My Track Car Build, Spanning past 3 years

[Motorhole]

Thanks WSW. Been stalking your Escort build too, that's a very professional bit of work.

So this weekend I set out to solve niggling issues I've had with the cooling system from day 1. Although car never overheated, or even got close to overheating, it's not been quite right. The story went something like this.

1) Initial radiator install, filled cooling system, bled, hot air through heaters, fan comes on okay, job done. Then I noticed a small coolant leak from the radiator return hose after I'd driven it to the MOT centre. Put this on my list of things to fix once I got the car back.

2) Thought I'd managed to fix coolant leak, until I returned from the bodyshop to find coolant pissing out through the radiator expansion cap onto the floor.

3) Removed join that was cause of leak. T-bolt was slightly to big for the pipe joiner, which is why it was leaking under pressure, no matter how tight it was done up. Fitted a smaller t-bolt, leak fixed, re-bled system, job done take two.

4)...until after driving, I spotted another leak. A very slight weeping from the fan temperature switch on the side of the rad. Plus the system was over-pressurising again, causing the expansion cap to vent air. Of course, head gasket is always a possibility but I knew the engine was fine in the donor car and I had no other HG failure symptoms whatsoever. I thought I'd just best get the cooling system A1 first.

5) Scared to torque up the temp switch any more for fear of breaking the flimsy plastic, I decided I was going to remove this, use some PTFE tape and re-fit. Until I decided to do a bit of research on the Eis-branded radiator I'd bought (2nd hand, unused) and found they are generally considered to be a load of tosh. Throwing caution into the wind, I decided to stump up the £90 or so for a brand new Nissens radiator, in an effort to fix not only current issues, but to protect against any future ones. Radiator arrived next day and it only took 3 seconds to see that the quality is infinitely better than the Eis radiator. I went to fit this on Saturday morning.

6) Upon draining the system (again) and disconnecting all the hoses, I found that the temp switch was just turning in its boss, it wasn't unscrewing. Not good. I removed the rad to find the the plastic had cracked around the boss. Of course, no amount of PTFE would've fixed that. I had to cut around the plastic to remove the switch with the insert, then use a pair of grips to hold the insert whilst I unscrewed the switch. Pain in the *ss.

7) Fitted new radiator and re-filled the system once more. Ran the car up to temperature, hot air at vents, bled out a tiny amount of air then took it for a test drive. Bit of traffic, some back lanes, a fast dual carriageway blast then some more traffic before I returned.

All this drive did was confirm that nothing was right with that first rad! Before, the temp would typically sit just over halfway, dropping slightly at speed. In traffic it quickly rose to just below 3/4, when the fan would kick in and drop the temp. With the new radiator, the temp sits just below halfway and even sitting in traffic for a few minutes (after the dual carriageway), then idling it on return to the garage, it never got hot enough for the fan to have to come on at all. Checking things over afterwards revealed no leaks and no hissing expansion cap.

So now hopefully that's the end of my cooling maladies. Perfect demonstration of "buy cheap, buy twice". Now I just need to keep driving it until the next ugly issue raises its head...

[rix313]

I stumbled on a real bargain few years back and won a Nissens rad on eBay for £5. Half expected him to turn around n go sod off ha.

[Motorhole]

I stumbled on a real bargain few years back and won a Nissens rad on eBay for £5. Half expected him to turn around n go sod off ha.

Nice one! Haha felt a bit like that was going to happen with my £160 style 42s.

[Motorhole]

Well the BMW had its first on track outing yesterday at Oulton park. Was a mixed bag to be honest.

Track was damp starting off so not knowing/being comfortable with the car and not knowing how much grip was available, I drove very conservatively. Did 2 sessions of warmup lap, 2 fast (ish) laps, cooldown lap to break things in and those went okay. Once the track started to dry though and I started driving a little faster and braking harder, I started getting horrific vibration through the brake pedal when the brakes were hot and I was slowing from speed. Enough to frighten me!

So I pulled off the front wheels and noticed on the nearside there were signs of slight caliper-wheel contact. Filed off a mm or so from the offending extremities of the caliper and tried it again, with the same result. At this point, as braking from 'normal' speeds and when the brakes weren't stinking hot was okay, I decided to call it a day and drive home before I broke something properly. A shame, because I never really got anywhere close to figuring out the car's capabilities, but at least it got there and back under it's own steam.

So what did I learn?

