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  1. Mishimoto BMW E46 M3 Direct-Fit Oil Cooler Kit, Part 5: Final Data Review

    Mishimoto BMW E46 M3 Direct-Fit Oil Cooler Kit, Part 5: Final Data Review

    Interested in purchasing this E46 oil cooler? Check out our product page for more information!

    Mishimoto BMW E46 M3 Oil Cooler Kit

    Mishimoto E46 M3 Oil Cooler Kit

    The results are in and they are exactly what we expected! This cooler provided huge gains in cooling efficiency. Let's take a look at the data we compiled. First up is the core volume comparison.

    Core volume comparison
    Core volume comparison

    As you can see, the Mishimoto oil cooler provides a huge increase in total core volume.

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  2. Mishimoto BMW E46 M3 Direct-Fit Oil Cooler Kit, Part 4: Cooler Installation and Data Collection

    Mishimoto BMW E46 M3 Direct-Fit Oil Cooler Kit, Part 4: Cooler Installation and Data Collection

    Interested in purchasing this E46 oil cooler? Check out our product page for more information!

    Mishimoto BMW E46 M3 Oil Cooler Kit

    Time to see if this cooler can make a significant impact on fluid temperatures. As before, we borrowed a test fit vehicle from the folks over at Open Road Tuning. Once we had the car on the lift, we removed the factory cooler lines and spliced our temperature sensors into the stock lines so we could collect inlet and outlet fluid temperatures.

    Temperature sensors installed
    Temperature sensors installed

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  3. Mishimoto BMW E46 M3 Direct-Fit Oil Cooler Kit, Part 3: Cooler Comparison and Adapter Installation

    Mishimoto BMW E46 M3 Direct-Fit Oil Cooler Kit, Part 3: Cooler Comparison and Adapter Installation

    Interested in purchasing this E46 oil cooler? Check out our product page for more information!

    Mishimoto BMW E46 M3 Oil Cooler Kit

    Welcome to our third installment of the build! We are nearing the completion of this project, with only some final test fitting necessary and data collection to ensure that this product performs to our standards. First, take a look at the Mishimoto oil cooler compared to the stock unit.

    Mishimoto prototype oil cooler (right) and stock oil cooler (left)
    Mishimoto prototype oil cooler (right) and stock oil cooler (left)

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  4. Mishimoto BMW E46 M3 Direct-Fit Oil Cooler Kit, Part 2: Cooler Design and Prototyping

    Mishimoto BMW E46 M3 Direct-Fit Oil Cooler Kit, Part 2: Cooler Design and Prototyping

    Interested in purchasing this E46 oil cooler? Check out our product page for more information!

    Mishimoto BMW E46 M3 Oil Cooler Kit

    Our team now had a functioning oil line adapter to convert from the stock oil filter housing to -AN fittings. Now we would be able to move forward with designing the actual heat exchanger for our kit. We reached out to a few of our local friends and sourced this Oxford green example!

    Test vehicle on lift
    Test vehicle on lift

    Our friend Andrew at Open Road Tuning was kind enough to loan his vehicle for a week of development! First we tore off the stock cooler to get a look at what kind of space we had to work with.

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  5. Mishimoto BMW E46 M3 Direct-Fit Oil Cooler Kit, Part 1: Product Introduction and Component Prototyping

    Mishimoto BMW E46 M3 Direct-Fit Oil Cooler Kit, Part 1: Product Introduction and Component Prototyping

    Interested in purchasing this E46 oil cooler? Check out our product page for more information!

    Mishimoto BMW E46 M3 Oil Cooler Kit

    The BMW S54 won the "International Engine of the Year" award at its inception in 2001 and was consistently on "Ward's 10 Best Engines" list for four years. It's hard to argue against the E46, an 8,000 rpm, 3.2L straight-6 producing over 330 hp and 260 ft-lb of torque, with a competent chassis, an exhaust note that straightens the neck hair of all within earshot, and a body styling that is unmatched in uniqueness. Although my opinion is slightly skewed, being a fan of most BMW products, many would agree that the E46 was a fantastic vehicle for the street and even better for the track. E46 M3 pricing has trickled downward over the past few years, meaning that even those on a tighter budget can find their way into the cockpit of one of BMW's finest. We are seeing these vehicles at track

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