Tyler's 04 slicktop 6spd Silvergrey MCS/Brembo/CSL/Karbonius/Nogaros/Supersprint

[duracellttu]

I absolutely love my suspension and my "final" 343lb/628lb springs. Only issue is a little remaining understeer. I'm trying to solve it with wider/grippier wheel/tire. I'm back on medium setting for hotchkis swaybar (which was causing too much understeer with 400lb springs) and it seems to pair well with the 343lb front springs for my driving speed/style. But it will still push a little too much for my liking though it's worse when the tires start to get too hot, so maybe it will be satisfactory with stickier tires.

Nice! I'm still playing with my setup. Currently at 400/600. Planning on going softer in the front to 336 Swifts and keeping the 600 TCK in the rear. Sounds like it's comparable to your setup!

[Tbonem3]

How are you liking your currently spring rate setup?

I absolutely love my suspension and my "final" 343lb/628lb springs. Only issue is a little remaining understeer. I'm trying to solve it with wider/grippier wheel/tire. I'm back on medium setting for hotchkis swaybar (which was causing too much understeer with 400lb springs) and it seems to pair well with the 343lb front springs for my driving speed/style. But it will still push a little too much for my liking though it's worse when the tires start to get too hot, so maybe it will be satisfactory with stickier tires.

[Tbonem3]

2023 was a funny year for me, but I did accomplish a few things (besides the spring/suspension changes noted earlier).

The car had to sit outside for half the year, so I topped it off with a fresh application of ceramic coating (1 year "lite" coating - wolfgang uber)



Did a chemical decon wash, then panel wipe, then the coating. Didn't have time to polish the car, but with it being a fairly light color, you can't see any fine scratches anyway.



I finally got tired enough of the brake fade in the canyons to go ahead and get some hotter pads & fluid. I also took the opportunity to remove what I felt was a liability in the ECS/CM porsche 996 style brake lines. Too many reports (one of them a friend, witnessed first hand) of failures. I already updated the rears with HEL a few years ago. I found a set of HEL made lines with the 90 degree bend from a speed shop in the UK. I got several sets as I'm also building a 996 kit for a friend right now. Worked out to about $70 a set so not bad at all, and now my mind is at ease.



I also have plans to increase the width of my front wheels and tires, but the first step in tuning the car better for canyon carving are the brake pads. The porsche textars are very good, no issues at all, but fade easily. I decided to go with Ferodo DS2500 as it seemed to be a good middle ground between street use and track use. I was also eyeing PFC z or 08s but went with ferodo. I also got a liter of Motul RBF600. I'm not sure if the ATE typ200 (already higher boiling than stock) was inadequate, but figured I should go up to 600.



I just liked this pic, the floating E46 M3! Alright, time to start.




I started with the line change, then pads, then I'll flush



Good riddance to this cheap shit



The HEL lines are obviously higher quality just holding htem in your hands. Plus their rubber grommet actually fits! And stays in places! And doesn't crumble - amazing!



Pad changes for the 996 are stupid easy! (if you don't have the dumb dampers in there)



Time to flush. Motive (euro) bleeder is a great investment!



Rear right first. Old fluid is super clean (not that old, not many miles).



All done!


Then did a bedding session. Well, from cold, there was no noise so that was nice (I was expecting squealing when cold or really hot). As soon as I got some heat into them (getting ready to bed), they grabbed really well. The cold bite is still not great, but that's down to the smaller pistons (clamping force) than anything. They don't seem to have worse bite than stock textars so that's a relief. It took much more work to get them hot, but man they stop the car quickly! My tires were squirmy and squealing badly (next thing to change) trying to get them to lock up. The next day I took it out and man what a revelation! I can still get them to fade, but it takes a lot more work (and frankly, bad driving as in using the brakes too much). I just wanted to see what the threshold was. They only squeal a little when hot hot, and coming to a stop. I am very very pleased. Still want more front end grip and stickier tires, but this was a great move to set the car up for its primary use (dangeous driving in Mexico).

[duracellttu]

How are you liking your currently spring rate setup?

[Tbonem3]

That seems odd the moboball FCABs caused numb steering. The poly bushing with a stiffer rubber is supposed to do the exact opposite. Also, whats wrong with the SS twin sec 2? All I saw was how it changed the exhaust note and it suggested to get a resonated version.

Also, what in the world happened to the Dinan exhaust? SS Stepped Headers v1, SS stepped sec 1 w/ HJS cats, SS twin sec 2 resonated, and Dinan muffler might be a really nice combo. It would be 63.5mm all the way though.

It's hard to describe the loss of steering feel because you'd expect it to be the opposite. I have a theory that the elasticity of rubber helps "pull" back on the joint whereas a bearing is completely free to move, and doesn't pull back to center like rubber does. Or perhaps the harshness of a solid bearing ruined the feel. It happened when I tried camber plates with a bearing and it happened with the solid fcabs.

