My E90 M3 Dedicated Track build (with pix!)

[dogbone]

Originally Posted by Bartledoo

Totally agree. My spring collection is also growing.

Your Spring Collection------that sounds like a fancy wardrobe in your closet!

[derbo]

Originally Posted by dogbone

Your Spring Collection------that sounds like a fancy wardrobe in your closet!

Bartledoo x HyperCo x Eibach x Swift Collab Spring Collection 2021

[Bartledoo]

Originally Posted by dogbone

Your Spring Collection------that sounds like a fancy wardrobe in your closet!

Gotta look good for track season ya know!

Originally Posted by derbo

Bartledoo x HyperCo x Eibach x Swift Collab Spring Collection 2021

Start the season business casual with Eibach in the front and Swift in the rear?

[dogbone]

Originally Posted by Bartledoo

Gotta look good for track season ya know!

Start the season business casual with Eibach in the front and Swift in the rear?

Haha awesome!

[fsmtnbiker]

I'm all in on Swift for 2021. I love how light they are compared to almost all the other springs in my collection!

[dogbone]

Originally Posted by fsmtnbiker

I'm all in on Swift for 2021. I love how light they are compared to almost all the other springs in my collection!

This isn't going to turn into a Spring Fashion show is it?

[ThunderMoose]

Originally Posted by dogbone

This isn't going to turn into a Spring Fashion show is it?

I dunno but I'll spring for the afterparty

[slcook54]

Originally Posted by ThunderMoose

I dunno but I'll spring for the afterparty

Going to have to decompress after that

[derbo]

Originally Posted by slcook54

Going to have to decompress after that

You always have dampen everything huh?

[ThunderMoose]

Originally Posted by derbo

You always have dampen everything huh?

But he's always quick to bounce back

[DRLane]

Originally Posted by derbo

You always have dampen everything huh?

When you wind up, the sag is inevitable...

[dogbone]

Quick, someone call a pun doctor! I don’t think the patient is rebounding quickly enough!

[dogbone]

Even though I haven't been able to engage in much Bimmer Challenge in CA this year, I'm always following what's going on with it because my friends do it.

Yesterday, several guys committed to buying fancy new tires like new A7's and new DH and came in with their guns blazing because the weather was looking to be perfect at Buttonwillow 13CW.

I have to give a shout out to a few guys who had sub-1:50 runs.

-Charbel Elian did a 1:46.9 in his crazy light, insane build E36. He was on new A7.
-Steve Lee did 1:49.6 in his E36 with E46 engine on new A7’s. His car is quite light and has a front splitter and mellow rear wing.
-Serhan Emre did a 1:49.9 in his E46 on new DH. He does not have any aero on the car!! Crazy time.

Anyway, going sub-1:50 at Buttonwillow is a solid achievement, so I have to give those guys some props.


On my end, yesterday I installed the softer 12k springs on my rear coilovers (down from 13k). The job wasn't too bad. I believe I could do it at the track if I had to. I already showed myself that I can swap front springs at the track.

I am hoping that I can get out to High Plains Raceway this week and do some more testing. In my emails with them, they said they need to plow the snow from the track so I can run it (!!!) hahahaha

I'm trying to keep driving the car so that I feel like the setup is in the right place for when the new front aero is installed----things like the ride height, rake, etc. because the aero is supposed to sit a certain height off the ground and sit at a certain angle. My understanding is that the splitter is in production now. Pretty excited about that.

After I posted some new stuff to Instagram recently, a shop I've never dealt with reached out on IG to ask me if I wanted a new splitter because "pieces were missing" from mine.......hahahaha yes yes I know.....the one on there is quite overdue for replacement. (I'm still super impressed that it lasted this long though.)

Anyway, all this is in motion with the goal of getting to COTA in Feb with MVP Track Time and March with SuperLap Battle.

[admranger]

So, not being versed in aero, I’m curious if you will want to take some out a lower elevation track due to the higher air density?

[tsk94]

Originally Posted by dogbone

Even though I haven't been able to engage in much Bimmer Challenge in CA this year, I'm always following what's going on with it because my friends do it.

