I Made My BMW Run On Audi Ignition Coils | N54 DIY!
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- Опубліковано 24 сер 2024
- In this video I show you how I converted my BMW N54 to run on Audi R8 Ignition coils using my own home made circuit board.
Audi ignition coils are "Smart" coils and BMW ignition coils are "Dumb" coils. A smart coil has the driver built into the coil and a dumb coil needs to be driven by an external sources such as your ECU or DME. The advantage of a smart coil is you can power it right from your battery which allows for you to run more dwell before it becomes saturated.
An N54 can support more power and you can run more spark plug gap with Audi coils.
I do this on my 2008 E90 BMW 335i.
Parts List (affiliate):
Coils
amzn.to/39qpTk9
10K Ohm Resistors
amzn.to/2UskhBL
Transistor
amzn.to/3bEsuc0
Prototype Board
amzn.to/3awirpc
Heat Shrink
amzn.to/2vZehHd
Voltage Regulator
amzn.to/2UrXTZk
Audi Coil Connectors
amzn.to/2xCP2Lc
Cable Loom
amzn.to/39BleME
amzn.to/2WSkwYx
Male Spade Connectors To Stock BMW Harness
amzn.to/2xwySDf
For anyone wondering I couldn't find the male plastic BMW ignition connectors.
This was possible due to the fact that running an N54 on Audi coils is supported in MHD. There is a ready made kit available from a merchant called Bimmer Life Tuning. I am not affiliated with them and I pieced this together myself. If you like the concept of driving your coils external of your ECU but don't want to do all the work show in this video you could consider their product.
If this is the first video you're catching of mine please consider subscribing. I upload regularly.
Thanks for watching :) When you see the word "affiliate" listed beside any link in my description please know that this is a custom link and I will earn a small commission if you opt to purchase using said link. This is at no extra cost to you so it's a win all around :) Thank you!
BMW needs to pay you top dollar. Your a ultimate BMW tech/mechanic/N54 Master
Hey, just want to say thanks for the N54 videos. Really good to watch at this time. I am 6 months into my build and your videos have been a huge help. I think N54 will get (even) more attention in the coming years as prices drop and more people realise the potential.
Already have the bimmerlife coil kit on my single n54, but still watched because I was intrigued how the whole system operated. Great vid man!
This is what smart people do when the virus has them locked in to long
There's already a kit by bimmerlife for this, I've had it on my car for over a year. Not going to save money building it yourself over buying it from bimmerlife.
@@N54God666 and dude said that in his video. Said it wasn't worth the hassle and to buy the kit if u want.
@@N54God666 the video is for those who care to build it, not for those wanting to buy from bimmerlife.
i know it's pretty randomly asking but does anybody know a good website to stream newly released movies online ?
I appreciate you doing this. Ive been running the BimmerLife kit ever since i went single and people don't understand how well these coils work.
I've noticed that the car feels super smooth under load and my cold starts on E60 are as smooth as 93 now. I'm happy with the Audi coils.
@@VehicularDIY My exact reaction after upgrading. Running Full E85 feels like second nature to the engine and that power delivery is IMMACULATE! Keep up the great content, you make owning an N54 a breeze for us DIYer's.
Not better than Eldor coils. Aftermarket coils are a waste of money.
thelightning87 Is this an April fools joke? 😂
@@thelightning87 That may be true depending on the application. How much wheel horsepower does your car make?
Whoa this is EXACTLY what I needed since I’m going single soon. The Bimmerlife Coils are hard to find
Grab some PR ones. They are sweet
Krushal Patel I would but they sit a little too close to the turbo when going single. Ppl have melted some lol
BlackCladGentleman that is the reason the relocated side mounting bracket exists. To pull them away from the heat generated by the top mounted single turbo
e46m3lol just saw that. Nice but really makes that PI side cramped. Would rather just get r8 coils
BlackCladGentleman I run PI on my car with the relocated PR coils and you don’t even notice that the PI there.
