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Got the new coilovers installed without reaching the 3 month mark of looking at them in their box !! Will need new front sway bar end links but otherwise went very smoothly. Still have a little more lowering available if I want, but drives very nicely as it is.

Finally installed the new coilovers which have been sitting in a box for a few months !! Very happy with them Can still go a little lower than it's currently set to. MCA Pro Sport's if anybody is interested.

Looks nice. But if that is yours get rid of that plate. Easy pickings for a $200 fine.

I believe all NZ new and Jap import LCIs have hydraulic steering. Rest of the world got electric steering instead.

I meant inner door handle. You can get away without removing the outer one to install the locking mechanism although some may find it easier. As long as you can get into the car you can remove the door card with the door closed and go from there (may result in some damage to it)

Low kms manual 130i for sale in Queenstown. Looks like the owner is going to drive up to Auckland if they can't sell it in Qtwn! https://www.trademe.co.nz/4696546470

I've got them on full soft and they're probably little firmer than the OEM M-Sport setup I think ... still street friendly enough for Auckland roads and no doubt really come alive out of the city. I see MCA have got the Pro Street model on their website now which they said was just about to drop. Would offer a better range of comfort (actually adjusting out of the full soft I am on) but is not designed for as much drop. The level I am at would likely be maximum low on the Pro Street's. Car certainly feels sharper with them installed ... can't really say more than that until the new sway bar end links arrive and i can reconnect that 😆

It's the going rate. Just look at the minter I got for $3k.

Manual Mt1 325i vert on fballs for $35K if you want to be a cool kid like SJ and Palazzo. Was this Will's old car? Looks familiar.

Even easier if your door’s not locked shut. Can’t remove the door handle without removing the window rail and can’t remove the window rail if the door is locked shut. Actually at a loss here, need to break into my own car 😂

Hi @Olaf yes i have had a talk with my engineer and he said it is very much doable. Just need to take some pictures of the e12 underbody and come up with a game plan with him. I haven't started a project page just yet, once I get it started i will indeed document it all. @Neil McCauley Thanks heaps this is pretty much what I was looking for, Chances are either e46 or e90 at this stage just depends what the certifier says and how much work to make either setup fit. But thanks for the site and pictures they help out heaps.

@KwS ironically when they're going to spend several tens of millions to remove one set of traffic lights further down SH2 (Melling) - which I am in favour of. JFC NZTA are terrible. The public service cull should've started with them So much this.

I did a end of year project on suspension kinematics at uni, but the more I learned the less I knew... ... this site has some awesome articles and is a good place to start, I wish I had this resource in 2004! From a design perspective, the E90 stuff is pretty hard to beat. Multi-link is a massive step up from semi trailing arms, but the calculations required for things like spring rates are massively different - See link above. Fortunately the E90 stuff (complete, including the front sub frame) has been used front and rear with an S85 in the past, although it all went into an E30 M3, so it "is" possible. See the pics attached for a possible solution - custom cradle for the rear using the same E90 pickup points, and then get that mated to the shell. Wide body will be the next step if you keep the sub frames the same width though. If you're looking at the simplest solution at getting the power to the ground, I'd suggest a 4-link and tubbing the rear to the width of rubber you want to run - there's really nothing wrong with McPherson struts up front, and you can always build some custom coil overs with rates to your fancy. I've seen it in the rear end of an E30 with 650whp and it was an economical solution to the trailing arm problem.

Negative, went with the Powerflex bushings all round. Are the mono balls supposed to offer some big advantage ? Thankyou for the kind words I used to be a design / mechanical engineer many years ago and have always been into things mechanical / technical / hands on ... whether that is playing with cars or designing / building a deck etc. I'm in the tech game now and have been for some time so this project ticks a lot of boxes for me and the things I enjoy doing 👍

Back into the main project thread with another side project, might start a dedicated thread in case its of use for folks at some point. I will have a crack at making custom PCB's / circuits for the steering wheel controls. Both sides of it for: Cruise control buttons which will go to the Nissan ECU which expects a resistance ladder. BMW has some data based solution. Radio control buttons to go to the Alpine head unit, which also expects a resistance ladder. Can't see the point in trying to use some 3rd party adapter box when I will be messing with the cruise side anyways. Early days but will get the OEM boards out of the wheel this weekend so i can model the shape and button locations. Picture is of starting to look at the cruise signals ... but making some micro controller to take these signals and then some how output a varied resistance / voltage would be somewhat silly.