Most of you knew my Mk1 Clio which was used for track days over 3 years, then the E30 with the SR20DET fitted. After beginning to re-shell the E30 I lost all interest in the project, and decided it was going to take too long to get working properly, not to mention iron out all the niggles. One of the main reasons was it was only used twice in the space of 6-7 months, I just wanted to get back out there and drive something on a regular basis which wouldn't need so many 'custom' parts to keep it working properly. Anyhow I broke the E30 for parts and got a great return on the money that went into it, keeping my seats once again along with a few other bits. Then started browsing....
I planned on not bothering buying something for a while and just keeping the money in the bank. That idea soon went out of the window and I decided to look at getting something - I needed RWD, and something with comparable pace to the Clio. After realising how cheap E36 328i Coupes were I decided to just go and buy one, only live once... right?
In the past I have always borrowed trailers to take the Clio/E30 to track days, but now I had the opportunity to go and buy one myself so went out and purchased a tilt bed capable of fitting an E36 on with room to spare. Turned out it was even better with the one I got had a tyre rack on the front of it. The plan was to find a cheap 328i Sport, sort the brakes and handling and leave the rest standard for now leaving as much cash aside as possible for track days/fuel. I banked half of the E30 return fund, then purchased the trailer, leaving the remainder to buy a 328i, do some bits to it and do a couple of track days.
After a week or so of searching, going to view a few and test driving some I found one that seemed to fit the bill. The body/chassis were solid, few patches of surface rust (arches), a few car park dents (to be expected), full service history and 116k. I wasn't concerned about the bodywork as long as the mechanical side was spot on, at the end of the day its only ever going to be a track day car. After some further searching there was nothing else that came close so I went ahead and bought it..
A couple of people were planning on doing Oulton Park on 25th July, so I decided to plan on getting it ready for that for its first outing. First job once I had it back was to strip the inside bar the dashboard..
Shame it didn't come with a set of these instead!
The interior went straight on eBay, 99p start. Ended up selling it for £51, good return considering I was going to put it all in the tip! The front seats weigh a LOT, at least 50kg each I reckon. Planning on weighing it at Oulton when I go to see what the end weight is.
Browsing eBay for 'E36 Coilovers' I came across a used set of H&R's which looked in great condition. Only height adjustable but thats all I wanted for now, less to play with and worry about on a track day. Ended up winning and collecting them for £300. The seller had paid £1100 for them a year earlier :clown:
Couple of days later I got them on the car and set it to an all round equal height..
After leaving it until the weekend it settled and the front was a tad low..
So the first job on the list for next time was to raise it up slightly. The brakes had recently been replaced by the previous owner, but they were not performance items and I wanted to upgrade the fronts anyway. Some bargin E46 330i front calipers and carriers were sourced locally on eBay for £50 (direct bolt on fit), taking the disc size upto 325x25mm from 286x22mm. Brembo HC's were purchased from G172 on here for £90, and some Carbone Lorraine RC6 Pads for £140.
Old setup:
Removed:
Disc comparison:
Caliper comparison:
I raised the coilovers while I was there on both sides, then fitted the new setup:
Wheels back on - worth noting that I will need to run at least 17" wheels to clear these, which I am planning on changing to once the tyres on the 18" have worn out. There is more availability for semi-slicks and slicks in 17" it seems!
With the bigger front calipers a bigger master cylinder would be required to compensate, otherwise the pedal travel would end up being reallly long. I sourced a servo/master cylinder setup from a 3.2 M3 Evo (same brake line ports/size as the standard 328i item) and swapped them over..
After a bit of a fight with rusty rear bleed nipples I eventually got the brakes bled with some Super Blue flushing the whole system out. Pedal feel was great.
With the car being a 1997 model it did not have an LSD as standard, instead it has ABS and ASC (traction control). This basically consists of a system that can brake the back wheels independently and a second throttle body (in front of the normal one) that the ECU can open and close to control the engine. I wanted to disable both systems, which isn't too complicated thankfully. Started by removing both relays, unplugging any wiring associated with the second throttle body and removing the ABS computer. With this particular version of ABS it usually feeds the ECU a road speed signal from the wheel sensors, if the ECU does not see this signal it limits the ECU to approximately 5000rpm. Simply had to add a wire from the speedo feed on the clocks (Pin2 Blue Connector) to the ECU (Pin15) and the full limiter will be restored, as the diff (which runs the speedo) will now provide the ECU with a road speed signal.
The viscous fan was working on the car when I got it, but I wanted it removed anyway to free up some space. The usual mod is to fit a lower temp fan switch to the radiator (80deg instead of 90deg) which kicks in the air conditioning radiator electric fan sooner. Instead of using a BMW part I read that a Volvo 430 fan switch was a direct replacement and the correct temp rating, so picked one up from the local factors and fitted it..
Cut the connector off and crimped two spade connectors on, then plugged it in. At the same time I removed the AC compressor and lines from the engine, some more weight gone at least!
Next up was to swap the standard non-LSD diff out for a quicker LSD one. Sourced a M3 3.0 LSD (3.15 ratio) and propshaft and set about fitting it.
