E30 Zone

After getting my first taste of drifting agt the weekend I'm looking to have a few more goes at it throughout the year.

Can people suggest what would be the best upgrades for suspension and chassis to make the car more chuckable round the bends

Things like strut braces, poly bushes tha sort of thing which I've heard people talking about but never really looked into before

Thanks

if its in the 316 saloon get your self some more torques, some more ponies, and a LSD.

get some smaller wheels with barely legal tread on too.

Then stiffen the suspension.

A quicker steering rack too, z3 1.9 FTW!

Its for a 318is, the saloons a bit redundant for now lol

The z3 steering rack you say, is that a direct swap? I'm guessing it means less turns from lock to lock?

It depends if your planning on keeping the 318is strictly for the track. In that case I heard welding the differential is effective, it introduces another level or drifting.

Its not adviced though if your planning or driving the car on the roads aswell.

Theres a detailed thread on here somewhere if you do a search, Its pages long.

I think it needs a wee bit of spacing here and there but apart from that its a straight (ish) swop. less turns lock to lock, less than 3 i think, compared to the std 400 turns lock to lock, like a nimitz class aircraft carrier

320mm steering wheel cos lets face it standard bmw wheels are huge,
H&R anti roll bars,
LSD is a must have if your serious about it.

the standard bm slippers are a good place to start but as skill levels and speeds increase you really need more than 25% lock up.

if your on a budget and the car is mainly for drift use,

*)weld the diff,
*)strip it bare,
*)get a good solid mounted bucket seat (this helps you 'feel' the car more + stops you ending up on the passenger)
*)set up a hydrauic hand brake as the standard e30 ones are shocking
*)slam it on its arse with some cheap but rock hard shocks.

and finally get a pile of sh*t old wheels to burn.(you can pick up bottle tops with good tyres for next to nothing)

Cheers for the help chaps

The car will be used for both road and drifting but I'm planning on getting a spare diff to weld so I'm not using it on the road as a daily.

I noticed the handbrake was cack at the weekend so that will be getting sorted, then I'll be dropping it on its arse

I'll keep an eye out for the z3 rack too for future mods

Cheers

get yourself the iS slipper as they are much cheaper (£150) and a much shorter ratio so you can keep it in teh narrow power band of the iS.

good thing about being in newcastle is your only 35-40 mins from teesside auto drome. your lucky i moved away from there

any ideas on how much i would be looking for an lsd on a 320i 1988??????

wouldnt bother with an lsd, u need a welder

i want to but the other half wont let me as its my day to day car as well

if the car is going to be a road car too dont weld it. in my experience its not the best for the road and you can forget fast B-road driving. you will just end up in a bush and thats not the bush of a delightful young lady either.

if you get a slipper you could get a rebuild and up the lock to 50% or even 70%?

you can get rebuilds for about £100 and if you get a iS slipper its about £150 so for the price of a 3.91 or a 3.64 etc you can have a fresh rebuilt 70% lock slipper.

lots safer and much more useable than a welded. unless its not used on the road much the get the welder out

why would he end up in a bush?

if you are careful you will be fine, just realise that in normal fast road driving it will increase understeer as the car will want to push on.....even upgrading an lsd will cause this

you can get rebuilds for about £100 and if you get a iS slipper its about £150 so for the price of a 3.91 or a 3.64 etc you can have a fresh rebuilt 70% lock slipper.

Where has this stupid notion of 318is LSD's costing £150 come from? They command MORE value than medium case 3.64/3.73/3.91 LSD's due to their rarity.

Rebuilds for £100?

Welded diffs are ok if you understand the working of it - got one here on a turbo'd 325i daily car, bit bouncy on slow turns and garrunteed to shag any subframe bushes in a year.

Admittedly it's dam right dangerous in the wet though.

Also got a hydraulic hand brake on it that works brilliantly