Brera & Spider Tuning

"Thank you for reading my Brera performance tuning guide."

The Brera is a good car tuning project to play with. If you do your research then you can create an awesome Brera but don't be fooled there are lots of sports mods out there that will simply not suit it read our unbiased guides first.

Engine choices were

• 1.75 L TBi I4 t/c petrol
• 2.2 L JTS I4 petrol
• 3.2 L JTS V6 petrol
• 2.0 L JTDm I4 t/c diesel
• 2.4 L JTDm I5 t/c diesel

The Brera also came in a roadster version, and bore the Spider name. They are great cars to drive and it is a mystery to us why only 35000 units were sold during the production run.

All engines respond well to tuning and upgrades, and the already capable chassis can be improved with a few choice suspension upgrades and modifications.

Many Brera owners uprate the handling of their cars with performance suspension mods as a priority, this will certainly increase your enjoyment of the car. We would go to a maximum drop of 35mm on most models. You risk rubbing on the arches if you go lower than this.

Top end power should be your overall aim on the Brera with a nice fat peak torque band.

Sadly with smaller engine sizes you are wasting your time spending money on modifications, so if this applies to you get yourself an engine swap then apply the following mods.

Engine tuning mods.

Typically these sports mods are usually installed by our members, decide how far you wish to go in your tuning project before you get started.

Getting the right uprated modifications for your planned usage of the car is vital. Stage 3 motor sport parts just won't work well on the road difficult in stop start traffic.

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Modifying to Stage 1:

 Sports exhaust, Alloy wheels, Suspension upgrade (drop 30-40mm), Lighter flywheel, Remap, Panel air filter.

Modifying to Stage 2:

 Power/Sport clutch, Ported and polished head, fuel pump upgrades, Fast road cam, high flow fuel injector.

Modifying to Stage 3:

 Internal engine upgrades (pistons/head/valves), Sports gearbox, Adding or upgrading forced induction (turbo/supercharger), Competition cam, Engine balancing.

Your aim when modding the engine should be a nice flat torque curve. You don't want all the power to be at the top end of the rev range unless you are creating a competition car.

In this article we shall give an overview and introduction to the best mods for your car, but we'd encourage you to spend some time on the site looking into the details of each type of performance modification.One of the most cost effective mechanical tuning upgrades you can do to your NASP engine is to fit a fast road camshaft .

The intake and exhaust flow play a large part in your cars power band, but be careful here, getting this wrong can upset the idle and make the car impossible to drive in traffic. You'd need to follow a cam upgrade with other mods and finish with a performance chip for the best performance gains.You will need to ensure that the engine is not starved of fuel so will need to increase the fuelling.

Frequently power losses, flat spots and erratic idling after tuning modifications are done can usually be traced to timing or fuelling issues.Uprated injectors will enable you to supply sufficient fuel to the engine. If you've uprated your fuelling with bigger injectors you will also need to get a bigger fuel pump to supply it.

Intake and Exhaust Tuning.

Breathing mods are usually next up. Please note that WE DO NOT RECOMMEND INDUCTION KITS without a cold air intake, and unless you have tuned your car extensively and are finding that the standard air intake has become a restriction there is not much performance argument to adding one to your Brera.

Derestricting the airflow into the engine is the primary part of tuning so get a better flowing air filter if you find that the car is running lean. Induction kits can sound sporty but due to the warm air in the engine bay they will not add noticeable power and actually rob you of power.

Sports exhausts can help equal out the flow of air through the engine. But if the exhaust is too large, ie: it's over 2.5 inches bore, you will lose a lot of the flow rate and end up losing power and torque.

Head work including a polish and port and 3 or 5 angle valve job will really help to release the potential of the engine. Your clutch can fail if it starts to break and the standard clutches are only ever good for power gains of up to 48%. Fit clutch to avoid power loss through the transmission. Remaps offer significant power gains on all turbo charged cars.

Alloy wheel upgrades.

Due to the fact that alloy wheels are less heavy they improve performance and they will help to cool the brake disks. Large Brera alloys can decrease performance. If you get big alloys you will be changing your final drive ratio.

Although some people have fitted larger wheels we would restrict ourselves to a 18 inch rim size as the maximum.

For more information on Tuning your car please join us in our friendly forum where you can discuss Brera options in more detail with our Brera owners. It would also be worth reading our unbiased Alfa Romeo tuning articles to get a full grasp of the benefits and drawbacks of each modification.

Please help us improve these tips by sending us your feedback in the comments box below. We love to hear what our visitors have got up to and which mods work best for them on each model of car. Comments are used to improve the accuracy of these articles which are continually updated.

This article was written by Waynne Smith on TorqueCars, and I appreciate your feedback and suggestions. This entry was filed under Alfa Romeo. You can leave a response below or join TorqueCars forum to discuss this article and car modification in detail with our members.

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