So I decided to go with this kit rather than the PR kit for various reasons despite some of the issues - primarily because I'm staying twins so I want all the help for reliable high-HP I can get, and the smart coils outshine the PR in certain departments I think are necessary - but I just ordered the harness and bought the following coils instead of the typical ones that come with the kit.
These are Bosch versions, a new revision of the R8 style coil and I believe they're actually even the OE coils for the 2012-ish gen R8 GT (V10 engine for those who don't know). What attracted me to them is not only the fact that they're a newer revision (item# ending in F instead of E like the ones that come with the kit), but also the lack of shielding.
However I wasn't sure if they were literally the same coil just stripped of the metal cover, luckily my local Advanced had a couple on hand. They also had some of the most recently updated genuine N54 coils on hand and the guy at the counter allowed me to use his personal micrometer calipers to measure the differences between the three coils (shielded R8, Bosch revised R8, and N54 Delphi), I don't have the exact measurements like
@fmorelli was able to provide, however I was able to measure some key things that you should hopefully be able to tell from the pictures too:
1: the Bosch coil isn't quite as thin as the shielded R8 coils are when the shield is removed, and don't taper quite as much towards the tip, however they are close to the size of the Delphi coils (caliper fit over the thick part of the shaft of both about the same - the Delphi N54 shaft is slightly thicker) at their upper parts.
2: there are no extended nubs on the Bosch coils that would need to be trimmed, due to them not having full-length shielding.
3: the little plastic tabs up top on the Bosch R8 coils are about half the length of the rubber and plastic tabs on the red-top R8s, so there'd be no need to trim anything. Worst case scenario, they would be easy to entirely break off or cut half of them off.
4: Again, the Bosch R8 coil doesn't taper quite as much as the other coils. However, the caliper fit over the thickest part of the bottom of the Bosch shaft, BUT wouldn't fit over the bottom buldge of the Delphi coil. This leads me to believe there shouldn't be any clearance issue inside the plug's cylinder.
5: while I didn't have Morelli's measurements for depth, the length of both the Bosch coil and the Delphi were very very close as to where they would be fully seated. I'm thinking worst case scenario is the metal shielding at the tip of the Bosch would need trimmed halfway up or removed, although I think even that is unlikely. I think worst case scenario is I'll have to snip the tabs at the head of the coil, but we'll see.
Unfortunately I'm still waiting on my harness to get here, but I expect that BL will probably move to this coil (assuming it fits) if they want to stay with OE/genuine coils and as long as people are willing to give up the red top. If they aren't, well I think there's an red version too - OEM spec though instead of actually OE
