1985 BMW 318 Stage Rally Build - 1988 Porsche 924S Street Build - Sequoia Build

nothing much new to report. Today I ran out to my buddy Viet's place DANGEROUS MOTORWERKES and he mounted up my other two loose DMacks onto two more bottlecaps I managed to score up. Still need to paint them blue, but that's a project for a random evening.

In other stuff, I'm re-doing the GT6's exhaust system this week, and pulled the header only to find a nice 1" long crack in one of the tubes in a very inconvenient place. Had to get the welder out and try to patch weld some very thin metal (it's a 40-year old header!). That was fun. Hopefully it works.

Doing a few other little things on that car, up on the stands right now.

<img src="http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/BMW%20320i%20e21%20build/DSCF6972.jpg]/img]

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/BMW%20320i%20e21%20build/DSCF6970.jpg" alt="" />

also pulled the header off the e21 project to sell. It's a Stahl header, so it's worth more than I paid for the car. Since I"m not using the M10B20 in that car, selling the header, exhaust, and eventually the engine/tranny.

well-designed piece

today I built a little protective shelter for my tire trailer. It looks weird, but that's because it folds down and out of the way when not in use (the leg is hinged, and the diagonal brace is removable, just held in place by the weight of the shelter. All if it was built with spare materials I had sitting around - 2 types of shingles, some wood, and some old gate hardware:

with enough room to open the double gate :)

Some stuff for this weekend's project arrived. Since my M42 OEM expansion tank is bulging (said to be a precursor to failure), I decided to "upgrade" to an M20 setup with the separate tank. I know there's a lot of back and forth about what is a better setup, but this was the budget way to do things.

Ordered up an ebay aluminum radiator. Yes, it's Chinese-made. Yes it was about 1/2 or less the cost of the big-name brands. And no, I'm not worried. I actually know the company that makes them and they have a pretty good reputation in the industrial world. And for $125 I'm willing to take that risk, frankly. I gave the piece a thorough inspection and it seems reasonably well-made with decent gussets and welds, so we'll give it a go.

Still need to round up the expansion tank (getting from someone local) and a couple hoses, but all in all should be a pretty easy project, which has been done before on M42 cars.

Having 3 tons of gravel delivered to my house tomorrow for the "side parking zone" so I expect to be getting a good workout with my shovel and wheelbarrow for the foreseeable future :P

I've got a nice little custom made aluminum expansion tank for sale if you want it. Sorry for the thread jack, here's a link to my craigslist ad.

http://norfolk.craigslist.org/pts/3963742958.html

That looks like a pretty nice eBay radiator. What's the name of the company?

sethmeister4 wrote: I've got a nice little custom made aluminum expansion tank for sale if you want it. Sorry for the thread jack, here's a link to my craigslist ad. http://norfolk.craigslist.org/pts/3963742958.html That looks like a pretty nice eBay radiator. What's the name of the company?

In typical Chinese style, the radiator is a carbon copy of the m20 Mishimoto radiator in every way (I actually compared with pics of the Mishimoto), and the name of the company is (wait for it...)

Koyostar. Because hey, if Koyo makes good radiators, KoyoSTAR must be even better!

Anyhow, it's a big company in Guangzhou, China that is ISO certified and has all kinds of other corporate "western" machining certifications and may make OEM radiators for some brands from what I can gather. So hopefully the product holds up well. Time will tell.

--

Interesting catch can. I might be interested but finances are a little tight to justify something like that for a rallycross beater, honestly. If you would let it go for around $30 shipped or so, I could justify it perhaps. But I can't bring you cash in person obviously. Was it on an e30 before? I thought the OEM reservoir had 3 hoses rather than 2.

irish44j wrote:

sethmeister4 wrote: I've got a nice little custom made aluminum expansion tank for sale if you want it. Sorry for the thread jack, here's a link to my craigslist ad. http://norfolk.craigslist.org/pts/3963742958.html

Interesting catch can. I *might* be interested but finances are a little tight to justify something like that for a rallycross beater, honestly. If you would let it go for around $30 shipped or so, I could justify it perhaps. But I can't bring you cash in person obviously. Was it on an e30 before? I thought the OEM reservoir had 3 hoses rather than 2.