1) It is fairly quick. Even driving as conservatively as I was, I could still nudge 105mph before having to brake for lodge corner.
2) I may need stiffer springs as at least once, the undertray bottomed out on the tarmac on the dip at the exit of lodge.
3) It's actually quite chuckable and grips very well - my confidence in the car in the respect has improved a lot. Never felt lairy or about to spit me off - but then I never got the opportunity to increase commitment from 5 tenths to 9.5 tenths!
4) Similarly, drivetrain and engine wise, it was bang on. Temperature never rose above halfway. No nasty noises.

I don't have time to do much work on it in the coming weeks, but when I do, I'm going to pull apart the brakes to check for uneven wear and swap out the front wheel bearings. As the wheel was only contacting the caliper on one side, when hot and under high g, there may be enough give in the bearing on the nearside for contact to occur, given the marginal clearances between caliper and wheel. Only Christ knows what the mileage was on the bearings was when I acquired the hubs. If anyone has any other ideas, do let me know

[Demlotcrew]

Could be soft pads and the rubber guide bushes on the callipers causing the actually calliper to pivot against the calliper carrier and thats enough to move it out?

I would have thought you could feel a worn bearing if theres that much movement!

Andrew

[Motorhole]

That's not a bad shout Andrew, hadn't thought of that. Might have expected to see that both sides rather than just nearside though - and calipers are all new (unlike the bearings...) E36 M3 ones - but still worth a look see.

I guess something like this would sort it if that was the culprit?

http://www.turnermotorsport.com/p-4118- ... e-kit.aspx

But then would that require stripdown and clean after every trackday?

[Demlotcrew]

Its possible that the calliper which was touching was bled and the other side had air, or it could be the hose swelling if still using OE lines etc. Its hard to say, but what I do know is that if theres not enough room for a credit card then its very possible the calliper is pivoting out.

Yes the brass bushes would work well and certainly will help eliminate that weak spot. You could also easily grind off the casting webs on the front face of the calliper, wont do any harm at all.

Andrew

[Motorhole]

The evidence!



Family commitments and kitchen renovation get in the way of my resolving this any time soon. But hopefully I'll be able to get on the case a few weekends down the line.

[Demlotcrew]

That doesn't look too bad, I have seen wheels destroyed with stones sticking between the calliper and barrel

Hope its an easy fix!

[Motorhole]

Okay, so today I set about Phase 1 of the brake vibration resolution project: replacing front wheel bearings.

Although it was only the nearside that was causing issues, I went about replacing both bearings anyway out of good practice and to prevent any future wheel bearing issues from arising. So I had two complete FAG wheel bearing kits to fit.

I set about the problematic nearside first and everything went exactly to plan. Hubnut freed up no problems, thanks to the world-moving leverage exerted by my 2.5m washing pole-turned-breaker bar. Bearing pulled off cleanly, as did the old dustcaps. A clean up and light grease of the spindle and the new bearing drove on nicely. The end product:



I should add that my car isn”˜t suspended by that bottle jack under the lower arm, that”˜s purely an auxiliary jack to stop the car (potentially) rocking around when undoing/torquing up the carrier nuts. I did the hubnuts through the wheel with the car on the ground for added safety

It turns out that this was indeed a likely culprit. I”˜m not sure wheel bearings should be doing this for a start:



And the wheel bearings that were on the hubs were not OEM items. They”˜d been replaced before and the ones that were there were of the cheap and nasty variety.



The other side was a little more problematic due to half the bearing staying on the spindle, but it still wasn”˜t too much of a ballache.

After all this I made a minor mod to the pedal box. If you”˜ve been bored enough to stay with my build thread this far, you”˜ll know I put a spreader plate under the floorpan for the pedal box. I wasn”˜t entirely happy with this on its own though, so to spread the force a little more when really leaning on the brake pedal, I fitted some bigger skirted nuts below some thick washers. Just for added confidence Then I took the thing for a test drive.

Repeated hard braking from speed is difficult to do on the road safely and legally. But I did the best I could within the limits of the law and so far, so good. No nasty vibrations. But I really need another trackday to be certain. Hoping to get something for early April.

And here”˜s a little pic from the day at Oulton Park, where it”˜s difficult to see that I”˜m only tootling around at 4 tenths

[DanThe]

Its normal to have some play in the bearings with the nut removed, its the only thing holding them together after-all

[Motorhole]

Its normal to have some play in the bearings with the nut removed, its the only thing holding them together after-all

Yeah I figured that might be the case actually. But it was still moving around a bit before I removed the hub nut. And the other side wasn't moving around anywhere near as much

[Motorhole]

So last Monday, I took a long lunch from work with a few to test driving my car, prior to booking a trackday.