The dual pipe sect 2 seems to quiet the total exhaust sound down a bit, which might be welcome, but when combined with the loss of the resonator, it created an ambiguous vaccumm cleaner like tone replete with drone but void of any rasp or e46 m3 character. I've heard the resonated version doesn't do this. I rode in a friend's car with the resonated version and it didn't seem to do it (he had same mods as me as well). I just think stock is perfect. It's a bit larger (60mm) than the primaries (55mm) and sect 1 (58mm), has the proper shape, H pipe and resonator, its free. it's so good, the only way Supersprint could improve upon it was to slightly increase diameter (60 to 63mm). It does make a bit more power, so I think it's a worthwhile mod for many, but it's not as important as the headers/sect 1 or induction or tuning or chassis etc. I'm not ok with a slight bump in mid range at the expense of the car's sound which is a major priority for me. You can only go so fast, plus you grow a tolerance for speed but you never tire of wonderful motorsport music.

The Dinan is an interesting piece. Dinan is pretty good quality, it's one of the few 2.5" full flow exhausts out there, but the drawbacks are too numerous - odd look of one side's tips being black with soot and one side clean (dummy tips), a decent sound, but nothing special. Pretty character-less. Decent weight loss from stock, but not the lightest by any means. The tips are "only" 76mm. Many prefer 80-83mm. Don't like black tips - though that I rectified, tediously, by polishing the black coating off.

The scorza, by contrast is better imo. Same 2.5" same 76mm tips, but much better sound. I'm not a fan of mufflers on this car really, but don't want to ever sell the og scorza. No need for any others, for me then.

[Projecte46m3]

It's ok. Nobody believed me about the monoball fcabs or the SS dual pipe sect 2 either.

That seems odd the moboball FCABs caused numb steering. The poly bushing with a stiffer rubber is supposed to do the exact opposite. Also, whats wrong with the SS twin sec 2? All I saw was how it changed the exhaust note and it suggested to get a resonated version.

Also, what in the world happened to the Dinan exhaust? SS Stepped Headers v1, SS stepped sec 1 w/ HJS cats, SS twin sec 2 resonated, and Dinan muffler might be a really nice combo. It would be 63.5mm all the way though.

[0-60motorsports]

Some sort of reticulated foam (maybe open cell?) From ebay. Like a 3' x 5' piece. Don't have a link sorry.

Awesome thanks brother! I'll have to order that and try it out.

[Tbonem3]

Some sort of reticulated foam (maybe open cell?) From ebay. Like a 3' x 5' piece. Don't have a link sorry.

[0-60motorsports]

The only thing I have really is the N: there's some decent whine at freeway speeds, but I put some sound insulation under the rear bench and almost eliminated it. There probably is some extra harshness as well, but nothing bothersome. I appreciate the much firmer power transfer from driveshaft to wheels so it was an easy trade for me. I've been happy for 9 years so much so that I never made changes, and Lord knows, I make changes if I'm unhappy.

Oh that's exactly what I have. What insulation did you use?

[Tbonem3]

The only thing I have really is the N: there's some decent whine at freeway speeds, but I put some sound insulation under the rear bench and almost eliminated it. There probably is some extra harshness as well, but nothing bothersome. I appreciate the much firmer power transfer from driveshaft to wheels so it was an easy trade for me. I've been happy for 9 years so much so that I never made changes, and Lord knows, I make changes if I'm unhappy.

[0-60motorsports]

Indeed! AKG 90a poly sub & diff

Thats interesting that you have no or Nice NVH with those. I am running the CMP solids with everything else OEM. RTABS have limiters but i'll be removing the inner limiter pad and leaving the outer onces.

[Tbonem3]

Indeed! AKG 90a poly sub & diff

[0-60motorsports]

Thats great news! What subframe bushings do you have T?

[Tbonem3]

Thanks Jon, maybe I'll see you around some day. I never seem to make it over to the roads off the 14/210 - I think I'm too spoiled by the ones in my backyard! But I should some time, just cause.

Ok, latest round of updates...

In January, did my annual oil change. Using up the last of my Castrol "sale" stock. With two "S" engines needing about 16L annually, I think I'll switch to Motul for 2024.




I also checked on my make-shift plug for the Karb's IAT port that I don't use. I had measured the ID of the port (think it was like 13mm) and then sourced a rubber stopper in the appropriate diameter. It was unnecesarily long, so I cut it down, leaving enough incase it migrated at all. But after a decent amount of driving, it hasn't budged.



Onto suspension...

