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I have a 115mm grinder and had no trouble. But I cut a lot of the cradle out first and bent the bits away from the welds to ensure ease of access, cheating. You'll get covered in sparks and have a pretty pattern of burns on your forearms. (when you have ear plugs and specs on you don't need a long sleeve shirt, have to leave an element of danger.)

Exactly what I thought untill I sat in some. The huge holes don't obscure a thing. Bit over the top here, that thing won't see a track or a windy road. Just the same sets of traffic lights over and over.

Open diff made in March 1988. 40 teeth on the ring gear, 11 teeth on the pilot. 3.63 ratio. A fine ratio indeed.

Ok. This car is AMAZING. Worth every dollar. It's amazing with crap tires on the back... I tested the damping abilities by turning hard over 4 railway tracks... tractioned. Hit big speed bumbs at 60-70 while turning.. traction. Well, none while the car was in the air AHAA, but landed well. Hit Hanrahan St (north west christchurchians will know it, near the uni) with no brakes, traction. Love these matched shocks. And the spring rates will be fantastic for Targa style duty. Ride height is good. Will be testing with 4 good street tires tomorrow. (pilots and 901's) Anyway I said there would be a detailed report aha, I will continue testing tomorrow. And yes indeed Sam, now that I'm finally mobile again I'll come round at some stage

If only it didn't cost a testicle to get it on the ferry! The first decent road I drove in this car was those Rimutaka hills. Would love to hit them up now.

Sennas car... Heading to welly in a few weeks. Will be going.

I found out a few onths ago that a 325i E30 was about 80-90000 dollars when released. The average house price in Hamilton at the time was 30k!

I have a 3 tonne powerbuilt one. A lot of use over th last 8 months. Works well, but heavy, and goes high. Not the fastest jack though aha

Yeah I think I'll be getting the perches moved down, annoying, but now that I see it rides quite high it'll help out. I'm happy with where it sits now though, just want it a bit lower for when it becomes more dedicated to the track.

If I can gather the funds... I still need a roof haha! And a warrant. So I'll evaluate

Heh, sure Riley, we can do that any time this week. It's got much much more potential, the streets provide no challenge. Want to get some Rcompounds baaaad. With them all wound down to min, I'd say it'd a little lower than the old springs, and that's all I intend to lower it. I'll sort it out tomorrow in the daylight ha. Been a looooong day doing up bolts. And the camber in the front is massive. Such a stance. Love it.

Hmmm well I just went and tore up the streets a bit. Battery is f**ked, won't start at all, even after 20 mins of high revs... Might charge it over night. And the wind buffeting from the big hole in the roof hurts the ear drums. But, ITS AMAZING. No body roll and the car is much, much more responsive, really notice the sunroof weight missing, and the bushings and not harsh at all. The way the power gets put down is dramatic, instant and smooth. The corner entry is fast, and the back end comes around so nicely, mid corner throttle control is simple, drift it or not is simply a wee bit more on the gas, the lower kays LSD feels much tighter. Corner exit... Wow. Most fun ever. There is no slop at all, what you put in is what the car does. Hold the steering wheel straight and use the power to turn, ohhh damn it was a blast. The dampers need another half turn on them or so, more on the front I think, rebound damping wasn't strong enough (They were all 1/2 a turn from soft just now) Springs were compliant and the whole kit was completely silent. No noise. The only noise now is a beautiful diff winding noise, not loud really, but great to listen to. I need to get 2 more pilots to match the front tires, then tune the weight distro. The car is not low at all, in fact its about 2cm higher than before, and thats with the rears CAPTIVE at 1/2 way up and the fronts just captivised. No pics till tomorrow

I have just finished installing EVERYTHING. Except for the AKG motor mounts. Off to get some brake fluid, then bleed brakes. And off to my friend at Advantage Tires, at the sockburn roundabout, to get an alignment. Student discount.

For Ollie Oh and sometimes a lot of bending back and forth to tear the metal can help...