I am headed to VA beach this weekend for an autox at ACU-4 and could pick it up if you guys can work out a deal before then.

Thanks Shawn, I'll let you know sometime this week if I go for it. May actually want it for the e21 project now that I think of it.

Also we got a nice little plug (collectively as e30s) in the August edition of WDCR SCCA's "Straightpipe" magazine..

I really need to come to a DC event...

Took out the M42 rad and fitted up the M20 rad. I used the stock M10 rad lower mounts, and then used some upper mounts out of the e21 (will replace those later), as well as my old ghetto upper mount just for some extra security. It's a good fit and very secure.

Need to go pick up a reservoir from Viet, and one new upper hose, and should be good to go. Also, cut out a bit of the headlight cover so the temp sender wires could clear, since the M20 rad is a bit wider than the M42.

Also have to get some stuff to fit up my Spal fan since the old M42 shroud mount won't fit this one.

e21 upper mounts through the rad support lip and the radiator lip

test fit

cutout for the temp sender

partial install

I think I set a personal record today. My formerly M10-powered rallycross e30, which has an M42 swap, got an e36 6cyl (Chinese-made) aluminum radiator today. Because of this, I had to "install" an expansion tank, since the M42 radiator has one integrated. From an M20 e30.

On the M20 car, these are mounted on the passenger side, but I have coil packs mounted there so it had to go on the driver's side. Since I was lazy I decided to fab up my mount brackets for it out of whatever was in my "junk drawer."....this included some odd BMW bracket for something else that happened to have holes that lined up to the reservoir mount points (on the wrong side), a backing plate from a u-bolt, and a twisted L-bracket (this is the front mount for the M42 airbox. The rear mount is a bent-over bracket that used to hold relays on the M10).

Combine this with a welder that didn't want to cooperate, as well as my mediocre welding skills, and this is what you get. The funny part is that it's solid as hell and holds everything exactly where I want it. And since this is the rallycross car, who cares about engine bay aesthetics?

(also, the lower coolant hose is made out of the OEM hose with a 90* elbow, and the charcoal can (which I will get rid of eventually) is mounted down below).

But it all works, and is all held in place nicely.

hose routing

Also installed the fan with quick-install stuff. I'm not really confident in their strength and will fab up some kind of more substantial mount in the near future (and no, it will be less ghetto than the other one...)

The reservoir was actually in my old 280Z when I bought it. The PO had installed a BMW radiator, and he made the reservoir and put it in. He was a suspension welder/fabricator for Panoz, so I think it's a pretty cool piece. I'd let it go for $30 for sure if you want it.

Since I know ALL of you have been checking this thread all day waiting with baited breath to see my results as we start the second half of the season....... :P a quick update.

Today was beautiful weather, course was very long (90+ seconds for the fastest cars when dry, more like 120 when wet), course was tons of fun, and the results came out exactly as I expected: with Roberto winning. Big Course is his strongest of the three and he's now won all three events where we ran this course. Also expected but not too pleasing....Gorka (last year's MR season runner-up) co-drove Roberto's car, and with no points on the line, ran fast and hard and took second. He was in place to beat Roberto on his last run with a "decent" solid run but he went crazy and just pummelled cones.

So instead of Roberto and I going 2-3 as it probably should have ended up, in the end Roberto 1 and me 3, which makes the next two events do-or-die basically. I have to take first in both of them to win the season points. I'd love to complain about it, but in reality Roberto ran strong and mostly clean and fast, and I made some lame mistakes in easy areas of the course due to lack of concentration or something.......so nobody to blame but myself and on good driving on Roberto's part.

