[matteblue3er]

Originally Posted by boro92

Don't go dinan if your car is already raised in the front. All the dinans do is add stack height--effectively raising your front even further by another 1/2 inch or so. You are best served with something like a vorshlag or tck camber plate --where the stack height is the same or in some cases, even less than the stock upper mounts. Fwiw I have bilsteins and stock xi springs with vorshlag plates and my car isn't raised. If anything it is lower

Originally Posted by rothwem

Yea, I considered the Dinan's, and then decided against them for that reason. I had considered the Vorshlag's, but decided against them due to NVH concerns. I'd really like to ride in a car with actual camber plates to gauge how bad it is.

For now, I'm just going to deal with the understeer, but I'm not sure how much longer I can take it. I drove a 177k mile 2005 325i the other day, and despite the automatic trans, blown shocks, worn bushings and a steering rack with terrible on-center play, I tossed it onto an exit ramp and was like, "dang, this thing handles better than my car!"

Dinan plate is only 1/4" thick. You remove the 1/4" thick reinforcement plate from the factory strut and replace with Dinan. There is no difference in height. I have them...

Camber plates on a street car are just overkill

[boro92]

According to this post, they do raise ride height: http://www.e90post.com/forums/showthread.php?p=6062243

[hugyourewoks]

Originally Posted by rothwem

I kinda wonder if the X1 springs would fit on the E91. That might be a neat look.

I wonder too. I can't find any info about it. Even realoem doesn't have any springs listed for my wagon. Isn't the X1 based off the e91?

front
http://www.realoem.com/bmw/enUS/show...diagId=31_0698

rear
http://www.realoem.com/bmw/enUS/show...diagId=33_1238

[Rocklicker]

That is really weird, I poked around a bit and RealOEM doesn't seem to have coil spring information from ANY model.

But I went over to Tischer and found a part #, here it is for the E91 front:
31336769916

And here it is for the X3 front:
31333412728

Doesn't answer the "will it fit?" question but it is a start. If anyone is going to try this I recommend investigating the difference between CV articulation angles in the two models: hopefully its NBD but if the range on the E91 CV joint is small and it maxes out when unloading a longer travel X1 shock bad things will happen.

[hugyourewoks]

Originally Posted by rothwem

I put Bilstein HDs on my wagon with stock springs. The new strut mounts really raised the ride height though, it looks pretty funny, like an "Allroad" version of the E91. They needed to be changed though, at 84000 miles the old ones were compressed a solid half inch and the bearings had a ton of play in them.

Who cares though, it drives awesome, and it hasn't even been aligned yet. Who knows, maybe at some point I'll put some Eibachs to drop the front a bit, but I'm not too worried about it at the moment.

What size wheels are those? The stock 16in?

[rothwem]

Originally Posted by hugyourewoks

What size wheels are those? The stock 16in?

They're 17s from a Pre-LCI sport package car.

[Greyfox]

Originally Posted by hugyourewoks

What size wheels are those? The stock 16in?

BMW 161... they normally are a square set of 17x8 or staggered 17x8 front and 17x8.5 rear.

I run 17x8.5 square with 255/40r17 tires normally. Thinking about switching to 245/45r17 which will get rid of the -3 mph issue with the speedometer.

[rothwem]

Originally Posted by Greyfox

I run 17x8.5 square with 255/40r17 tires normally. Thinking about switching to 245/45r17 which will get rid of the -3 mph issue with the speedometer.

That's what I'm running on this car. Four rear 161s with 245/45/17s. The speedometer still reads a bit fast.

[hugyourewoks]

What do you all think about tires for ground clearance? I'm going to keep my stock 156 style 16 inchers for now, and I was pondering increasing the tire size from 225/55 16 to 225/60 or 65. The tire diameter increase from 55 to 60 would be 0.9 inches, with the increase from 55 to 65 is 1.8 inches. I know it won't be a big difference, but I think it will satisfy my "off road" desires. Off road desires=towing a tiny two person camper, or my Laser sailboat, and camping.

[rothwem]

Originally Posted by hugyourewoks

What do you all think about tires for ground clearance? I'm going to keep my stock 156 style 16 inchers for now, and I was pondering increasing the tire size from 225/55 16 to 225/60 or 65. The tire diameter increase from 55 to 60 would be 0.9 inches, with the increase from 55 to 65 is 1.8 inches. I know it won't be a big difference, but I think it will satisfy my "off road" desires. Off road desires=towing a tiny two person camper, or my Laser sailboat, and camping.

I think you'd be fine. The 245/45/17s are 0.7" taller than the stockers and I don't rub at all. With a narrower tire, I think you'd be fine.

[rothwem]

Oh and btw, my car has settled considerably since I made this thread. It's not the best pic, but it's come down a solid half-inch since I installed the shocks.

[macindude]

Seems there's a lot of stack height with the factory strut mounts, as well as a little room to play around (mounts compress and lower the car a bit). I wonder if running a camber plate setup like ground control's would get us a bit of a drop...