Whoa that is a major PITA to build that, but what an amazing DIY. I think $200 for the wire harness and trimming and all that stuff is an amazing deal
Thank you! I've been scouring forums looking for a diy on this. You're my favorite BMW channel on youtube!
this is definitely something crazy man. respect for you that you figured it out
Really appreciate your videos, as a filthy NA driver a bunch of this stuff has really helped me as well. I swapped out my shit tier Bosch coils and went with the Delphi system and it really brought my car back to life at 80k miles... It's kind of crazy how much better it runs. Using your rim refinishing video to clean up my style 95 wheels currently... Hoping to do the trans service next with your guidance. You really make working on this car extremely easy! Keep it up man!
Totally agree when there is a will there is a way. Nothing you can't do if you put in the effort
Holy cow!! Nice work, cannot wait for you to Dyno that car again, That is not work for the faint of heart, But seriously well done, very interested in the long term reliability of the system. Considering road vibration, Thanks as always for the content. Stay safe
Thanks! Yeah I'll report back if I encounter any issues.
Nice to see you keep making content for the N54 👍
I am so glad your still making E90 content and you reminded me of my circuits 1 class 😂
Nice video, I'll highlight to others its critical to clip the coil tabs and rubber boot (like the video shows) so the coil clips down on the plug properly ! 👍
A tip on how you could do the connector is to spray wax in the socket of the bmw coil, then place the connectors over those in the coil. Then pour epoxy in to the coil connetor. When its dry you should be able to pull it out as a “plug”
“How does he know these things?” - M on James Bond
Fascinating. Now for some before and after logs to see if it is worth it.
Good job man, love videos, keep it up! Good to see another Texan bringing BMW content.
Thanks it was late and I didnt watch the end of the video that you explained the same forum. The cost of getting the bimmerlife here is around 1k or over in NZD. I've accumulated bits so will give it a go. There was fear that it wasn't robust. But yours is running fine.
Great video. Keep the content coming! Hopefully I will need this upgrade in the future, when I start more modding.
Nice video, and nice work. You could easily fab a PCB for this and sell them for a good profit. OSHpark or another fab house would have a quick turnaround if you know how to make a Gerber design
Great video! This is awesome! You are a mad scientist. Good stuff man.
Great video, good explanations! Thanks for putting that up!
Great video!! Good job. You have balls of steel to just jump into that. Lol love your videos!!
The content is interesting. However:
1)downstepping 12V to 5V through a voltage regulator - with such a big step that voltage regulator going burn out. Should have soldered on an additional voltage regulator to each existing one matching the pins, to SPLIT POWER between the two. Or at least glue them to a heat sink - a slab of aluminum. Or could have used opto-couplers.
2)additional circuitry delays the signal, so at higher rpm this could play in badly towards ignition timing control.
(no, I did not dislike it.)
1) The power dissipated in a linear regulator will be proportional to the volt differential AND the current through the regulator. If the current is small enough the power will also be very small. That is why the TO-92 package works fine in this application. It sure looks like he has one regulator for each coil. What I don't see is input or output caps. I would have added some small MLCCs to the input and output of the regulator. TI datasheet says 330 nF input and 10 nF output is fine, but you could make them both the same to simplify things. He also put it in the DME box which has a built in cooling fan.
The circuit he has drawn will draw 5.5 mA from the regulator plus the current consumed by the Audi coil which is just a logic level trigger, so lets say another 5 mA, though that is generous. That's 10.5 mA total. If the car was running the DC system voltage would be around 14 volts. 14 - 5 = 9V. 9 * 0.0105 = 94.5 mW. However, the regulator is not supplying this constantly because it is just one of six. So lets divide this by 6 to get a rough estimate. 94.5 mW / 6 = 15.75 mW. The TO-92 package has a max junction temperature of 125° C and a R_theata_ja of 158 °C/W. This is a very conservative way to calculate temperature rise, but lets say the regulator would see a rise of 2.5 °C. Barely perceptible. The inside of the DME box could be 100 °C (it is surely MUCH lower, probably closer to 60 or 70 °C) and our estimate shows the 78L05 would have a junction temperature of 102.5 °C which is much less that 125 °C.
