e30guydownunder: Project M42, probs definitely got more power than your S50

[e30guydownunder]

Today was another late start. 3pm.....
was doing this previous:



anyway, it was worth it because after having done that for dad he was happy to help tinker for the afternoon. We managed to borrow a hydraulic punch for the weekend and as such needed to work out what gussets and plates we were going to punch for the rollcage and other associated stuff.

With that we came to the conclusion we need to build several "taco" gussets, for the main hoop, dash bar and roof bar reinforcements. These will be punched with the 2" punch.

To make the taco we built a mandrel and die to push the 1.6 steel into using the hydraulic press. My absent mind has forgotten to take picture off all of this.

I was focusing on the steering column and steering wheel mods.
Column on the removal...cut the horizontal anti-tamper bolts.



Then chiseled the other ones out. Then i had to work out how to get the steering lock out. See this roll pin:



remove it:



Then i hit on top of the lock with a punch and it popped out (broke the actuator).



This is what is left:



Then i remounted the column with some make shift, adjustable spacers:



Three nuts worked out to be pretty right. I will remake these out of some aluminium stock or what ever i find, that seems light :D

Some pics:





I also removed the 318iS fuel tank which has a few benefits. One smaller capacity (65 litres is unneeded. And also has a balance line across between the two tanks, reducing the issues with surge.

Thats about all I did today

Alright...so guess what the plans have changed again!
Yesterday was a day for thought. Basicallly we were looking and thinking about the cage construction again. and came to the conclusion that throwing the fuel tank in right where we are planning to weld the main hoop to is a bad idea!

because we aren't throwing the tank in we can't throw the subframe in etc etc.

so yer yesterday i focused on the taco construction and tag plates. so as to use the punch while we had it:

the punch, good bit of kit this, but it would want to be for $4000!!!!

http://i365.photobucket.com/albums/oo93/e30guydownunder/Race%20Car/DSCF2719.jpg

drilled plates



ready to punch



A punched piece

http://i365.photobucket.com/albums/oo93/e30guydownunder/Race%20Car/DSCF2712.jpg

The days work



Our taco mandrel



ready to press



started to press



Moved the mandrel along (it was too short)



A taco template



but i then decided to make the taco bigger



Finishing the taco bending



drilled the ends of the taco and getting ready to cut with plasma



taco ready for fine tuning



finished products, bar punching



stringline in the door bar to find the angle of cut needed



something along the lines of this



OKay that was yesterday. today we did even more thinking about the rollcage and have decided to plough on with rollcage finalisation and get the car rolling afterwards. we need to really have the cage wrapped up in two weeks. This is doable given all thats left is the dashbar and drivers door bar reinforcements. then chop the floor and weld the cage up. Its doable, but probably be pushed for time still.

So i worked on finalising the door bars....passenger side was easier to work with obviously

Here i am using the stringline to find the angle of the notch




i cut the tube long. then measured the lengths needed for the lower and upper portion of the door bar, the two pencil marks. Then found the middle of this and made it so the middle of the notch went through this mark. Thus i have the same angle on each bar and should have enough lmaterial to construct each bar....i had shitloads



doorbars



door bars and the verticle bits



This gives you an idea of the finished product. The taco will obviously be retangular and possibly have a tube reinforcement on the bottom as well (this will require serious notching)



I also threw the handbrake cables back in for shits and giggles (more shit up off the floor out of the way

http://i365.photobucket.com/albums/oo93/e30guydownunder/Race%20Car/DSCF2715.jpg

and started to assemble the subframe, again reducing the shit kicking around. I'm giving up on making predicitions of what work will be done because the plan keeps changing, who knows tomorrow arvo i could get bored and throw the engine in

but basically little things like shock mounts and spring seats will get made during the week after work while major fabrication can't really take place and then on the weekend ill focus on major things like welding the cage in and then throwing the suspension bits in.

hope you all had a great Australia Day!

[e30guydownunder]

Today is a pretty good day. Checked in with the speed shop yeaterday, Springs and shocks have arrived, so I'm going to pick those up this afternoon. Grabbing a speedway Q/R hub for trial as well and a dual contact (shuts engine off) battery isolator as well.

