87 325is project: On-the-cheap track car

[mbonanni]

"wicked hella flush stance"

I lol'd.

Sweet build.

[aventari]

thanks all!

nice work. but will the lollipops move if it doesnt have a bolt going thru it?

I doubt the bushings would rotate in the lollipops without the set screw, but it's cheap and easy insurance against them moving. And here AKG recommends the set screw: http://www.akgmotorsport.com/gallery...picture&id=359

[aventari]

Just got an alignment done at lunch (Goodyear Tire $65, no warranty), the only thing adjustable on the car is front toe, so I had them set it to zero.

Here are the specs I wound up with

Front Left			Front Right
-2.4		Camber		-3.0
 7.9		Caster		 9.2
 0.0		Toe		 0.0
 
 Rear Left			Rear Right
-2.4		Camber		-3.0
-0.19		Toe		 0.04

I haven't had a chance to push it on the street so I can't say for sure how it is, but it feels decent so far. We'll see once I get on the track.

[aventari]

Today I spent ensuring the tow vehicle was ready for the trip. The last time I towed with it, I noticed a bad vibration between 60-65mph, so I took the REMINGTON WIDE BRUTE A/T tires to Walmart for balancing (only $6.50/tire). All the tires were pretty badly out of balance and it seems to ride smoother now unloaded, we'll see once it's loaded down. I think it could use some new shocks too..



I was looking for a tow vehicle at the beginning of the year, at first for a Crown Victoria or a 3rd gen 4Runners.

The main issue was that I want a manual transmission, and manual 4 Runners are hard to find, and the Crown Vic doesn't come with one :(

Eventually I saw this 2004 F150 shortbed with a 4.2 V6 and 5 speed for $4300 with only 122k miles and I jumped on it. Everyone cautioned against the V6, but my feeling is that people have been towing cars for decades with trucks that have less power and been doing it fine, so I'll be fine. I'll be a little slow on the Grapevine but that's not a big deal.

After outfitting it with a Class V hitch and nice trailer brake controller, it's been the perfect truck for my uses. Towing the car it feels like there's barely anything behind me. The brakes are great and there's plenty of power to run at 75-80mph all day long. I can even accelerate pretty quick, and I attribute it to the manual trans.
The last track day I got an average of 15mpg towing the BMW, going 70-75 most of the way.

Anyway at the end of a trackday, being able to drive the race car up the trailer and get in the air conditioned cab is pretty damn nice :)

[aventari]

Had a blast on Saturday, we ran Buttonwillow in the CCW #1 configuration which was new for me and took some getting used to. At first the car felt skittish and unsettled, but it turns out I had too much tire pressure, 35psi cold all around. Dropped it to 31 rear and 32 front and it settled down a lot and we got faster and faster all day.

It was a race weekend with quite a few different series running (S2k challenge, Lotus challenge, etc) and the top 2 groups were open passing, no point-by. I think that contributed to the most offs and crashes I've ever seen at a track day. An S2k spun into the pit wall, a Civic rear-ended a Lotus right behind me in the first session of the day (woman driving the Lotus went nuts and blamed me for braking in weird places and going slow causing her to get rear ended..)

Luckily we drove really clean and had zero incidents, except a few times when the ABS freaked out braking over crest and rough pavement, my friend experienced what must've been 'ice-mode' with the ABS just pulled all braking and the pedal got rock hard. He had to release and re-apply and by that time the corner was blown. It really freaked him out.

I had been noticing the ABS being way too intrusive myself, but nothing that bad. After the first 2 sessions, I found and pulled the ABS relay. That got rid of the ABS but the car then had seriously difficult to modulate brakes. Like you would lock them up and release and the tires would keep skidding and take an extra few tenths of a second to come back. That was really disconcerting as well.
I think it's a combination of bad bias front->rear (Hawk HT10's up front and stock pads in the rear) and low performance street tires (Yoko ES100's)
I will fix these and see if that helps the brake feel issue.

