Where to buy mods?

I get my stuff from either eBay or Facebook groups, and if I need new stuff or I can't find the part in those places I go to Daihatsu Copen L880K JDM parts direct from Japan - Nengun Performance
Or I send an email to one of the ex Daihatsu dealers. You can find them in Daihatsu's UK website. Daihatsu

For aftermarket parts (mods), I guess you just have to try and find a Japanese seller willing to ship overseas. I haven't managed to find many, but I haven't really been looking into this too much as I want to leave my car mostly standard for now.

Croooober seems to offer worldwide shipping. If you've never heard of them, you may have heard of up garage. Croooober sells parts from up garage overseas.
Copen | Croooober
*note up garage specialises in used parts.

As for aftermarket performance brands for the copen, I do know of quite a few.
D-Sport
K-takeoff
Halfway
Mo-fac
Cc-sport
Hks

 

Hi Nublit,

I live in Australia where they only sold 200 (?) stock JDM J880Ks, so any parts here are - unobtainable.
My big question is do you have a 659 or a 1.3?

1. If it's the 659, let me know & I'll detail the things I've done, using generic off the shelf parts, to increase my output by around 30% (still no torque of course). No stock ECUs or intricate, expensive things that will shorten the engine life, just liberating all the ponies that the engineers planned for. They worked backwards to reign it down to 50kW. Cost, around $2k AUD for the works.

2. If it's a 1.3 then one way to make a huge difference is to just find a good Sirion GTvi engine & swap it out. For some reason Daihatsu felt that you Euroers needed a 'normal' engine instead of only the 659. They looked at their vastly improved & proven version of the Toyota 1.3 in the GTvi & said "nah, just whack a stock Echo/Yaris one in." I had 2x Sirion GTvis before my Copen, each with 160k km and these are great little cars/engines.

Redline is 8k & both of mine would pull to 180kmh+ before I decided to end the 'research'. With just a pod air intake & straight through exhaust, less than 9 seconds 0-100 is very do-able & theoretically over 200kmh if you're really brave. The 659 needs 2x services per year, the 1.3 only one.

xOf course with squillions of little Toyota 1.3s around in various guises, finding mods for that engine is pretty easy.

Anyway, good choice buying a Daihatsu, the Japanese build quality is superb & well maintained they will just keep going. Weirdly, Daihatsu had the habit of putting fuel filters INSIDE the tank, so never run them to empty.
Regards, Brian.

 

OK, done my friend!
My Princess is my first ever turbo, so I knew nothing when I started.
Here's what I've done which has made my Copen SERIOUSLY better to drive whilst not getting anything exotic or risking blowing up the little 4.

1. Remove the ridiculous air intake & buy a direct pod intake. I found one for the Copen on ebay, about (all $AUD) $120. It's easy DIY, sits snugly next to the tiny intercooler.

2. Put in a straight through 2"exhaust (preferably stainless steel). I had to anyway, my car was only ever used as a toy & so the exhaust was rotten. I also put a little bit of 2.5" roughly under the gear lever for a bit of nice echo. This is using the existing manifold, trying to change that is VERY hard & expensive for marginal gain. Keep the original. Cost, about $700.

3. The cheapest mod of all & easy DIY - creating a fantastic blow-off 'whoosh' noise every time you lift off the throttle! Simply disconnect the 'vent to turbo' pipe & let it vent to atmo. With the tiny twin scroll turbo this makes NO difference to turbo response at all. Buy a metal cover to go over the turbo inlet so nothing goes in there. Cost $0.60 for a little metal cover & 30 mins work. It's dead simple, I did a post on it called I think "How to make your Copen sound like an angry WRX". You'll find it in "Mods" or "General Chat".

4. Install an off the shelf "Turbosmart" manual boost controller. This really is a gamechanger. Get a tuner to install it as we still use the original ECU but you don't want to run lean. I also got him to source it & it only cost $10 more than if I bought it off ebay. Seemed smarter to let him just do it in case of any problems. Before & after dyno runs showed a 30% increase in kW at the wheels! You can really feel the difference, it's like someone put in a 999cc version! Fuel economy, not something I worry about, increased about 0.8L/100. The 659 drinks a lot for its size anyway as it's basically a semi race engine not built for economy. Cost - less than $350 all up from memory.
Marnob here is a good guy who helped me do this.