But Self-Santa has come through with gifts arriving a lil late.

I got a call from toolies to say the guard roller i ordered has come in, woot can fix the roady's guards and have a play on the race car.

Not only that but i bought a Maxim branded toolbox off ebay as well and that has rocked up at home as well, woohoo, my bank account loves me.

And have also lined up cplagz to buy his Mega Squirt setup. I proably won't be installing it straight away but when things get a lil slow I'll have something to do :)

So later on in the year Ill set that up, after getting my head around all the sensors and things that i need and how im going to do the ignition.

While this is a somewhat basic cheap ECU, its only limited by your electrical/programming knowledge, and with my brother getting into building his own circuit board and about to embark on PIC programming it is the perfect project.

i have been making slow progress on the race car this week after work, taking a break from the major tasks such as grinding the insulation off :D But have also had an electrical gremlin in the road car...brake lights keep crapping out.

Had a pretty slow weekend, motivation was weak. I fixed my road car, with the jumper cable, haven't had any issues yet.

I built this this weekend:


Still need to get the appropriate fastening equipemnt but that is basically the steering setup finalised. It was one of those little jobs where you totally under-estimate the amount of time needed to complete.

The piece of scrap steel:


All marked out:


Drilled:


Yep it works:


Making the hole in the middle for the Q/R Spindle:




Yep that works:


Now that Q/R spindle is designed to be welded onto a shaft, not into a plate. So i cut up a 3/4 High-Tensile Bolt to get this:


Ready for welding:


Then the lot was put in the lathe (held by the spindle) and the outside was made round and the plate trued (and i forgot to get a pic):


Then i had to make the adapter plate from the 3PCD of the Q/R to the 6 bolt PCD of the Wheel.

Marking out:


Hacked out (yes by freaking hand with a hacksaw)/Drilling:


After a hell of a lot of drilling and spinning in the lathe:


apart from that we have figured out why our m20 flywheel doesn't work. A 325e flywheel has a differet pitch to that of a 323i, where the m20 starter motor i have originates from.

Few choices here:
Knock the ring gear off, replace with M42 and use the original starter. Net gain, flywheel/clutch assembly 4kg lighter, Starter motor is 4kg lighter also. Will take a pile of stuffing around and time i dont have, we have a machining contact but still.

Chase up a different m20 flywheel. Possibilty to get a lighter/earlier model e21 flywheel. Net gain flywheel/clutch assembly is 6kg lighter, 4kg heavier starter, but starter is beefier and not likely to break down with a high-po motor later on down the track. Will cost money to get the flywheel.

Chase m40 flywheel and clutch, lighter, more expensive clutch assembly, bolts straight in no worries.

give it all away and use my stuffed as dual mass flywheel. Spend money chasing m42 clutch.

decisions decisions.

aiming to get fuel tank and rear subframe back in by monday week (after long weekend), including any seam welding reinforcing i think ill do under the car.

flywheel sorted. purchased a 323i flywheel off Andrew (shotright). Turned out to be the lightweight one of 6.4kg so i have reduced the total clutch assembly mass by 6 kg or 33%. Should be a lil rev happier now.

I was thinking i would swap the ring gear anyhow, but have decided to just go with the bolt in solution, will bolt the m20 flywheel and clutch on using the 3mm spacer. And will use the m20 starter. Purely just so we get going a bit quicker.

the ring gear mod will be part of stage two where i dump 4kg of weight just swapping starter motors.

Nearly have all the bolts for the Q/R sorted. Also swapped the brake rotors and ceramic pads out of my road car yesterday. The rear subframe needs a wash and maybe fresh coat of paint. The sway bar mounts reinforced and then reassembly, with the drilled rotors, ceramic pads in the painted calipers and stainless brake lines. hoping to wrap the reinforcing (on the trailing arms anyway) up tonight allowing paint tomorrow and then reassembly thursday.

Thats the plan anyway.

