[ajvee]

Originally Posted by MNm3

Welcome... welcome back it sounds like. That e36 is awesome
I like your e90 too. Sedan looks good with the comp wheels. I wish I had those on mine.

Believe you me... You will not be dissapointed by the e90 m3 on the track. It is a blast.

Do you have any aftermarket plans for the new M? I'm in the market for exhaust and just can't figure out which to go with as I've only heard one in person (Gintani).

I presume you've listened to the official exhaust soundclip thread? What is the word on changing out xpipes? Are you considering that as well? I would think swapping that out would really let that V8 sing.

[M3x2]

Originally Posted by ajvee

What type of engine management system are you using? Is your reluctance to track the car based on reliability or too much power? Also, what is your take on the forced induction scene for the E30 and E46 M3s? What is the overrall consensus on whether turbocharging or supercharging is better? Obviously, the power delivery on each system is completely different, but I am curious on what most modders opt for.

Hi again. the tuning is by TRM (Atlanta). My reluctance to track her is soley based on the fact that it's a convertible so any roll-over event could be truly catastrophic. In fact, the BMW and Audi clubs explicitly prohibit them on their events. Of course a roll cage could be assembled, but that would defeat the purpose of a pleasure car (the kids love rides in her) and a proper roll cage would probably make it impossible to have the top up, so any rain would ruin your day.

As for consensus between turbo and sc, that's a long, hot topic. Most would agree that you can get more power from a turbo while sc's tend to be a little more linear. Lots more info is available here

As for the E90. I might do an exhaust, but really am reluctant to do anything more. I mean its plenty fast and handles superbly! I just ditched an '09 E63 AMG for this car. The E63 was very comfortable and was an absolute sledgehammer power wise, but I never felt particularly safe or connected when driving her hard. She lasted 11 months in my hands. I'm thinking the E90 will have greater longevity! If I ever do get bored (which I doudt), I can always drop in the Dinan stroker engine.

[BSME90]

^^I think I saw your M3 on bimmerforums. I'm definitely jealous!!

[IRL-MN]

I'll have some bits and pieces for sale in the next week or so, offering to the local MN guys first:

1. OEM european light switch to enable rear fogs. For pre-2009 vehicles. $75.
2. Matte black kidney grilles. Purchased from Bimmian less than 6 months ago. $50.
3. Front tow hook license plate mounting bracket. Purchased from rho plate less than 6 months ago. $40.

All in excellent condition.

[M3x2]

I did buy this car off the showroom floor at Maplewood, the very one you had seen.

For me 4 doors is key as I regularly haul the kids around town.

As for the E63. It was more gorilla, the E90 more cheetah. E63 more sledgehammer, E90 more scalpel. Both have their merits. The E63 felt pretty squirrelly near the limit and didnt inspire confidence. Finally, it was a little too pimp-like for my tastes, lots of chrome. I did really like it thoug, it's just that i prefer the E90, that's all

Speaking of chrome, would IRL-MN's matte black kidney grills fit my E90? I'd like to try it out.

The E36 is pretty sleeper. A trained eye would notice it's lower and hear the aftermarket (AA gen 3) exhaust. The air-water intercooler radiator is tucked away down low in front, and the SC is pretty quiet. It's so much fun to drive on a nice day!

[BrianMN]

Haha what's your main reasoning for wanting the DSG?

[IRL-MN]

Originally Posted by Nick.CBR

When do you pick that new coupe up?? I'm on the fence about the grilles. Maybe someone else has a burning desire to pickup your brand new stuff for a good deal I'll let you know...

Nick

It was dropped in Baltimore last Friday. My CA reckons it'll be another 5 days or so before they have it.

I think they look good with my Space Gray, or any of the other lighter colors. I'm also on the fence about swapping out for the BMW Performance gloss grilles with my new Le Mans blue. I'll have to see the color in the flesh first!

[IRL-MN]

Originally Posted by Nick.CBR

Oh - and how do you like the DSG trans? I swear I'm the only other one on this board that is killing to have that trans in my N54 equiped 335 Everyone else seems to prefer the 6MT (aka, grampa's transmission)

Nick

Grampa's eh? Should we start the debate again

[IRL-MN]

Originally Posted by M3x2

I did buy this car off the showroom floor at Maplewood, the very one you had seen.

For me 4 doors is key as I regularly haul the kids around town.

As for the E63. It was more gorilla, the E90 more cheetah. E63 more sledgehammer, E90 more scalpel. Both have their merits. The E63 felt pretty squirrelly near the limit and didnt inspire confidence. Finally, it was a little too pimp-like for my tastes, lots of chrome. I did really like it thoug, it's just that i prefer the E90, that's all

Speaking of chrome, would IRL-MN's matte black kidney grills fit my E90? I'd like to try it out.

