750Li xDrive vs. Stage 1 vs. Stage 2
 

Here is my review of the Dinan Stage 1 and Stage 2 upgrade on a 2012 750Li xDrive. Before having the Stage 1 installed, I wanted to establish some base line numbers in the qtr mile so I would have something to compare to. All passes were done in the Sport + mode, temperature 85* & approximately a half tank of gas.

Stock – 400HP, 450 lb-ft torque
I did 4 passes and the times were pretty consistent. My first run is slower because I let off the gas right before crossing the line, rookie mistake.

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		Stock
	7/12/2012
	#1	#2	#3	#4
Reaction	0.3137	0.5889	0.5664	0.399
60 FT	2.2773	2.1385	2.1037	2.1656
330 FT	6.0046	5.8357	5.7915	5.8694
1/8 ET	9.0102	8.8254	8.7732	8.858
1/8 MPH	83.33	83.44	83.66	83.46
1000 ET	11.5525	11.353	11.2925	11.3853
1000 MPH	97.15	97.42	97.76	97.36
1/4 ET	13.7173	13.4773	13.4106	13.5143
1/4 MPH	99.91	105.98	106.26	105.09

Stage 1 – 495 HP, 573 lb-ft torque
The car ran ever so slightly faster as you can see from the numbers. This was very disappointing to say the least. One would think that after adding 95 HP & 123 lb-ft. torque the car would do better than 2/10ths of a second faster in the ¼ mile. The car had about 1/8 less gas than when I did the "Stock" run, so I attributed the slight gain to having less gas. 60-80 lbs could account for this. Assuming something went wrong with the install, I took the car back to the dealer to have them check it out. Their computer said that the program was in fact installed correctly on the car and that they saw no problems. The dealer re-installed the program again to see if it made any difference. The dealer was still not sure of any significant difference. After some research we discovered that the x-drive cars may need to have Stage 2.

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		Stage 1
		7/19/2012
	#1	#2	#3	#4
Reaction	0.467	0.3364	0.1283	0.1205
60 FT	2.1137	2.0993	2.1304	2.0407
330 FT	5.794	5.7569	5.7803	5.6771
1/8 ET	8.7562	8.7088	8.7255	8.6242
1/8 MPH	84.3	84.59	84.81	84.73
1000 ET	11.2579	11.2	11.2128	11.1125
1000 MPH	98.3	98.77	98.92	98.79
1/4 ET	13.369	13.3004	13.3101	13.2117
1/4 MPH	106.64	107.24	107.55	107.32

Stage 2 – 501 HP, 580 lb-ft torque
When I went to pick up the car, I drove a stock 750Li x-drive car then immediately got into mine. I thought the car pulled much harder in 1^st and 2^nd gears. Before I went to the track I put 6 gallons of gas in it so the fuel level was the same as my first trip to the track. Again, as you can see the results are very disappointing. I really don't know what to think anymore.

*******>********>

		Stage 2
		8/2/2012
	#1	#2	#3	#4
Reaction	0.2121	0.3593	0.3032	0.1679
60 FT	2.2127	2.1869	2.152	2.1316
330 FT	5.8645	5.8239	5.7948	5.7597
1/8 ET	8.8203	8.7684	8.7362	8.6993
1/8 MPH	84.33	84.86	84.89	84.89
1000 ET	11.3252	11.258	11.224	11.1863
1000 MPH	98.06	99.16	98.77	98.79
1/4 ET	13.4386	13.3597	13.3208	13.284
1/4 MPH	106.58	106.81	107.6	107.45

!!!!!!!!!!!!! Really!? I was expecting much better performance since I thought you found where the problem is!

So you notice the difference after stage 2 installed and the track result said otherwise. Hmm, really disappointing. I really don't know what to say anymore.

Maybe it's time to give Dinan a call. :(

Nah,I don't buy his story also. That's 100 hp more, it should be shaving at least a second off the quarter mile time. Actually I was expecting better time on your Xi model since all wheel drive helps a lot on high horsepower car. Something is not right, I remember cabimmernation unofficially recorded 4.3 sec to 60 mph, that's 0.7 sec less just in 0-60.

THIS IS BULLSHT! I REPEAT, THIS IS BULLSHT! Take your car back to them and tell them to install it correctly or if they can't, refund your money.

You probably didn't see my previous review that my stealership tried the same sht with me, ie gave the car back with the dinan not installed, stating it was. The scheduled 3-4 hour install took 4 days, not a big deal as I only drive the car on the weekends and I dropped it off on Sunday night. The excuses just kept piling up every day to why my car would not take the upgrade stating this has never happen before. They still had the car Friday morning and hey what do you know, the software finally successfully download, just hours before I needed the car back. I guess I should have told them that had done timed 10-12 0-60 runs, so I will know if this is actually installed.

It was exactly the same as before I brought it in. Brought it back and of course got the same song and dance as you that the computer is showing it's installed correctly. When its installed you will know the moment you touch the gas. As I stated before, there are many many people out there driving around after paying 3k for nothing other than being able to post on their Bimmerfest page that they now have Dinan. It really does mess with you when you get it back and they say its installed and it isn't. The reason why is because you start hammering on the car to see if it feels different and you try to convince yourself it is. NUMBERS DON'T LIE. I am consistently 4.2, 4.3 0-60 all day no matter the temp (I live in So Cal), gas level, ect. and it did this from day 1 of installation.

This not much of a surprise after what I went through, what amazes me is that Dinan would straight up lie to you. I guess they have to cover their money makers ass, but they know the 0-60, quarter mile, ect. numbers better than anyone.