Got a bit further than i was expecting with the subframe, the trailing arms are modified and painted.





and yep i can get the brake lines in and out of that gusset :)

UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE

Alright...I had taken the day off today to go to BDO....after a few shortcoming of some mates *waves fist* i couldn't get down and back safely or atleast to the satisfaction of my parents. In the meantime i decided my time was better spent on the race car so cut my loses sold the ticket and spent the day in the shed. What a day it was.

I've only been doing more of that dredded insulation delete mod but its finally over. I got it all off as of 6 this evening after about a 10am start (i enjoyed the extra sleep!)

Before paint:











Then I applied shit loads of RUST GUARD to the bits i anticipate not welding...much.







while the paint brush was handy i gave the subframe a coat



With the aimm to be putting the rear suspension in this weekend i started work on the sway bar and rear shock tower reinforcements during the week.



And have also started working on the rear shock mounts. Here we have removed the factory rubber and started to prepare it to bore out the centre to a suitable diameter. We will then turn up a steel piece to hold the spherical and weld it into the factory mount. before doing a final bore (welding will stuff the accuracy of the turning etc)



My brother also got the other trailing arm together, so now all i have to do is put the bushes in and throw them on the subframe and into the car...



Dad went shopping today and found me these. We have decided to up the spec of the spherical....so that the a machined mag wheel nut will fit inside it. Here is the nut and bigger bearing on the end of the strut insert.



Tomorrow i should be able to throw the fuel tank and lines back in and the subframe. Will have to finish the sway bar reinforcement first. Will probably then start on the shock tower reinforcement along with the rear shock mounts.

Pending progress and how much assistance my parents need with the carport, it might even be possible to drop the engine in this weekend. Im trying to get the car rolling under its own power soon ish, so it becomes less of a pain in the ass in the shed for dad.....might help motivate him a bit :D

Otherwise progress is great and im going to bed :)

[e30guydownunder]

but in the mean time we've also been working on the front strut tops. So far we have this:



And basically I'm going to use those to make these:

http://www.roadracetech.com/catalog/images/camberplate_e30_03.jpg

alrighty good night, hope you all had a great break and happy new year.

i have a whole lot more work to do still

started playing with the under car insulation, my blow torch thing is not as effective as i had hoped, going to buy a bunch of angle grinder wire wheels and paint removers today.

even just a wire wheel took the same amount of insulation off back to metal in about 1/5th the time compared to the torch. and the torch leaves a gooey mess behind.

eh.

Also nearly have the subframe out of my old daily, will be able to clean it up and put it back in the race car this week hopefully.

no its ok i got a 125mm wire wheel, it is even more effective! about halved the time to do the same area again. It is so effective that our second hand grinder bit the dust after about a minutes work :banghead

now i have to fork out for atleast grinder repairs

today i wrapped up the freeing up of the race car subframe, dad is happy with his standard suspension and my daily finally got a polish (but it probably wants atleast another days attention)

The steering wheel arrived on monday, very happy to find that i will still have room to fit a quick release of some sort. I am having trouble finiding a bolt on quick release that uses a taper pin for the locking mechanism (i'm not happy with the spring loaded ball bearing method).

I may end up cooking something up on my own, shouldn't be overly difficult to replicate or even improve?

But now dads car is taken care of i can really get stuck in, over the next few weeks im aiming to get the underbody prepped and painted, so the drivetrain can be dropped in and stay in (touch wood). Will probably look more seriously at getting the dash mounted around the cage and work on organising some odd bods i need.

Dave its not the actual connection im worried about its the locking mechanism, from what i can tell most of those quick releases, use spring loaded balls that engage in a groove around the splined part of the shaft. IM no happy with this style of connection, i dont feel comfortable with it (based on experience with the uni SAE car anyway).

Maybe the ones you have a are better but it is sometimes difficult to tell if it is properly engaged etc until you go to reef on the wheel and end up with it in your hands, has happened. Really can be solved with checking before you rip off. I'm one of those avoid the danger kinda people, rather than just assess danger and continue (will help if you know your work place safety/hazard box thing)

What im after is the "speedway style" (as my dads mate who was in the aftermarket part business for a while) quick release. What they use is a tapered pin that engages in the same sort of groove. You push the pin in moving the taper towards the groove and you get to the point where the diameter of the pin is small enough to fit over the big part of the spline. Hope that makes sense.

