WTB: Rare/NLA Dinan Parts for E46 M3

[megandowdell]

I have an E46 M3 coming soon that currently has exactly 10 Dinan points. I’ve ordered a carbon airbox, so I’ll be removing the Dinan intake and changing the tune. I’d still like to keep the car at or above 10 points and retain the Dinan badge with other period-correct Dinan parts.

I’m searching for any of the following:

• Dinan high-flow throttle bodies
• Dinan performance cams
• Dinan/Brembo brake kit
• Dinan 3.91 differential
• Dinan rear trailing-arm bushings/RTABs
• Dinan forged wheels

I am looking for all of these, but I definitely don’t expect to find, or necessarily purchase, every item on the list. I mainly want to see what may still exist in people’s collections or become available for resale.

I know these parts are NLA and extremely rare. From searching forums and Facebook groups, it seems like some of them only surface once every year or two. I’m open to used parts, worldwide shipping, leads on dismantled Dinan cars, or recommendations for specialty resellers that may handle discontinued Dinan components.

Please message me if you have any of these parts or know someone who might. Documentation, original invoices, part numbers, or information about the Dinan car they came from would be greatly appreciated, but not required.

I’m not on this forum often, so feel free to message me on instagram (@megandhercars) or email me ([email protected]).

Thank you in advance!
Megan

[9kracing]

Hi Megan. I'll shoot you an email, I have some of those parts you're looking for.

Also, in case anyone else wants it, here's the original Dinan brochure.

[02_lsb]

I’m ignorant. Never thought of Dinan as an upgrade, between non functional exhaust tips, to overpriced rebadged brakes…

what is the benefit of a Dinan badge?

[PSUEng]

Hi Megan. I'll shoot you an email, I have some of those parts you're looking for.

Also, in case anyone else wants it, here's the original Dinan brochure.

Now I got pressure to decide about those wheels! Dammit!

[xansabi]

I’m ignorant. Never thought of Dinan as an upgrade, between non functional exhaust tips, to overpriced rebadged brakes…

what is the benefit of a Dinan badge?

Status...

[PSUEng]

Hi Megan. I'll shoot you an email, I have some of those parts you're looking for.

Also, in case anyone else wants it, here's the original Dinan brochure.

Damn I only have 4 badge points; 3 of those in a box waiting for me to get off my duff and install. I wonder Who made their cams?

[Sharocks]

Welcome to E46 M3 ownership lol

Dinan was bought out by the same company that bought APR and Holley so when you call them, you're calling APR/Holley too.

A lot of the parts have been NLA for a while and will remain like that unfortunately.

I have been able to get some parts made for me by them in some instances but regarding your list below:

• Dinan high-flow throttle bodies - You just missed a set, every 6 months of so a set pops up
• Dinan performance cams - These are Schrick 280/272s but some folks claim that they're OE CSL ones (I don't believe that)
• Dinan/Brembo brake kit - You can get these new
• Dinan 3.91 differential - This is just a REM polished 3.91 R&P, but it's tough finding 3.91 gears now but not impossible
• Dinan rear trailing-arm bushings/RTABs - APR might have a set on the shelf
• Dinan forged wheels - I have a newly refinished set of them, never had tires mounted, I ended up finding some 18s to clear the Dinan Brembo brakes

Truthfully, as an owner of an S2 and S3R, Dinan parts on this platform is kinda meh.

It's cool as a talking point but in reality we have a lot of other great companies to work with that do stuff better.

If your car is already rocking a Dinan badge, I'd consider some other options for the money.

If this is about building value, Dinan on an E46 M3 is not the same as Dinan on an E39 M5 (they made far less Dinan M5's and therefore the pricing on them is stupid)

Source: I also own an E39 M5 and have Dinan bits on it lol

Good luck!

[George Hill]

Its not on your list, but I have a set of rebuilt JRZ shocks and struts. They have been waiting for the right project but I would sell them if you are interested.

[9kracing]

You guys have to remember Dinan was offering these parts back in 2006... you could buy a brand new M3 off the lot and take it to Dinan and have them modify to a level where it was faster than 99% of vehicles on the road. All this, and you keep your warranty from BMW.

In 2026 there are certainly equal or better options for most of these parts.

IDK if a Dinan E46 M3 is worth more than a non-Dinan car, but being a "Dinan car" certainly tells you the car wasn't hacked together in someone's garage.

[Maurzog]

I have a set of TB’s send me a message.

[xansabi]

What LSD does the Dinan 3.91 use?

[9kracing]

"Your Dinan catalog is very specific about what Dinan did to the differential. On page 4 under “DINAN Driveline Performance”, it says Dinan “shortens the stock 3.62 final drive gearing to a 3.91 ratio” and then says that “Dinan proprietary gear sets are lapped and fully matched.” It identifies the complete product as the 3.91 Limited Slip Differential.

That wording is important. Dinan talks about its gear set, not a proprietary LSD carrier or locking mechanism. The accompanying photo on page 4 is also just the ring-and-pinion gearset.

BMW's own contemporary technical release for the E46 M3 says its Variable M Differential Lock was developed jointly by BMW M and GKN Viscodrive GmbH. That is the speed-sensitive, multi-plate GKN M Variable / Visco-Lok differential used in the E46 M3. BMW describes it as fundamentally different from the older fixed 25%-lock M differentials.

So the best-supported configuration for the period-correct Dinan E46 M3 3.91 is:

BMW/GKN M Variable LSD carrier
+ Dinan proprietary 3.91:1 ring & pinion
+ Dinan setup/lapping/matching of the gearset

In other words, Dinan did not appear to replace the GKN LSD center with a Quaife, Drexler, Salisbury-style conventional clutch LSD, etc. They changed the final-drive gearing while retaining the E46 M3's M Variable LSD architecture. The surviving Dinan page still identifies the unit as D773-0460, their 3.91 Limited Slip Differential."

[9kracing]

This was not your typical automotive product introduction. Oh man, no. Sure, we were riding in the new car with the CEO of the company and yes, the VP of marketing was... nearby. But at that very moment we were going 185 mph on a very narrow tree- and cow-lined country road in a car driven by Dinan chief Steve Dinan, and right there in front of us—only a bumper or so away—was marketing VP Herb Shattuck on his personal Aprilia Mille R 1000-cc V-Twin, and we were passing him, passing him, when Dinan spoke.

“We’ve been discussing this for about a year and a half, what’s faster, a car or a bike,” he said, as if he were on the way to Home Depot for some wing nuts and not about to turn his VP into road pizza.

Turns out it’s a car (fire up your hate mail, bikers). But not just any car, this particular one was the Dinan S3-R M3, a 462-hp fully tuned howler that sells for more than $100,000. We had been driving it earlier, though going simply fast (not former World Challenge-racer fast), and found it did everything it was supposed to do just fine, like an M3 but more so in every area of performance: better handling, way faster, but not harsh and jarring like a crazed race car.



Yes, $100 grand is a lot more than a stock M3, which retails for about half that, leading to the question: Is a Dinan S3-R M3 worth double the sticker? Well, that depends how badly you want to catch your VP of marketing.

First there is the engine hardware: a Vortech gear-driven supercharger adding 5.5 psi of boost, air-to-air intercooler, bigger fuel injectors and much better oil cooler and radiator, as well as countless hours spent setting the optimum engine management calibration, all of which help give the S3-R that 462 hp and 328 lb-ft of torque at the flywheel.

Then there’s the 3.91 limited-slip for quicker launches and the Dinan/JRZ adjustable shocks, front negative camber plates, better bushings and bigger brakes front and rear. Bigger 275/30 front and 285/30 rear Michelin PS-2s on 19-inch wheels help, too. That’s not everything, just the highlights.

But, you say, I can get stuff very much like that on the internet for next to almost nothin’ and slap it willy-nilly onto my own M3 and have plenty of coin to go out and buy a superbike, too.

Well, yes, technically you could. But the reason Dinan stuff is so expensive is that the crew at Dinan spends months in R&D making sure your particular parts don’t actually make your car worse than when you started.

There are 14 guys working in research and development at Dinan, five of them poking around in the engine software department (there are 65 total employees). R&D work progressed full time on the suspension on our test car from August to right now. And Dinan BMWs and Minis share the same four-year/ 50,000-mile warranty of the stock versions.

There are 180 sales locations in the United States where you can buy Dinan stuff—parts or whole cars—150 of them are BMW dealers. The immediate goal is to consolidate and support those 180, increasing sales of Dinan cars from 5000 a year now to 15,000 a year, according to Shattuck. And then? Well, there’s a big hole in the European market that could use some well-engineered BMW parts.

My favorite magazine article about the Dinan E46 M3