E30 Zone

Hi all,

Took the beast to Bedford yesterday and she was brilliant fun again... really got my confidence and explored the limits of the handling yesterday and it was so much fun. The car is just great, so easy to drive fast and so communicative.. just need to sort out the tendancy to understeer and the tyre wall flexing... so some adjustable front top mounts and some 17" track rims will follow ! Anyway here are some pics:

Looking good! Love to see shots of the old chariots being used in anger!

that car is gorgeous! what wheels are you using on the track as they look different to the ones in your sig? nice motor that sell it me!!!!

Always had a soft spot for these from way back, my old man took me out in a new one he borrowed off his mate . . .

Scared the crap out of me


In its day a true monster and great to see one in excellent condition still being used in anger

Thanks chaps, well she goes and handles alright, just need to sort out my lack of talent but I am getting there.

320ise wrote:that car is gorgeous! what wheels are you using on the track as they look different to the ones in your sig? nice motor that sell it me!!!!

The ones in the sig are 8x17" style 42s. The track rims are E38 BBS 8x16s. I am afraid to say she is not for sale, far too cool to sell

that car is gorgeous

Looks better in the flesh. I think I parked my e30 next to it once and mine looked held together with chewing gum and love!

I love this shot

Great car, great shots!

Do you have a forum thread anywhere which lists what modifications have been done, or is it running pretty much standard suspension, brakes etc?

Mechanical mods are:

Full Stainless steel Powerflow exhaust
Fritz’s Bits Six branch manifold
K&N panel filter
E32 (302mm vented) front brake conversion
EBC 3G discs and Yellowstuff pads
E34 M5 (300mm vented) rear brakes
Braided brake hoses
ATE super blue racing brake fluid
Eibach Pro spring kit -30mm all round
UUC short shift kit
Whiteline heavy duty uprated ARBs
8x16 E38 BBS

So no, not standard. I have beem round in a standard one and the difference is quite shocking. The best mods are the brakes and ARBs which reduce the body roll enormously.

She looks beautiful Mark especially on the track!

Splondike wrote:Mechanical mods are:

YUMMY!

So no, not standard. I have beem round in a standard one and the difference is quite shocking. The best mods are the brakes and ARBs which reduce the body roll enormously.

Great list of mods! What shock absorbers are you running? Is it polybushed or standard rubber bushes?

Sorry to be so nosy, I'm considering an e28 myself and just wondering how much modification is necessary to make it hadle like that - looking at the pictures is not necessarily the best way of judging, but it does look like it goes around the corners very well.

No problems mate ask away. The shocks are standard bilsteins and I have not polybushed, but the rear dog bones and axle carrier bushes were replaced in September, also all the front suspension parts, steering components are all relatively recent. I was advised against poly bushing the axle carriers so it has BMW ones. The whitelines came with poly bushes for the ARBs which are in place. It also has had the steering box mounting strenthened to prevent flexing which helps the steering feel and stops some of the play.

As parts need replacing I will upgrade them if possible but I am trying to maintain a balance between road driveability and track day fun. I will run 17" rims and lower profile tyres to stop the tyre wall flexing and get adjustable top mounts before the next one so I can dial out some of the understeer with some negative camber, I will go for k-mac ones as these are polybushed and will hopefully retain some on street smoothness.

The car is brilliant fun, but will probably never be the best on track due to weight and being relatively tall. It was quick enough to keep a couple of scoobies behind at Bedford, but then you cannot legislate for the lack of talent in the other cars can you !?

If ever you are at a meet where I am too I am happy to take you out for a ride in it.

Was there a red Z4M Roadster there as well?

Yeah - with Irish plates iirc

Splondike wrote: The car is brilliant fun, but will probably never be the best on track due to weight and being relatively tall. It was quick enough to keep a couple of scoobies behind at Bedford, but then you cannot legislate for the lack of talent in the other cars can you !?

If ever you are at a meet where I am too I am happy to take you out for a ride in it.

True that, just because they're in a scooby doesn't automatically make them Richard Burns

Thanks for the offer, if I ever manage to show my face at one of the meets I'd be happy to get a passenger experience!

Splondike wrote:Yeah - with Irish plates iirc

That'll be him, is one of my friends.

E28's are just such a lot of bang for your bucks. Looks lovely mate....

Beautiful, great to see it being used properly after putting so much effort into making it what it is.