If you can get something like that, then goodo.

A might get you to price up a number of things soon just to compare against my local speed shop.

Also got dad to check out the 125mm grinder today....he pulled the rubber groumet off thepower lead (my brother and i hadn't) bingo bung lead. Looks as thou it had been breaking for a while and when i've loaded it up it went big time. So fixed thsat up and im ripping in. Only get to do like 5mins on each grinder because its pretty hard work. I use the big mother to get the majority of the shit off, then use the 100mm to clean it up and get in all the tight places.

I prolly spent 45-60mins and got this far:




and also anyone wanting to do an e36 rack swap and has some machining skills. You can make the standard e30 bits work without having to buy any of the e36 coupler stuff.

Machine this step and cut the shaft to length:


and it will slide in here and bolt to the top half:


obviously i haven't done it yet :D

thats all for tonight

Dave, I have since had a thought on the whole quick release setup, I may just have a way of making a weld-on Speedway style quick release work.

Alright so today i've had more of a play with the underbody insulation:





And then i removed the fuel tank so i could do over the top of that. In the meantime of doing that the neighbours went to bed so i couldn't do anymore grinding. So i played with the E36 rack swap bits instead.

Here is a machined (with a file :D) step and cut to length lower coupler:



Note the upper and lower now bolt together:



I drilled the holes out in both to accept these 10mm bolts (a fairly tight fit):



TADA:



All thats left on the rack swap is to make a blanking plate for the input/output, Im intending to port the two together, so the rack will operate like normal just without the power assitance and to find/make the required mounting spacers. This will all save weight and parasitic power losses.

Yesterday we started the sunroof filler plate.
E30 roof section:



Front and unneccessary Rear parts removed:





Initial Fit:



After some tweaking to get the curves happening longitudinally and across the front edge:







Thats about it.

Ohhh and i organised the thinning of my wallet :D
Found out from the local speedshop (Monaco Performance @ Kotara) that King Springs make a rear spring for the e30 racing class in victoria. This is 300LBS/in and slips straight in. E30 racing guys also commonly run a ford falcon koni adjustable in the rear.

So E30 Racing King Springs, KYB Commodore Front and Falcon Rear shocks have been ordered. Along with some 250mm long 300LBS/in 60mm springs for the front (e30racing guys run this rate in the front).

The shock setup is not ideal for changes later on, but right now it gets me on the track is awfully affordable and for stage 1 will suffice.

The aim is to get out on the track, have some fun, get some time in the car and we'll go from there.

You can thank my dad for the efforts on the roof.
Our thought is if we connect them using the blanking plate the rack will be as it was, just without the pressure assistance. I thought the P/S fluid would have been the lubricating substance. If im wrong that would be great thou. Could you throw me some resources?

Gotta think tyre clearence as well.
And Dave do you recon you could chase up a price on something like this



If you find one with the 6 bolt pattern even better, but an adapter will be cake to make.

Today I did alot more underbody insulating wire wheeling :screwed
I'm getting there, just have the floors and wheel well to go which are nice big flat panels that the big grinder will just love.

Speaking of the big grinder, i think it has slowly been dying, its bogging down easier and such, gets hot quickly etc etc. So i thought i'd have a look at our 9" angle grinder. Hey presto it had the same shaft size. So i was good to go with 2000W of unstoppable power.

This is it next to the 125mm Grinder, note the size, also note it is fecking heavy...working on the car now = a weight lifting session :p



hoping to have the lot wrapped up tomorrow so that i can sweep the floor and not be picking bits of insulation out of my hair (even thou i've been wearing a balaclava)

this is progress:




ohh i also popped two holes above the rear diff bolts in the subframe:


i will put a suitable sized hole saw through eventually (depending what size rubber groumets i find). This will allow quick and easy tightening/undoing of the diff bolts. Making diff removal a bit easier ;)

[e30guydownunder]

I also managed to remove the black widow alarm that was poorly installed and repair the iginition loom (weight be gone). That alarm will find its way into my daily no doubt although installed quite a bit better. While doing all this I also found where BMW tuck the central locking computer away.