Yesterday, several guys committed to buying fancy new tires like new A7's and new DH and came in with their guns blazing because the weather was looking to be perfect at Buttonwillow 13CW.

I have to give a shout out to a few guys who had sub-1:50 runs.

-Charbel Elian did a 1:46.9 in his crazy light, insane build E36. He was on new A7.
-Steve Lee did 1:49.6 in his E36 with E46 engine. His car is quite light and has a front splitter and mellow rear wing.
-Serhan Emre did a 1:49.9 in his E46 on new DH. He does not have any aero on the car!! Crazy time.

Anyway, going sub-1:50 at Buttonwillow is a solid achievement, so I have to give those guys some props.


On my end, yesterday I installed the softer 12k springs on my rear coilovers (down from 13k). The job wasn't too bad. I believe I could do it at the track if I had to. I already showed myself that I can swap front springs at the track.

I am hoping that I can get out to High Plains Raceway this week and do some more testing. In my emails with them, they said they need to plow the snow from the track so I can run it (!!!) hahahaha

I'm trying to keep driving the car so that I feel like the setup is in the right place for when the new front aero is installed----things like the ride height, rake, etc. because the aero is supposed to sit a certain height off the ground and sit at a certain angle. My understanding is that the splitter is in production now. Pretty excited about that.

After I posted some new stuff to Instagram recently, a shop I've never dealt with reached out on IG to ask me if I wanted a new splitter because "pieces were missing" from mine.......hahahaha yes yes I know.....the one on there is quite overdue for replacement. (I'm still super impressed that it lasted this long though.)

Anyway, all this is in motion with the goal of getting to COTA in Feb with MVP Track Time and March with SuperLap Battle.

That time by Serhan, in an ST3 level car, with no aero, is so impressive..

[dogbone]

Originally Posted by admranger

So, not being versed in aero, I’m curious if you will want to take some out a lower elevation track due to the higher air density?

I don’t think I’ll be making any altitude adjustments to my aero setup.

[dogbone]

Originally Posted by tsk94

That time by Serhan, in an ST3 level car, with no aero, is so impressive..

Yup. Really awesome.

[roastbeef]

Originally Posted by admranger

So, not being versed in aero, I’m curious if you will want to take some out a lower elevation track due to the higher air density?

probably a bigger problem than aero is going to be issues from pushing the supercharged car like he does in california at 5,000 feet. i think CO is like CA in terms of gas quality. might need to mix in some higher octane... maybe i'm overthinking it and it will be fine.

i know i always do this... but i interestingly enough- just watched a video about aero on pikes peak. spoiler alert- active aero is king.

[slcook54]

Originally Posted by roastbeef

probably a bigger problem than aero is going to be issues from pushing the supercharged car like he does in california at 5,000 feet. i think CO is like CA in terms of gas quality. might need to mix in some higher octane... maybe i'm overthinking it and it will be fine.

i know i always do this... but i interestingly enough- just watched a video about aero on pikes peak. spoiler alert- active aero is king.

Note to self, don't get throttle stuck doing 130.

[dogbone]

Gotta file this one under: Uhhhh holiday distracted? Brain fart? Spacing out? Dum dum?

I went to High Plains Raceway on Tuesday. Did another semi-exclusive day. (No one has been putting on any events there, so semi-exclusive is the only way to get on the track right now.) Again, I was the only one there. I was excited to go since the weather was looking very good. However, for whatever reason---and I simply cannot explain it---I totally miscalculated my tire situation. Stupidly, it never occurred to me that I needed to mount up some fresher rubber than what I had used and abused at Chuckwalla and my previous trip to HPR. I just decided that whatever was on the rims was enough for the day.......Boy was I wrong. I had several corded tires and several tires with worthless grip due to having been run so many times. This was supposed to be a day mainly focusing on the new softer rear springs, but it turned into tire triage. The dumb irony in all this is that I have a bunch of brand new and new scrub tires sitting in the garage.

