My '96 E36 M3 Evo Saloon

[Neil_M]

Output Flange said:

Have you got a braided clutch hose on it? If not, do it!

I haven't yet, quite a few people have said the shift is much improved from doing it??

[Output Flange]

It's town driving where it benefits - when the standard hose gets hot (crawling around in traffic, for example) it expands and makes changing gear a bit nasty. The braided line doesn't expand, so doesn't cause the issue.

Also, if you haven't already, check your diff mounts - they do like to crack.

[Neil_M]

Output Flange said:

It's town driving where it benefits - when the standard hose gets hot (crawling around in traffic, for example) it expands and makes changing gear a bit nasty. The braided line doesn't expand, so doesn't cause the issue.

Also, if you haven't already, check your diff mounts - they do like to crack.

The car doesn't really see traffic to be honest. But I may do it for good measure anyway.

Diff mounts should be ok, it had an inspection a week or two ago. I'll double check them over the weekend, when I'm changing the diff fluid.

Ta for the tips

[quavey]

Neil_M said:

I haven't yet, quite a few people have said the shift is much improved from doing it??

This was the first job I did on my M3 evo when I had it. Made a huge difference to what at first I thought was going to be a worn clutch/bad gearbox! My delight that £30 of hose would make such a difference was immeasurable!

[Neil_M]

quavey said:

This was the first job I did on my M3 evo when I had it. Made a huge difference to what at first I thought was going to be a worn clutch/bad gearbox! My delight that £30 of hose would make such a difference was immeasurable!

Cool, it's on the list .

I'd be more after it for improved shifts, which its claimed to help, outside of traffic.

[twizellb]

Neil_M said:

quavey said:

This was the first job I did on my M3 evo when I had it. Made a huge difference to what at first I thought was going to be a worn clutch/bad gearbox! My delight that £30 of hose would make such a difference was immeasurable!

Cool, it's on the list .

I'd be more after it for improved shifts, which its claimed to help, outside of traffic.

I've got a spare one still in the packaging, I bought one over the winter as part of my maintanance/upgrade list.
When the time came to fit it the mechanic informed I already had one fitted.... doh!
I you want it give me a Pm.

[Neil_M]

A few photos with the grandson!

Parked up in work with a work mates E90, bloomin epic car!!






Also some retro coolness arrived to replace the rather pants aftermarket head unit.

[832ark]

Love it! I have a silver one. Only 694 RHD Evos made so a pretty rare beast.

[Neil_M]

832ark said:

Love it! I have a silver one. Only 694 RHD Evos made so a pretty rare beast.

Awesome, I wonder how many 'loons are left?

[832ark]

Neil_M said:

Awesome, I wonder how many 'loons are left?

I bet less than 500.

Here's mine - its on genuine Alpina multispokes and debadged. No one has a clue what it is:

[Neil_M]

832ark said:

I bet less than 500.

Here's mine - its on genuine Alpina multispokes and debadged. No one has a clue what it is:

That's proper cool! Love it. Any more?

I'd be tempted by a set of period rims for it, however the love of the contours is too much lol. Never mind having six of them.

Debadged or not, they sure are sleeper cars.

[EJH]

832ark said:

I bet less than 500.

They only made 694 RHD Evo Saloons...? I knew there weren't that many but really...?

I'm still very much in love with mine, bought last April with 46,000 miles and it's now about to hit 53,000. Best work so far was new bushes and dampers (all BMW aside from some poly for ARB). When properly sorted these are lovely cars!

[Neil_M]

EJH said:

They only made 694 RHD Evo Saloons...? I knew there weren't that many but really...?

I'm still very much in love with mine, bought last April with 46,000 miles and it's now about to hit 53,000. Best work so far was new bushes and dampers (all BMW aside from some poly for ARB). When properly sorted these are lovely cars!

I'd say the figure is accurate. As I believe just over 1000 saloons were made in total. Whether that is RHD only, or 3.0 and 3.2 versions I'm not sure.

Interesting you say about the dampers, I'm quite tempted by the Bilstein B12 kit. I'm an OEM fan boy by all means, but the B12 kit is very high quality and may add to the car?!?!?!

[MarkwG]

When it comes to the numbers, it might be worth establishing some parameters: as far as I can tell, the "694" relates to the number of official BMW UK cars, both 3.0 & 3.2. Bearing in mind they were built in Germany & South Africa, & personal importing was quite popular in the '90s, there were probably more cars imported, & definitely more RHD cars built - probably into 4 figures. Since then, I should think at least a third have been written off, turned into track cars, & parted out, so a figure left in the region of 400 to 500 left in the Uk would be a reasonable estimate, I should think.

[melvster]

1109 RHD M3 Saloons were built so i would guess that the figure of 694 Evo saloons is accurate.

[EJH]

Neil_M said:

Interesting you say about the dampers, I'm quite tempted by the Bilstein B12 kit. I'm an OEM fan boy by all means, but the B12 kit is very high quality and may add to the car?!?!?!