I'll give Gorka credit too, but not quite as much (lol) since he ran 2nd in a co-driven car, so he didn't have nearly as much mud to deal with on the post-water-truck runs sitting at the back of the grid line, and I think almost his entire margin over me was from those 2 or 3 runs where Roberto and I were mucking it up in the messy stuff....Like 8 seconds per run difference. But that's the way it goes. Maybe I'm justifying a bit, whatever.

I think the final time spread had Roberto 1st with Gorka a second or two back, and I was about 18 seconds out of first. So berkeleying rotaries continue to be a curse on me, lol. I did manage to beat the other 9 cars in the class (a couple old Toyotas - celica and supra) as well as all the BMWs, by a 40+ second margin....so I guess that's worth some bragging rights since most of those guys are my buddies :)

On a side note, Shawn (moxnix) was entertaining as usual to watch while working course. That suspension man.....I swear you were drilling your radiator support directly on the ground on several occasions....

On the upside, I improved significantly on post-water-truck runs and of the two muddiest runs, me and Roberto were pretty much even on them. I attribute that to a bit better weight transfer of the car on my part (conscious) and better grip with the fresher DMacks over the old worn Yokos. I'm not sure I like the "feel" of the Dmacks as well as the Yokos, but I do like their grip.

some random pics, mostly not of me since those aren't posted yet.

Rallycross #6 coming up this weekend. Though I don't much like having a co-driver, I'm letting Chris Nonack co-drive my car this weekend. He blew up (and sold) his very fast V6-swapped MR2 rallycrosser earlier this year, and last event tried out his "new" '85 celica but bent the control arms or something. He's very fast, and I suspect he'll actually beat me in my own car, lol. Well, as long as he beats Roberto as well that's ok. I need to beat Roberto, and this event should be on my best course, so we'll see.

I am curious to see how fast Chris is in my car, since he drives much differently from me - I'm more technical, and he's more of a "power" driver. Will be a good datapoint for me to try to improve my own driving.

I haven't done anything to the car at all - instead working on the e21, being furloughed thanks to the idiots in Congress, and racing at the Pittsburgh ChumpCar double-7s. Well, did a writeup on this in the track section so suffice to say we finished both races (15th and 11th) in each, and here's a few pics.

So, a quick update from today's event. This is series event #6 out of 7. Coming into the event I was sitting in 2nd place, but to have a chance of winning the season I needed to win both of the last two events, or at least finish ahead of the class leader Roberto.

Today's event was expected to be on the "Barn Course," which is my fastest course and which I've won both times we've run on it this year. Unfortunately, due to all the rain last week Barn was heavily rutted and couldn't be used. Also due to post-ponement of the last event about 15 cars dropped out, giving us a smaller field, so they decided to use the "Gravel Course," which can only handle 40 or so cars due to a limited paddock/grid area there. Also unfortunate is that usually Gravel is my worst of the three courses, as it is usually very loose and deep/fluffy stuff and IMO is more of a "power" course than a finesse course.

Got lucky today though - all the rain really firmed it up so not much loose stuff. Also still damp enough that we had no water truck visits and the course ended up by the afternoon being hard-pack and rocky - more my style :)

Also today I had a co-driver. Chris Nonack, who ran his V6 MR2 very fast the last 2 seasons (but kept on breaking it) and then ran his 85 Celica at the last event before bending the control arms. He said he wanted to know what all the hype was about with e30s so I let him co-drive with me. I'll add that he is a better driver than me, I already knew that. But he had never driven my car so that should be an equalizer, right?

Long story short....we did 13 runs today with overall comp times running about 700-800 seconds, so a lot of seat time. In the end, Chris edged me out by 12 seconds to take first place in my car. He was actually about 1-2 seconds faster a run than me but coned alot. He drives in a "flatout" style rather than the "precision" style I try to run. So he had 10+ cones on the day and I only had a few.

More importantly, I managed to edge out Roberto in the end by about 2 seconds total (though I had a 8-second lead with 3 runs left so I drove "carefully" with no cones, while he grappled back going all-out).

