. Certain gen 3 injectors have a fat top on them that you can dremel a groove into so that the stock injector clips actually latch on and hold them up tight, but mine have the thin neck and the clips basically do nothing at all. I've modified the clips slightly and bent the inner sections upwards a little so they kind of poke up and hold the gen 3's in a tiny bit better. I've put it all back together as of today (for the second time since it leaked badly on 2 injectors lol) but haven't fired it up to check. Fingers crossed!

    Ok I'm going off topic haha. But yeah I did all the same research and came to the same conclusions, I saw the dyno charts, spoke to a HEAP of members running M60B30's who'd done the work, on E34's and E38's alike. But still, having swapped back and forth between the 3.0 and 4.0 manifolds a few times now, and done the 4.0 manifold swap on 2 other cars for friends, I'm certain that the smaller manifold with bigger throttle body is the best combination. Maybe it's to do with my motor, my driving style, my roads, my road speeds etc etc etc. But I'm swapping it back in probably in a few weeks and we'll see what I feel about it now

    I'm curious to look into that M62 PCV swap though! Was there any special work needed, or did you simply put an M62 PCV on and hunt down the internal crossover pipe? Does the crossover pipe have the connection already there on the bigger 4.0L throttle body, or did you have to modify it? Or did you just get an M62B44 throttle body that was still cable throttle? Curious to know!

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    My install of my bosch design 3 injectors went pretty smoothly, didn't experience any smoking or rough idle, took 2 cranks to get it going. I did remove the negative terminal on the battery so the adaptations could reset itself to the new injectors.

    I don't think i have had any leak issues, i do check occasionally to see if the outside of the injector is abnormally clean, indicating fuel leaking, but all of them look bone dry so that's good.

    I originally bought an m60b40 manifold and m60b40 throttle body, until i realised the pre vanos M62b44 intake manifold and M62b44 cable throttle body were better designed in a few ways. Late m60b40 manifolds and m62 manifolds have the brackets and mounting points already on the manifold to support the inner pipe for the updated pcv. So i purchased the pre vanos m62b44 manifold that came with the updated pcv and inner piping, but replaced the pcv with a brand new genuine one and cleaned up the manifold and inner piping. I then purchased the cable driven b44 throttle body which has a slightly different design channel on the inside to help redistribute the gasses, and they also have a very thin throttle plate, whereas the old b40 has a thicker throttle plate which could affect initial acceleration. So basically you can check your manifold to see if it has the brackets on them already. If so then you'd just need to buy the pipe and updated pcv and mount it with the b44 throttle body and should be good to go. My old b30 manifold also had the brackets to facilitate the pipe, but being an m60 they still utilised the old pcv design so it was never utilised.

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