The 400lb front springs (TCK 6.25"/60mm) were a great choice when I would push the car, at least in dealing with dips and keeping the front end from bottoming over certain sections, but it proved to be too stiff, when coupled with my hotchkis bar on medium, resulting in quite a bit of push or understeer. This is even after going up to 9" front wheels (though still a 245 mps4s). My first step was to move the swaybar down to the softest setting. While that did give me more grip, it still felt slow, just not as sharp as it was when it was on medium, but with 325b springs.

This was also at a ride height slightly lower than the typical 13.5", so while I was still concerned about bottoming out, if I did decide to lower the spring rate back down closer to the 325lb, I could at least raise the car a tiny bit to help combat it, and still be at an attractive height of 13.5".

So while starting the hunt to find the right spring (not always easy!), I got lucky and saw that ECS had an H&R (bilstein) set in 60n/mm (343lb) that was 7.1" tall (good for travel) and in the 60mm I needed for the MCS and my TMS plates on sale for $63 a pop so I went for it. I figured 343lb was close enough to my trusty 325lb, but with a slight increase in firmness that the MCS surely wouldn't mind at all. I have to say, the MCS were incredibly compliant even with the 400lb springs (on full soft setting!)



My MCS shaft bearings (to pickup tolerance between 14mm race dampers and camberplates made for stock 16mm) still looking good. Removing the TCK 400lb springs.



Had the hood up, so why not some glam shots of the engine/airbox?



I'll get around to affixing the M POWER decal at some point. Don't care for the unfinished look after all.

All done, rolled the car back and forth, and it seems like I've got it right at 13.5", but I probably will have to make small adjustments later, esp after I redo the rear springs.



Much better! *I also moved back to medium position on swaybar. This seems like the sweet spot so far. My main issue is still the rear being so under-sprung...

So now for the rear, I spent a lot of time thinking what rate I wanted to go with, that would also play nice with the hardware/perches I already had (or as I like to do, use the stock pad in some way). I saw that mrgizmo04 had put GC weight jacks and swift springs in his rear, so I asked if I could buy his rear Ohlins springs/perches as I wanted to try 628lb. I know the flatride spreadsheet would call for more like 700lb, but I just really don't like how harsh it is for what is still a street car. My rear end is also failry gutted, so 700lbs for me wouldn't be what it'd be like for a stock convertible, for example.





Me being me, I couldn't use the kit as supplied, heaven's no, I had to tweak something. Out of fear for repeating the experience I had when I tried 600lb springs on a GC perch with no isolation, I really wanted to make sure these ohlins were well isolated. I don't put up with much NVH- you' be surprised how quiet and luxurious the car is despite the myriad of modifications.



I didn't love that the top perch was simply plastic. Luckily, the pig tail of the spring matches pretty well to stock adn the stock rubber pad (5mm), so I decided to use it instead.

550lb eibachs - a little different in that they're a barrell spec and 6.5" so I was able to acheive 12.875-13.25" ride height depending on how many rubber sheet shims I used, while putting hte spring directly down onto stock rubber pad. The top GC cone made of poly was soft enough to isolate well - this setup was very compliant and quiet, but just not enough resistance to keep me from bottoming out on big dips at decent speed.
Versus the ohlins setup:



The Ohlins' perch has a rubber gasket to go underneat, and there's a plastic isolator for the perch seat itself. Seemed satisfactory to me.



I rotated the spring and wiggled it a little so that it caught on to as much of the "nipple" as possible. I doubt it moves under the weight of the car, but still... Great fit in the end!



I compressed the suspension a few times to look for any movement. The perch, itself (as opposed to just the spring), does lift its seat's outer edge off the control arm a little at full droop (I don't have a lot of droop), but the action was smooth and quiet, so I'm not concerned. The top didn't budge.

Back down, rolled it back and forth a little. got it pretty close to my desired 13.125-13.25" I'll have to tweak it all a bit, but good enough for test drive.



WOW! Much much firmer, but no issue for the MCS of course, and no noise or hashness! Mission accomplished. Took it to Little Sycamore canyon right before Sandstone peak there's a big dip, no bottoming out! Then a little later on Yerba Buena there's a smaller dip, but a faster section, and I was always scraping, but no more scraping now! Of course a stiffer rate would solve that issue, but I'm stoked because I accomplished it without making the car unbearable.


Car feels great, I'm really happy now after about 10 years of trying different suspensions. Parts are coming in for the next round of changes - HEL lines to replace the junk CM ones from ECS that I don't trust. Fedoro DS2500 came in as well as Motul RBF600. I'll probably install that stuff before I order the 9.5"et22 ARC wheels and whatever tires I go with. That will only help with brake fade in the canyons, I want the wider wheels with 265s for more front end grip.

[ChapterM3]

Terrific build thread - just had a look through the entire first page, and wow, so cool to see the car's journey. I'll look out for you as I see you're in the area - I'm usually around big tujunga or out to Palmdale and back, been hitting those quite a bit lately.