How not to do it
Okay, I thought this was too funny not to pass along. We actually run into customers like this every now and again...
Okay, I thought this was too funny not to pass along. We actually run into customers like this every now and again...
Squeezing more power out of a turbocharged 2.5 liter flat four cylinder engine is as easy as swapping out the original turbo for a bigger one, right? If only it was that simple.
Car and Driver magazine came calling a while back. They were looking for an unadulterated E46 M3 they could test for an article they were planning. And I happen to own one.
The question behind the story is not that unfamiliar to day dreaming car enthusiasts the world over: what cool car can you get for "x" number of dollars? C&D picked $25,000 for their bogey and then came up with a list of eligible used cars by combing through classified ads and price guides. (Video after the jump)
A few weeks back I posted the first entry in my "M3 GT conversion" series. I mentioned that the next step in my quest to turn my 2003 E46 M3 into a true "Gran Tourismo" is installing new wheels. Well, they are here!
After long and careful consideration I have decided to keep my personal E46 M3. Instead of purchasing a new car I will invest some money in the old M3-- give it a mid-life makeover so to speak. And as great as the car is on the track, I really think the E46 is a better GT car than all out sports car. So my tweaks will take that into consideration. I will not turn the car into a full out track monster (which is not that hard to do, really), instead I will focus on making it a better grand tourer.
This is a note for all of you who run heavier springs on your E36/E46 BMW. We have had a rash of M3s come into the shop with cracked FRONT strut towers lately.
Height adjustable suspensions have become quite popular of late-- even to folks who do not track their cars. Often referred to by the blanket term "coil-overs", height adjustable suspensions allow the owner to set and change the ride height of the vehicle for any of a number of reasons: to corner balance for the track, winter/summer ride height changes or just to fine tune the "look". But as high tech as some of these kits are, they do need yearly maintenance.
Continue reading "The Care and Feeding of Your Coil-overs" »
We began this project car with a clear focus on improving the performance of the suspension and the brakes, since the engine already had a thorough going over by another shop a few years back. The one speed area of the performance equation we decided to improve right from the start was changing the gear set in the differential. The biggest bang for the buck is not in adding power to the E30 engine, but changing how the exisiting power gets to the ground. This is espcially important at the track, where this car will consume most of its gas.
The BMW 1 Series has only been showing up on people's driveways in the States for a few months now and already there are enthusiasts ready and willing to fine tune it. A great performance car straight out of the box, it none-the-less comes with the compromises every modern car has. We've talked about this often enough: in order to satisfy the government's regulators, insurance lobbies, and the average consumer, new cars are "sanitized for our protection."
TCKline Racing at VRPerformance