So that puts me in a position where a win in the last event (assuming Roberto 2nd) would give me a tie for first on the season series. Or if Chris were to run and I beat both of them, I would win outright. A tall order. THe last event will be on a VERY long "Big Course" that Roberto is generally a bit faster than me on. So it'll be mostly on the conditions to see who can pull it off. 3 weeks from now.

On the other plus, Chris noted that of all the MR cars he's driven locally (including the RX7s, MR2s, and others) mine is probably the fastest and best set-up. So this goes along with what I've always thought about myself: I'm very good at building a car "for purpose" but I still need to improve my driving aggressiveness. Building has always been a stronger point for me than the actual driving, annoyingly.

I have no power/handling mods that I can get done before the last event, so I'll probably put a bit of effort into shedding some more weight and go all-in......rear door glass will get Lexan'd perhaps (if I have time), passenger seat will be coming out for sure (it's pretty heavy), and I may do a few other small things. I don't think it will make a huge difference, but maybe it will be a mental assist.

Anyhow, some pics from today.

Full album here with the Subies and other non-e30 cars: http://s78.photobucket.com/user/irish44j/library/BMW%20318i%20RallyCross%20Project/WDCR%20Rallycross%206%20October%202013?sort=3&page=1

great pic by Dan Hurwitz from MachV Motorsports :)

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/BMW%20318i%20RallyCross%20Project/WDCR%20Rallycross%206%20October%202013/8891.jpg

The ETA boys, locking up a 1-2 finish in PR and also a 4th place in MR.

Spencer. I took some photos from up in a tree for fun

afternoon finish gate was tight tight tight

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/BMW%20318i%20RallyCross%20Project/WDCR%20Rallycross%206%20October%202013/DSCF7852.jpg

Erika Detota's Atlantic-winning FWD stage-rally car. Nice

crew

Jim red-flagging his own teammates due to a Subie spinning out up the hill...

the slide riot http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/BMW%20318i%20RallyCross%20Project/WDCR%20Rallycross%206%20October%202013/DSCF7814.jpg

Oh look, a Subie at a rallycross :)

I tell ya... if I can manage to be convinced the engine won't explode after I get it fixed, maybe I'll join you next season...

Wait, so are you keeping the e30 now?

Or do you mean you'll bring the GT6?

Well, nobody is buying it, so I'm stuck with fixing it so I have something to drive while I work on the TDI. I'll take it to the shop next week when my mother gets home from vacation and I can get a ride home. Debating between installing the OE sport springs I bought or adding 1" spacers to the H&R Sports. I've gotta get the ride height closer to stock. It's too effing low. Damn lip scrapes on everything. Now I know why Chris never bothered putting one back on...

Oh hell no... I'd rally-x the Mini before the GT6. Despite the fact the Mini cost me twice as much as the GT6, the GT6 means more to me. Still, I'm not so sure how well the Mini would do since it has a coil-spring conversion and thus has maybe 2" of suspension travel... maybe. The smallest bump in the road feels like a crater.

Ian F wrote: Still, I'm not so sure how well the Mini would do since it has a coil-spring conversion and thus has maybe 2" of suspension travel... maybe. The smallest bump in the road feels like a crater.

Have you driven a Mini with the original rubber cones? It is much worse.

If I wasn't trying to sell my Mini I would probably take it out to the rallycross this weekend.

EvanB wrote: Have you driven a Mini with the original rubber cones? It is much worse.

(gulp) That's scary...

Rallycross coming up Sunday to close the season out, and we have a full field for MR class, including a Porsche 944, which I'm interested in seeing how it matches up with the RX's and e30s (though I guess there is no more RX7s in this class now....)

Just in the nick of time my man Carlos at Condor Speed Shop sent me a little package with their new weighted Delrin shift knob (which I chose with the MSport cap, because racekar). This knob has a removable weight inside it that can be taken out if you want a lighter knob or left in for more heft. It's also taller than stock (and than the 80s BMW motorsport knobs it was modeled after). I put it on tonight and its a perfect fit and has three set-screws to secure it (I gave it a good tug and it's definitely secure).