I turned up at the garage, rolled it out, frowned as I remembered how much it needed a wash then started checking it over. Only to find the rubber boot on the clutch master cylinder was full of brake fluid. B*ll*cks. I was especially disappointed as it was a new one too - albeit fitted over a year ago. Car went back in the garage, I didn't get my test-drive and I didn't book a trackday.

I ordered a replacement and as the weather was nice on Sunday, I set about replacing it. Drained the system, removed offending item, replaced it and did a one-man bleed using a piece of pipe and a lot of running around the car. The new m/s, despite being identical to the old one, feels different. Clutch is lighter and bite point is lower. Makes me wonder if the old one had been faulty from the off. I checked that the pushrod was entering the cylinder square and that appeared to be the case, so I can't see any other obvious reason for failure. I may take the old one apart to investigate.

I'm sure I can still hear some friction somewhere when turning right too. I've replaced the wheel bearings - so I'm ruling that out - there is now comfortable wheel/caliper clearance, but it sounds metallic so certainly not tyres on bodywork. I wonder if due to the p/s reservoir being mounted at an angle, the pump is drawing air on right hand turns? That's the next potential culprit to investigate.

One day, it will be reliable. But I don't have much time on my hands at the minute due to house move preparations and being busy at work. All it needs is a solid week of driving and fixing to get it 100%, sadly a week I don't have. So incremental fixes it is...

[milescook]

The joys eh... Keep plugging away

[Mikey_Boy]

Snagging lists.. Such fun! (Not!)

Stick with it fella..

[rix313]

I had to bleed the clutch on my car on my own so I know your pain there mate haha

[Motorhole]

Thanks guys. Yeah I'll keep at it when I can and hopefully soon I'll be able to give it some real death on track.

[Jimbob]

Keep at it mate, it's worth it in end. My M52 project has been going nearly 2 1/2 years now, had to take a step away from it for 6 months due to work and a new house but I know it's always tucked away in the unit ready for a tinker here and there.

[Motorhole]

Well, it's been a while since I've posted but work has been progressing in small steps. I've recently has some trouble which is proving a significant setback, but - well, more on that one later.

First up: a small niggle that's been bothering me for a while, but that I've been putting off for fear of it being difficult - the passenger door lock. Basically, it opened and closed with the handles just fine, but it had to be locked individually with the key. It was essentially missing the door pin mech and the central locking wasn't working - I'd stared taking it apart because it stopped working before I took it off the road, then I'd forgotten about it.

Anyway, turned out to be a simple fix. I re-built the door pin mech, greased the lock and whatnot and made sure the central locking servo (which worked okay) was properly located. It now works perfectly.

Now, in order to stop the engine moving around under cornering - and therefore potentially leaning on my brake lines or steering linkage, I'd ordered some Poly engine & gearbox mounts from Condor Speed Shop in the states. These arrived in due course:



Then the time came round to fit them. Access to the mounts was a bit fiddly with the engine bay fully built up as it now is, but got them both loosened, before jacking the engine up once side at a time to replace each mount in turn. Torqued them up to spec, then jacked up to the car to get to the gearbox mounts. This is much easier - just support the gearbox with a bottle jack, loosen and slip out the cross-member with the old mounts on it, replace the mounts then put back in and tighten up.

Engine mounts:



Gearbox mounts:



So this is where my problems started. I jumped in the car, fired it up and immediately thought something didn't sound quite right. "No worries!" thought I, "It's probably just the mounts transmitting more noise and vibration than the old ones."

So I took it for a drive. The car sounded awful at anything over 1500rpm and had no power anywhere. The only good thing to be said about it is that it changed gear superbly!

