Hello Cat lovers-

Just wanted to give everyone an update on my experiences with the aforementioned Mina Gallery products. First off, I drive a 2004 XKR porfolio edition. My cat as 38K miles on it and is was all stock. After researching the forum and other avenues of information, I decided that the Mina Gallery products recieved enough positive reviews for me to make the drive from OC to Reseda, CA and have the products installed. I called Chris and he was very patient and informative over the phone. He gave me realistic expections regarding the products and was very honest.

Super Charger Pulley/Air Filter/ Exhaust System:

I had these 3 parts installed yesterday at the Mina Gallery- I can say that the improvement is probably about 50HP and has made a world of difference in the performance for the positive. The exhaust note is rich and thunderous ( sounds like an Aston Martin). The pick up from 2nd gear and on is noticeable with the pulley super charger and and overall the combo of the 3 products is exceptional. I give it 5 stars.

Service:
Chris ( Mina gallery) and crew at European motors cordial and professional and added a personnel touch to the service. The dropped me off to my hotel while I waited for the parts to be installed and were overall a great group of guys.

Front Grill:

I also installed a the Mina Gallery front grill and it looks amazing.


I highly recommend any JAG owner to utilize the Mina Gallery products if you live in California it is worth it to drive to their location and have them install the parts.

Cheers
The Grey Man

 

Congrats, it sounds like a great success story!
Brian

 

Can you post some pics? Would love to see the setup installed. Mind if I ask the price for the set up and price for installation?

Tks

Dave

 

Hey GreyMan--I am within about a miles or so from Reseda. Did you have this work done at the shop run by the guy whose son owns Mina?

Also it is a shame that you are assuming what the improvement "probably" is rather than get before and after dyno runs.

Doug

 

The shop that installed the products was literally in next door to the Mina Gallery ( european motors). I did not get the gentlemen's name, however he did a suberb job and installed it without any issues as I witnessed the last end of the installment. He was quick and knew what he was doing.

Regarding the Dyno'; Yes I should have done one before and after. That said, I can say that it feels like I am driving a whole new car and I still can't get over the sound and improved accelaration, it truly sounds and rides better than ever.

I will post pics and a audio sample this weekend.


Dave-

Regarding the price, all I can say is that he made a good deal- Chris is reasonable and if you get more than 1 product he will work with you on the price.

Cheers guys

 

Do you have the address/phone number of this place? The shop I found that I think is the same one you found was a very small local independent on a side street adjacent to a residential area but there wasn't any real showroom--basically just a few mechanic bays. I think the guy's name was Renee and he said his son owned Mina. In fact the place is pretty well hidden away so it is curious that you tracked him down from Orange County. I am anxious to give him a try as soon as my Jaguar warranty runs out (in the very near future).

Doug

 

Just an after dyno would also do, we know in general what these cars perform in stock.

 

I saw the new air intake on Mina's website. That was a very common mod on my last car (a MINI) and was considered the "requisite" first mod to improve performance.

I like the look of Mina's air intake (and the price!) and being that it's not completely boxed in like the OEM intake, I can understand how it will improve performance on the car.

Does anyone have the air intake installed on their car? If so, was the installation of it alone enough to make a noticable performance difference (either dyno or "seat of the pants dyno")?

Thanks

Dave

 

Only drawback of this "hot air intake" is that it will actually lower the engine power, and will shorten the life of the supercharger due to the extra heat it has to coupe with.
This is also the reason why the original air box is closed, so you can only get “cold” air from outside the engine bay.
A larger cone filter does help in more airflow, but it should be boxed and only get “cold” air

 

Totally agree I did the underhood Cone filter and it gave me the sound and mabe a little extra GO mabe the first five minutes of driving but on long trips or hot days you could feel it make more noise but seem a little sluggish. This is my setup now its a little rough but defenitly a difference dont really get the lag as much and I can do 140 with the top down with ease.

 

Looks good, can't realy tel from the picture but have you removed the fog light?