I may have to get another one for the e21 down the line here, and maybe for the Chumpcar :)

oh, and we have some leaves here :/

Ian F wrote: Oh hell no... I'd rally-x the Mini before the GT6.

lol, yeah I was being a bit sarcastic. The thought of getting my GT6 on a rallycross course scares me. I would foresee broken spindles, body coming loose from frame, and general bottoming out the rear end all over the place (mine is lower than stock and has limited ground clearance).

I was looking at those shift knobs on R3v the other day... I wonder if they would fit on a MINI...

Since the E30 is gone, I'm back to pondering a car... right now, I can't decide between some newer and expensive (and reliable!) which would require a loan that I'm not too keen on since I just finished my mortgage, or something cheaper, but potentially less reliable. The reliable bit is important since I need this car to be a back-up DD when the TDI is down for service.

If there was some way I could get the 1800ES rebuilt, I'd consider running that in rallycross.

Have fun this w/e.

Seems like for the cheap side of reliable, old Volvo 240s in running condition are on CL all day long if you can suffer with a slushbox and a 4cyl. Those things seem to run forever. Them and old Benzes.

Else just go find an early-90s Corolla. They run forever.

Remind me and I can measure the shaft width on the shift knob. It's a snug fit right onto the e30 shifter (or the z3 shifter, as I have) like a sock on a foot....and the set screws are really just to hold it from popping upward, not to locate it.

The MINI and E30 levers are similar, so it wouldn't surprise me if they were the same shaft diameter.

A 240 or 740 has been considered... but I'm still hesitant about any 20+ year old car... for fear it would basically be trading one needy car (the E30) for another...

The Dirty e-Thirties Rallycross

So, we finished up the season on Sunday, and it ended more or less as expected at this point. Coming in to the last event, Roberto had three season event wins, and I had two (but I also beat him in the one event where neither of us won). Unfortunately, due to my first-event spin and self-destruction, I had to drop that event instead of my lone 3rd place finish. So that left me only able to tie for season points, and only then if I won the last event and Roberto finished 3rd or worse (which he had only done once all season).

Roberto had supposedly sold his car the week before, but showed up with it anyhow to try to take the undisputed class win. Chris was back driving his Celica since with him tied with Nick for 3rd place going in, I didn't think it would be fair to loan him my car again. In the end, Nick would prevail in the e28 to take 3rd for the season, though Chris made it close even in a mostly-stock 85 Celica. Impressive driving, as usual.

Event started well, and we ran the "long version" of the Big course, with a double-loop at one end and most cars running over 100 seconds. I went out of the gate more aggressive than usual on my first run and I think I surprised him, taking him by 6 seconds. He actually said he was surprised that I went so aggro, lol. After that, we basically matched times for the rest of the day, both running very clean knowing every cone counted. In the end, I won out by about 8 seconds.

The real story was whether my "teammates" could take 2nd over him and give me the help to tie for 1st in season points. At the mid-day break Jim Spoth (in the ETA) had a 2-second lead on Roberto with Nick in the e28 2 seconds behind. In the afternoon, with a new course, Jim kept running fast but got a few cones, and Nick had a stuck throttle on his 3rd run and had to pull off the course. Nick and his co-driver Bobby both took their final 2 runs in my car and put up some great times, but it wasn't enough to get them back into 2nd. Nick actually put up the fastest single MR class run of the day on his last run in my car, when he was driving against hope of clawing back onto the podium.

non-sequitur picture

I hope that Roberto might let off a little bit knowing that he had a tie for 1st no matter what, and letting someone else sneak in for 2nd behind me. But that wouldn't be like Roberto at all to not go all out for the undisputed win, and he didn't disappoint, and he is the undisputed class champ.

So here's the final standings for the last event (ignore the yellow highlighting on the Miata, that was for another thread showing that Miata isn't ALWAYS "the answer" lol)

So, that left me 2 points short of winning the season championship. But that's ok, I consider it to have been a good season, with the only real stain being the first event where I self-destructed.