Anyway I'm still trying to suss what I've done to c*ck things up so badly. Really annoyed at myself because whatever it is, it's me who's broken it. So far I've examined:

- Vacuum/air hoses for leaks/splits
- That the DME relay has power and is connected properly to all the fuel injectors and ICV, as it should be.
- Likewise with regards to the fuel pump relay
- That all the injector grounds are continuous at the ECU socket
- I have continuity and engine earth straps - but removed and cleaned for good measure with no effect.
- Checked fuel rail & FPR for damage
- Confirmed it's not actually misfiring (at idle) by pulling coils one at a time

So currently, I'm at a loss until I can get a diagnostics done on it. Unfortunately, my torque app and OBDII reader arn't compatible with the older BMW protocol and it can't read the ECU, so I need to source some BMW software and a laptop with a serial port. But if anybody else has any more bright ideas, I'm all ears! The most likely explanation is I've damaged something in the loom (or elsewhere) by jacking up the engine, but who knows. It just sounds like a Subaru (in a bad way - sound clip: and pulls like a 1.2 Corsa. Unfortunately it means I'm having to cancel my Elvington trackday as I don't really have the time to fix it between now and the 24th May.

In the meantime, here are some pictures of it cleaned up and looking good stood still at least.

[DanThe]

If your reader is for obd2 then all you will need is adapter to the round diagnostic port to get it working

[Motorhole]

If your reader is for obd2 then all you will need is adapter to the round diagnostic port to get it working

I have the round port - 22 pin adapter but it still can't read the ECU. Brianmooore says something about requiring an ADS adapter to read the older engines? My donor was a December 1995 car iirc.

The torque app/reader do work as I've used it on my own Fabia and various friend's cars without issue.

Edit: I do appreciate all the help and suggestions by the way

[Motorhole]

Again, it's been a while since my last post, but it doesn't mean I've been sat idle!

With regards to the running problems I encountered after fitting the mounts, after weeks of testing, scratching my head and investing in a BMW OBD2 reader, I eventually got to the bottom of it.

I was getting intermittent errors on both crank and cam sensors, and a replacement used OEM cam sensor made no difference. Intermittent errors are the worst kind. It turned out in the end that in both cases (crank sensor and the replacement cam sensor), the 3 wires where they met the sensor had crumbling insulation just falling off them, allowing them to touch - occasionally. So I put my previous (aftermarket) cam sensor on and a new OEM crank sensor. I noticed the difference between the aftermarket and broken OEM cam sensor was the presence of shielding in the short loom from the connector to the sensor. So I made my own from some aluminium tape and made sure that each line of tap was folded over to touch the previous one without adhesive between the two - to ensure a continuous shield.

I also wasn't getting on with the Condor Speed Shop gearbox mounts. They were not an isolating design, so vibrations were getting transferred straight from the gearbox to the cross-member through the centre bolt. This had just been exacerbating the running issues from the crank/cam sensors. I sold these on and replaced them with stock E30 gearbox mounts. The Condor Speed Shop engine mounts are ace though. Not much in the way of additional noise/vibration, but the engine is mounted rock solid.

So with the car running as it should again, I turned my attention to the disappointing handling I had experienced at Oulton Park. First concern was the front springs being way too soft (about 350-360lb by my estimation), so I swapped these out for some 7", 450lb springs from Faulkners. I also reduced the rear track by 10 mm per side by swapping the 15 mm spacers for 5 mm ones. This in turn allowed me to slot the shorter & stiffer Koni barrel springs back in (in place of the Jamex or Gmax 20mm drop ones I'd put in there), reducing both rake and roll. I could tell right away that these two mods transformed the way the car drove. It rolled less, was less tail happy and even rode better; on the old springs, I had cranked the dampers right up to make up for the reduced spring rate. Ultimately this is a bodge as a damper is in no way a spring and it made the ride crashy. Now, with stiffer springs I could back the dampers off, letting the spring do its job and that just made everything feel more - for want of a better word, 'right'.

So, with a solid driving car and a fresh year's MOT in my hand, it was time to put it to good use - I booked a day at Blyton Park. And yet again, things didn't go to plan.

Not long after booking, my lovely Fiancee reminded me we were attending a wedding in Rochdale the night before. So I decided to drive the car to the wedding with all my gear and get an early night.

So, herein I learnt the following lesson: floor-hinged pedals, manual brakes, hairline sensitive throttle response, bucket seats, harnesses and general lack of heat insulation make for a miserable experience in stop-start traffic in the pouring rain. Particularly a continuous 80 minutes of it. On the plus side, the car ran fine in these conditions, except for a slightly disconcerting grumble/whine that began to develop when coasting in neutral or with the clutch down.

6 o'clock the next morning, I dragged myself out of bed and went on my way. The aforementioned noise became a loud and pervasive transmission noise/grumble as my journey went on. I arrived at Blyton Park worried and with ringing ears.