So I estimated the Audi coil current draw, but my estimate of the junction temperature is likely very conservative. At more realistic numbers we estimate the junction temp will no more than 75 °C. NASA recommends a max junction temperature of 100 °C for a 125 °C parts for reliability. We have a 25 °C margin. Even if he had only used one regulator and it supplied 94.5 mW constantly, at 70 °C ambient the junction temp would be 85 °C, still under the recommend derating limit for reliability by NASA.
Even if optocouplers were used, the +5V to trigger the Audi coil would need to come from somewhere.
2) While you are correct that this will introduce some delay I can't imagine it would be significant. This would impact the ignition timing, so lets dissect how many degrees of crank rotation happen in one second at 7000 rpm. 1 revolution is 360 degrees and 7000 revolutions is 2.52 x 10^6 degrees per minute. Divide by 60 and we get 42000 degrees per second or one degree every 78 microseconds. This is actually pretty slow in electronics. What we are really concerned with is the time it takes to cut voltage to the trigger pin. At this point the primary current collapses and the secondary voltage spikes and a spark is generated. For the transistor this would depend on fall time + storage time. For the TIP42C we are looking at about 3.3 microseconds, or about 0.04 degrees of crank rotation at redline which is insignificant.
ajm8127 😳🥴
Great stuff always 🙏🏾!!! Maybe next time a wire tap clips for the main red wire?!?!
Heard you in the middle😂 crimp connectors
you are without any doubts the smartest person I know of.
Appreciate this, yeah I was following that thread thanks for the video
Saw the soldering ight imma head out
Man, amazing content and quite in depth on how to do the research, the build and correct it if you make a mistake. THIS is why I subscribe and stay. AND you gave a shout out to Bimmerlife with their pre-built kit. Could anyone ask for more integrity? Great job! You're inspiring me to do a vlog following your vlogs! --Steve
You should of mentioned the positioning of the the actual emitter, base, and collector on the diagram do not correspond to where they actually are on the transistor and voltage regulator. Secondly do the primary coil positives run to a switched ignition or constant?
Nice job! Thnak you for sharing!!!
I did this a few years ago but never thought about using a pcb in the dme box. I just put everything in line on each wire set, shrink tubed the connections and a put sheath over it all
Same schematics and components? Just about to build it.
Ray J yeah but the way it’s done in this video is way less time consuming and much smarter
OMG best DIY ever
This was cool but the Precision Race Works coils can be tuned. They can be turned up if you need them to be your tuner can turn up the ohms if needed...👍🏁
Genius!!! I suck at anything that have to do with electric🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️
Amazing video, thanks for sharing
Respect bro.very smart guy
I wish I made enough power for this to be more reasonable ☹️
Did this 2 years ago. I'm wondering if anyone can design a 3d model of the harness that goes to the BMW harness instead of just the pins? Post stl if you have/ can.
I cut the tops off my old stock coils to get the connectors section and solders the wires in works great. And they wont fall apart like some 3D printed connectors.
Ray J could you elaborate
Precision race ftw
Great work man 👍🏻
for your splice, try using western union splice method. it's stronger and looks cleaner
Great DIY!
🧐🤔you're crazy about mechanics😅and électronics 👍👌
You could always remove the BMW connectors and wire directly to the Audi ones... Not as easily reversible but still not bad.
My question is how does this impact knock detection? Because the MSD80/MSD81 use more then just the knock sensors they also detect resistance in the coil and it will trigger timing corrections
Not sure but interesting thought I'll research that.
Subbed. This is great content!
I have always been told that soldering and heat shrink tubing is the preferred method of wire connection, and that crimp connectors are crap. Anyone else heard that?
great work!
but in the prototype there are two different types of transistor
You're a wizard.