The first big problem with the job was the exhaust had been totally bodged on in the past and all the bolts holding the downpipe to the headers were rusted solid. After lots of grinding, drilling and hammering I finally got the entire system off revealing the propshaft.
Propshaft comparison:
Finally dropped the diff out (heavy!)..
Then swapped the output flanges over with the 328 diff so the driveshaft stud pattern would match..
Before fitting it onto the car I filled it up with some LSD gear oil (Castrol B373), then finishing by lifting it back up into place and bolting everything back on. The studs on the headers <> downpipes had to be drilled out and bolted instead. I will eventually remove the headers along with the whole exhaust and replace it all, as I dont like the system thats currently on it (complete bodge), but theres always time to do that in the future.
Before putting the wheels back on I wanted to remove the paint from the bolt seats, as I've had problems with wheels coming loose on track due to paint being left on in the past! I had saw a cool trick on another forum a while back that worked, so tried it myself.
Take 1 old wheel bolt and cut a few angled slats in it with a grinder..
Then drop it into the wheel and turn a few times to clear the paint..
Job done. All four wheels back on and a few other jobs were done like un-seizing the track rod ends and doing the tracking, fitting some standard wing mirrors I had painted black (£10 eBay - to get rid of the M3 items that were on it!), black grilles (£20 eBay) and smoked indicators (£10 eBay). When I was doing the tracking I also spotted the front wishbones actually have M3 bushes fitted, which someone must have done in the past at some point - bonus I guess!
Now that the car was mechanically sorted all that was left to do is make my seats fit. Thankfully the E36 has a very simple floorpan. The standard seat mounting holes are perfectly level and in a rectangular shape. I got some 40x7mm flat bar, cut it to length and bolted it to the standard mounting points. Then decided what sort of position I wanted my seats in and welded two bars in the opposite direction.
After marking up where the side mounts needed to be bolted to I drilled for those and bolted everything in - really solid and a very good position, leaving slight front-back adjustability from the side mounts if ever required.
Fitted the steering wheel from the E30 and bolted both seats in:
..and it was pretty much ready to go. Checked over all the nuts and bolts that had been touched, tested the brakes and other bits then loaded it up on the trailer ready for Oulton Park. In all there was only a couple of days work involved to get it to this stage, the longest day was messing about getting the exhaust off but everything else is simple bolt on stuff which anyone would be capable of doing.
I did consider buying an E36 M3 before this, but soon forgot the idea as they are obviously more expensive to start with, not to mention more expensive to run parts wise. For a fraction of the cost I could have a well prepared 328i with choice mods and still come in way under the cost of one. Obviously there are plenty of mods out there for the 328 engine, with the main one being the gains from the M50 inlet, larger throttle body, etc. I decided to leave doing that for a while as I want to use the car 'as is', so when I do eventually want to swap over I will feel the gains from it more, rather than having it on there from the start.
More to come :approve:
I planned on not bothering buying something for a while and just keeping the money in the bank. That idea soon went out of the window and I decided to look at getting something - I needed RWD, and something with comparable pace to the Clio. After realising how cheap E36 328i Coupes were I decided to just go and buy one, only live once... right?
In the past I have always borrowed trailers to take the Clio/E30 to track days, but now I had the opportunity to go and buy one myself so went out and purchased a tilt bed capable of fitting an E36 on with room to spare. Turned out it was even better with the one I got had a tyre rack on the front of it. The plan was to find a cheap 328i Sport, sort the brakes and handling and leave the rest standard for now leaving as much cash aside as possible for track days/fuel. I banked half of the E30 return fund, then purchased the trailer, leaving the remainder to buy a 328i, do some bits to it and do a couple of track days.
After a week or so of searching, going to view a few and test driving some I found one that seemed to fit the bill. The body/chassis were solid, few patches of surface rust (arches), a few car park dents (to be expected), full service history and 116k. I wasn't concerned about the bodywork as long as the mechanical side was spot on, at the end of the day its only ever going to be a track day car. After some further searching there was nothing else that came close so I went ahead and bought it..
A couple of people were planning on doing Oulton Park on 25th July, so I decided to plan on getting it ready for that for its first outing. First job once I had it back was to strip the inside bar the dashboard..
Shame it didn't come with a set of these instead!
The interior went straight on eBay, 99p start. Ended up selling it for £51, good return considering I was going to put it all in the tip! The front seats weigh a LOT, at least 50kg each I reckon. Planning on weighing it at Oulton when I go to see what the end weight is.
Browsing eBay for 'E36 Coilovers' I came across a used set of H&R's which looked in great condition. Only height adjustable but thats all I wanted for now, less to play with and worry about on a track day. Ended up winning and collecting them for £300. The seller had paid £1100 for them a year earlier :clown:
Couple of days later I got them on the car and set it to an all round equal height..
After leaving it until the weekend it settled and the front was a tad low..
So the first job on the list for next time was to raise it up slightly. The brakes had recently been replaced by the previous owner, but they were not performance items and I wanted to upgrade the fronts anyway. Some bargin E46 330i front calipers and carriers were sourced locally on eBay for £50 (direct bolt on fit), taking the disc size upto 325x25mm from 286x22mm. Brembo HC's were purchased from G172 on here for £90, and some Carbone Lorraine RC6 Pads for £140.