Unfortunately at least one of the tires pretty badly flat spotted now :(
Other than that minor issue everything went awesome, this car is an unkillable beast :)

Buttcrack of dawn on the Grapevine




on the track:







cool guy we met there




Today I ordered some TRC1's in 15x8 and some Ventus RS3's in 225/45-15

[aventari]

Got 15x8 TR C1's and 225/45-15 Ventus RS3's all mounted and balanced from Tire Rack.



So today after work I waxed them inside and out and installed em. Waxing them makes brake dust easy to just wipe off and not corrode the finish. Seems retarded for a track wheel, but clean wheels make it easier to look for cracks and such that could cause the wheel to fail on the track.

Crappy pic as it got dark of wheels installed


The bad vibration (flat spot) I had went away and a lesser vibration went away too that I think was a bent lip on the BBS's :)

[MattAvino]

moar nsx!!!

[efficient]

nice i like this!

[aventari]

BMW update:

Since it's still CA smog legal and registered, I drive it to work once a week or so and generally have fun with it which is really nice for a track car.

I've decided to put a fully exhaust system on it, so I'm starting with these $230 ebay headers.

So I went with some "Raceland" ebay headers for my Miata a few years ago and had nothing but problems with them. They looked nice and were well made but the fitment was _terrible_. Bolt holes needed to be elongated, they hit the transmission and they didn't seal against the nidpipe.
So I was leary of getting these Ebay specials, but a few people here have posted that these suprisingly fit fairly well at the head but may just get a bit close to the frame rail, and you basically have to fab up something to fit your exhaust to the outlets.

For the frame rail, I have no problem fixing that with a Big Fucking Hammer, and I'm just going to fab up my own exhaust from the headers back so that doesn't matter either. I'm planning on merging these with a y-pipe to a 2.5" pipe back to a magnaflow straight-through muffler. It will probably be loud.


Anyway they're really well put together for the price:











I also ordered on of red46's skid plates, and that's going on soon too :)

[aventari]

moar nsx!!!

since you asked :)



NSX and my other BMW

I got this 2002 for free as a parts car because it was totalled, smashed in the front and the back. My friend and I took a community college autobody class 10 years ago and spent 5 years repairing the body and then repainting it

This is when I first got it:

[MattAvino]

^incredible

That NSX is sexy

[aventari]

So the clutch disc exploded at the track in December






So I installed the JB Racing Al flywheel with a Stage 1 Clutchmasters clutch

http://store.bimmerworld.com/e30-325i-lightweight-flywheelperformance-clutch-kit-p1071.aspx

last weekend


Also installed new brake rotors as the old ones had tiny cracks all over them, I assume from the extreme heat.



Also installed a new driveshaft center support bearing, and new TOP SPEED RACING Ebay headers that actually fit fairly well. I only had to hammer the passenger footwell in a few inches

Note: E30's are _insanely loud_ with open headers.
The car is at the shop right now getting an exhaust fabbed up.

I'm going from the 2" header outlets to a y collector into a single 2.5" pipe all the way back to a Magnaflow straight-thru 2.5" can.

Should sound awesome :)

[aventari]

Had a great time at the track 2 weekends ago, the car did awesome and I was passing almost every car at the end of the day. I ran in the 2nd highest group "point-by" meaning point-by anywhere on track. The highest was race/open group.

Here's a bit of video from the middle of the day. I got a lot faster but the camera battery died

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGOc3yCzyEU

I got complimented on the exhaust note quite a bit actually :)

Took pics of the intermediate group lined up




Then driving home at 70mph fully loaded and trailering the racecar my from left truck tire blew out..It felt like the wheel fell off but it was so loud and violent I had no idea what happened. I've never had a blowout, but I lightly braked, shut the motor off and eased it to the side of the road.



Spare only had 20psi, but luckily I had all my tools and a pump



I did flat spot a front tire I *think* but it was still an awesome trackday

[Blue55]

I'm building out an e30 for ChumpCar. Which Summit Racing radiator did you use? Did you have to make custom brackets?

Thanks!

[aventari]