Mspir3d's FI build

[Mspir3d]

My foray into BMW started in 2009 when I was an undergrad student at the University of Colorado. It was a 2001 325i automatic with 40k miles on the odometer. The steering rack and oil pan were shattered but after replacing, the car ran like new. I loved how quiet and comfortable it was and the handling was much better than the built 93 subaru legacy SS I had been driving. My only disappointment with the car was how slow it was. After some searching, I found a 02 M3 in San Antonio. I flew from Denver and drove it back in time for work the next day and was immediately smitten. Though I did get pulled over outside of Amarillo.
Here she was with the 325.



The M3 came with a Turner Motorsports Intake, TMS pulleys and a shark tune.



The view from the house was that much better with the M3 in the driveway.



After I graduating from CU in 2010, I moved to Omaha to attend the Nebraska Medical Center. I added some ebay headers and replaced the shark tune with an epic motorsports tune from Bimmerworld. I also added koni yellow sports, and eibach prokit springs. The fitment on the headers was terrible and required a bit of persuasion to work.



The orginal wheels were peeling like crazy at this point so I bought some Forgestar F14 wheels. The wait time was advertised as 6-8 weeks but it was 8 months before they were delivered.



Paint correction after exams was a great way to deal with stress.






Driving in the mountains of Colorado helped me perfect driving in Nebraska snow

[Mspir3d]

The speakers were also very tired at this point so I took the opportunity to replace them and the Amp. The CDT diamond 6x9 subs were a very nice upgrade coupled with the alpine amp driving them.




When I bought the car, I had the dream of eventually going to a supercharger or turbo. After I graduated for hopefully the final time, I picked up a stage 1 MaxPSI kit as a present to myself. Thankfully they were still shipping kits at that time and I installed it in my tiny garage attached to my villa.








Stealth Install of the gauges



A couple months after install, the clutch unexpectedly started slipping...After pulling it out, the pressure plate fingers were damaged, the pivot pin was broke resulting in the fork rubbing on the plate and the disc looked a little worn.




The stock clutch was replaced with a Southbend ferramic kit

[Mspir3d]

After about a year of street and track use, the rear end started making unwanted noises. The damage was pretty severe. The spring perches were broken and sunlight could be seen through the floor of the trunk. One of the studs holding the subframe was easily moved by hand. This was outside of my skill set but thankfully the nearby shop I frequented for conversation helped me out. It seemed like a good time to upgrade the subframe bushings to AKG as well.

[Mspir3d]

Temps under the hood started getting pretty warm so it was time to vent the hood. Cutting the hood was one of the more nerve wracking things I've done to the car. I do miss the look of the original hood but the vents do a great job of lowering the termperature.

[Mspir3d]

The SMG transmission started having problems with shifting and destroyed a synchro.

After the lower mileage transmission was put in it was time for more road racing.



After a couple years of running race gas, it was time to upgrade. I talked to MIke at MaxPsi and bought the E85 flex fuel kit coming off of the shop car.

[Mspir3d]

With the increase in power came more problems from the SMG. I quickly removed it and converted to a 6 MT before it ruined another synchro. Originally I wanted to use a RTD self centering shifter to avoid changing the bell housing. However after spending time reading, I decided to have have it machined.The bell housing from the old transmission was removed and sent to Technica motorsports in California to be prepped for the conversion. They did a great job and quickly turned it around.










The steering wheel was looking a little worn after almost 190k miles

[Mspir3d]

I started visiting the nearby track more for Test and Tune. Running on e85 and 19+ psi, the car was in need of some new shoes. I added some 17" silver apex arc 8's and Mickey Thompson ET street R's (275/40r17)




I very quickly realized these are not a good choice for drag racing with a ferramic clutch. On my second pass the clutch was fused to the pressure plate. I made haste for the exit and drove it home without being able to release the clutch. And....out came the transmission again.
I called competition clutch and they had discontinued their twin disc ceramic clutch. However they still had some in obsolete inventory and gave it to me for a screaming deal. The twin disc is night and day compared to the Southbend unit it replaced. The pedal pressure is much lighter and the streetability of the clutch is amazing. It's held up to a lot of drag strip launches on drag radials without a problem.

[Mspir3d]

The intake pipe for the turbo had the misfortune of rubbing on the sway bar and sending aluminum shards into the turbo. Last year I noticed the car would occasionally smoke and it gradually got worse though never being terrible. Again I contacted Mike and he recommended a Borg Warner S300sxe. By moving the torque hit higher in the rpm range, it should offer a little protection to my poor original rods that had been taking a beating.


The front side of the turbo arrived quickly but the exhaust side needed to be modified to work with my setup. Once it arrived, it needed to be installed and clocked. The port for pressure also needed to be drilled.

[Mspir3d]

The BW compared to the Precision 6266 is super laggy. When roll racing at the track if I'm not brake boosting it feels like the car is broken. It is however a lot of fun to drive and I started pushing the pressure higher. I've run as high as 25 psi but had difficulty with the welds on the intake manifold cracking and needing to be reinforced.

[Mspir3d]

After a cruise in December, the car developed a vacuum leak. I was in the process of hunting it down when I decided to pull the engine and build it.


Possibly the source of the vacuum leak









The rods all look shockingly good for having pushed out over 800 whp on their last run.

[Nicholas1996]

Digging the build. I love the car. Good insight on the BW vs precision.

[Nicholas1996]

What intake manifold are you going to run now as the max psi one is cracked??

[TylerBrown]

To piggy back off of the previous post, NFA in Southern Cali makes s54 intake manifolds. They’re on cars with over 1,000whp. Check them out on Instagram @nofuckinaround

[Mspir3d]

What intake manifold are you going to run now as the max psi one is cracked??

A friend had his father in law reweld it and reinforce it with a plate across the top and across the throttle body side. Max psi said they started welding 3 dowels from top to bottom along the throttle body side. The cracking is caused by the pressure flexing the top plate causing it to bow out.

[Nicholas1996]

To piggy back off of the previous post, NFA in Southern Cali makes s54 intake manifolds. They’re on cars with over 1,000whp. Check them out on Instagram @nofuckinaround

I’ve got an FSR intake manifold but Jason mangana built . It’s killer