5. Possibly not necessary in Ireland but here in Canberra it goes from -6 to 46 every year, so I installed a real-time engine temp display. It showed that the OEM temp gauge is useless. It has 4 settings: cold, pretty cold, medium & "you're engine is stuffed". Cost - about $220 installed. (the original gauge sits at 'medium' from 60deg to 100deg! I've set my alarm for 95deg)

6. Mostly for fun & to make my baby look cooler, I put a boost gauge on the dash (make sure it is orange when the lights are on). Cost was higher because my auto-electrician, despite being next to the tuning shop that did the controller, took forever to do it, $300 all up

7. Again, mostly for fun & cool factor, but also because with the roof up you can be doing 7,000 RPM in 3rd & not notice, I installed an upshift light next to the boost gauge. I've set it to 4,000 RPM so that (with the boost controller) it falls back to 'still in turbo world' 3,000RPM on change. But it actually is useful - now I just drive & when the light comes on I upshift. Cost - $220 installed.

8. I installed a phone holder in the middle so I can run a GPS Speedo on my phone. Now the cockpit looks great at night & I rarely look down except to check my fuel.

9. I bought a combo 2x USB, with a voltmeter LED screen between the sockets, on ebay for about $15. Great purchase, lets me know that my battery is charging nicely.

But most importantly, put in new top class oil religiously every 6mo & change logbook items by km (time is irrelevant by 2021).
When you do change, use good 185/50 tyres. Not 55s, that ruins the handling (ask me how I know...). I'm using very reasonably priced Hankook Kontrol Kinergy Ecos & they are really good tyres for outright grip & good in the wet.

Hope this helps you, just do it as you can afford it. I'm so happy with my little baby, she frustrates me but she's just damned
gorgeous & every drive is a real drive. Plus she gets really good attention & compliments.

Below is an assortment of pics that might help you.
Feel free to contact me any time.
Cheers & good luck from Canberra Nublit,
Brian

 

Daihatsu Copen L880K JB-DET (07/2002~) - RHDJapan

I get my stuff from here

 

Thanks for the tip. I have to import every basic Copen specific bit into Australia so it's good to know of suppliers.

 

Hey Brian - I really appreciated your write up about your mods. Do you have any other pictures of your manual boost controller? I have one that I never got round to installing and your post might just give me the drive to get it sorted. Thank you.

 

It's a bit hard to get a decent shot of it as it is squeezed tightly between the air intake, intercooler & plumbing as in the photo I posted earlier - well, it IS a Copen.
If you head to the Turbosmart website it has some install information & I'm pretty sure yours will too. But it's the same basic technique regardless of brand..
Or just google "how do I fit a manual boost controller?" & there will be lots of stuff like this:
https://carsupercare.com/best-manual-boost-controllers/

Definitely get onto it.
If you aren't confident installing it, just go to any tuning shop & they'll install it professionally in an hour or so at not much cost. That's what I did.
If you need more encouragement, just give me a shout!
But in the meantime, please do try the 'vent to atmo' DIY $0.60 30min blowoff mod. You can always change it back & I'd like to know what you think of the sound.
Brian
PS: I just installed a double DIN 7" GPS capable touchscreen. Looks great & as it is Android, you can just hook it up to the wifi & download apps. I use "Digi HUD".

 

Thanks for the comprehensive info, bought myself a copen a month ago or so and giving it some love and attention,
tried the BOV idea but ended up removing it once I installed the pod filter as it still made the same noises xD

~Barely

 

Those Enkei RPF1 looks crazy on a Copen !!!! What's size are those rims ?

 

Thanks for those info !
What's the PCD of those rims ? 4x100 ?
And did you think a set of 7x15 ET 40 can be installed without any rubbing ?

Thanks for your help !

 

Thanks for your answer ! I'll think more about wheels next days, I've seen a few rims that I can maybe buy soon...