A race bmw 316, m10, s14, m20, turbo, na, its been the lot!

[Graham]

Re: a very powerfull and troublesome bmw 316

progress has been a bit slow, i got the front of the shell up pretty high then stripped out the from suspension for a spot of cleaning and painting



engine crane and very tall axle stands came in handy here

[Graham]

Re: a very powerfull and troublesome bmw 316

a minor milestone here, ive bolted the front suspension and steering back in, for good rather then on a tempory basis.

as well as splashed some blue paint around, i was going to change the colour, but decided against it, fianances being tight means i wont have to buy as much paint as i have some ( but not enough) left over and can get on with it now rather than waiting for payday

[Graham]

Re: a very powerfull and troublesome bmw 316

so having bolted something back in the car what better way to celibrate then by unbolting something else,

so out comes the rear suspension, and at this point there nothing left that i havnt removed form the shell



the plan for the backend was just to remove the redundant spring mounts from the trailing arms and make a smallish modification to the beam mounts, note i said was!

[Graham]

Re: a very powerfull and troublesome bmw 316

e30 beemer rear suspension is very similar to a sierra, they both suffer from gaining excessive negative camber when you lower them lots,

i had already used an old trick by inserting the beam mounts upside down , this pushes the beam higher in the body and helps offset the lowering, but with my new even bigger wider wheels and rubber i wanted to take a little more camber out, buying a pukka group A rose jointed beam and wishbones was out the question and although could make an adjustable beam, i dont think i'd have the time to do that and get the car ready for the seasons start, so i've resorted to getting the beam even higher in the body by slimming it and its mounting bushes and sleeves down a bit

before the angle grinder treatmeant



after


stainless sleeve being trimmed


even with a sharp tip, the bushed themselves didnt really machine nicely, they ended up looking a bit like i'd filed them down with sandpaper, but they will do the job


still on the beam i added some reinforcing gussets

[Graham]

Re: a very powerfull and troublesome bmw 316

one i had stripped out the trailing arms it was obvious some of the bushes were shot


the bushes not being that old i wondered why for a while and realised two things, firstly as the the suspension moved they were being rubbed hard against the main brackets which was wearing them, well more tearing them actually but also as the sleeve through the middle of them was longer than the bushes, they worked there way out of the trailing arms slightly and then twisted under load, although i suppose the utimate reason for the wear is as much down to masive slicks as anything, i must put some real thought into making a pukka group A / touring car rose jointed rear end some time

so i enlarged the hole on some penny washers, so they went over the sleves and effectively widthwise made the bushes a perfect fit in the beam and trailing arms so they cant work there there way out and have a better surface to sit against, well thats the theory anyway


finally after a quick coat of shitty green paint (it was free so i dont care about the colour) the beam ready to go back in, the diff got an oil change, and the bolts on its back cover nipped up, and i swapped the halfshafts for my spare ones as the ones i took off the car has quite a lot of play in the outer cv's



i will put the trailing arms in later as im still waiting for the new bushes

[Graham]

Re: a very powerfull and troublesome bmw 316

my trailing arm bushes didnt arrive today as they were supposed to

so i struggled a bit to get much meaning full stuff done, the boot got some paint



finished the rear brake caliper mounts by making some spacers and and finding a suitable wheel stud and nut to hold the alloy bracket to the hub as opposed to the nuts and bolts i had used to mock up with on the car


i started to blend the rear arches, well until i ran out of filler

[Graham]

Re: a very powerfull and troublesome bmw 316

right got togo to work now, but my bushes turned up this morning, so i got the trailing arms, driveshafts and rear brakes bolted back on, i didnt take any pics because they look exactly the same as when i took them out.

but at last having got both the front and rear suspension bolted in for good i feel like i've made some progress

[andypipe]

Re: a very powerfull and troublesome bmw 316

You might make it out for the 1st race then

[Graham]

Re: a very powerfull and troublesome bmw 316

i've been out of circulation for a while, have trapped a nerve

so no real progress other than to catch up with a couple of pics

whilst engine was out the car i stripped off this little lot so i could check the torque on the head bolts



actually it was a bit of a waste of time the head bolts haddnt loosened, so the gasket obviuosly doesnt compress with use, which is worth knowing and i wont worry about trying to retorque it in future which is virtually immpossible with the engine in the car


i also checked the ends, which slowed a bit of wear in no 4, so that got a couple of new bearings, thankfully the crank was ok, this could of been caused by a bit of oil starvation with one of the several oil leaks i suffered last season or when i buzzed to engine to silly silly revs


lastly and quite by accident i discovered the rivits holding the clutch plate to its splines had come very loose on the outer plate so a quick call to demon tweeks got me a new pair of plates for almost nothing after my discount and using some sponsorship vouchers i got after a pic of my car appeared in motorsport news




nice to see the new plates have twice as many rivits as the old ones

[Graham]

Re: a very powerfull and troublesome bmw 316

still no progress as i cant stand up for more than a few mins, but i can drive so i popped over to emerald, and got dave to flow test my new injectors, they flow a wapping 960cc per min



that should be big enough!!!

potentially a swap back to my origonal exhaust manifold could bump the power up by another 65bhp which means the fuel pumps are going to struggle to keep up so i picked up another high pressre fuel pump whilst at emeralds,

i need to give some thought to the low pressure facet, because that wont be able to keep up, crunching the numbers show at full throttle if the engine does regain what i lost when i swapped exhaust manifolds the swirl pot will empty in 10 seconds, so i either need a second facet or i may just use a high pressure EFI pump in its place

[david_white]

Re: a very powerfull and troublesome bmw 316

Sounds like you're aiming for some big numbers there Graham, hope you get better soon to get this beast finished in time

When you say you might run another facet do you mean in series with the other one or parallel to it?

[Graham]

Re: a very powerfull and troublesome bmw 316

it would need to be parallel, but that means spending even more money to buy another one so i will just use an efi pump instead as i have a spare one which will do the job, the efi pump makes far more pressure than you would need for a swirl pot but seeing as excess fuel just vents straight back to the tank without any restrictions i cant see that being a problem.

as for numbers well, i don't like quoting them, because so much depends on other factors, the engine is now half 2006 spec and half 2007, any may not be at full strength anyway after it sitting around for half a season and my valve bending episode and it now having slightly under-size valves.

but assuming the engine hasnt suffered too much

with the 2007 engine spec with cossie manifold lost me power but it peaked higher, so i hope that with the 2006 manifolding i keep the higher peak and get the lost power back, with the secret modifications that i Incorporated at the same time as we up upgraded the ecu to multiple maps, on paper at least 550 is within reach and a mind boggling 600 possible if i switched the T38 for a T4, although as to if it ever made it and how long it would make it for would be another matter entirely along with severe doubts as to if the bog std transmission would cope

[Graham]

Re: a very powerfull and troublesome bmw 316

still not done anything to the car, well almost nothing, i dropped my PLR supplied escort fuel tank in the boot and its a perfect fit.

[Graham]

Re: a very powerfull and troublesome bmw 316

at last some progress, i've lobbed some primer and paint on it, and it really is lobbed, not being able to bend or move properly doesnt do much for my very very rusty painting skills cellelose was still all the rage last time i worked in a bodyshop.

panelbasher could of done a better job blind foldered standing on one leg with his hands tied behind his back but it is at least presentable

[Graham]

Re: a very powerfull and troublesome bmw 316

because i bought a black car the inside has always been black, i cant believe how much better the inside of the car looks in body colour

managed to get the steering colume and pedal box back in without putting my back out again