yes, it should work. though I haven't done it. There are several others who put an M54 engine in an M52TU car. You will have to keep 323i's MAF, throttle body, intake, exhaust manifold, wiring, and likely have to keep: engine mounts, oil pan, coils, and valve cover.

It should bolt up and run fine as is, but you may want to reflash the DME to the 2.8 M52TU tune down the road to optimize performance. I don't think you can flash it to an M54 tune because the M54 DME is looking for a drive by wire throttle body which your car won't have.

I would not do it, unless your 323i needs a new engine. You might not notice much in higher performance and the M52TU is a good engine with typically little oil consumption

 

Why would he reflash a 2.8 tune if he's switching to a 2.2 L engine? If anything the 323 tune would be the closest fit, but even that won't be quite right.

There was apparently an M52TUB20 which might a better fit software wise as well. There's also the thai exclusive M52TUB24, which actually apparently made more power than the M52TUB25 in the 323 - that software combo might be interesting.

 

Okay thanks for help. It***8217;s running fine. It***8217;s got 215,000 miles on it. I was thinking about doing head on it and saw people talking about doing m54b22 head on m52 to get better cam. So then I was thinking about just freshen up a m54 then sticking that in. It***8217;s my drift car so it***8217;s not a daily

 

OP wasn't clear which M54 he wanted to install, I was assuming it was an M54B30..Since he can't flash an M54 tune (due to throttle body) I was suggesting a M52TUB28 tune might get him close if he does in fact use a B30.

If he uses an M54B25 (2.5 liter), then leaving the tune as is might be fine.

Leaving the tune as is would be a good starting point regardless of what engine he puts in. See how it runs after install.

Hadn't thought about the non-US tunes.

 

Title says M54b22?

 

Yes it does. I missed/ignored it. Too much North American-centric thinking I guess...

OP- this swap doesn't make too much sense unless your current engine is toast as you will be losing some 35 NM of torque (M52TUB25 to M54B22) according to wikipedia.

If you were to do the swap, don't touch the 323i's DME tuning, unless it causes problems.