Oh dear, more problems :(

[Turbo-Brown]

Stood for about a year or so.

Don't think it's the coupling that's causing the problems though, it's just the last 2" of the blades bending forwards until they contact the radiator.

I'm kinda surprised it hasn't pissed all of it's fluid out though because driving for hours on end with the fan being stuck must generate some serious heat in the coupling!

[gareth]

well, like it'll ever break... it's a BMW!!!!!

maybe the fan blades are getting sucked towards the atmospheric depression that your turbos leave in front of your car?

[Turbo-Brown]

<Drum roll> <tssssssssh!>

Presenting: THIS WEEKS PROBLEM!

Started the car this afternoon do drive to a mate's house. Didn't think anything of it at the time but there was a tiny delay between turning the key and the starter actually doing anything.

Drove to said mate's house, started car again went out to one shop. Started car again and went to Saino's. Went to start car having picked beer up and.......nothing!

Turn the key and nothing happens except the temp gauge drops to zero, but there's not a sign of life from the starter!

Any ideas?

[Brianmoooore]

Turn the headlamps on. What do they do when you turn the key?
Depending on the result, the problem is either the ignition switch or apoor connection on one of the battery cables.

[lentec]

Sounds familiar check your starter solanoid.

[Turbo-Brown]

Oh, spoke too soon!

The oil leak's back again!

Why couldn't these things have happened next weekend?! Need the car to work on tuesday!

Happier news is that it does 28.5mpg which ain't too bad considering how much full throttle it got on my economy finding run!

[Turbo-Brown]

Oh dear, this one might be serious.

Whilst finding out that my 0-60 is 6.3s, I also found out that if you slam the throttles shut and then go back to WOT, one of them might jam shut and the resulting friction causes it's actuating arm to slip around and hold the other 5 full open with no way of getting them back!

Looks like the limiter (which it hit a load of times) was set to 6400soft and 6500hard so there's hope that it won't have fucked the engine.

Time for throttle bodies mk2 I think, that could've been bloody dangerous if it'd happened on the road!

EDIT> Oh yeah, forgot to add that Brown came home on the back of a truck

[lentec]

Could you not use a vacuum throttle opener like the one fitted as standard? so when you get a large vacuume spike it holds the throttle part open to stop it slamming?

also are you running a dump valve?

[Turbo-Brown]

Not heard of the vacuum thingies, haven't got a piccy of one have you Len? Don't recall having seen anything like that on the standard TB

I am running a dump valve, but I eliminated a pressure spike caused as the throttle's shut being the cause as the same throttle kept on jamming once freed up with the engine off.

Dunno if the butterfly's shifted a bit or something so that it jams or what, but it buggered up what was turning out to be a good day

[Ant]

Bad news there Alex, looks like you may have saved the mill though yeah ?

Lennie is referring to the vacuum setup as used on the 323, with the pusher capsule, TBH I dont think theres room for that in your setup though.

[e30_Turbo]

Bad luck Alex mate, fixable tho I'm sure!

Did you get any other times or was that the first runs of the day?

Mark.

[Toby_Unna]

won't some subtle machining of the bodies/perhaps with new butterflies sort it?

if it's only one sticking that's a good thing!

i'm sure the engine will be ok anyway Alex, my m30 saw plenty of the limiter in top gear with the shorter LSD on and it's still fine

[lentec]

Lennie is referring to the vacuum setup as used on the 323, with the pusher capsule, TBH I dont think theres room for that in your setup though.

Thats the one
Spent an hour this morning looking for a pic of one.

[Turbo-Brown]

Hope the engine's gonna be alright! Had a look in the map yesterday and the soft cut limiter is set to 6400 which is what the hand book says is the absolute max.

I was last out and on my first (and only) run when it all happened, but wasn't entirely in vain as at least I posted a respectable 0-60. Apparently based on the power and torque though, I should be aiming for about 5.4s though so there's a lot to be done to the car and also my launch technique!

Wonder if just a little hydraulic damper in the throttle linkage which catches it just before it closes and the gently lets them close might be a short term solution.

The next thing I need is more low end torque so those TBs I designed a couple of months ago might see the light of day afterall, with smaller diameter and longer inlet runners assuming the company's willing to work for me still (think they were expecting a flood of work although I never led them to believe that)

[Andy335Touring]

I'm sure with your mechanical/engineering skills you will be able sort it mate

6.4k rpm isn't to bad so long as it wasn't for too long i guess ?

Would you be able to sleeve the TB's and make some matching butter fly's ?

[Turbo-Brown]

Don't think the TBs them selves are too big, just the runners into them. They only go about 5 or so inches and are 48mm in diameter so the air speed in them must be pretty darn low at low engine speeds!

[Andy335Touring]

Did Dave Walker say any thing about them when it was mapped ?

[Turbo-Brown]

He said he had to pour fuel in at idle and light loads to get it running decently which would indicate not much air speed carrying the fuel into the engine I guess.

Did ask him specifically if he thought it might be the problem but I think he was being diplomatic in his answer after an embarrassing morning of my workmanship letting the car down.

Gonna try and measure the runners on the standard manifold at some point and work from there.

Have just been out and re-synchronized the throttles and it starts and runs without making any nasty noises so I might have got away with it (I hope!)

Such a shame I didn't get to 100, would've loved to know the result!

