BMW M3 #395 Development History

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Kiwi
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BMW M3 #395 Development History

Post by Kiwi »

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Jamie and #395 racing the Mt. Washington hillclimb in 2011

2009

I purchased my BMW E36 M3 from Larry Barbieri in early 2009; its first hillclimb was the spring Mount Ascutney I. The car was run without any modifications from Larry's setup. It still had the full leather interior, stock seats, etc. A nice road car. Larry had made the following modifications.
Engine
  • Jim Conforti cold air intake
    Larger European airflow meter with adapter to the stock intake rubber elbow
    Jim Conforti chip
    Turner Shorty headers
    Stock factory catalytic converter
    Borla cat-back exhaust and muffler
Transmission
  • Stock flywheel and clutch, stock ZF 5 speed with 1.000 fifth, and stock 3.11 LSD
    UUC short shift kit
Front Suspension
  • Koni single-adjustable dampers
    H&R springs, approx 1.5 inch lower ride height
    Slotted front camber plates
    Delrin front control arm lollipop inserts
Rear Suspension
  • Koni single-adjustable dampers
    H&R springs, approx 1.5 inch lower ride height
    Turner rear lower adjustable camber arms
Wheels and Tires
  • Factory 7" wheels with a Toyo street tire 235/45-17 all around
Brakes
  • Wilwood Superlight 4 piston calipers (old cast version) with UUC mounting kit
    E46 M3 BMW Motorsport rotors (drilled) with pin-drive alloy hats
    Braided stainless steel brake lines
The first modification I made was installing a Race Technology DL1 data logger.

On Saturday of the spring 2009 Mount Ascutney hillclimb, I broke out on each of my first two runs up the hill before anyone including me realized I had broke out. I got my warning and did not break out again until my first official race run on Sunday morning. I broke out by half a second and got sent home. Nevermind, Burke moutain was coming right up!
At Burke Mountain I also broke out. Time for a cage.

Peter Fielding Rowell stripped the interior and prepared for the cage. Chris Howard in Massachusetts built a cage, halfway between a minimal road racing cage and a full FIA spec rally cage. Basic six point cage with a single main hope diagonal up to the drivers head, two door bars in an X configuration but bent and welded together leaving two continuous tubes. Foot protection was added at the front and a brace placed between the rear damper towers.

Updates
Body
  • Full cage by Chris Howard
    Cobra Sebring Pro race seat with lateral head support
    Cobra Suzuka race seat for co-driver/passenger/instructor
    Momo 3 spoke race steering wheel with quick release
    Aluminium strut brace (purchased used)
Wheels and Tires
  • D-Force 17x8.5 LTW wheels
    Dunlop Direzza Star Spec tires 255/40-17
The first event with the caged car was Burke II. I shared the M3 with a friend who did not have a race car that weekend. He crashed heavily on Sunday. Front, side, and rear or damage mostly to the sheet metal meant the car was out of action for the next two months. After being repaired by Jimi Heyder, I ran the last event of the year, the Mount Philo hillclimb.

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The rock turn at Mt. Philo

2010
For 2010, the M3 was the same basic mechanical specification as in 2009. However the cylinder head developed a small oil leak just above the timing chain tensioner.

Wheels and Tires
  • D-Force 17x8.5 LTW wheels
    Toyo R888 tires 255/40-17
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Mt Ascutney Spring 2010

At Mount Ascutney, I had a strange problem where the steering wheel would lock solid in a corner and would not easily return to center position. This happened several times on one run, and it kept happening for the rest of Saturday. Saturday night we tried to find and fix the problem but found nothing. Sunday I raced a car again with the wheel locking in the corner and it would only unlock by doing something with the accelerator and brake and steering all at once. After the event, we discovered that the engine mount and gearbox mount had both broken and so the engine was rotating under torque and the engine mount would contact the steering knuckle and prevent the steering from unwinding. We replaced the engine mounts and gearbox mounts with solid aluminium mounts.

Transmission
  • Solid aluminium engine mounts
    Solid aluminium transmission mounts
At Watkins Glen with NASA in October, I grabbed second gear instead of fourth, over revved the engine and bent the valves in cylinders two and three. I drove home on four cylinders with the engine vibrating and the solid engine mounts transmitting their vibration through the whole car for six hours.

2011
The Mount Washington Hill climb returned in 2011 and I decided to fix up the car properly. I had the cylinder head machined, had SuperTech +1 mm valves installed with SuperTech springs and retainers. The oil leak was welded up which turned out to be a crack in the cylinder head oil gallery just above the timing chain tensioner.

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The cracked cylinder head. This has caused me a lot of anguish.

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Rebuilding the head.

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Head back in the car.

Below are the changes to the car for 2011. The spring rates are approximate.
Engine
  • Rebuilt cylinder head
    SuperTech +1 mm valves with SuperTech springs and retainers
    Schrick 256 degree duration cams from Turner Motorsport
    Jim Conforti Chip
    Samco rubber air intake boot
Transmission
  • 3.91 three clutch LSD with 90/30 ramps and built by Dan at diffsonline
Front Suspension
  • AST 5200 double adjustable struts with remote reservoirs
    Hypercoil compound springs with an initial rate of 440 pounds per inch and increasing to 850 pounds per inch on full compression
    Vorshlag monoball camber plates
Rear Suspension
  • AST 5200 double adjustable dampers with remote reservoirs
    Hypercoil compound springs with an initial rate of 280 pounds per inch and increasing to 650 pounds per inch on full compression
    Upper control arm/spring carrier replaced with lightweight camber arm from Turner Motorsport
    All rubber removed
    Solid monoball upper damper mounts
    All solid ball joints in the suspension
    Solid bushings for the subframe and differential
Brakes
  • Wilwood forged Superlight six piston calipers
    Wilwood 12.2 inch diameter rotors with aluminium hats, total weight 12 pounds (compared to 17 pounds for the BMW Motorsport rotors)
    Wilwood 600 brake fluid
Wheels and Tires
  • D-Force 17x8.5 LTW wheels
    Hoosier A6 tires 245/40-17 all around
Body
  • Large aluminium rear wing from New England Motor Racing Supplies. This is a front wing off a Super Modified race car
    Door bars added to the cage by Butch Sr. and Butch Jr. at New England Motor Racing Supplies (on Father's day no less!)
I didn't get the big wing onto the car until the Okemo hillclimb so I borrowed Tom Merrifield's BMW E36 motorsport-style wing.

