Albi Blue 200 >> BMW E46 Track Car

[tombate911]

Carrying on from the big Cadwell update on the previous page here's some video footage.
Firstly some footage of me and Chris in the Clio 200's and then me being followed by a mate in his well set up BMW e36 with 300bhp. He could have easily passed me on the straights if he wanted to.

Some general track day snippets.

 

[Pav]

love watching you race Tom..great vids

 

[Matt Scarbro]

Well done Tom, car and driver going well!

Pleased to hear you liked Cadwell, nowhere better IMO!

 

[trackspec197]

Nice footage Tom. As Matt said it's a great circuit.

 

[Big Ben]

Great vids Tom. Looks a fun circuit with all the undulations.

Still amazes me how the 1*2 keeps ahead on the straights.

 

[tombate911]

Thanks for all the comments guys. Car was going well but still lots of things I want to change. I wasn't 100% happy with the gearbox to be honest. Feels fairly stiff in a few gears and the oil seemed to really be going off when the box temperature was very high. That's something I'm going to work on over the weekend so will add that update tomorrow.

Update for this week then...

8 wheels went off for powder coating so the car was left on the driveway on axles stands. Perfect time to do some maintenance and some jobs over a period of a couple of weeks.



While i'm off work for 6 weeks it was a perfect time to start working on some of my own projects.
dragged out some 35mm aluminium round and some m16 rose joints and set about making a new lower engine mount. I've been running a standard engine mount with a powerflex insert for 12 months but want to make the engine mounted more solidly while it's only a track car now.



turned down 4 top hat spacers/reduces to fit the m12 and m14 bolts for the engine mount and made the length adjustable using the two rose joints and threaded joiner. Only took a couple of hours to make. Test fit and then ill be onto some of the other engine mounts to stiffen them up further. I think it was @A1axx who padded out the main chassis leg engine mount, but i've been trying to find information on it on your built thread?



While I know it's off the road for a few weeks I started at the rear of the car removing some bits of interior. I know i'm not going to save a lot of weight but every little helps. I did look at the price of a shell last week with a 6 point cage already welded in and polycarb windows but It was a big step and a lot of money so decided to go down the progressive round with this one.

So far i've removed all the the interior from the handbrake backwards except the headlining. This is where i need to make a decision. Do I keep the front carpet in place once' I've removed all the sound deadening from under it or do i take it up completely and just put in a thin metal floor with grip tape. Also unsure whether the head lining should go too.

The plan here is the remove the door cards eventually and make my own with door pulls and electrical switches in place and paint the inside of the shell. Originally thought the same albi blue but also tempted by black...



Going to get under the car tomorrow and progress with some mechanical bits I want to mess with but I'll update that tomorrow and post up about the number of parcels I've received this week.

 

[brunodias]

I'm enjoying this stuff! I see a lot of tar ready to come out!

 

[trackspec197]

Thanks for all the comments guys. Car was going well but still lots of things I want to change. I wasn't 100% happy with the gearbox to be honest. Feels fairly stiff in a few gears and the oil seemed to really be going off when the box temperature was very high. That's something I'm going to work on over the weekend so will add that update tomorrow.

I know what you mean about this Tom. I have never had problems with Millers Nanotech for Plate LSDs its awesome and worth the extra expense.

 

[Northloopcup]

Thanks for all the comments guys. Car was going well but still lots of things I want to change. I wasn't 100% happy with the gearbox to be honest. Feels fairly stiff in a few gears and the oil seemed to really be going off when the box temperature was very high. That's something I'm going to work on over the weekend so will add that update tomorrow.

Update for this week then...

8 wheels went off for powder coating so the car was left on the driveway on axles stands. Perfect time to do some maintenance and some jobs over a period of a couple of weeks.

View attachment 111668

While i'm off work for 6 weeks it was a perfect time to start working on some of my own projects.
dragged out some 35mm aluminium round and some m16 rose joints and set about making a new lower engine mount. I've been running a standard engine mount with a powerflex insert for 12 months but want to make the engine mounted more solidly while it's only a track car now.

View attachment 111669

turned down 4 top hat spacers/reduces to fit the m12 and m14 bolts for the engine mount and made the length adjustable using the two rose joints and threaded joiner. Only took a couple of hours to make. Test fit and then ill be onto some of the other engine mounts to stiffen them up further. I think it was @A1axx who padded out the main chassis leg engine mount, but i've been trying to find information on it on your built thread?