The E36 is pretty sleeper. A trained eye would notice it's lower and hear the aftermarket (AA gen 3) exhaust. The air-water intercooler radiator is tucked away down low in front, and the SC is pretty quiet. It's so much fun to drive on a nice day!

Welcome! You have a nice stable of vehicles there

I don't think my grilles would fit an E90. I'd recommend the gloss ones if you decide to go dark. They will flow better with the gloss mirror and window surrounds.

[M3x2]

More E36 love:

[airwolf878]

Originally Posted by M3x2

More E36 love:

Nice pics!

Apparently you know my friend Eric with a black turbo'd E36?

[M3x2]

Well, Airwolf, I've never met Eric, but was complicit in his getting into said turbo M3. I knew the seller (and the guy who built it before him), and did suggest he drive it. As you know, when you aren't a buyer (in this case I already had a FI E36), the next best thing is the fun helping others get into fast cars, and generally spending their $$! .

How is that turbo running? Last I heard he was working on a tune with the meth kit.

[airwolf878]

Originally Posted by M3x2

Well, Airwolf, I've never met Eric, but was complicit in his getting into said turbo M3. I knew the seller (and the guy who built it before him), and did suggest he drive it. As you know, when you aren't a buyer (in this case I already had a FI E36), the next best thing is the fun helping others get into fast cars, and generally spending their $$! .

How is that turbo running? Last I heard he was working on a tune with the meth kit.

Gotcha. He hasn't done anything with the tune yet, so it's still set up how it was when he bought it... which is fairly conservative compared to what the car could handle. Still very fast though!

[M3x2]

I'm still getting used to the DCT, but so far I like it a lot. It provides the convenience of an automatic when in traffic or I'm lazily cruising, yet when asked to, it shifts faster/smoother and rev matches better than any human possibly can. I plan to track the car and the dct will allow me to focus on line and braking more. Its also very flexible. and finally, if I want to row gears, I always have the E36.

I dont think its better than a 6mt either, just very cool and very very efficient. You can argue that its cheating or that it might be 'less involved' than a proper 3-pedal manual, but there's little argument the DCT is faster. Both are great.

[MNm3]

The E90 M3's grilles are different than the regular E90s. I got the black ones on mine. I believe they are the exact same as the E92 for the M cars as they share the same front end.

If you want em. Check out TurnerMotorsport.com

They have the black and Carbon if you want, plus a laundry list of other goodies.


ajvee:

On the exhaust note. Yes I've listened to the exhaust review... about a 1000times... Some good sounds there.
I'm thinking I will stick with cat back and not mess with HFCs as it is my daily driver and I don't really want to deal with the Check engine light until I get a chip. Plus some of the ones I have heard sound sort of tin canish.

I'll look more into it when I can afford another car to drive to and from the office.

What's your opinion on the best sounding one? I really like the Eisenmann Race sound...

[M3x2]

thanks MNm3, will check out turner right now.

[ajvee]

Chaps,

I hope you had an awesome weekend, because I for one did! I decided to take Monday off to attend the BIR performance driving track day. For more information, refer to: http://birperformance.com/viewpage.aspx?ID=63

As a bit of background, some of you (MnM3, DrBurton, BrianMN, etc.) might recall that I was unsure about tracking my car as I was fearful about the strains on my drivetrain, brakes, scratches, tires, resale, etc.

Anyway, the beginning of last week I realized that I had had my car for almost a year and barely knew the thing. How would it handle at the limit? What would acceleration feel like out of a corner? How would turbo lag play a factor in a competitive situation? Out of fear of "hurting" my car, I choose to live vicariously through the numerous car reviews and the experiences of those brave souls who tracked their 1ers. Bear in mind, I have driven on a track numerous times in the past but it was always with track prepped or crappy cars that could be driven hard with little consequence. Anyway, I was itching to know what it felt like to drive my car hard and pulled the trigger on a day long Track session at BIR!

The first part of the session was a classroom orientation session with the usual spiel about safety, flags, race lines, etc. So I will not bore you any further with it.

Here is a list of other cars that were in attendance:

Audi S4
Lexus SC430
Porsche 911 convertible
BMW E36 M roadster
Honda S2000
Corvette C6
Ford GT

The instructors first took all of us for a ride in a ford explorer K9 edition around the track. The dude was an ex-indy car driver and he definitely wasn't looking to get any groceries with that thing! The first thing I noticed about the track was that it was pretty technical in that the straights were short and corners quickly lead into each other.

My drive

Instead of being excited about the prospect of driving my car, I initially fussed the instructor with questions on wear and tear, oil temperatures, etc. Anyway, as soon as I started my warmup lap to learn the lines, all my worries were replaced by HOW FAST CAN I GET THIS THING AROUND THIS TRACK!


