E46 M3 Valvetronic Designs Section 3

[jet_dogg]

Never even heard of these guys so I'm guessing it's made in chinastan due to that and qc issues.

[Stilt]

Never even heard of these guys so I'm guessing it's made in chinastan due to that and qc issues.

You'd guess correct:

[9kracing]

Any updates?

[davidinnyc]

Yeah - I got some money back to have the piping cut and welded. I’ll install this weekend on the Imola and see if the tone has changed at all and share some pictures and audio!

David

[davidinnyc]

Update 10/5/24:

I decided to install the exhaust on the Imola Red M3 to test “out of the box” fitment and sound clips for discussion.



Fitment

Lots to be desired. The car is stock and this Section 3 did not line up with the Section 2 piping at the flanges. The Valvetronic had one pipe welded 1/8 inch off center, so I need to forcibly tighten the bolts to get them “close enough” for the gasket ring not to slip around between the bell mouth ends… I wouldn't be surprised if there's a leak right at the Section 2 to Section 3 mate. I will be resizing these inlets to 2.5”, so I'll live with this for now.

I installed new exhaust hangers but this Section 3 sits higher on the passenger side by nearly 1/2” - I'll just spacer it down, but not the best.

The vacuum valve mechanism when open was not pointed straight “down the middle” of piping, so I took it apart and fixed it.

I pulled titanium Status Gruppe exhaust tips off my SCZA and put them on for now since the included 3.5" outlet tips simply DO NOT fit the stock diffuser. It looks like the quad exit holes need about 1/4" more space towards the ends of the muffler. The right exhaust tip on the left side of the exhaust rubs the inside of the diffuser with zero clearance. The left exhaust tip on the right side of the exhaust has about 1/8" clearance. I can't really make any adjustments to the hangers because any movement left would just pull the right set of tips against the diffuser. Pictures attached. I had to pull the exhaust tips so far out that they “cleared” the diffuser so I could even put them on. The zoomed in picture is where you can see they only clear because the exhaust tip tapers in.

Right exhaust tip, left set of exits.



Zoomed in on right exhaust tip, left exits to show that this is only clearing the diffuser because I have the tip pulled out pretty far away from the muffler.



Clearance on the left exhaust tip, left set of exits.



Clearance on the left exhaust tip, right exits.



Sound

Gnarly. I have to admit that this thing sounds really incredible over 6500 RPM. It's very high pitched and, dare I say, Ferrari-esque? Drone is horrendous. Luckily, the exhaust note with valves closed sounds like my debaffled stock Section 3.

Sound Clips

Cold start, valves open. I close the valves about 1:20 into the clip.

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/rthzh4xe7bavdo53v8gvs/Video-Oct-05-2024-7-16-21-AM.mov?rlkey=fbr0hkbbc5fdftt3m5tl20r2o&st=nowc3tp9 &dl=0

Cold start, valves closed.

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/qiwhbnsu389s8v6sbn3p4/Video-Nov-01-2024-9-16-55-AM.mov?rlkey=zr2jw5zailxkc3ybmhplkir9v&st=6ujhdtgr &dl=0

Valves open, backing out of driveway and coming to a complete stop. Lots of bad drone in first gear around the 3500 RPM area (you can hear it when I clear the bushes on the right in this clip).

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/n48h6r8bwyxsnbdrhyy3z/Video-Oct-26-2024-10-39-34-AM.mov?rlkey=nszrnf6jyl6q436gymck64fo2&st=m1l2394k &dl=0

David

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[davidinnyc]

Updated - tried to install the Valvetronic exhaust tips and they simply don’t fit. Been chatting with customer service (gentleman named Pierce that's been pretty friendly) stating they have an in-house M3 and it fits the stock diffuser fine, but I wouldn't be able to fit these tips / exhaust on the car without putting on different tips from a different manufacturer or cutting the diffuser, which I'm of course not going to do.

[9kracing]

That's really too bad.

I've heard pretty much the same thing from everyone... the muffler sounds great, but fitment and quality leave a lot to be desired, especially at this price point.

There's a severe lack of quality 2.5" section 3s for these cars. Dinan and Supersprint... and then RE which I wouldn't run if it was free.

I wish someone made a Dixis quality level titanium section 3 that was true 2.5"

[davidinnyc]

That's really too bad.

I've heard pretty much the same thing from everyone... the muffler sounds great, but fitment and quality leave a lot to be desired, especially at this price point.

There's a severe lack of quality 2.5" section 3s for these cars. Dinan and Supersprint... and then RE which I wouldn't run if it was free.

I wish someone made a Dixis quality level titanium section 3 that was true 2.5"

IIRC EthanolTurbo is contemplating doing exactly this!

[CrisSilberGrau]

That's really too bad.

I've heard pretty much the same thing from everyone... the muffler sounds great, but fitment and quality leave a lot to be desired, especially at this price point.

There's a severe lack of quality 2.5" section 3s for these cars. Dinan and Supersprint... and then RE which I wouldn't run if it was free.

I wish someone made a Dixis quality level titanium section 3 that was true 2.5"

If by Supersprint you mean Status Gruppe SCZA then yes. The SS race was only 63.5mm / 2.5in by custom order and I am unsure if any have ever come up for sale. If there's a group buy for some I'd be in for it.

-Dinan (best flowing)
-SCZA
-RE el Diablo "Caliente"

AFAIK those are the only 2.5 in on the market currently.

[9kracing]

It literally says 63.5mm in the URL?

https://www.supersprint.com/ww-en/bmw-e46-m3/supersprint-performance-sport-exhaust-bmw-e46-m3-csl-63-5-mm/044006-rear-exhaust-lightweight.aspx#!/

[Tbonem3]

-Dinan (best flowing)
-SCZA
-RE el Diablo

AFAIK those are the only 2.5 in on the market currently.

Magnaflow & Borla at least in us mercado

And the diablo is only 60mm iirc. The el caliente edition is the 2.5" piece as best as I can remember

[davidinnyc]

FYI: I tried to put a CSL diffuser against the tips and that was even worse that the stock diffuser - the clearance is virtually impossible if I were to go that route.

[CrisSilberGrau]

9kracing It refers to the "63.5mm" exhaust system, the race muffler part number is the same across all diameter exhaust systems.

https://www.supersprint.com/ww-en/bmw-e46-m3/supersprint-performance-sport-exhaust-bmw-e46-m3-csl-v1/044006-rear-exhaust-lightweight.aspx#!/

[davidinnyc]

Update 12-6-24

I received the titanium version as a replacement for the steel. It's ridiculous how much better the welding and piping looks and fits compared to the stainless steel version. The quality control is clearly lacking. Vacuum controller boxes are different (I might have received an older version with this titanium unit), but all seem functional.

Titanium had zero issues fitting to stock Section 2 - actually fit pretty perfectly. The stainless steel unit clearly had issues lining up to the stock Section 2 and had a leak given the sound differences when driving through the RPM range.

You can see that the quad exits on both units just… yeah. They're bad on the stainless steel version. I tried to explain that the unit's exits were too close to center and that's why exhaust tips would rub the diffuser. The titanium version fit the stock diffuser perfectly center.

The last two pictures are how the stainless steel version lined up with the stock Section 2. Brand new exhaust hanger rubbers and the piping on one inlet is welded about 1/4 higher than the other. There's no way this aligns without forcing the bolts to tighten and twist the section 2 ever so slightly.

I'm at the end of my journey with this company. As everyone has already alluded to, these are manufactured in China and the quality control is absolutely terrible. I wouldn't recommend this product to anyone unless you want to pony up for the titanium version only, and even then I’d buy from Alibaba.

David






Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk