M42B18 to M50B30 Swap

[318isCoupe 0]

i n a straight line drag with a mates M535i thats had , engine had new rings etc, e34 head fitted , chipped and a cam , pretty much neck and neck upto about 150km/h then the e28 just pulls away ,he is still in third gear upto 180km/h .

Reckon you'd take Him if your's was manual and had been chipped, head + cam work, and exhaust and intake..?

I'm probably going to go for an M52B28.

[318isCoupe 0]

Have you checked what brakes you actually have in your car, like are they vented front & rear or vented front solid rears.

Rotors are an easy and cheap upgrade, stock 328 ones are around $100 a pair, not sure what you need to do with calipers

If you drive like that then I would be doing lots of brake and suspension development to ensure you stick to the road and look at some real sticky tyres not mid range as they will let you down when you least want to be let down. ( I have a similar style but slighty less agressive on getting to the Speed limit but onvce there generally add GST. )

The M52 B28 trawls seriously from 1500 RPM in standard form and with recent mods has more bottom end and similar top end behaviour to an M 50

If you look at the perfoemance of the 323 and 325 they are very simiar in top speed and acceleration

The difference is in the 80 to 120 in 4th gear acceleration, the M52 will get there half a second quicker, the gap is even bigger for the 28

I've already done the 328 rotor swap! And yes, went from vented front and solid rear to vented all around.

Doing Mintex 1166's and fluid today. And somepoint later I might do stainless brake lines since they apparently improve pedal feel.

Suspension wise, I'm open to suggestions..

Today I'm also looking for a new set of tyres to put on my factory 16"s too..

[318isCoupe 0]

Had Conti previously also good but last bit of compound is quite hard and no fun in the wet.

I'm guessing when you say 'no fun in the wet' you mean that I'd really enjoy the lack of traction in any situation except hill starts in front of an angry cop?

Don't worry, this really clued up guy that races a corvette has convinced me that what I need is 155 rayon cord's and I'll be sweet.

Suspension wise , beef up sway bars , Koni SA shocks and heavier springs, which part of town are you in?

Pretty much exactly what I'd planned to do, just wanted a different opinion.. I'm actually very happy with the m-spec suspension in the rear.. It feels like there's an unproportionate amount of roll in the front of the car compared to the back and I'd like to tighten it up a lot..

[318isCoupe 0]

Hey I have a Navara ute for that, lets go early so you can power slide any time you want in the wet and it is diesel !!!

The Conti became very unsticky for the last 10,000km so you had to button off quite a bit or they would just go into a 4 wheel slide. The P Zeroes, do slide in the wet but you need to provoke them and they are very predictable so you can have some fun and it is all happening at "good" speed.

On the Suspension front when you say M Tech I take it is up rated springs and shocks plus stiffer sway bar- Sway bar should be 18 mm. If so the stiffening up the front by going to 26 mm bar and Koni SA etc will balance the car back up.

I did the rear bar first and while it was fun to start the car tended to over steer and "push" from the back with more roll in the front , plus on twisty off camber sections it was easy to spin a back wheel in a corner.

Once I balanced it up again traction inproved and car is far more settled on the road. Mine is now Mtec springs with Koni SA shocks plus M3 sway bar in the rear

I'd like to increase the oversteer tendencies of the car a little just to have it feeling a bit more balance because at the moment it's very neutral/slight understeer, and my driving has always been in cars which have either a lot of oversteer (push it too hard out of the corner and you need instant opposite lock.. first car was a tuned & stripped mk1 Escort on skinny little tyres..) or that through power manage to flick the rear of the car out on corner exits (SR20DET S13 running fairly close on the limits of its factory internals).. so I'd like a setup where it doesn't feel like the rear of the car is pushing the front of the car towards the nearest outside bank or ditch and might even need a flick to throw the rear back into a straight line if I'm particularly excited in my corner exits. (in no way am I trying to make a 318iS do drifts.. I just feel uncomfortable driving a car that doesn't have a natural feeling oversteer)

In the front do you think I could (for now) just do the sway bar and a higher rated spring on the M-tec shocks? As it is a lot softer in the front of the car (even just pressing down on the bonnet you feel a huge difference) and from what it feels like while driving, most of it is the actual dip in the front of the car under braking/rise under acceleration feel than an actual body roll.. as far as I know the shocks will help against the "lifting" effect on one side of the car under body roll and the springs help against the "dropping" effect on the opposite side of the car to counteract the roll? the biggest problem in this car feels like the way the outside (in relation to the corner) of the car "drops" into the corner.. I'm used to a very flat, hard ride that feels almost solid at lower speeds so this gets a tad un-nerving and makes it feel like coaxing an oil tanker around some corners..

However the other thing is that presently (according to my tyre wear, cornering feel and a recent wheel alignment.. they don't adjust camber..) my front tyres are running no negative camber if not a slight positive, and my rears are running very slight negative camber, 0.3-0.5 degree's.. what would you suggest as camber settings? I was of the opinion somewhere around 1.5 in the front and 0.5-1.0 in the rear would be an improvement?

Cheer's for the help..