Once I was actually at the track and realized my situation, I had to get creative. I ran the first session on whatever was on the car from my last trip to HPR (Pirelli 305 front/Yoko 300 rear---remember Yoko 300 is an inch wider than the 305) and the rear was sliding ALL OVER THE PLACE. The Yoko 300's looked good from a visual standpoint, but they were totally burned out from a grip standpoint. On my previous visit a couple weeks ago, I ran a 1:51 on these tires. I could not do better than a 1:55 in the first session. It was terrible. At first I was thinking the softer rear springs were a mistake. But then, after coming in and thinking about it, I was convinced that the rear tires were simply not holding the track.

The thing that saved the day was that I had two Yoko 280's that only had two sessions on them. I had not run these tires on my previous trip to HPR a couple weeks ago. They had only been run on the front at Chuckwalla for two sessions. I decided to leave the Pirellis on the front because they seemed ok (and Pirellis seem better up front than the Yokos). It was the rear that was just terrible. So, I put the 280 Yokos on the rear hoping that the fresher (but narrower) rubber would outweigh the fact that I now had a reverse stagger going. (The 305 Pirelli in the front was wider than the 280 Yoko in the rear.) Not ideal, but I'm working with what I got.

I went out 2nd session on this unholy mix of rubber and reverse stagger. My previous PB at HPR was set a couple weeks ago as a 1:51.2. I ran a 1:50.9 on this f*cked up setup. And for most of the lap, it was a 1:50.6 until I waffled a bit. The rear settled down very nicely with the fresher 280 rubber......a difference of almost 5 seconds just with a rear tire change. Crazy. I like the softer springs.

While I was unhappy with my spacing out about my tire situation, I was thrilled that I was able to go faster on this ridiculous setup. I attribute the faster time with being more familiar with the track. I appreciate fsmtnbiker walking me through each turn a couple weeks ago after my first visit with the E90. I can't say I applied everything yesterday, but I had a lot in my head and I was trying to get it down while being distracted with my rubber situation.

Here's the lap. Not super proud, but I think it's ok given the tires I had.

The 280 soft Yoko rears didn't maintain the higher grip much after their first session. And my fronts were getting really beat up, so I never was able to go faster.

Now, I'm looking forward to the new front aero. I just got an email saying it should be done in a couple weeks. I am satisfied with this current spring setup. Maybe some day later, I'll experiment with even one more step down in rear spring rate. But it's not a priority. If the tires are decent, I know the car can be quick.

The next time I go out with the new aero, I will overcompensate by bringing some sort of brand new rubber. I don't know what that will be yet.

I know without any doubt whatsoever that the car with good rubber can do a 1:49---maybe even better. I just need to have my head in the game. This is my process----slow gains over time.

High Plains is a very tricky track. (And the speeds of the E90 make it even more challenging versus the Street E92). Lots and lots of opportunities to mess up a lap----the multiple off-camber uphills, the multiple hairpins and hairpins that are off-camber, the off-camber downhill turns. There are just so many unusual and challenging features. Honestly, I think it's great practice for COTA. I am very glad that I trailered the E90 to CO a month ago.

One other thought---perhaps a bit obvious, but worth mentioning: Being in good physical shape is a HUGE advantage when engaging in motorsport. When I'm doing cardio (bike riding) and lifting weights, doing track days is SOOOO much easier from a physical standpoint. When I go to the track out of shape, I really suffer by comparison. Perhaps being 50 years-old amplifies it. But I've been lazy over the last month and haven't been exercising much, and I gotta tell ya, I was exhausted yesterday. I was in great physical shape when I went to CA in November, and I was doing 3 driving days in a row, and I was fairing so much better than I did yesterday. Gotta get back on the bike and hit the weights again.

[rhyary]

>> I went out 2nd session on this unholy mix of rubber and reverse stagger. My previous PB at HPR was set a couple weeks ago as a 1:51.2. I ran a 1:50.9 on this f*cked up setup. And for most of the lap, it was a 1:50.6 until I waffled a bit.
——————

I am not saying anything but fast is fast!
Try eBay tires next time :-)

[dogbone]

Originally Posted by rhyary

I am not saying anything but fast is fast!
Try eBay tires next time :-)

hehe no, I'll be going the other direction with some sort of new tire--most likely Pirelli or Hoosier.