[Andy335Touring]

Have just been out and re-synchronized the throttles

Do you want to barrow the gizmo again mate ?

He said he had to pour fuel in at idle and light loads to get it running decently which would indicate not much air speed carrying the fuel into the engine I guess.

Sounds about right, fuel drop out ?

Such a shame I didn't get to 100, would've loved to know the result!

Yes ! Third gear or about 60mph onwards is when you really feel the extra power/torque. Getting the power down in first bleeds/wastes so much time with E30's with extra power.

[Turbo-Brown]

Ha haaa! This is why I kept my nice long final drive!

Can get well over 60 in 2nd, and first gear is pretty handy for gaining speed too (got a sport box with a standard final drive, open diff goodness)

Think fuel dropout is the term, although the speed of the air must be so minimal as the injectors are aimed at the backs of the valves!

Many thanks for the offer of the gizmo again mate! Considering the options at the moment though: Can either make do with the setup that's on there now (albeit modified so that nothing can jam shut again!) or I can have a set of my ball bearing TBs made up which are angled to better accept longer and smaller diameter runners, and also move the injector away from the head which should help fuel presentation, downside being the price!

[Andy335Touring]

Many thanks for the offer of the gizmo again mate!

No probs, just drop us a pm when/if you need it

I wish i could get over 60 in second, i'm a bit to short geared to exploit the torque properly at the mo, 3.46 lsd and sports box would be nice but i lack the dosh

[Turbo-Brown]

Definately worth getting a diff that makes use of more of the gears, used to hate the standard 'box, 2nd was useless once moving as it was just too low!

Remember the GT6 had insanely closely stacked ratios which made it great fun on twisty roads where changing gear is all part of the fun, would do 50 in first and 70 in second (not that the acceleration was great but hey) and having got to 2nd, you still had 4 gears left to get into top

Shame they don't make cars with overdrive anymore, having gears available at the flick of a switch is wicked!

[Turbo-Brown]

Ho dear!

It's general transport problems this time!

Been riding my bike to work and back for the last year and a half every day as it's free and the car's not all that reliable.

Anyway, was getting some oddness from the rear brakes at the begining of the week which got worse and worse until yesterday when I noticed that the side wall of the rim's split!

Have had it happen before and of course it means buying a new wheel which I've now done, problem being that the car's not roadworthy at the moment and now the bike's out of action too

What a pullover eh

[gareth]

ooh, nasty!!!! i thought you were talking about the rims on the car for a minute!!! i was imagining crack blingin alloys for a sec!!!

had you got something stuck in the brake block? then? i cracked a road bike rim years ago when i get a lump of grit in the block, i thought i'd leave it until i'd finished the time trial i was doing (way back when before i got a car and subequently got fat!!!!) and the rim exploded! racer tyres on a time trial are often in excess of 200psi and it want with a hell of a bang!!!! metal chunks everywhere and of course the rim collapsed thowing me into a hedge!

i bet riding your bike saves a LOAD of fuel money!!! my 335i does 180 miles to a 55 litre fill up when i'm mostly doing the 2 mile run to work and back! it never even gets to temperature! yours must be even thirstier!

[miamistu]

It's just worn out I think, god knows how many miles it's done, and it started out life on my trials bike which had really hard brake blocks on hydraulic brakes which probably didn't help.

Arse, can't seem to log out at me mate's house!

[Turbo-Brown]

Blimey!

What a transformation's come about this weekend!

When I originally borrowed Andy's air flow gizmo to balance my throttles, I did a bit of a half arsed job of it as adjusting the butterflies accurately was nigh on impossible.

Anyway, since the incident with the sticking throttle, I made up some links for the butterflies which have little micro adjusters on them and which don't rely on friction to turn the spindles!

Spent some time on Saturday fiddling about with the gizmo and getting the throttles balanced about a million times better than I did before so all the cylinders read 7kg or air/hour at idle.

It's absolutely smooth as silk at idle now! I really can't believe how much of a difference it's made!

Took it out for a spin though, and it feels really slow for some reason, just hope nothing did get damaged during the rev limiter bouncing incident!

[Andy335Touring]

Nice one dude, nice to be back on the road

[e30_Turbo]

Nice one Alex!!

I wonder if the changes you have made have effected the mapping at all?

Mark.

[325i-Dog]

maybe you should badge your turbos as 316i
hehe

[Turbo-Brown]

Well, re-aligned the throttle pot and tried again. All seems to be back on song

Think's it's overdue it's 800 mile service though so it's time to make the switch to proper fully synthetic oil. Just hope the oil leaks don't spring back as soon as I do!

I'd forgotten how violently the boost comes in with a full boot of gas though. Was pulling out into a tightish gap on a big roundabout on the way home today so gave it full berries and almost gave myself whiplash in the process

[lentec]

Good work mate!

[stonesie]

good work fella, might help tease a couple of extra rampant horses out to play

[Turbo-Brown]

Oh no!

Seems the petrol has had the idea of running out of the tank and onto the road instead of towards the engine!

Guess the tanks on the early and late cars are different too?

Thought my economy was getting worse!

[gareth]

nasty!!!

is it just the filler neck or the whole tank?

[Turbo-Brown]

Hmm, there's a question!

It is leaking on the drivers side so it might just be the filler if I'm lucky? Or is it a beatch either way?