Is there any advantages over the precision raceworks kit? I'm pushing 500whp on the daw turbos, but not getting any misfires with conservative timing
The PR kit is good, the advantage would be the power isn't coming from the ECU so less load and less chance of burning up the MSD80 DME.
There used to be a benefit to running these, but Delphi and Eldor have surpassed the R8 coils in recent years.
I had my tuner push my tune closer to 600 whp and ran out of coil recently, I had a fresh set of Eldors in there. The Eldors are good but for around 500 whp from experience.
Vehicular DIY eldors the same exact part number are used in many other cars, putting out over 600-650hp.
Good video, I am not familiar with Audi ignition coil, however, because probably it has only a TTL logic input I would use optocoupler such as 6N137 which has a proper digital output instead of a single transistor. Secondly, I don't think so u need a 5V regulator for each of the coils. May I use a 5V step-down converter instead of the 7805, they are widely available on aliexpress.
You don't need a 5v regulator, but you DO need a resistor from collector to trigger (200 - 1k, depending on what voltage feeds the emitter) to limit the trigger current.
Moreover, why any changes in dwell and multispark needed? What are they in the stock configuration?
If you're able to play with the dwell, most likely you can crank up the charging current on stock coils as well.
Technically I had the voltage regulator reversed at first and the transistor was seeing 11V and the coil did not fire.
@@VehicularDIY I almost certain lm7805 or similar could NOT source any current if connected reversed. Audi coils need current to trigger (up to 200 mA, but limited), unlike many others with built in IGBT that fires out of voltage
great diy
Just finished my loom but was worried about the small pigtail wires that run off the 12volt battery and negative heavy wire are only 10amp. They are only about 8 to 10inches long and heavy wire that feeds them is 25amp
Link to circuit diagram? Thank you.
Really appreciate your work. Great video. I have one question about all that.Are this circuit board going to work on older bmw electronic?
I bought the kit in February
Great Job!!🤗🤗
Hello! I made this circuit for mye E30 318is. But the the transistor do not go down to 0 volt when trigger is not applied. It sends 5V dc+ when trigger(ground) is active, but only goes down to 3-4V dc+ when trigger is not grounded. So the coils are getting constant 3-5 volts when ignition is on. Can someone please help me figure this out? Have tried to get mey E30 to start with R8 coils for 2 months now.. starting to loose hope 😩😩
Why not just remove the NPN transistors in the ECU and bridge them, that you get the 5v output from the CPU direct for the Coils? Now you use the transistor in the ECU to trigger the transistor on your board thats trigger the transistor in the Coils :D Ore did I miss something?
I designed a PCB that uses a design pretty similar to this one. My only concern is that normally BMW uses a shunt resistor, on E36 and E46 this resistor is 240 ohms, it goes between the secondary gound and the valve cover ground. Using this design you are adding a resistor to the ground of those transistors. Did you get any CEL using this approach? I'll be testing mine in a couple of days.
Dude you are the most underrated car guy on here. Huge inspiration to us all. Would love the chance to talk cars with you (f10 owner) you should create a discord or something. I myself would even pay to be part of a community inspired by you!
Thanks for the kind words!
peeps been doing audi coils to the n54 n55 n20 n26 for about a decade now
Hello!
I need a sujestion the N20 ignition coils!
Stage 2 map
Tanks
which radio components you used, I did not see if you can write. and white and red wires where they go ... and if you can the whole circuit .. thanks
I'm jaw dropped, wow
Why didn't you but a 12 to 5 v converter then run one hot one ground down your coils
I really wish you were my neighbor!
I upgraded my coils with the bimmerlifetuning kit and I did 2 step colder plugs but I still get intermittent misfires on cold starts and even while driving. Any ideas? Injectors?
I'd lean toward injectors. How many miles?
Vehicular DIY I have 147k miles index 6
What happened to the other aftermarket coil kit you had?