So further to needing to dissable the central locking for 3J I will also be able to remove some weight

Have also being trying to work out a way to remove the heater box and maintain functionality. That is, direct air towards the driver and demist the windscreen.

I found a universal window demister kit on ebay for $50 which might be worth giving a go. The only thing then is getting air from where the heate box intake was to my general direction. If i manage to dump the heater box thats another easy 5 kilos.

I know most 3J guys just use rain/fog x. But I just want to have it there on a button, "demist windscreens". Will save me tossing up before a track session (is it going to rain or not) and then having to wipe it on (I'm a lazy ass). Its also something else I don't have to remember to bring to the track.

Thats pretty much all the progress, cept for all the money I've been spending.

The rollcage tubing turned up yesterday. So did my clutch kits (race car and daily) and steering rack, but mum wasn't home to sign for them So the E36 rack, M20 clutch it and M42 clutch kit should arrive today.

Interestingly I had my M42 clutch off to compare the difference between it and the M20. Few odd things. My M42 clutch does not have two seperate rotating parts to it...the one currently in the car did. The clutch plate was in backwards and about 50% of the spoke materials connecting the centre and the plate is gone as a result (clutch failure was immenent).

My '90 engine has a '92 head on it. The intake heater setup is also completly different to my other '90 engine....I think some of the '92 parts found their way on to it. The flywheel bolts are most definitely not 25mm long like realoem said they were going to be and as a result would definitely not work with the m20 flywheel. I'm hoping the ones on the other engine are different. The flywheel/clutch assembly has had a damn hard life. I hate buying barstardised crap off wogs (no offence to the proper ones, but your dodgy brother cousins are messing shit up)

And after all that we came to the conclusion we can modify a clutch fork to use an original M42 throw out bearing and the M20 flywheel and I'm going to try cancel the $190 order I made yesterday for an e21 323i throw out bearing that has to come from Germany and generally stop project progress (3 weeks before it would get here)

Yesterday Arvo:

Rack, Clutches are here. Removed a further 6 kilos of tar/insulation from the cabin (total 11kg)

Tried fiddling with reducing the wires...in the process of working out what bits making the electric mirrors work so i can keep it for the time being. Does anybody know the password for the pdftown electric skematics? Or can you point me to a copy elsewhere?

All stereo associated wiring removed, and yer I've made a start on the unneeded wiring in the doors, so (electric windows, central locking, tweeters, etc etc)

Taking the shell to the roll cage man today! His just bending and notching some of it for us. We'll finish the notching and weld it in later.

So I have an e30 cabriolet now and the caged out money pit snaked a spot in the garage, pics to come laters

steering wheel purchased.

Note to self must upload pictures to interwebs....oh and turns out the rear exhaust valve on number four cylinder is stuck open a lil bit....equates to about 45psi compression

Dad wonders if the hydraulic lifter isnt jammed, so we are going to try some lifter flush, otherwise keep your eyes peeled for low kay, cheap m42's.

Apart from that the engine could use some rings sooner than later, pending exhaust valve situation and the engine hunt, money may be spent.

ok so i got set up with photobucket instead of imageshak, now i can upload multiple images at once, this is important for someone like me who can't be f'd sitting around uploading images for a couple of hours...that and i dont wanna fork out for super duper internet.

picture time!

Sunroof before removal:


Panel and the workings out, now to removal this stuff:


ready to remove weight:


roughed out:


all trimmed up:






Now to get some roof donor metal:
the problem i had was all the crap out of the parts car was in the parts car.....hmmm, lets stack it in the other parts car.





sweet now we're ready to go


1,2,3 i call a cut the roof off that parts car


And heres a good shot of why i need that bit of metal:


oh wait theres some bars in that roof!
Pretty much this is where the car is at:

snaked a spot in the garage, a/c, hoist, radio...."i'm loving it."


a few shots of the bar work:

The main hoop and diagonals, note belt bar/make-shift strut brace (well as close as i can get to one) in the rear


The pedals are going to be moving backwards within IP regs to mate up with the as far back as possible (comfortable) seating position and steering wheel with dish


A shot of where the main hoop rests. A suitable box and supporting structure for the hoop feet (none of which are made or shown) is yet to be created.


