whats best then?

[john-rambo]

ive already posted topics about the 2.7 conversion but upon looking at various other topics in this forum i have been getting other ideas....
whats the general veiw on the following
turbo 2.5
2.7
24v 2.5 from e36
or just a plain old 2.5 from e30

[maxfield]

turbo 2.5 you can always add more boost when you get bored thats how i look at it

[beardymat]

i spoke to someone recently who had done a 2.5 m50 conversion and was dissapointed as it didnt seem much quicker for the hassle

im going to drop a 2.7 into my touring over the next week(hopefully) as i like naturally aspirated engines.recently drove templ8e30`s 2.7 and it felt sweet but its had more than just the 2.7 bottom end and 731 head.

a 2.7 with a turbo could be fun and it would be easy to put a low compression 2.7 together to take large boost

guess it comes down to personal preference

if you just go m20 2.5 you`ll always wish you went that little bit further

[fuzzy]

doesnt matter what you do you always wish youd went further but if your going to the trouble of an engine conversion you might as well go as big as you can afford.depends what your final goal is if your happy with a modest power increase or are using it as a stepping stone on to big power.my aim has always been as near to 400bhp as i can get then stop to keep some sort of reliability as a dailly driver i used the cosworth engine because i had it at the right time when i blew the m20 but if i was to do it again id probably go with an e34 m5 engine as a start then turbo it.i couldnt go back to n/a as id miss that big kick you get when full boost kicks in and the adrenalin rush as you fight to control the back end kicking out at motorway+ speeds

[john-rambo]

i know its been covered here before but how easy is it to actually turbo the 2.5 is the compression too high or not

[maxfield]

The later engine is lower compresiion which is 9.8.8. So it can be turboed at a fair boost

[WillG]

8.8:1 m8, its good for 1 bar maybe more, no problems turboing these engines

[maxfield]

Dammit. I thought that looked high

[john-rambo]

right i think im just gonna go for the n/a 2.5 conversion my car is currently a 1.8 auto i realise that im gonna have to do a lot of fooking about for this but do i need to move my battery to the boot or not

[jmc330i]

but do i need to move my battery to the boot or not

No.

318i to 325i (assuming M20 2.5) is a pretty easy swap.