View attachment 111670

While I know it's off the road for a few weeks I started at the rear of the car removing some bits of interior. I know i'm not going to save a lot of weight but every little helps. I did look at the price of a shell last week with a 6 point cage already welded in and polycarb windows but It was a big step and a lot of money so decided to go down the progressive round with this one.

So far i've removed all the the interior from the handbrake backwards except the headlining. This is where i need to make a decision. Do I keep the front carpet in place once' I've removed all the sound deadening from under it or do i take it up completely and just put in a thin metal floor with grip tape. Also unsure whether the head lining should go too.

The plan here is the remove the door cards eventually and make my own with door pulls and electrical switches in place and paint the inside of the shell. Originally thought the same albi blue but also tempted by black...

View attachment 111671

Going to get under the car tomorrow and progress with some mechanical bits I want to mess with but I'll update that tomorrow and post up about the number of parcels I've received this week.

What temps you seen in the box mate? Or have you not done a day since installing the temp sensor?

 

[A1axx]

I just have the R3 top engine mount mate.

Lower one is modified as I think engine sits slightly lower or higher with it.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Pav]

big step Tom..so the car will be a track weapon only now..thought you were thinking of an oil cooler for your box??

 

[tombate911]

What temps you seen in the box mate? Or have you not done a day since installing the temp sensor?

Not fitted the sensor yet and driven it on track. Will get the wiring and sensor sorted tomorrow. Ordered an M14-1/8npt rather than m16-18npt
I think it will be an interesting test before looking at cooling especially considering I'm going to try different oil which should stand the heat better.

I know what you mean about this Tom. I have never had problems with Millers Nanotech for Plate LSDs its awesome and worth the extra expense.

Yeah. Certainly went very notchy and stiff. Got a different gl4 gearbox oil to try along with a temp sensor in the gearbox and new shifter cables so fingers crossed that sorts it and I can monitor the temps.

 

[Northloopcup]

Not fitted the sensor yet and driven it on track. Will get the wiring and sensor sorted tomorrow. Ordered an M14-1/8npt rather than m16-18npt
I think it will be an interesting test before looking at cooling especially considering I'm going to try different oil which should stand the heat better.




Yeah. Certainly went very notchy and stiff. Got a different gl4 gearbox oil to try along with a temp sensor in the gearbox and new shifter cables so fingers crossed that sorts it and I can monitor the temps.

I'd put money on it that it's the gripper heating the oil and breaking it down that's making it notchy mate.

Mines the opposite - the more you thrash it the better it feels! Lol

 

[tombate911]

I'd put money on it that it's the gripper heating the oil and breaking it down that's making it notchy mate.

Mines the opposite - the more you thrash it the better it feels! Lol

Quaife? My standard box was like that. The more you reved it and got it hotter the better it works. We shall see what happens next time it's out. Either way it's keeping my mind active.

 

[Northloopcup]

Quaife? My standard box was like that. The more you reved it and got it hotter the better it works. We shall see what happens next time it's out. Either way it's keeping my mind active.

No mate just a standard box. I don't have the time to install a diff in my own box - I'm too busy building everyone else's! Lol

 

[tombate911]

No mate just a standard box. I don't have the time to install a diff in my own box - I'm too busy building everyone else's! Lol

That's true. I keep point people your way too! think you're doing a box at the moment for a mk1 for a friend of mine combining likes of ph2 parts after he bought a box which turned out to be an absolutely nail with a 2p coin and some jb weld holding the bell housing together.

 

[Northloopcup]

That's true. I keep point people your way too! think you're doing a box at the moment for a mk1 for a friend of mine combining likes of ph2 parts after he bought a box which turned out to be an absolutely nail with a 2p coin and some jb weld holding the bell housing together.

Yeah I am mate. Lol! It's coming down in a few weeks time. I'm supplying a new upper casing as well. What a fucking bodge!!

 

[tombate911]

Small update but a little bit of progress none the less.

Spent a could of hours working on the car on Saturday morning...


Started off with one of the larger jobs which was to replace the gearbox cables.




Nice and easy while the car was up and out of the way on axle stands. Dropped the exhaust down out of the way and removed the head shield from behind it to give me access to the bottom side of the gear lever box.



Nice and simple, pop off the end of the cable and the clips that hold the gear cable outer in position. I also marked each of the cables so I could mark the new ones before they went in as they twist and swap sides as they run into the engine bay. Both cables are slightly different too.