A shot of the main junction over the passenger side


and the drivers


The guy who did all the work (Adam) calls himself "Rock Art customs". His more focused on bending bars for rock crawling guys and such but he started out in motorsport much the same way i have and was cool with doing the work for some experience.


Since these pics as I've mentioned, removed the abs and some miscellaneous wiring. And just today dropped the standard subframe out of the rear in order to swap it with the adjustable one i previously made for my old daily. It just so happens that i made it to move the inner point 25mm, so complies with 3J. Even thou I'll be dialing in a fair amount of camber over the road setup. The adjustability will be more useful for the toe.

Something that has been occupying the thoughts alot lately is the shock setup and what to do. The general thought is commodore strut inserts in the front with the idea that there valving will be closer to right than the e30 ones in terms of controlling the much stiffer springs. Then the only other decision is what I'm going to do in the range, some koni's are $500 a pair and plain gas kyb/monroe's are $250. the key is the konis are adjustable and will have the facility to be re-valved etc. Some phone calls are to be made on this.

[e30guydownunder]

Hi guys I've been kicking round R3V for a while now, you may or may not have noticed me. I'm just starting to get stuck into boosting my track car and thought you guys might like to tag along for the mayhem. I have a massive build thread on a local forum but will cross post here with the important bits.

I've also got a fairly tidy 318iS for my daily and I will eventually get to throwing that up as well. But this is all about the track car so lets get started. First the background info.

Last year in march I stacked my 318i. Lil front to back fender bender up ahead of me and I just ran out of luck, skill and time to stop. So I bought a 318iS from auction to fix it up.

Heres what was left of the front apron and bumper



Shortly after that I started mentioning dropping the M42 in the road car. Insurance premiums and being on my provisional licence meant buying a 318iS was a more suitable option. So I sold my 318i to me dad, and bought the current Daily 318iS. This left me with a car's worth of 318iS bits, plus various suspension components and the dream to build a go fast E30 was somewhat rekindled.

With a new car I had to get some rims...wogboy spec chromies weren't for me. I found some suitable 15x7's through good ol' ebay and turns out the guy was local and parting out his E30 track car. We struck up a deal and the PO will be using my bent 318iS chassis for the LHD -> RHD conversion on his M3 and I got his 325i shell as a roller.

At the moment the idea is to put together a track rat for sprints, hillcimbs and the like with minimal unrecoverable outlay. So far I've only bought bits that can be later transferred to my road car if an "abort-plan" is seeked.
I just bought my first road car unsuitable bit tonight. A Sparco Sprint that has been used all of two events.

Other items include:
Wheels, 15x8, I purchased these off a fellow forum member this weekend - $200

I will probably throw some paint on these at some stage, for now they will be going on the daily because im running out of tyres to keep up to the 14's while I'm repainting the MiM wheels that started all this race car business.
Coil on Plug kit (rob_e30) - $225
Zimmerman Drilled Brake kit: Discs, SS lines, Pads (ebay special) - $475
New Lower Control Arms, M3 Bushes, Tie rods (FCP Groton, ebay) - $200
and two pedders used shocks out of a commy that my mate gave me :)
These should complement the intended stiffer springs I'll be running (thinking 300LBS) on the front coilovers i need to make yet. If it does all the right things, the same mate can get me good prices on KYB shocks.
All shown below minus the FCP Groton stuff

I realised the discs are drilled :) and that this isn't preferred for track, but I figured at the price I'd give them a go. At the end of it all if they aren't what I want I can put them on the road car (so long as they dont self destruct!) I'll be watching the holes like a hawk.
And to show you why I dont use the shell I already have sitting out the back just chillin.


We had to actually cut that hole to smash the door lock off so we could get the door off.


And the business end...this engine is actually going in the daily because it seems all the timing components have just being replaced! The black plastic guides are still all sharp and pointy..somebody spent a bit of cash on this car before it got written off.