Old setup:
Removed:
Disc comparison:
Caliper comparison:
I raised the coilovers while I was there on both sides, then fitted the new setup:
Wheels back on - worth noting that I will need to run at least 17" wheels to clear these, which I am planning on changing to once the tyres on the 18" have worn out. There is more availability for semi-slicks and slicks in 17" it seems!
With the bigger front calipers a bigger master cylinder would be required to compensate, otherwise the pedal travel would end up being reallly long. I sourced a servo/master cylinder setup from a 3.2 M3 Evo (same brake line ports/size as the standard 328i item) and swapped them over..
After a bit of a fight with rusty rear bleed nipples I eventually got the brakes bled with some Super Blue flushing the whole system out. Pedal feel was great.
With the car being a 1997 model it did not have an LSD as standard, instead it has ABS and ASC (traction control). This basically consists of a system that can brake the back wheels independently and a second throttle body (in front of the normal one) that the ECU can open and close to control the engine. I wanted to disable both systems, which isn't too complicated thankfully. Started by removing both relays, unplugging any wiring associated with the second throttle body and removing the ABS computer. With this particular version of ABS it usually feeds the ECU a road speed signal from the wheel sensors, if the ECU does not see this signal it limits the ECU to approximately 5000rpm. Simply had to add a wire from the speedo feed on the clocks (Pin2 Blue Connector) to the ECU (Pin15) and the full limiter will be restored, as the diff (which runs the speedo) will now provide the ECU with a road speed signal.
The viscous fan was working on the car when I got it, but I wanted it removed anyway to free up some space. The usual mod is to fit a lower temp fan switch to the radiator (80deg instead of 90deg) which kicks in the air conditioning radiator electric fan sooner. Instead of using a BMW part I read that a Volvo 430 fan switch was a direct replacement and the correct temp rating, so picked one up from the local factors and fitted it..
Cut the connector off and crimped two spade connectors on, then plugged it in. At the same time I removed the AC compressor and lines from the engine, some more weight gone at least!
Next up was to swap the standard non-LSD diff out for a quicker LSD one. Sourced a M3 3.0 LSD (3.15 ratio) and propshaft and set about fitting it.
The first big problem with the job was the exhaust had been totally bodged on in the past and all the bolts holding the downpipe to the headers were rusted solid. After lots of grinding, drilling and hammering I finally got the entire system off revealing the propshaft.
Propshaft comparison:
Finally dropped the diff out (heavy!)..
Then swapped the output flanges over with the 328 diff so the driveshaft stud pattern would match..
Before fitting it onto the car I filled it up with some LSD gear oil (Castrol B373), then finishing by lifting it back up into place and bolting everything back on. The studs on the headers <> downpipes had to be drilled out and bolted instead. I will eventually remove the headers along with the whole exhaust and replace it all, as I dont like the system thats currently on it (complete bodge), but theres always time to do that in the future.
Before putting the wheels back on I wanted to remove the paint from the bolt seats, as I've had problems with wheels coming loose on track due to paint being left on in the past! I had saw a cool trick on another forum a while back that worked, so tried it myself.
Take 1 old wheel bolt and cut a few angled slats in it with a grinder..
Then drop it into the wheel and turn a few times to clear the paint..
Job done. All four wheels back on and a few other jobs were done like un-seizing the track rod ends and doing the tracking, fitting some standard wing mirrors I had painted black (£10 eBay - to get rid of the M3 items that were on it!), black grilles (£20 eBay) and smoked indicators (£10 eBay). When I was doing the tracking I also spotted the front wishbones actually have M3 bushes fitted, which someone must have done in the past at some point - bonus I guess!
Now that the car was mechanically sorted all that was left to do is make my seats fit. Thankfully the E36 has a very simple floorpan. The standard seat mounting holes are perfectly level and in a rectangular shape. I got some 40x7mm flat bar, cut it to length and bolted it to the standard mounting points. Then decided what sort of position I wanted my seats in and welded two bars in the opposite direction.
After marking up where the side mounts needed to be bolted to I drilled for those and bolted everything in - really solid and a very good position, leaving slight front-back adjustability from the side mounts if ever required.
Fitted the steering wheel from the E30 and bolted both seats in:
..and it was pretty much ready to go. Checked over all the nuts and bolts that had been touched, tested the brakes and other bits then loaded it up on the trailer ready for Oulton Park. In all there was only a couple of days work involved to get it to this stage, the longest day was messing about getting the exhaust off but everything else is simple bolt on stuff which anyone would be capable of doing.
I did consider buying an E36 M3 before this, but soon forgot the idea as they are obviously more expensive to start with, not to mention more expensive to run parts wise. For a fraction of the cost I could have a well prepared 328i with choice mods and still come in way under the cost of one. Obviously there are plenty of mods out there for the 328 engine, with the main one being the gains from the M50 inlet, larger throttle body, etc. I decided to leave doing that for a while as I want to use the car 'as is', so when I do eventually want to swap over I will feel the gains from it more, rather than having it on there from the start.
More to come :approve:
