Tuning the Ford B-Max

"Thank you for reading this Ford B-Max tuning article."

The Bmax or B232 if you use it's internal name, is a tiny multi person vehicle aimed at families. It was a Fiesta platform inspired model and has been quite popular.

The engines offered all propel the car quite well although more power can be gained with the right mods and it's light chassis allow you to feel every additional pony of power.

The B-Max is a awesome car modification project to play with. If you do your planning then you can create an awesome B-Max but don't be fooled there are lots of motorsport inspired modifications out there that will simply not suit it read our unbiased guides first.

The Ford B-Max are fantastic to work on and with the ultimate modified parts like remapping, turbo improvements and camshafts you will greatly maximize your driving enjoyment.

In this article we outline options for your B-Max tuning and summarise the best modifications for your car.

Handling/Suspension upgrades

Many B-Max owners uprate the handling of their cars with fast road suspension upgrades as a priority, this will certainly increase your enjoyment of the car.

If you set the toe out to around 1.5 degrees on the front, and add some negative camber then cornering will greatly benefit.

We would go to a maximum drop of 28mm - 44 mm. on most models. You risk rubbing on the arches if you go lower than this.

Putting larger brake discs and better quality pads will make for sharper enhanced braking.

Bear in mind that some performance friction pads can be noisier and will need to be really hot before they bit.

On your regular commute to work the brakes are only used rarely so won't stop you as well so specify friction pads which don't need to be really hot.

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

Smaller engines do not provide much of a return in terms of power so start with a bigger engine. Engine swaps are a good option if you have a small engine size.

Power mods.

Typically these tuning parts are usually installed by our members, decide how far you wish to go in your tuning project before you start.

Petrol engines

• 1.0 Ecoboost 101 PS (74 kW) 169 Nm (125lbft) @1,400–4000 rpm
• 1.0 Ecoboost 120 PS (88 kW) 201 Nm (148lbft) @1,400–4500 rpm
• 1.4 Duratec 90 PS (66 kW) 127 Nm (94lbft)
• 1.6 Duratec 105 PS (77 kW) 150 Nm (111lbft)

Diesel engines

• 1.5 Duratorq 75 PS (55 kW) 190 Nm (140lbft) 95 PS (70 kW) 215 N⋅m (159lbft)
• 1.6 Duratorq 97 PS (71 kW) 215 Nm (159lbft)

Getting the correct grade of modified upgrades for your planned usage of the car is a time and money saver. Stage 3 motor sport parts just don't work well on the road hard to control in slow traffic.

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Modifying to Stage 1:

 Sports exhaust, Suspension upgrade (drop 28mm - 44 mm.), Lighter flywheel, Alloy wheels, Panel air filter, Remap.

Modifying to Stage 2:

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

Modifying to Stage 3:

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

Your aim when tuning the engine should be a flat and wide torque band. You don't want all the power to be at the top end of the rev range unless you are creating a motor sport car.

In this article we shall give your a good starting base 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.A fast road cam will be one of the best NASP power modifications you can do mechanically to your engine.

The intake and exhaust flow play a big role in your cars power band, but be careful here, getting this wrong can upset the idle and make the car difficult to drive in traffic. You'd need to follow a camshaft upgrade with other mods and finish with a remap to fully release the power gain.

You will need to ensure that the engine is not starved of fuel so will need to ramp up the fuelling.

Using higher octane fuel is another option if you find you are suffering from detonation or premature ignition on your Ford project after fitting other motorsport mods. Increasing the injectors is another beneficial modification and will deliver sufficient fuel.

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.

The next area for modification is the intake and exhaust.  Please note that WE DO NOT SEE IMPROVEMENTS WITH INDUCTION KITS, unless you have tuned your car a lot and are finding that the standard air intake has become a limitation.

For most B-Max engines TorqueCars would suggest you just go with a washable panel air filter. On heavily tuned engines and turbo vehicles an induction kit will help release the power providing you address the problem of supplying cold air.

Sports exhausts will certainly help air flow through the engine but avoid an exhaust that is too wide or you could will reduce the flow rate. Stick to 1.5 to 2.5 inches as a rule of thumb.

Head work including a head port and polished and 3 or 5 angle valve job will really help to release the potential of the engine. In nearly all cases of B-Max tuning your clutch will start to fail and this needs to be uprated - read our overview on clutches for more information. The best mods in our opinion for your B-Max are a remap especially on a turbo, a fast road camshaft and sports exhaust, with a good air intake.

NASP engines do not achieve big power gains if you remap them, unless you have done extensive modifications. With turbocharged engines this is another story. A remapped turbo will give significant power gains and fully release the potential power of the engine.

We've also seen some tuners toying with twincharging applications and making some impressively high power gains.

The most impressive power gains for NASP engines usually involve the addition of forced induction. Superchargers are often easier to add than a turbo. Turbos give boost in increasing proportion to rising engine speed and this can make mapping difficult.

The nice correlating boost and rpm characteristics of the supercharger make them more straightforward to map. Decreasing the engines compression ratio will allow you to add forced induction, water injection may also help prevent detonation.

Alloy wheel upgrades.

The benefits of alloys include reducing your unsprung weight and more efficient brake cooling. Pay attention to your choice of tyres (tires) for your car, a good directional tread pattern tire can really enhance your cars handling. Please note that although they can look cool on the B-Max big alloy wheels will actually decrease your performance. The larger you go the lower your acceleration will be - this to the change in your effective final drive ratio.

For this reason try to keep the overall rolling diameter of the wheel the OEM setup. In all cases avoid going above 17 inches.

Wheel and tire sizes for the B-Max

• 195/60R15 88H
  6Jx15 ET37.5
• 185/60R15 88T
  6Jx15 ET37.5
• 195/55R16
  6.5Jx16 ET40
• 205/45R17 88V
  7Jx17 ET40

For more information on Tuning your car please join us in our friendly forum where you can discuss B-Max options in more detail with our B-Max owners. It would also be worth reading our unbiased Ford 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 Ford. 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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