Yeah the spacer below the shock won't help, the shock is as high as it can go. I haven't got them on the car, but I'll show you why this lack of shock extension is a concern for me. It's not to do with travel or droop. It's the fact that there is about 6cm of spring perch range and I can only use half of it. In the pic the rear strut is wound until just captive, I could lower the car 1cm (the shock won't be captive but it's not like I'll be hitting ramps and doing back flips, plus te big sway bar will keep it all together, this is how the kit was designed to run). The front strut is wound as much as I can do with my 22 year old fit muscles with the proper tool for leverage, that's the max preload I can attain. The ride height is going to change by sh*t f**k all, the collar has only moved 2cm or so, and that makes the spring more preloaded and the car sits what maybe 1cm higher? when it gets on the ground.. This is my only concern really. The travel will be fine how it is. But, If the shock was lenghtened by say 3-4 cm, I could wind the perch right up and have it captive and nicely preloaded. With added bonus of more travel. And I could wind it down for track days, it won;t be captive, but the spring is not going any where is it? Especially with a 24 mm sway bar and the fact it has no where to go even if loose. I see this as logical, I've never had 'adjusties' before, but from the hoards of setups I've researched, mine just seems wrong.

No the one of the left can be lowered 1cm, which is how it is now in my lounge. 1cm of range is not enough, hence the need for longer shocks.

I only need the spring to be captive when it is wound right up, for warrants and rough road thrashing. It doesn't need to be captive for the track, and that's how the kit is run in the states, non captive on the road and track. It's all pre-planned

Red is spring. Blue is the collar travel. Left is how it is now, at MAX ride height. Right is how the shock should be, set up so Max ride height is matched to the spring lenght. The shock is as far out as it can go in both pics here. *I'm confident both my front and rear will be captive with the longer springs I have over the standard kit. From installing the rear today it looks like it will be captive. The front 100000% is ahaa.

Dude dude dude. You don't get what I'm trying to say. I don't want a low, low, low car, I want the ability to raise and lower the car by the 6 or so centimeters the collar gives me. And if the shock stanchion was 2 inches further out i WOULD have more travel. Sigh.

A few disadvantages to changing the height with preload... There would be less droop and more inclination for the wheels to come off the ground during braking on a rough road.. I would like the most droop possible Solving problems in this thread rocks!

I can't just wind it up... All that does is squeeze the spring, not change the height, it is all bolted together and I've played with it all day, so I'm not guessing here Need the height adjustment! Otherwise I would have just bought springs haha. *I see what you mean about the preload changing the ride height, I'd rather not do it that way, would rather have minimal preload and all adustment via the distance the collar travels

The shock stanchion doesn't extend far enough out of the shock housing. Therefore the max ride height is limited by this because the spring is 2 inches longer than GC spec, and clearly they have given me shocks for 6 inch long springs. I'm still going to have the max ride height that 6 inch springs give, but I'm only able to lower it about 1cm, I could get the new spring perch welded on about 5cm lower to get the full range of height adjustment, but that defeats the purpose, it'd be much to low.. I wanted longer springs for long travel, but I still have the same travel as 6 inch springs, and hardly any height adjustability. If I just wind the collar up I'll get massive preload on the spring, and a harsher ride. The only option really is getting the shocks un-shortened. I assume this can be done. I hope.

Yeah I have the AKG diff bushing, it's made a few appearences in the thread so far :D Shots from today. Pretty much have the rear end in. Subframe was a nightmare, the bolts weren't lining up with the aluminium sleves in the bushings. After an hour of mucking around I devised a plan, I took the Al sleeve out and put the subframe up, then used 3 fingers to flex the bottom of the bolt across with the sleeve while my sister smacked the bottom of it. WIN. And the front struts are all wrong. GC have shortened the shocks too much. In the pic that's the highest I can run it.. The shocks would be perfect for the 6 inch spring BUT I GOT THE 8 INCH, GAH. Incredibly annoying. can I get these shocks lengthened? And keep my custom valving?

Rear end almost back together, subframe was a BITCH. Front is ready to bolt in. Will be driving it tomorrow BACK TO THE CAR! Will be working till sunset has long passed

When the engine comes out I shall. Probably before summer.