 

no i didnt remove the fog light I had to do a little metal trimming here and there to get it to fit and not poke into my fender well

 

Does anyone out there have experience with the Paramount Performance cold air induction kit (http://www.paramount-performance.com..._Upgrades.html)?

It is the only commercial one that I could find that has a boxed cone filter as avos mentioned.

Here is some additional description from my query to them:
Thank you for your enquiry regarding our cold air induction kits. The kit comprises of a carbon fibre air-box with a cylindrical cotton gauze washable filter element inside it. The kit also comes with a silicon link hose to go from your airflow meter to the new air-box and a length of pipe to go from the front of the car to the box to supply the filter with fresh air from the front of the vehicle. You would need to remove your old plastic air-box assembly then install the silicon link pipe to the airflow meter using jubilee clips and work forward from there. It should take you around an hour to an hour and a half to fit.

The only time fitting may become a little more complicated is on some of the post 02 cars the airflow meter and the airbox are one piece so you have to carefully cut the the air-box off the airflow meter. This however is a fairly rare fitment only on the later cars so your car shouldn’t be like this.

Thanks!

 

Have no experience with this myself (yet), but it is on my list to do. For me it would be important to know what (cone) filter is in the box as I would want to know the size & flow rate. Then the last point of thought is whether to just get air from the fender, or use some ram air effect by for instance removing both fog lights, and connect both holes with the filter box.

Here is a picture of this type in a XKR (instead of the XJR on pp sites), this is from www.eajp.com:



Am afraid I would need a bigger one...

 

Doug-

Exactly, it is pretty well hidden- across from some apartments. You can call Chris the owner of Mina Gallery and he can set you up with a appointment.

 

I had the Mina intake on my XK8. It made the car sound great and definitely helped it breath. I was amazed at the tiny hole in the inlet tube into the air box...like sucking air through a straw! Between that and the crimped exhaust pipes (the Mina exhaust solved that problem) and you wonder how these engines make any power. I can't figure out why Jag designed them this way.

When I got my XKR I talked to Chris at Mina about the intake kit. He said that the Mina intake doesn't have as much effect on the XKR's power because the factory R intake box has a flap at the front that opens to allow more air when the sc needs it.

BTW, avos makes a good point about hot air to the sc, I hadn't thought about that. I'm thinking that keeping a good clean filter in the factory box might be the way to go on the R's.

 

The 4.2 engines have indeed a flap that can open in the intake box, however this opening is located just behind an opening where fresh outside air is flowing in. So you have a large opening to the fender, and a smaller opening that lets fresh air in from the front. This can't be compared at all with an open under hood filter.

Don't take my word for it, this is all very easy to measure with a standard OBDII meter, needless to say that I have also done measurements that only confirms the obvious. You can always be very specific with resellers, and ask precisely what and how they have tested of what they claim, and let them show the results, that usually helps in separating stuff that works only between the ears or on the car

 

BMC is actually the maker of the kits available:
http://www.bmc-air-filter-shop.com/0...ar-XJR-4.0.htm

Now if they could make a bigger one then this (will check with them):
http://www.bmc-air-filter-shop.com/i...5L230-B&zoom=4

 

I just got done typing a long post about this and my software crapped out and I lost it! Anyway...

I took apart my intake yesterday and discovered that the intake only brings in air from about a 6-8 square inch hole. Quite a bit different than the entire open filter that Mina sells!

The big difference is that the stock filter brings in cold air and is thus a CAI - Cold Air Intake, whereas the Mina filter is a HAI - Hot Air Intake. On the forums of my last car (a MINI) there was a lot of debate and discussion about the differences/benefits of HAI vs CAI...I don't think that one can effectively do a CAI with the same intake amounts on a Jag - they're just set up differently.

I think for the money, the Mina filter looks like it would work well. I'd love to see some dyno results for it though. Even though I'm running stock at this point, and need to have the ability to turn it back into stock, I'd be interested in buying one and adding it in my car if the results show that it's worth it.

Dave

 

No question about it, that intake tube is VERY restricted. I'd be surprised if it's 6-8 sq. ins.. The plastic in that tube is fairly thick and restricts it even more. Like I said...like sucking air through a straw.