[Mister_smart_LA]

Don’t forget that powerpack ! Worth every penny .

I don't doubt it. Madness had a performance-enhanced 453 that they loaned my showroom for about a year and a half. That car was CERTAINLY faster than the stock 453's. It boosted hard enough to threaten fuel cut. I believe the original Madness-enhanced 453 had the Lorinser power pack in it.


I liked it. A lot. Anybody with a 453 looking for performance enhancements, you've gotta check Madness out. Your friends will never talk smack about a 0.9L 3-cylinder again.

 

[Mister_smart_LA]

When you tromp on it , the turbo just keeps on boosting , it makes my 5-speed a blast on twisty mountain roads . Taching to red line happens quick . What a hoot .

The BRABUS does this too, and the trans programming LOVES to keep the rpms up. Unfortunately there is such a small sample size in America with only 75 coupes and 19 cabriolets.



I believe the BRABUS models were already uptuned, and therefore don't really need a Lorinser ECU or other ECU + related components upgrades.


Clearly, the car can be tuned even more aggressively. The uptuned smart 453's are very easy to crash. They are fast enough to overwhelm their brakes and chassis in turns if you stomp on it. Last thing you want to do is open up the turbo and then suddenly traffic stops in front of you. You can hit the brakes all you want but you'll need to wait a split second or so for the wastegate to do its job...



There is still some room to make the smart BRABUS even faster though. I can tell it was tuned to tease us and throttle back just a bit. I wonder if Lorinser's is a touch more aggressive, or if the Madness kit is even more aggressive than both...