[rothwem]

Originally Posted by macindude

Seems there's a lot of stack height with the factory strut mounts, as well as a little room to play around (mounts compress and lower the car a bit). I wonder if running a camber plate setup like ground control's would get us a bit of a drop...

I don't think that camber plates alone would result in any drop, in fact, some camber plates have a higher stack height than the stock strut mounts. I think that Vorshlag makes some low-stack plates, but I'm not sure they make them for the xDrive cars. I'm not sure if it matters though. I've also heard that the low-stack plates are for "race use only", with a less durable bearing. I'm not sure how that translates into real-life usage though.

btw, "vorshlag" gets autocorrected into "horselaugh" on my iPhone.

[tlow98]

Originally Posted by hugyourewoks

I like this higher look a lot! I'm going to get the HDs for my e91. I've teetered between the Bilstein B4 OEM quality for price, and the B6 for higher overall quality. I'm not a race car BMW driver (I like to stomp the gas occasionally, but I drive a heavy wagon, c'mon). The slight off road ability appeals to my outdoor self. Honestly, if I could lift the wagon 1 to 1.5 inches I would be perfectly happy.

BMW has made spring pads in many different thicknesses over the years that will fit this car. You could easily do 5mm, 7, 10, 15 even up to 20mm (iirc) which is a super cheap and easy way to raise the car with no downsides. Just over 3/4" with the 20mm.

[hugyourewoks]

Well, I am going to research the possibilities of doing this to my wagon. Most of the suspension components of the X1 E84 are the same on the E91 according to realOEM. I'll probably start picking up parts from the X1 on ebay for cheap and using a little visual engineering. My main "humph" moment is why aren't springs listed in realOEM? Is this because the springs are a third party product that BMW just uses?

http://www.acschnitzer-us.com/en/bmw...d/gallery.html

[rothwem]

Awesome! An actual lifted wagon. Make sure you post some pics of the X1 conversion.

[Rocklicker]

Man after a 900 mile roadtrip this week to see the total eclipse I'm starting to think this car ain't all that great when you have an infant. The two biggest issues I have are rear seat room for modern, rear-facing car seats, and how low to the ground the E9x is. Added ride height would certainly help with the latter issue and make going down potholed forest service roads a lot more bearable. I like performance, fuel economy, and versatility as much as any wagon owner but this last trip I was certainly hearing the siren song of kid-wrangling practicality that recently lured hassmaschine to the X5.

It will be interesting to see how this thread turns out!

[rothwem]

Originally Posted by Rocklicker

Man after a 900 mile roadtrip this week to see the total eclipse I'm starting to think this car ain't all that great when you have an infant. The two biggest issues I have are rear seat room for modern, rear-facing car seats, and how low to the ground the E9x is. Added ride height would certainly help with the latter issue and make going down potholed forest service roads a lot more bearable. I like performance, fuel economy, and versatility as much as any wagon owner but this last trip I was certainly hearing the siren song of kid-wrangling practicality that recently lured hassmaschine to the X5.

It will be interesting to see how this thread turns out!

He's already installed the X1 stuff--check this thread:

http://www.e90post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1413836

[Kevindshea]

Originally Posted by boro92

Don't go dinan if your car is already raised in the front. All the dinans do is add stack height--effectively raising your front even further by another 1/2 inch or so. You are best served with something like a vorshlag or tck camber plate --where the stack height is the same or in some cases, even less than the stock upper mounts. Fwiw I have bilsteins and stock xi springs with vorshlag plates and my car isn't raised. If anything it is lower

Old thread but not sure how much Dinan fixed plates add .

it's not 1/2" _maybe 1/4" at most

[E91WAG3N]

Any updates? Looking at picking up an xi to satisfy some winter mountain runs and not many people have opted to lift their cars. Most, including myself, have gone in the opposite direction!

[Soravia]

Originally Posted by ubersteuer

Any updates? Looking at picking up an xi to satisfy some winter mountain runs and not many people have opted to lift their cars. Most, including myself, have gone in the opposite direction!

Get X1 springs, cut them to length, get B6/HD dampers (handle stronger springs), and put on 235/45/18 wheels (they fit stock xDrive suspension, barely)

[rothwem]

Originally Posted by Soravia

Get X1 springs, cut them to length, get B6/HD dampers (handle stronger springs), and put on 235/45/18 wheels (they fit stock xDrive suspension, barely)

No cutting required. @hugyourewoks already put X1 springs on and it added about an inch.

Originally Posted by ubersteuer

Any updates? Looking at picking up an xi to satisfy some winter mountain runs and not many people have opted to lift their cars. Most, including myself, have gone in the opposite direction!

For my car, the strut mounts and spring rubbers settled in a month or so and it got back down to normal ride height. I knew it would, but I thought I'd be funny with the thread title. Anyways, I've since sold the car since my knee was acting up and the clutch was torture. I'm in a 6AT wagon now.