Nevertheless, signed on and did some very loud sighting laps. I gave the car a good once over and confirmed it probably wasn't a wheel bearing or other safety-critical item, then decided to watch for a while and go home. But watching brought on temptation and I succumbed. I decided to risk a few laps.

Apart from the noise, the car was great. It could do with a bit more power and a cornerweight/geometry setup to get it bang on, but it was a completely different car to the one I drove earlier this year at Oulton. It went where I pointed it with no understeer and at no point did the rear feel unsettled. Furthermore, replacing the front wheel bearings had indeed fixed the high-speed braking issues I'd experienced at Oulton. This is more like what I was expecting after I'd invested so much time and money. I was grinning, but decided it was better to call it a day at 3 hard laps before I broke something proper. I proceeded to limp it home at a steady 50-60mph and shove it in the garage. Once more, I had to take some solace from the fact that despite some mechanical maladies, it hadn't failed to get from A to B and then Back to A again.

So for now, with tax up, I've SORN'd it until I can figure out what's wrong. Hopefully just a failed centre-bearing and hopefully not a diff - but we'll see. Overall though, despite a disappointing day, I've been left feeling much better about the overall state and capability of the thing than I was a few months ago. MUCH better.

Can't wait until my next track outing, where hopfully I'll finally be able to get a full day in without issue.

[Mikey_Boy]

Good man....!

Blyton's a cheeky little track isn't it?? Great to hear that you are tracking down the niggles - once you have these sorted it sounds like you have a whole can of whupass fun on your hands!

[Motorhole]

Yeah I really like Blyton - was there last year in the Fabia too. It's a nice, technical track with quality tarmac and proper kerbs - but minimal consequences should you run out of talent! Perfect for getting to know a car. I also like that you can join the track from a full-bore standing start

Unfortunately tracking down niggles is taking ages - because I'm not getting enough action out of it at the moment. Hopefully that'll change in a few months.

[Motorhole]

Prognosis looks bad. Got under the car today and had a proper poke around. Centre bearing was good, as were wheel bearings. But the diff is making a horrible noise when turned by hand. I drained off a little of the oil for inspection and it was nasty, thick and grey. Pretty certain LSD oil shouldn't look like that after 1200 miles. Video and pics to follow...but now I have to consider what I'm going to do in the way of sorting it! A rebuild or pick up one of the few used Torsen diff's floating around - although these have a slightly taller ratio.

[Motorhole]

So, video: nasty grinding noises coming from diff.



And the autopsy! First up, oil looked like this:



Bearing in mind it”˜s only done 1200 miles since I filled the thing, it shouldn”˜t be looking like that.

Turning the thing by the input shaft by hand felt all kinds of wrong. Perhaps difficult to see from the video, but it was sticky and notchy.



Then there was the swarf collecting on the magnet for the speed sensor:



And there we have it - the reason behind the noise that was making my ears bleed at anything over 60 mph...

[DanThe]

Looks like the pinion bearing has given up

[Motorhole]

Yeah I think so too. Getting quotes for a rebuild - pm'd Gareth but there are also a couple of motorsport shops round here (9M Racing and Tech9), although they are Porsche specialists and probably hugely expensive...

You don't have a quiet Torsen knocking about at 3.15, 3.25 or 3.38 do you?

[rix313]

You spoken to Will Frost at Rally Prep?

[DanThe]

If yours is the multi plate M diff it would be worthwhile having it sorted, I doubt it would need a full rebuild, clutch plates etc, but defo new bearings all round at least

[Motorhole]

Didn't come with the large backplate with extra fins though. Seller had sold that on separately, so I have a regular medium case backplate. Numbers stamped on the LSD unit are:

4061006519 8038680 S25

Cheers Rix, I'll drop Will a pm too

[Demlotcrew]

That looks like an mcoupe differential. It only fitted with two clutches. Could be worth while getting an upgrade at the same time

[Motorhole]

Upgrade as in a new LSD unit? Gripper/Kaaz, or more clutches? But yeah, it”˜s a Z3 M-Coupe diff. At 3.15, the final drive is about right for a track car that”˜s driven to/from circuits when mated to the ZF 328i/M3 ”˜box.

[Demlotcrew]

Two more clutches would see a massive improvement a‘a

If you wanted a little more then ramp angle work would be needed.

[rix313]

Mine has had the 4 plate upgrade done but that was done before I bought it. Better off with that than a Quaife IMO.