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Butch Sr. getting ready to weld.

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New 3.91 three clutch LSD from Diffsonline.com

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I had a dyno run done in early 2012 for this engine before we put the VEMS engine management in, so this is the "Mt. Washington engine".

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Mt. Washington 2011. First day of practice, first run of practice, second corner...

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Winning the Hillclimb 2 class at Mt. Washington 2011

The cylinder head started leaking oil again at the very first event (Mt. Washington). I raced only five hillclimbs all year and did no track events. Also the limited slip differential had stopped working completely. I had Dan at http://diffsonline.com rebuild the diff for me and he showed me the three clutch discs with their teeth completely stripped. He said it's actually impressive to be able to strip the teeth all at once. Probably did that at Mt. Washington.

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Mt Ascutney Fall 2011

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Good photo of the new wing at the bridge, Mt Ascutney Fall 2011

2012
I entered the Pikes Peak International Hillclimb in 2012 and was trying to get the turbo car #317 built. Could not get it done in time so we switched back to number 395 for Pikes Peak. Most of the work was done by Cyrus House at Black Arts Fabrication and Charlie Gerry at Six Star Motors.
Engine
  • Rebuilt the cylinder head, again...
    VEMS engine management system
    Tuned for VP109 Motorsports racing fuel
    Removed the catalytic converter and Borla exhaust
    Custom thin-wall mild steel exhaust system with single resonator
Transmission
  • BMW solid race gearshift lever from Bimmerworld
Wheels and Tires
  • TSW 18x9 Interlagos wheels
    Hoosier Radial slicks 265/645R18 with R80 compound all around
Body
  • Custom carbon fiber bonnet (hood) by Bill Lockwood, weighs 5 lbs (2.3 kg)
    Custom carbon fiber boot (trunk) by Bill Lockwood, weighs 3.5 lbs (1.6 kg)
    New rear wing mounts
    Front splitter and dive planes with side plates
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Here are the before VEMS and after VEMS dyno runs by Jason Russell.

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The first hillclimb to test the new configuration was Okemo I.

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Bill and Jamie checking out the front dive planes built by Cyrus House

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Qualifying on the lower section of Pikes Peak

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Practice on the middle section of Pikes Peak

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Race day at Pikes Peak International Hillclimb 2012
Last edited by Kiwi on Wed Nov 28, 2012 6:54 pm, edited 14 times in total.
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Jamie Melhuish
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KevinGale
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Re: BMW M3 #395 Development History

Post by KevinGale »

My goal for next year is to change the oil and maybe check the valve lash. :lol:
Mopar 151w2
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Re: BMW M3 #395 Development History

Post by Mopar 151w2 »

Unless Kevin scores one of these.....
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Mopar 151w2
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Re: BMW M3 #395 Development History

Post by Mopar 151w2 »

Visual refrence for Kiwi
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KevinGale
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Re: BMW M3 #395 Development History

Post by KevinGale »

Mopar 151w2 wrote:Unless Kevin scores one of these.....
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Yeah that should scare those hikers right off the road!
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Challenger392
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Re: BMW M3 #395 Development History

Post by Challenger392 »

Mopar 151w2 wrote:Unless Kevin scores one of these.....
Image
Borla now makes velocity stack kits for most popular v8s. Great for custom efi setups.
Luke Moultroup
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http://moultroupracing.blogspot.com/

2012 Dodge Challenger SRT8 392
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2004 Mazda 6
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Rabbit Farmer
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Re: BMW M3 #395 Development History

Post by Rabbit Farmer »

Hmmmmm...... [tangent]the replies to Kiwi's original post[/tangent]

;) ;)

Kiwi... let's get some photos of your car in this thread. I know that I suffer from forum ADD.... paragraphs scare me unless they are captioning a photo.

s
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dsldubn
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Re: BMW M3 #395 Development History

Post by dsldubn »

keep writing...enjoying the read. I too look forward to some pics, and possibly an update as to what's coming up next with this or the turbo car...
Jason Orzell
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Kiwi
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Re: BMW M3 #395 Development History

Post by Kiwi »

Pictures are up.
Will start a new thread for the new car soon...
Jamie
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Jamie Melhuish
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Re: BMW M3 #395 Development History

Post by Challenger392 »

Apologies for being a thread hijacker. With how fast and capable the BMW #395 is I am exited to see what this "turbo" car is going to be.
Luke Moultroup
Technical Support
Pratt & Whitney Engine Services

http://moultroupracing.blogspot.com/

2012 Dodge Challenger SRT8 392
1972 Dodge Challenger 318
2006 Jeep Grand Cherokee 5.7
2004 Mazda 6
Howe Modified
1989 Suzuki GSXR1100K
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