E46 M3 - Kumho Championship Race Car Build

[jibber_monkey]

Wow! That's one amazing car Martin! Mad. Utterly, utterly mad. But amazing :-)

[jibber_monkey]

Should have a proper update tomorrow but for now, here's some piccies of the passenger door shaped, fitted and working i.e. it fits in the hole! Shut lines look alright too for our first attempt at a fibreglass door, which is nice.

[jibber_monkey]

OK, first with the good news. We've managed to get all the arms bushed up and fitted



Seriously impossible to fit these bushes without a hydraulic press!

[jibber_monkey]

So that was the good news.

The bad news is we bought a Butler Motorsport endurance engine off a reputable race team to reduce the build time on this project. This is only the second time we've bought an engine off someone, normally we build our own race engines, not least because we can but secondly because...

...the first time we bought an engine was a part built Nissan SR20DET with forged Tomei rods, CP Pistons and all sorts of other loveliness. We finished the build, mapped it up then watched as it ate head gaskets every time we took it out on track. "Why?" we thought "The parts are all genuine. The build is perfect. The machining is all good. Why the hell is it blowing head gaskets?!"

Turns out the numpty we bought the engine off got his calculations wrong when removing the squish from the head. He'd mixed up mm cubed for cm cubed and specified the wrong pistons. Upshot was we were inadvertently running a 14:1 compression ratio turbo engine trying to push 1.2 bar. And we were the numpties for getting all over excited about expensive labels without checking the calculations.

So lesson learned and never again, right?

[jibber_monkey]

So to our "Butler Motorsport" endurance engine.

Now Terry at Butler has a cast iron reputation for building rock solid S54 race engines, he's also a thoroughly decent bloke.

We've also known the race team that sold us the engine as they've been buying batteries off us for a number of years.

So a Butler endurance engine running 288/280 Schricks, ARP bolts, tilton clutch, flywheel, all ancilliaries etc that "just needs dropping in after a precautionary refresh of the shells" for a not inconsiderable premium over a donor S54 engine?

Well. It was going to cost us more than building our own but would cut a week off our build time (and frankly we needed all the help we could get to get this project back on track).

So what could go wrong? Right?

[jibber_monkey]

So we pulled the sump off and started to have a nosey about the bottom end. Looks OK on first inspection, new chain, guides, ARP bolts all present, just as we'd been told.



Better give Terry a bell to check which shells he used to build up the bottom end.

"Sorry guys, I didn't build that engine."

OINK?!

[jibber_monkey]

Oh dear. Best take a closer look at this then...

The oil came out looking fresh and clean but let's check the sump



Pants. Hope none of that's steel...



Oh Joy. Big chunks of steel.

Better get the rocker cover off



Now there's some marking on the cams but hopefully that's it right?

Let's check the plugs.



Oh look a stick. An actual stick! Yup. That's a stick wedged down there next to the spark plug.

Can't get any worse can it?





Oh yes. It can. What is that inside the sealed rocker cover? Sand. Yup. Actual big ass bits of sand.

So with a horrible sinking feeling we refit the rocker cover to protect it from any more heavy aggregate and start to strip the engine down.



Can't see it too well here but the valves are covered in a dusty white coating. Not really ideal from a engine longevity perspective...



I wonder what the water pump looks like?





Sludgy orangey black stuff? That's a good sign, right?!

Now I want to be 100% clear on this subject. We have spoken to Terry and this is NOT a Butler Motorsport engine. Terry has never had his hands inside this engine apart from fitting the ARP bolts before supplying it as a donor engine to a race team that wanted to build it themselves.

Our jobs for tomorrow:
- Taking the head off
- Wincing
- Prizing open the wallet for a full rebuild or worse
- Taking advice
- Having a conversation with the people that sold us this engine

[Mark CSL]

Love your posts :thumbs:

just goes to show how not to build an engine :banghead:

That would not have lasted long does the people who sold you the engine race in the same races as you :whistle:

[jibber_monkey]

Apologies for the delayed update. We've been getting the new unit finished and pointedly ignoring the stricken S54 sat in the corner.

After finally biting the bullet, we removed the head:



And peered into the bores:











So our recently refreshed "Butler Motorsport" engine has big chunks of steel in the sump, signs of piston slap, lean running and scored bores that at the very least need a hone and possibly a bore. It's off to the machine shop tomorrow for all the tolerances to be checked and the head and block to be crack and pressure tested.

Once we've got the news back from the machine shop we will be opening discussion with the people that (mis)sold us this motor... and depending on the outcome of that conversation. Naming and shaming.

Currently oh so very far from impressed.

[jibber_monkey]

Well this past week has been something of a mixed bag. So starting with the less than happy news...

We stripped the engine down, sent oil samples from the sump, filter housing and head off for analysis and sent the big metal bits off to the machine shop.

So we're we waiting with bated breath for the outcome of this in depth analysis?

Well no, not really. On top of the bore scoring and chunks of metal in the sump and lumps of sand in the head, take a look at the state of the rest of this motor:

A set of more than slightly second hand pistons and rods


On closer inspection, I'm thinking this is a slightly misaligned big end shell


A crank scored and pitted beyond repair




And with moving pictures too!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gFKWsFSS20

Looking at the state of this follower, you may think this is bad, but fear not! The cam lobe has been worn to a handy 50 pence piece profile to match the wear pattern on the follower.



We have made initial contact with the people that sold us this "good working order" "Butler Motorsport” engine but they have become mysteriously difficult to contact since sending them these images and video.

Still tomorrow's another day and we've made some half decent progress on the rest of the build...

[jibber_monkey]

To happier news...

Despite all sorts of engine related shenanigans, we got round to sorting the back end of the car, starting with a set of cleaned up and repainted driveshafts



A happy little diff installed





And a random close up of the front suspension

[outnumbered]

That must be seriously annoying. Good luck with getting some compensation from the sellers...

[jibber_monkey]

Certainly more than a little annoying but we've made some good progress towards a settlement today. Hopefully we'll have it resolved before the end of the weekend and we can get cracking on a replacement engine.

For today's update we're finishing up the back axle, which means fitting our diff cooler and pump. Out came the custom loom for a (very) quick and dirty lay out in the car to check where best to mount the diff pump.







We also figured out where the rear firewall will be located. Next step is making up a template, then fabricating a firewall in carbon fibre.
In the meantime it's on with fitting the diff cooler and pump.



You may also notice a rogue driveshaft laying on the floor there. Turns out one of its universal joints is a bit graunchy so we'll fit another one next week.

[shimmy]

When you've finished this and got bored of it and cant sell it for decent money, can you PM me and ill have it, looks ace :smokin:

[jibber_monkey]

Oh alright then, seeing as it's you :-)