E30 Zone

Advice no longer required thankyou.

Hi guys and girls

Before I get started, please PLEASE don't hit me with hearsay and conjecture, I want solid information.
For example if you took your car to a specialist for a fast road alignment, and you know what they set it to.
Or if you are qualified and have experience in doing this yourself
I dont want to seem ungrateful for any possible advice, I just want to avoid all the "well I set mine to this and it feels OK" posts if possible!
Thanks!

So it is a 1990 325i Touring
15x7 ET20 front 15x8 ET20 rear (subject to change...)
205 50 15 NS2-R
AVO 'RACE' coilovers
GAZ pillow ball top mounts with camber adjustment plates in the front
E36 M3 front eccentric bushings
Pillow ball rear top mounts
OE spec rubber arm/subframe bushings
Standard front and rear ARB's for now, but will likely upgrade in future.

So effectively it has the standard adjustment available, plus the camber plates in the front.

It will be used for a mixture of fast road driving, and the very occasional track day.

It is a toy not a commuter tool.

TIA!

I have a question, what’s a pillow ball? Furthermore ‘set ups’ do depend on personal preference when it comes to track driving for sure.

What settings are you asking for? I assume toe, camber and ride height? What spring rates are you running on the car? What you say ‘race’ what makes the dampers race?

rix313 wrote: ↑

Fri Aug 21, 2020 7:39 pm

I have a question, what’s a pillow ball? Furthermore ‘set ups’ do depend on personal preference when it comes to track driving for sure.

What settings are you asking for? I assume toe, camber and ride height? What spring rates are you running on the car? What you say ‘race’ what makes the dampers race?

I'm surprised by the content of your post, considering the content of your forum signature!

I don't know what the spring rates are, I couldn't find the information on AVO's website.

It would be easier for you to Google what a pillow ball is.

AVO made hybrid twin/monotube coilovers for the E30 specced for either racing, or rally, and they called the variants simply 'RACE' and 'RALLY'.

I am looking for camber, caster, and toe specifications.

I'm sure the feel of the car will be down to personal preference, but I have to start somewhere.

And most importantly, enjoy your Friday night!

Just finished carb day at the Indy 500 so it’s been a long Friday for us. None of the others here knew what a pillow ball was either so I was curious.

Spring rates should hopefully be written on the spring somewhere, if not need to get them on a tester and see what you’re running with. Quite important to know what you’ve got on there really.

Toe wise I’ve always run 2mm out on the race car. Then camber wise I’ve always run the maximum the top mounts would allow, running on R888R tyres. Ride height I’ve been running a lot of rake in the car to keep the rear end lose but I plan to test it with a lower rear ride height soon to increase traction.

You can't go wrong with factory specs for road use

Pillowball is a slang/marketing term/americanism used to describe a rose joint

I'll have a look on the springs to see what I can find out.

Yeah a pillow ball is basically a rose joint, but when looking for parts you probably won't get far searching for rose joints. Pillow ball, for better or for worse, seems to be the accepted term at least when trying to buy parts online!

acme15 wrote: ↑

Fri Aug 21, 2020 11:23 pm

rix313 wrote: ↑

Fri Aug 21, 2020 7:39 pm

I have a question, what’s a pillow ball? Furthermore ‘set ups’ do depend on personal preference when it comes to track driving for sure.

What settings are you asking for? I assume toe, camber and ride height? What spring rates are you running on the car? What you say ‘race’ what makes the dampers race?

I'm surprised by the content of your post, considering the content of your forum signature!

I don't know what the spring rates are, I couldn't find the information on AVO's website.

It would be easier for you to Google what a pillow ball is.

AVO made hybrid twin/monotube coilovers for the E30 specced for either racing, or rally, and they called the variants simply 'RACE' and 'RALLY'.

I am looking for camber, caster, and toe specifications.

I'm sure the feel of the car will be down to personal preference, but I have to start somewhere.

And most importantly, enjoy your Friday night!

If you can't be arsed to answer someone's question about the "pillow ball" then by that logic you might as well pay for a Simpack license and run some simulations yourself with different suspension setups

Having correctly matched spring rates to the dampers and ride height will influence your handling more than the alignment. Have you thought about the roll centre as well? The semi trailing arm rear suspension has a lot of camber gain as it compresses so there's lotssss to think about if you want a "race" setup.

I'd stick with the factory specs and see how you find it, then make changes accordingly if you want it to have different handling characteristics. Adding stiffer roll bars might help with its cornering ability without having to go studily stiff with the springs.

And as per your original post, you seem to only want comments from the best of the best. I've just spent a term working with Simpack doing motorsport engineering and learning all about suspension set ups.

Lemon98 wrote: ↑

Fri Nov 27, 2020 1:08 pm

acme15 wrote: ↑

Fri Aug 21, 2020 11:23 pm

rix313 wrote: ↑

Fri Aug 21, 2020 7:39 pm

I have a question, what’s a pillow ball? Furthermore ‘set ups’ do depend on personal preference when it comes to track driving for sure.

What settings are you asking for? I assume toe, camber and ride height? What spring rates are you running on the car? What you say ‘race’ what makes the dampers race?

I'm surprised by the content of your post, considering the content of your forum signature!

I don't know what the spring rates are, I couldn't find the information on AVO's website.

It would be easier for you to Google what a pillow ball is.

AVO made hybrid twin/monotube coilovers for the E30 specced for either racing, or rally, and they called the variants simply 'RACE' and 'RALLY'.

I am looking for camber, caster, and toe specifications.

I'm sure the feel of the car will be down to personal preference, but I have to start somewhere.

And most importantly, enjoy your Friday night!

If you can't be arsed to answer someone's question about the "pillow ball" then by that logic you might as well pay for a Simpack license and run some simulations yourself with different suspension setups

Having correctly matched spring rates to the dampers and ride height will influence your handling more than the alignment. Have you thought about the roll centre as well? The semi trailing arm rear suspension has a lot of camber gain as it compresses so there's lotssss to think about if you want a "race" setup.

I'd stick with the factory specs and see how you find it, then make changes accordingly if you want it to have different handling characteristics. Adding stiffer roll bars might help with its cornering ability without having to go studily stiff with the springs.

And as per your original post, you seem to only want comments from the best of the best. I've just spent a term working with Simpack doing motorsport engineering and learning all about suspension set ups.

I considered it a strange question for someone who is clearly into race cars and track days to ask, I thought it would be something they would know!

It would have been easier to Google it for a technical answer, I stand by that. The same goes for a lot of things. Sometimes part of being constructive on a forum is searching for things you aren't sure about so as to not waste anyones time and ensure you give an cosntructive answer to move a discussion along. It takes a matter of seconds.

I searched for alignment specs on and off for days and got a lot of conflicting information, hence this thread.

I didn't want replies from the "best of the best", just people who have some idea what they are talking about. I wasn't met with that when I first asked this question on the E30Zone Facebook page, some of the nonsense people responded with was baffling.

Anyway this thread is 3 months old now, a lot has changed, the AVO's are coming off the car and will be for sale. It is going back to lowering springs and uprated shocks, and I will put a factory alignment on the car. It won't be seeing track usage anymore.

Thanks for the reply and advice.

Was a pretty honest question that's clearly upset you. I'll endeavor to make my replies more constructive. Just try and make yours less stand off-ish