conrod

Yep, its a tad fat on the tuning side! I was watching an old vid the other night, of the 1992 Nissan Mobil 500 at Wellington.The Nissan GTR of Skaife/Richards used to belch out black smoke- not sure why they used to run it so rich?

Most Ferrari V8's (if not all) run flat plane cranks, pretty much everything else this side of exotica runs crank pins spaced at 90 degrees. The "more mature" among us may remember Roger Freeths V8 Starlet- this ran a Rover V8 which was fitted with a flat plane crank and sounded very cool! It does tend to induce a lot more vibration into an engine than a 90 degree crank though. BRM V16 is THE sweetest sounding engine ever- pity it would only give you a lap or two of music before blowing up! If you are into this sort of thing, go and buy Nick Mason's (Pink Floyd drummer) "Into the Red" book, which details his car collection, and provides a soundtrack on CD, including the fabulous BRM. BTW- the S14 sounds pretty good at 9000 rpm!...............

650 tyres all round. A standard E30 325i only has enough grunt to pull about 190 down the straight at Puke (even though the speedo will tell you 200) so there is no point gearing it for 240 kph, as given a long enough straight it won't be able to pull max revs in top gear anyway. An E36 M3 Evo will do about 230 kph at Puke, and that is with 320hp. You have to look at what hp your car is making, and gear it accordingly.

I'm running a 4.45 in my car at the moment,and with a 1:1 6th gear it is perfect at Puke! Mind you, it will pull 9000 in top!.........

American M3 engine (S52) uses cast iron block, not alloy!

I wonder if they do a non-slip mat for the rear so my dog won't slide around too much?!!!........................

Pretty sure it is going into an E36 coupe! Just use M50/M52 parts, such as engine mounts etc, should be a 100% bolt in job. That was a good deal by the way!

$2500 buy now offer- sounds like a fair price to me!!!!

Mark, cylinder head not likely to be the source of problem, unless it is cracked and water in going into combustion chamber, and you would probably notice it using water if it was. Give Gavin Bellars a call regarding Dyno tuning, he is on the shore, has a good dyno,and knows BMW's inside out.He has run several of the E30 cars already, so has a good database to compare yours to. Furthermore he is much more friendly when it comes to invoicing than Jerry Claytons, if you get my drift! Hi Velocity Ltd 16D Parity Place Glenfield 021 483 562 442 4451 cheers Conrad

Sounds like a very good deal to me! Good luck with the sale, and whoever buys it can come play in the "open class" of the race series!

Although there is a black one in NZ that has always been touted as being "genuine factory RHD," I think you will find it was bought by BMW Motorsport Australia (Frank Gardner) as a LHD, then converted into a RHD car over there. A top notch job, but not factory.

Next time you are at a roundabout with a LOT of traffic flow, look what happens. The feeder streets to the left of the main feeder get backed up because they cannot enter the roundabout, as there is always traffic on the roundabout. You do not need a degree in traffic flow to see what happens, it really is quite obvious even to a caual observer.

The powers that be haven't followed Australias roundabout example for a very good reason- THEY DONT WORK! Roundabouts only work for LIGHT traffic flow areas, feed some heavy traffic though one and see the problems start- ever driven through Sydney in rush hour-f%$kin nightmare!!!!!! Great to see the new feeders to and from the northwestern finally open, heaps better than sitting on Union St for ages. And if you don't like the drive to work, I'll let you in on a secret that will reduce travelling time to work to zero- work from home!

Or a cheap base for an M3 race car! cup half full etc. etc.

I don't think it works like that, it must be 20 years old from when it was first registered when it comes into NZ, regardless of who brings it in, and sells it to who etc. You can re-export it if it is a bit "young" then bring it back in, but this is obviously a bit expensive to do.

Correct!

ALL, and I mean ALL E30 M3's were built as LHD by the factory, if anyone tells you they have a rare factory RHD (including the black one kicking around AK) then they are wrong! You will find most, if not all M3's in Japan are still LHD. Most use 325i parts to convert to RHD, including the slower steering rack. Easy conversion by the look of it, but given the choice I would leave it LHD if possible.

I looked at doing this about 12 months ago, and found you will pay between NZ$7000-$13000 for a japanese car, depending on condition, I saw an Evo 2 go for $12K which looked like nice condition, I just missed out on that! I always say buy the best you can afford or find, it will be a more cost effective solution in the long term. Landed it should owe you around $15K, no I have not done the excercise but these were the numbers I came up with when I looked into it. For the trouble of doing it you will end up with a much nicer car then one of the $13K ones being advertised on trademe, or if you go the cheapy route you should own/land one for less than $10K.

They are 12mm thick in the crowns, so you certainly have the scope to machine them down.

I just bought a job lot of race car parts, mostly for my S14, but there were a few other odd bits in the mix, these were one of the things. Thought I'd throw the offer out here first. They are 83.6mm JE forged pistons for an M42. Originally made for a development engine for an NZ touring car,they use only one compression ring and one oil ring, for lower friction (same as the S14 and S42 sprint engines) Anyway, if they are of any use to anyone, I am offering them for $600 with rings and gudgeon pins and circlips,all brand new never been fitted etc. These would cost you $1500 normally, $600 is the price if anyone wants them. cheers conrad

Sounds pricey Darren- why not save yourself a lot of hassle and money, and just buy Group 4 Escort ones, they are the same part as the BMW ones! (both ZF LSD's)

What is the failure point- stupid bitch not fact checking or the handbrake?!!!.................

hope he remembered to put the handbrake on in those first few pics! I can see an AMI ad coming on.........

That second photo, definitely reminds me of someone, who was that German bloke?!.................

So Sam, the 1900 auto floats your boat then?