Finished up with 3 event wins (4 if you count the non-points "tuner" event we had during the summer), and Roberto also had 3 event wins. The 7th event was won by Chris driving my car, so I'll have to take a little bit of credit for that one since I built the car, right? lol....

While I'm thinking of it, I want to shout out a "THANK YOU" to two people:

First - [B]Adam Kimmett and the rest of the WDCR SCCA RallyCross organizers, who make sure we have this great venue, run great events, and set up awesome courses.[/B]

Second - [B]Carlos at CONDOR SPEED SHOP, whose parts I use and whose parts I suggest YOU use, and who has been greatly supportive in many ways during this build and race season![/B]

All in all, the "dirty e-thirties" did pretty well this year. Stephen Nichols took the championship in PR, winning the last four events. His co-driver Chris Helgesen came into the last event needing a 2nd place finish to take 2nd for the season, but Spencer (in the 318i) beat him for the first time this season, by like 1 second, and that knocked Chris into 3rd for the season behind

Chris kickin' it in the ruts

Shawn in the RX7 (the defending MR class champ who beat me last year). Spencer got progressively better throughout the season and if he runs a full season next year I'd expect him to be competing at the top, especially if he gets some rally tires instead of snows. Jesse in his 325i didn't come to the last 2 events after up-and-down finishes, so I'm not sure what his plan is for next year.

Shawn in the RX7, doing his usual awesomeness in a car with no actual suspension remaining

Spencer with some rear inside lift

For MR, you know how I did. Nick ended up 3rd in the e28 and pretty much put up solid 4th place finishes almost the entire season (with one 2nd), on snow tires. They just got rally tires for next season, and seeing how he drove my car I expect we'll be duking it out next year in MR. Chris Nonack is probably the fastest driver in the class, but he kills cars. Killed his very fast MR2. Broke his Celica somewhat, but it's not that fast anyhow. His best two finishes of the year were actually driving Nick's car (3rd) and my car (1st). I know he's actively looking for another car for next year, so I expect he'll be the one to beat in the class next year. Jim missed 2 events, and had to deal all season with having a 4-driver car running in PR and MR (which really wears a car down I'd say), but when he's "on" he's as fast as anyone in the class. Bobby, co-driving with Nick in the e28, finished up in 6th for the season. Pat and Jason had some issues with their car throughout the season but now have rally tires and seem to have sorted most of the issues out. Knowing Pat I'm sure he'll do some good work on the car (both for rallycross and for trackdays) over the winter and will run against the top of the class next year now that he has a full season of experience under his belt.

In other news, a bunch of Subarus won all the AWD classes, with the battle royale in M4 ending up a tie between last year's M4 champ Matt Berkabile and last year's PA champ (and rally chair) Adam Kimmett.

Only one car ran stock RWD this year (IIRC), and just at this last event.

And it was a Volvo Amazon. Love it!

So, before I post some more pics, I'll note a few small things I plan to do this winter: 1. Watch vids of Chris driving. Maybe that will make me drive faster, lol. 2. Weight reduction. I'm going to do some quick-release mounts for the bumpers. Dumping 100lbs off the extremities of the car will help I think, but I want bumpers for street driving. 3. ???? I have no other "big" plans for the car this winter, but who knows. I have a lot of work to do on the e21 project, and also will be helping with an engine swap for the Lemons/Chump e30 when I can.

So, some pics. I don't often get to see my car driving without me in it, so took a few myself that I like

also if you want to see the full album: http://s78.photobucket.com/user/irish44j/library/BMW%20318i%20RallyCross%20Project/BMW%20318i%20Rallycross%20-%20March%202013%20and%20later/10%20NOV%2013%20RALLYCROSS?sort=3&page=1

The boxers watching Nick

M4 co-champ Kimmett

Jeremy Miller, always keeping it interesting with powerslides and ripping his front clip off

Spencer

the ETA boyz

Ex-Spec Miata now Lemons car now rallykar

MR crew

Dirties