Black & Tan 332iT

[heinzboehmer]

3) I opened up the strut clamp bore on the new part and probably shouldn't have. The holes came in a little ovaled, and now I think I'll need to find an actual solution to this problem to make them round. Aluminum tape will do for shimming the oversized hole, but I'll need a way to fixture it straight which could be challenging.

Print a fixture! Then a boring bar on the lathe/mill and good to go.

[Bry5on]

Print a fixture! Then a boring bar on the lathe/mill and good to go.

Always coming at me with the logic. Of course!

[Bry5on]

Still struggling for blocks of time - setting up the house is taking priority.

But I did get a chance to powder coat the rear x-brace, and while it was out I had to drive the car without it for a week, on my regular commute, so I’ve got some reverse observations.
1) the car is smoother on hard impacts without the brace but there’s more after-bump ‘noise’ that’s not generated by the road. Sort of like a ripple after effect.
2) steering precision with the brace is definitely better
3) the m-clunk came right back on removal and turned back to an m-thud on reinstallation. I’m convinced that the clunk is exacerbated by the flexy trunk floor. Constraining it with the combo of the rear x-brace and the subframe-v-brace does the trick, and I think you need both to net the results. This also supports my theory that bracing to the center isofix attach point is necessary.



Next up we’ve got to see if the carbon driveshaft from EthanolTurbo eliminates the rest of the clunk because of the damping effect that carbon has.

[heinzboehmer]

Still struggling for blocks of time - setting up the house is taking priority.

Man, I feel that. It's no fun.

X brace looks great in black though.

[Bry5on]

Alright, I had a few free hours this morning and there was an open lift, so here we go!

How it started:


A few minutes later:


And another 30 minutes after that, we're all buttoned up again and ready for a test drive:


This is the F80 driveshaft that EthanolTurbo had modified with e46 M3 flex disc and CV joints. It is exactly 5mm shorter than a factory M3 driveshaft. Because it's shorter, I did not have to unbolt or drop the diff or subframe to install it, as you can see above. This is a tradeoff, as there will be less spline engagement with the driveshaft and CV joint. I think 2-3mm shorter than stock would be the sweet spot if you're not using the telescoping F80 version of the shaft (which is a better solution overall, in my opinion). Install was easy, just like any other driveshaft, only made difficult by the shitty supersprint header joint.

We measured before that this shaft is 80mm OD, versus the 75mm max OD stock shaft, so the math says that this carbon shaft should be much stiffer (bigger diameter, 50% stiffer material, likely also thicker wall) than the original and also bring in some of the inherent damping that carbon weaves have that steel does not. It's also one piece, although I don't think this is likely to have any real noticeable effect from the seat. We measured that it's 3.5lb lighter than the steel part, which I also don't think will be too seat of the pants noticeable, because inertially these math out to be very similar due to the larger OD of the carbon shaft.

Because this shaft is larger OD, it's a very tight fit. This is only suitable for cars with non-raised, solid subframe bushings. My car has *non-raised* & solid subframe bushings with reinforcement plates (4-5mm thick, which helps gain clearance) and I had about 8mm clearance to the transmission tunnel. Any displacement of the subframe/diff under acceleration or due to adding subframe raising solid bushings is likely to put you at risk of hitting the transmission tunnel and disintegrating your driveshaft. Consider this fair warning if you choose to go carbon, and I cannot stress this enough. Carbon does not fail subtly or slowly.

https://youtu.be/umdLZ_PUL_w

Good news, I did not have to make any clearance to my unmodified exhaust heat shield.

So what's the verdict? My initial thoughts say a very minor positive difference versus steel.

First of all, since I'm in San Diego it's easy for me to make a quick trip to Mexico where I tested the car up to 120mph (with stock gearing) and had absolutely no noticeable vibration. I'm sensitive to vibration. Sort of OCD about it. In fact, I'd say that the car is ever so slightly quieter at speed. I was expecting this as it's a common noted difference, so there may be a bit of placebo here.

When I initially took the car for a drive, I was pretty hopeful because I couldn't detect any semblance of the m-clunk. This changed once the car had warmed up. I'd say this was a mild improvement to the clunk (more of a thud now in my car), definitely less of an improvement than the rear end bracing made (my touring cabin X-brace and subframe-v-brace). Any improvement here is welcome, but it's not a magic bullet. Shift & shifter quality is largely the same, just with slightly less of the thud on a hard 1-2 shift.

There is also an improvement during clutch take-up, it just feels smoother and a bit more direct - in the direction of, but not equivalent to, a Porsche. This is maybe the most detectable and biggest difference.

There is no perceptible increase in the car accelerating quicker or revving faster that I can tell. Note that the math also generally agrees with this.

On just one occasion, it did seem that I was able to excite some natural frequency somewhere around 40-50mph under WOT second gear acceleration after a 1-2 shift. It felt similar to a failing CSB, but I wasn't able to reproduce this, so it could have been coming from the road, as I was on a highway onramp in a landfill area.

So overall I'd say this is mostly a smoothness, directness and NVH improvement, in that order. All effects are relatively minor but if you're OCD about NVH and needed a driveshaft balance like me anyway, I'd say go for it. It's an improvement. If you don't need a driveshaft, maybe wait until your next 'while I'm in there' opportunity. If you're debating whether to do this or a chassis stiffening mod first, *definitely* do the chassis stiffening mods first, you'll feel those a lot more.

Hope that's helpful!

[Arclitgold]

Wow this car keeps getting better and better! Nice work and keep it up!

houses are endless sources of… well lots of good and bad! Haha