I have these from bimmerlife and they work great.
Excellent work
Thanks, I pulled them out when chasing a misfire. The company I got them from stopped carrying them so I ran Eldors until installing the R8 coils.
Yeah, I've been looking at doing this myself. The cost of the coils and them being available locally was a plus. With it being trimmed it seats fine on the plug? That was a main issue on some of the earlier revisions of the bimmer life setup I believe?
Yes with the trimming the coil engages the plug really well.
@@VehicularDIY ok good to know. Thanks!
WTF??? whats is the beautiful work?!! :)
But...why ignition coils NgK Audi R8 in your BMW N54??
Beats me. The Eldors work fine for powerlevels of at least 600hp.
Hi，I follow ur step did the same thing with you,but my 12v input then output is 9v can’t get 5v,any advise to solve it
Why not run s55 f80 coils? They can handle loads of power.
Has anyone replicated this setup? I’m trying to build the board and it’s hard to tell how the transistor is wired up.
This goes to anyone with experience out there but how do these compare to Eldor coils or Precision Raceworks?
Like a boss
I bought a set of the BimmerLife coils (R8 Coils with harnesses). I can't seem to get any answers on weather I need to do any ECU coding or tuning to run these coils.
you are the man
Nice.
Put It on the dyno. Thats the only thing that's going to convince me, but I expect negligible results.
I want to put such ignition coils on the motor M52 Siemens ms 41.1 how to do it. scheme if you can help
Hello. Great video! Did you tune the dwell time?
Thanks, yes that was done via MHD. The tune adjusts for Audi R8 coils.
Do bimmerlife coil kit has electrical board to regulate the voltage like this?
Nice
Hope you answer do you know if these can be put in place of the oldstile of coil so something like the m52 that had the brembi coilpacks can the be changed to audi ?
Isn’t it easier/better to just get PR coils or Spool coils etc ? 🤷🏻♂️
Watch after 20:20 and you'll get your answer
Another great DIY. One question, BimmerLife said you should not modify the coils. You said that you have to. Do you know why they state that you shouldn't?
Not sure actually, from what I read the coil won't seat into the head and engage the spark plug without modification.
@@VehicularDIY I agree that I have read that also. I just found it interesting that BimmerLife said that. Either way. Good DIY. Another awesome job man. People appreciate what you do!
Another question do the coils stay hot with the constant 12v attached?
Any suggestions on that type of gap to run and if 2 step colder plugs are still the best option for lets say 24-26psi? Im thinking of gapping back to .030 from the current .020 but curious what others are running with their r8 coils.
Is this better then the coil pack you were running before?
I want to connect a r8 coil to my bmw m42 motor vehicle, I will use the orjinal brain, how many volts do the resistors need to be.I want to connect a r8 coil to my bmw m42 motor vehicle, I will use the orjinal brain, how many volts do the resistors need to be.
bro last vedio u say eldoor batter for more hp
The Eldor coils were good to about 600 hp. Lately my tuner pushed my tune further at my request. Everything I said in my coil review video still holds true.
What happened to the dumb coils setup that you had before from Spool?
I took them out when I was chasing a misfire and ended up running Eldor coils. I returned them to Spool. Spool decided to focus on fueling and stopped producing the coil kit.
@@VehicularDIY that makes sense. This is really interesting content even just from a technical perspective, thank you. I did reach out to Spool at the time regarding the Coils but couldn't get in touch with them. I'm running the 17t turbo at 26psi with methanol port injection right now on Delphi coils with a 0.018 gap, have already upgraded the MOSFETS in MSD80. I have looked at both the PR and BL coils but not convinced there is a straight cut big performance advantage. I have started getting timing corrections at this boost level but think that's due to needing to flow more meth for octane rather than the coils failing, as I understand it the coils would either fire or not, not be the cause of timing corrections. Still on the fence regarding this upgrade.
What is the name of the app that you are use to flash the ecu for coil change ?