Thanks for the comments...Some have said in the past I shouldn't track it, but really as long as it is properly prepped (and it is) I am sure it does it no harm.. it seems to thrive on it.

Pilsbury wrote:

Splondike wrote:Yeah - with Irish plates iirc

That'll be him, is one of my friends.

I hope he had as much fun as I did

Certainly seems to have done.

Looks good, must have been a right laugh. Suprise any new cars?

I want to take my E30 around a track as well. Whats the name of the track in Bedford?

how much does it cost?

It surprised the owner of an E46 M3 that I had a few pax laps with and then I took him out in mine, he was expecting it to be awful but was suitably impressed, which was nice.

Costs vary from 120 - 200 depending on time of year, they sometimes do evening sessions or half days too for around £99. The curcuit is Bedford autodrome.

I really must get to Bedford this year. Its the one place in the uk that really interests me to try.

It looks great in those pics, you can really see the ARB's have made a massive improvement over stock roll (I know I used to own one and have plenty of vids/pics from drifting it leaned right over).

I eventually went with spax adjustable shocks all round with my existing lowering springs (brand escapes me now for some reason ) which were great for what I wanted. Firm and flat. I never explored full soft to see how they could ride on the road but sat at half all round they werent back breaking at all.

I bought fixed neg camber top mounts (-1.5 deg on top of whatever you have atm) from Bimmerworld which were a cheap alternative to fancy slidey pillowball top mounts.

steerfromtherear wrote:I really must get to Bedford this year. Its the one place in the uk that really interests me to try.

I bought fixed neg camber top mounts (-1.5 deg on top of whatever you have atm) from Bimmerworld which were a cheap alternative to fancy slidey pillowball top mounts.

It's a brilliant circuit, you would love it...

As for the mounts, I really want adjustable ones. Apparently E30 ones fit, so I am going to look into getting some. Do you think the ones without a poly bush would be horrible on the road... the last thing I want to do it totally ruin it on road and make it too track focused.

The mounts I had were e30/e28/e24 fitment so yeah that should be ok. I dont get what you mean about without a poly bush?
Do you mean metal top mounts without any rubber bushing like oem mounts? It will introduce a little more stiffness to the front end for sure. I wouldn't of thought it would be too intrusive. The pillow ball deals with the horizontal flex and your suspension with the vertical which the oem rubber would do.

Some just appear to be bushed (k-mac / eibach ones) and others seem to be just metal. I did not realise that the oem ones were not bushed either. Anyway I am hearing good things about the k-mac ones so I may try and source a set of those.

HULK (zoner) was on that trackday in his silver Mitsi EVO 6 rallyart.
Cool pics, top example of an M535

I love the pics especially the part where you removed the plates then your sig has it on full display

As for understeer. Slacken off the front ARB to a softer setting if its an multi position one. Failing that stick some toe out (5deg max) on the front.

To simplify. Understeer is caused by lack of front end grip. So you want to transfer more weight/pressure to the front. If you can lower the front slightly more than the rear it will help too. I assume you will be run coilovers with the adj camber plates. To help conteract the couple cms in extra height they cause? If you don't want to change the wheels just get lower profile versions of what ever you have now. so 50 profile becomes 45. Bear in mind that some tyres have very stiff sidewalls and that can also reduce grip as you need "tyre slip" What are you running now?

Haha yeah I know, I did not take them out for the benefit of the zone though and we seem to still be in one piece

Thanks for the advice any is appreciated. The ARBs are fixed, I was not going to go as far as coilovers just yet as it is not a serious track weapon just a bit of fun. That is an interesting point about the extra height, that has not been mentioned before and maybe a reason not to do it. The tyres on the front are dunlop 205/55/16s and as you say some with stiffer walls may be in order in a lower profile.

Looks very nice mate. we just picked ourselves one of these up last week

What's it like mate ? Got any pics ?

There is one in the photo gallery, a few of the bbb cars need to gt some better ones taken tomorrow, its polaris silver has some rot in the front drivers wing you can see it under the paint but both rear arches are solid a little surface but that will clean up and prevent them from spreading, pulls like a train just lve the 3.5 on the manual

Just seen it, Polaris and style 5s... looks nice.

Needs a pair of rear tyres but we have a mtching set of rims in stock with 9's and 8's! a little bit of rubbing but nothing a good roll wont cure