So right now, I'm just collecting bits and concerntrating on getting uni out of the way for the year. At the same time me and my father are working out a way to bend the main hoop and front legs. We are both proficient MIG welders so the welding is the easy bit. We also have a lead on a tube notcher. At this rate we may have to pay someone to bend the tube for us :(
Other than that...I have this dream of one day exploring Forced Induction and bigger brakes and things...for now the aim is to have fun with minimal cash spent! :D


At the moment...its purely a go fast car :) wheel to wheel racing is quite a bit more costly as you will know. But at the same time most of the private track days run have a few cars on the track at the same time :p

I've been reading and re-reading the CAMS manual over and over. I've got the cage requirements down pat. I have spoken to one cage builder at the moment and he mentioned that using 44mm tube all round made it difficult to weld the top edges properly. So we're pricing up about 4m of 44.45mm for the main hoop and about 25m of 38mm for the rest of it.

Update, the shell is now making our neighbours go "WTF is with these people." Seriously four e30's at one 1/4" acre block was pretty excessive but now we have five :p

pics tomorrow after i unload it. And ill get some pictures of the seat mounts too.

Alright progress started this week on Friday. Did a last measure of the shell to make sure I was happy with my measurements and ordered the tube from Performance Metals in Sydney. That lot should arrive mid week allowing for the guy i have lined up to bend and notch starting next saturday.

On saturday, I did some more stripping of the interior to make sure I'm ready for next weekend. Everything that unbolts and needs to be has being removed and I've removed a bit over 5 kilos of insulating tar from the floor (prolly another couple of kilos left). Ive just been heating the area up with a heat gun and scrapping with a BIG flat screwdriver. Its being coming off easily and in nice big flat sheets. I' ve also started reduced the wiring....so far this has only included things that i can unplug from the car completly like the boot/fuel cap central locking and the antenna wires, radios/cassette wires etc. Wires thats are a bit more integrated but to be removed included, the check panel, the sunroof, ABS, A/C, fog lights etc etc.

Then today i focused on suroof removal as this is critical for the cage install. So far everything bolt in associated with the sunroof panel is out. This week i will be attacking the sunroof carriage with a plasma cutter and angle grinder CAREFULLY.
I had been carrying on but have a few things to ponder. A big one is where the front legs of the cage go, because the dash mounts may or maynot get in the way.
And i have also got a lead on an m20 single mass flywheel to sort out this dual mass issue. Thanks shotright/e30_320i for that. Im going to send it for machining balancing this week and get kitted up with a new clutch and such for the eventual swap. Time for the pics.

The Car:




The seat position as it was for the track day (but with bolts):



The seat mounts:



The tar removal:



oddly this bit was only on the passenger quarter of the car:


knowing that the car has had a few hits, we're guessing the whole quarter has been replaced at some stage in the cars life. And this also explains the two spots of rust that have started in the junction of the quarter and c-pillar at the front of the boot and the junction of the taillight panel and the quarter at the rear of the boot. Niether are issues, just need to be ground out and treated, no biggie.

thats about it for the week. I'll get some pics of the sunroof carriage(box thing) removal mid to late week

So Pictures to come later again :p
The sunroof carriage is removed, although I left a little portion of the carriage, forming a perpendicular lip along the roof, this will give it a little bit of resistance against denting etc.
We have worked out where we are going to be putting the cage through the dash and it will still maintian dash removabilty (a feature i want in case of future development) The main hoop location is also finalised, allowing for a little bit of flexibilty with the seat position.

Re: Seat position. With the steering wheel I'm attempting to buy off a fellow forum member (waiting on postage quote) I think the seat may have been too close in its initial position. So the studs in the floor will be getting the chop and as per Dave's suggestion some meaty plates will be welded to the floor and nuts/bolts used to bolt the seat even further back and even closer to the transmission tunnel.

With this my longer legs (which brought on the idea of a wheel with dish) and new seating positionI probably wont be able to reach the pedals quite ideally. So the pedals are going to be repositioned within 3J specs (25mm)