I just read through this again and its really starting to piss me off. If your wife drove the car for a week, it would then run differently??? What he wants is for you to hammer on it for 5-10 mins and then see how it drives. Have you ever done this when it was stock (without the Dinan)? I mean really hammer on it for 5 mins? The car then starts jumping off the line, pulling harder and feels faster in ever gear. Just more BS trying to get you to believe its installed when it clearly is not. I really wonder what percent of F01 owners that have the Dinan installed actually have anything?

I challenge all F01 owners that have Dinan installed to time 0-60. All smart phones have stopwatch timers on them and its easy. I bet some of you are going to be pretty pissed off. And I know, timing it on your cell phone isn't the most scientific way of doing it, but there is a huge difference btw 5.0 and 4.3. 0-60 stock F01 = 5.0, F02 = 5.1, not sure about x-drive, I think it's the same.

I paid a visit to my dealer today and they were as confused as I was. The good news is that they were on the phone with Dinan and now the rep will be at the dealership Monday morning to check everything out. The dealership was very supportive after seeing the numbers and said they will get to the bottom of this one way or another. I don't think they will be selling any Dinan upgrades with results like this.
I would venture to say that there are a lot of people that have paid for the Stage 1 or 2 that actually have nothing but a big bill. There are too many accounts that I am hearing about that the computer say's it's installed, when in fact it is not.
Lastly, I am really disappointed in the Dinan person I spoke to last night. I won't drop any names, (right now) but it was not my area rep. He gave me every lame BS answer he could think of. I don't think I mentioned this one yet, but he said that the car would not do well in the qtr mile runs because of the staging areas on the track. Meaning that after the car runs, it will sit and get hot in the staging area and therefore post slower numbers. I informed him that it was a slow day at the track and I did not have to stage the car. In fact I would make my run and pull right around to go again. Now the double talk really started to come. He gave me a long drawn out engineering answer as to why that would also make the car slower. Now the funny part, after he got done with all his dribble, I told him that my car did slightly better after each run (see above Stage 2 chart) and that was just another BS answer. I mentioned that I might get the car dyno'd and see what the actual HP and Torque numbers are. He didn't like that either and told me that the results would not be accurate because their Dyno is set up for turbo cars and they have the fans just right, blowing at 80 mph blah, blah, blah. Give me a fricken' break. The Dyno will measure the HP and Torque, disagreeing with the results is another matter. I could go on and on, but I won't. I came away from the conversation feeling like this dude deals with questions like this all day. And what does that tell you???? He had a script to follow. Luckily for me, my dealer is in my corner and are going to make sure it is fixed.

yeah...I agreed. This is f...king bs.

Wow, the Dinan person you talked to is totally lame! Nice try, and he should get his A#@# fired for this. :)

If I had not done stock 0-60 numbers, I would be running around without it installed also. You trick yourself into believing that is faster. Every time I get it back from the dealer, I time a 0-60 run, even if they told me they didn't touch the software.

I'm amazed that we haven't heard from any Dinan upgraded cars out there, maybe they are all out running 0-60 times.

I'm sure that's the culture, deny and then cover your ass and the dealers ass. Who knows in what order.

is there any track or dyno place in twin cities area? lol

wow crazy ordeal!!....i actually met a rep of theirs at my dealership...asked them about doing something with the AH7....they said sure...but no idea the effects it might have, so didnt pursue that road any further....needless to say, otherwise I would love to add on Stage 2 to my already 515lb of torque and really see what this thing would do!! ;)....im sure it would be pretty intense

Dinan update
 

I am happy they stand behind their product, and I agree getting the car produce more power and perform better is what YOU want, not the money back.

Good luck and hopefully they can come up with a solution.

Richard109 - let us know the outcome. I was going to have the Stage 1 install done on Friday, but I will wait and see...

Any chance to get it on a dyno? No way it's up 100/ 130, which would probably be -20% at the wheel.

I did verify that Dinan does not use a typical roller dyno. They remove the wheels and attach to the axels/hubs to do their measurements. I have no idea on how that would translate to a standard dyno that you pull the car onto, start the fans and take the measurements.

With the xdrive being all wheel drive, I have only found 1 dyno in the state of Ohio that can do it.

Yea, I forgot about your all wheel drive. What a pain in the ass this has turned into for you.

you do realize that stage 1 vs stage 2 is only a few horsepower and torque and not much more than that? In a car with 500 HP, a 5HP difference is only 1%. You aren't going to feel much of anything with a 1% increase; it's at least 10% it takes to feel something different with your butt dyno!

As far as those complaining about dinan stage 1 being installed and not being installed, that is a problem with the dealer as they are applying it. It isn't dinan's fault if the dealer couldn't put it on your car and tricked you into thinking they did.

Also AWD dynos do exist however trying to get an accurate reading from systems like SH-AWD, ATTESA, XDrive, etc are hard because of the torque vectoring and how it is constantly changing power ratios to each wheel. The only way to properly measure this is to disconnect the front or rear driveshafts and measure only 2 wheels.

Stage 2 has more to do with the "turbo response" which is noticed mostly in the first 2 gears. As qouted from their website.

"Our team was able to make Stage 2 much faster by improving turbo response across the power-band. This tuning is especially noticeable in the first two gears, now catapulting the car off the line."

Guess I never paid any attention before, but the Dinan website uses the same “Product Description” for both the 5 & 7 series. My tires don’t spin when I press the throttle to the floor??

"From a standing start (with the traction control fully disengaged) all it takes is the press of the throttle to the floor to get the tires spinning."

http://www.dinancars.com/shop/D903-4...0i.aspx#page=1

Mine does, but then again you have x-drive. I think they were referring to non x-drive. Turn all traction off, drop it into 1st and hammer to the floor. Tires light up and it slides out sideways through 1st and 2nd.