My 2017 GT350

[anyonebutme]

I keep forgetting you run with that pile of shit that is the SCCA, lol.

I feel your pain. In specE46 (and I'm sure in whatever autoX class it lands), they don't allow the ATI damper on the 3.0L engine, which has a design flaw in the engine balance that causes a harmonic vibration that snaps the oil pump shaft or rattles the gear right off of it. Instant conversion from engine to boat anchor. I'm told to run the 330, you HAVE to replace the factory balancer every 2 races, it dies that fast. Although without rulebooks, adding an oil pump chain tensioner and the ATI pulley instantly converts it to one of the best engines out there, way more reliable than the E46 M3's rod bearing eating engine, lol.

[edit]: Provisional rule change request, lol

[nodoze]

hey now im rolling over 150k with stock rod bearings in my e46 m3 ! I thought their was another fix out their for the oil pump bolt , because its a very common issue for the e36 m3 as well

[anyonebutme]

The M54 is way worse, welding the pump nut or safety wiring it doesn't work like the older engines, as it will break the pump shaft in half. They make a stronger shaft pump, then it breaks the chain itself or the pulley, and I've seen the gears themselves get chowdered up. For some dumb reason BMW chose to not install a tensioner on the pump chain like all the other engines have, and the chain vibrates until something breaks. The BMW factory race engines came with different chain and pulley set to try and stop the failures it was so bad, and the touring car engines had tensioners added.

I reference to the E46M3, most people never have issues, especially if they took their cars in for the rod bearing recall where BMW installed new coated bearings for free. Get it on the track, though, and it rears it's head again. Heavily tracked or raced cars are recommended to change the rod bearings every year as annual maintenance. Seen a couple cars lose engines in under 10K miles, but it was all track miles.

Also, VINCEBAR your shit if you drive your M like I do, lol.

Also, thread successfully jacked!

[DocWalt]

The endlinks that I installed apparently had some of the crappiest washers known to man... I started noticing a bit of noise after a few days and it got progressively worse the last few days as I was driving the Mustang to work. I checked the nuts and they were really loose and this was the cause. The washers yielded, which is far from ideal.


So I went through the process of making a level pad on the side of the garage that I don't normally use, one corner of the car needed about 1 & 1/4" of 1/16" tiles stacked up to get to level. The other three corners were fine. Weird, especially since that's the corner that's near the door to the house. Explains why there's always a puddle there, lol. Checked the alignment on the level pad, came up with -2.0/-1.9 up front, but -1.0/-0.5 in the rear. The rear adjustment is a gigantic PITA and I may pay to have a shop do the rear and then reset the front toe to make the wheel straight.

As a side benefit, since I was setting my end link length on that side of the garage it explains why they were so different side to side. Every other car I'd set them up on the more level side of the garage, but this side is easier to work on... I fixed the lengths of the end links and now the car tramlines a LOT less which is great. The tramlining was VERY annoying after driving my GTI which doesn't tramline much even with a lot more camber.

Today I also replaced the crappy washers with Nordlocks and some hardened steel washers. When I tightened down the nuts it felt "proper" like I expected. Before there was a feeling of softness and I was always nervous that I was stretching the stud or something.

First pic with things not tightened up, so mind the gap.


All tightened up. I kinda wish the nut was bigger/had a flange built in to be able to use the larger size Nordlocks and get more surface area, but oh well. I'll keep an eye on it.

[DocWalt]

I was 2nd fastest raw time today and if it was scored using PAX I'd have won by 0.048, which is super tight!

[DocWalt]

[futurevr4man]

I would like to buy a car after you own it. You always do good work!

[DocWalt]

2:05.94 & then 2:05.88 around VIR. Pretty friggin happy with those times all things considered. More to come later

[anyonebutme]

That f*cking sound. It never gets old. I need one of those engines for my car even though mine doesn't sound terrible at 7K, that just sounds better.

[DocWalt]

It's absurdly loud. First two sessions I thought it was feedback from intercom with instructor... Solo rest of the weekend... nope, just louder than frig.