Ran the cables through into the engine bay and clipped them into position. Had to pop the intake and battery out to get to the top of the cables. You can see the nice and freshly painted gearbox here



Next up was fitting the replacement alternator I had sources after the battery light issues at Cadwell. After 10/15 minutes on track in the afternoon the alternator was stopping producing 14v and was dropping down to 12v when it left to cool down it went back to normal. Replacement fitted while I send mine away for a service by a friend who does these at a decent price compared with a new unit.



Onto the little bit of progress I made today while it was raining.

Started off the morning down at EFI Tuning with a friend with their Storm Grey clio having the map adjusted by Chris. While I was down there I picked up some 1/8NPT Temp sensor, plug kit and some wire to run the temp sensor for the gearbox. With this I'll now be able to get it fitted into the box and the gearbox filled with oil.



Loom all made up ready to run into the car. Still working on the other end. Not sure how permanent of complicated I'm going to get with the monitoring and logging of data on the car yet. I've got some ideas I'm going to have a play with though but a simple multimeter is the easier way to measure the resistant and calc the temp from that. or a gauge set up with a pull up resistor to convert it to a voltage reading or even log the data with the likes of a little Arduino or Raspberry Pie.



Final job for the evening was to make up some little wire loops for the airbags and pretensioners that I have removed from the car to remove the airbag lights off the dash. 3.3ohm resistor soldered into some little link wires with crimped ends. I did measure the resistance of the pretensioners and they were reading 1ohm so we will see if it works for those. I know 3.3ohm is perfect for the airbags anyway,

 

[Northloopcup]

Small update but a little bit of progress none the less.

Spent a could of hours working on the car on Saturday morning...


Started off with one of the larger jobs which was to replace the gearbox cables.

View attachment 111806


Nice and easy while the car was up and out of the way on axle stands. Dropped the exhaust down out of the way and removed the head shield from behind it to give me access to the bottom side of the gear lever box.

View attachment 111807

Nice and simple, pop off the end of the cable and the clips that hold the gear cable outer in position. I also marked each of the cables so I could mark the new ones before they went in as they twist and swap sides as they run into the engine bay. Both cables are slightly different too.

Ran the cables through into the engine bay and clipped them into position. Had to pop the intake and battery out to get to the top of the cables. You can see the nice and freshly painted gearbox here

View attachment 111808

Next up was fitting the replacement alternator I had sources after the battery light issues at Cadwell. After 10/15 minutes on track in the afternoon the alternator was stopping producing 14v and was dropping down to 12v when it left to cool down it went back to normal. Replacement fitted while I send mine away for a service by a friend who does these at a decent price compared with a new unit.

View attachment 111809

Onto the little bit of progress I made today while it was raining.

Started off the morning down at EFI Tuning with a friend with their Storm Grey clio having the map adjusted by Chris. While I was down there I picked up some 1/8NPT Temp sensor, plug kit and some wire to run the temp sensor for the gearbox. With this I'll now be able to get it fitted into the box and the gearbox filled with oil.

View attachment 111810

Loom all made up ready to run into the car. Still working on the other end. Not sure how permanent of complicated I'm going to get with the monitoring and logging of data on the car yet. I've got some ideas I'm going to have a play with though but a simple multimeter is the easier way to measure the resistant and calc the temp from that. or a gauge set up with a pull up resistor to convert it to a voltage reading or even log the data with the likes of a little Arduino or Raspberry Pie.

View attachment 111811

Final job for the evening was to make up some little wire loops for the airbags and pretensioners that I have removed from the car to remove the airbag lights off the dash. 3.3ohm resistor soldered into some little link wires with crimped ends. I did measure the resistance of the pretensioners and they were reading 1ohm so we will see if it works for those. I know 3.3ohm is perfect for the airbags anyway,

View attachment 111812

If you were to buy a spa temp/temp dual gauge, they have the ability to kick a oil pump in via a relay mate if it's something you'd consider.
I was wanting mine kicked in by the gen90, but I split the car after the £2.5k nurburgring fiasco. Lol

 

[sevenfourate]

I like the dedicated direction you're heading in Tom.

To be fair I think it was destiny and always likely to happen

Not sure about 'small update. As seen - even the smallest job on paper can take a while to do well in reality.

Hope the cables further improve gearshift and the logging stuff being fitted helps to safeguard the investment you've made ref box, gripper etc recently.

It's rapidly becoming quite the weapon.....