The MINI Club of Ireland

Hey all!

I have a 1997 Works Cooper S with spi, the fuelling on it is all over the shop, I was only getting about 15mpg, the car is actually undriveable at the moment, it just sits and gurgles with no power whatsoever... Would you recommend having the ECU and all that jazz sorted out or just biting the bullet and switching to carbs? Also is there any recommended carbs for my motor? Bearing in mind it is a Works Cooper S and had a serious amount of poke before she died on me I don't want to sacrifice power by changing to an ordinary carb setup so something performance minded would be ideal...

Haven't had the time to get it sorted recently so I'm planning to take it up to Griffins and get them to have a look but I thought I'd ask you folks what you thought first?

irlmin's the expert on injection vs carbs, but he's out of action for a few days due to a family bereavement. However, there was a thread on this a few weeks back, and he was saying that there's no reason why a carb setup needs to be put in to rectify an injection problem. Between him, and his brother Aiden, they're literally the gods of Mini when it comes to sorting out issues, so hold tough, and he'll be along in a while to advise.

Oh, and welcome aboard, glad to have someone new Get some photos of your car up in the projects forum for us to see

Sounds good, sure I'll hang tight for the man himself so, I'm off to projects to get a few photos up then

Hi,
I had problem not so long time ago with my 1996 Spi mini. The engine was cutting off very often causing massive embarrassment around the town.
I’ve consulted few garages; some advised to change injection for carburettor, others told me to fix it.
The problem you can have if you decide to changed injection system for carburettor could be increase of Co2 emission, so the car with 1997 registration will fail NCT. Every car Co2 emission is measured accordingly to the values that are in force in the year that car was manufactured. Limit of Co2 for injection cars are much stricter than for old carburettor cars. Apart from fuel efficiency introduction of inject engines main purpose was reduction of Co2 emission.
I wanted my car to pass NCT so that’s why I choose to fix it. I brought the car to a garage, plugged to ROVER diagnostic equipment and all the faults that were causing problems were cleared. Since this I have to problems at all.
Before you decide to do anything with injection I would recommend asking the expert, so better wait for Irlmin to respond.

Regards

Maciej

Hi ,
You say its a 1997 Spi I presume its a Japanese import , as European Minis were Mpi from nov 1996 on , anyway it sounds like your mini is 'over-fueling , there are several things that might be causing this -some very simple , give Me a call on 0868663828 Tomorrow and I will talk you through the most likely ones and I am sure we can resolve this .
G

Thanks very much, really appreciate that!! I'll give you a call some stage tomorrow so! Can't wait to get her sorted and get her out for her first spin in ages!!!

So I've finally gotten the problem sussed, lead free inserts in the cylinders dropped out!

since we're on the spi/carb conversion discussion id like some information on this if possible please. iv been considering doing this, id like a mini i can tune myself and with my spi this doesn seem very possible, i want a fast road mini. if i was to convert my spi to carb could i still use it as my everyday driver, and how much would i be looking at to convert and is it a big job, and come nct time am i totally screwd or is there ways of getting around it, and in general would you reccomend it or do you think i should just stay away from the idea. sorry for all the questions would really appreciate any replys thanks

I would stick with the SPi as it is ok when its working as it should , its no major problem to get it right and it will stay that way . if you need more fueling because you have fitted a modified head / cam etc We do a 44mm conversion for the spi throttle body , std is 38mm and this works really well with the above mods . my advice is get your current set-up right and go with that .
G