For the first few laps, an instructor will accompany you and once they are comfortable with your level of experience, the track is yours for the rest of the day, barring an hour for lunch.

I can only describe the laps as exhilarating. These cars were meant to be driven like this (at least a couple times a year ) With each lap, I took it on as a challenge to hit the apexes more precisely and exit the corners more aggressively. I began to really understand some of the handling nuances cited by magazine reviews and regular track rats. Specific to my car, I noted that it had a general tendency to understeer and it rolled gently during long sweeping corners. After my third lap, all my concerns about tracking my car were firmly out of my mind and it was definitely a liberating feeling. I did glance down at my oil temp gauge once and noticed that it was rock stead at 250.

After about 6 laps, on my 7th lap with the instructor, I became a bit cocky. For the first 6 laps, I was being relatively conservative and hitting the lines very consciously, braking well in advance, and being light on the throttle. On my 7th lap, on the 6th turn, I was a bit slow coming out of a corner which quickly led into the 7th turn. I figured I would use more of the throttle this time to see if I could combat some of the understeer I was experiencing and then it happened.

Within seconds, the tail shot out and I experienced a jarring ride into the grass. I had lost it at about 60 mph. and immediately I got a sick feeling about the potential damage to the car. After the dust settled, the TPMS light came on and the steering wheel was vibrating badly. I limped the car home into the pit and got out nervously. My front left and rear right tires were flat and all four wheels were caked in mud and grass. I thought to myself that I couldn't have possibly had a worse start to this.

It turns out that dirt had gotten in between the tire and the rim, which was causing the tires to lose air. Unfortunately, the tire shop opposite the race track wouldn't dismount a low profile 18" wheel, so there ended my track day. Since I didn't have a spare and my right rear tire was still leaking, I decided to head back home early to get it checked out at the Discount tire. The lead instructor was awesome and basically said that he wouldn't count this session and that I could come back for another day whenever I wanted!

Ironically, once at the Discount tire, the leak had mysteriously disappeared .

As an aside, the folks at Discount tire are awesome! They got me in right away, put all four wheels in the dunk tank and confirmed that there were no leaks. They spent more than half hour on my car and charged me nothing for it! I highly recommend their customer care and service.

I think it would be great if we got a group of bimmers together for a day at BIR. They will offer us a discount if we get more than five people and should have the track pretty much to ourselves.

What better way to enjoy our ultimate driving machines than by actually driving them? (the corniness of this sentence will leave a bad taste in my mouth for days to come)

I hope I didn't bore you all with my review

Cheers.

[ajvee]

ajvee:

On the exhaust note. Yes I've listened to the exhaust review... about a 1000times... Some good sounds there.
I'm thinking I will stick with cat back and not mess with HFCs as it is my daily driver and I don't really want to deal with the Check engine light until I get a chip. Plus some of the ones I have heard sound sort of tin canish.

I'll look more into it when I can afford another car to drive to and from the office.

What's your opinion on the best sounding one? I really like the Eisenmann Race sound...[/QUOTE]

Dude,

I agree about the X pipes, because it sounds like they have broken coke cans in the engine.

My ranking:

1) Meisterschaft
2) AA signature
3) Eisenmann race

The can understand why you like the eisenmann race as it has that exotic note to it, but I think choices 1 and 2 really bring out the V8 characteristic of the engine and add that boom.

[M3x2]

ajvee, that bir write-up was great! Even the spin out part. If you dont push it, you dont learn, right, and no real damage done, thankfully.....

Glad you had the chance to get the car out there and thrash her around. That's awesome. I just got back from skip barber driving their formula car around Laguna Seca. I am still high from the experience.

this was me, 6/27th;


One of the big reasons I bought the E90 M3 was that my instructors told me its the fastest car in their 'performance school' they drive around that track. "no question about it" was that several of them say. looking forward to break-in and then bir and Road America!

hope to catch you up there sometime

[M3x2]

Hardwire V1 install: Just did mine in the E90, with remote display in ashtray (blacks out head unit for more stealth, and places mute button at easy reach). Willing to help anyone else interested.

[ajvee]

Originally Posted by M3x2

Hardwire V1 install: Just did mine in the E90, with remote display in ashtray (blacks out head unit for more stealth, and places mute button at easy reach). Willing to help anyone else interested.

I am defnitely interested in this. Do you by chance have an extra one lying around that I can buy from you?

It would be great to see what your E90 can do at BIR. As I said in my post, lets try to get a group together to go up there. They have all their open track sessions on Monday.

[M3x2]

no, sorry, i dont have one, but they are available for purchase directly from valentine. You want the main head unit ($399) and the remote display ($39), seen here: https://store.valentine1.com/store/

once you have those things, we can get it done in about 30 minutes. IMHO, these items are not nice to have, they are mandatory!