I decided to OEM (or OEM+) on mine as I thought that which was on there would be well past its best. As such, I thought going to back to stock would probably deliver the improvements that I wanted (and it did). The car is also my dally driver and so I wanted to keep ride height as it was and didn’t want the suspension to be any harder, etc.

A précis of my "OWM+," setup is:

Dampers Sachs (original units but rather less than if in a BMW box)
Most bushes BMW OE
Some Bushes Powerflex
Rear Top Mounts E46 Cabrio (tougher than E36 standard)

This was then aligned as stock but with a little less camber and slightly more rear toe-in.

I left the brakes as stock (all parts bought from local BMW dealer - they give a decent enough discount and not sure who else sells floating front discs!) aside from the addition of braided brake hoses which, to my mind at least, improve pedal feel greatly.

Full details of the work done to my car is here: http://www.iridiumengineering.co.uk/casebook9.html I have no affiliation with Iridium but am a very satisfied customer.

[Neil_M]

EJH said:

I decided to OEM (or OEM+) on mine as I thought that which was on there would be well past its best. As such, I thought going to back to stock would probably deliver the improvements that I wanted (and it did). The car is also my dally driver and so I wanted to keep ride height as it was and didn’t want the suspension to be any harder, etc.

A précis of my "OWM+," setup is:

Dampers Sachs (original units but rather less than if in a BMW box)
Most bushes BMW OE
Some Bushes Powerflex
Rear Top Mounts E46 Cabrio (tougher than E36 standard)

This was then aligned as stock but with a little less camber and slightly more rear toe-in.

I left the brakes as stock (all parts bought from local BMW dealer - they give a decent enough discount and not sure who else sells floating front discs!) aside from the addition of braided brake hoses which, to my mind at least, improve pedal feel greatly.

Full details of the work done to my car is here: http://www.iridiumengineering.co.uk/casebook9.html I have no affiliation with Iridium but am a very satisfied customer.

Thanks for all the info sir, I'll have a look at the link shortly.

I wouldn't touch the brakes, apart from as you say the braided hoses.

The suspension needs changed now, so I'll have to decide what route to go down.

Mine however is not a daily driver, nor do I wish to ruin it with no ride comfort at all.

It's all been BMW parts so far too

[EJH]

Neil_M said:

A few photos with the grandson!
Also some retro coolness arrived to replace the rather pants aftermarket head unit.

Meant to say earlier; this is a feeling I know well.

When I bought mine it had a FUBAR Alpine in it. After some careful consideration of fitting a new Alpine, an amplifier under the passenger seats, a set of components in the front and a pair of JL Stealthboxes(1) in the back, I ended up buying one of these:


(image borrowed from Google)

Yes, I know that they can be bought for just over 1/3 of the price with a Rover badge on them...but that's really not the point when one is trying to do these things right!(2)


(1) If anyone knows where these can be bought, I could still be tempted. Seemingly they're crafted from pure unobtanium!

(2) For similar reasons, I bought a set of M Contour IIs new from BMW. Impossible to get wheels properly refurbed over here and, with shipping factored in, new ones cost about the same. This means that I have a spare set to sell or refurb for track or winter rubber. The ultimate skiing machine...?

[MarkwG]

EJH said:

I decided to OEM (or OEM+) on mine as I thought that which was on there would be well past its best. As such, I thought going to back to stock would probably deliver the improvements that I wanted (and it did). The car is also my dally driver and so I wanted to keep ride height as it was and didn’t want the suspension to be any harder, etc.

A précis of my "OWM+," setup is:

Dampers Sachs (original units but rather less than if in a BMW box)
Most bushes BMW OE
Some Bushes Powerflex
Rear Top Mounts E46 Cabrio (tougher than E36 standard)

This was then aligned as stock but with a little less camber and slightly more rear toe-in.

I left the brakes as stock (all parts bought from local BMW dealer - they give a decent enough discount and not sure who else sells floating front discs!) aside from the addition of braided brake hoses which, to my mind at least, improve pedal feel greatly.

Full details of the work done to my car is here: http://www.iridiumengineering.co.uk/casebook9.html I have no affiliation with Iridium but am a very satisfied customer.

I had a quick look at yours when I stopped by to pick up my rebuilt manifold - looks lovely, I'm going through the same process in slow motion, dampers & drop links next...Iridium are a very good team, really know their stuff.

[Neil_M]

EJH said:

Meant to say earlier; this is a feeling I know well.

When I bought mine it had a FUBAR Alpine in it. After some careful consideration of fitting a new Alpine, an amplifier under the passenger seats, a set of components in the front and a pair of JL Stealthboxes(1) in the back, I ended up buying one of these:


(image borrowed from Google)

Yes, I know that they can be bought for just over 1/3 of the price with a Rover badge on them...but that's really not the point when one is trying to do these things right!(2)


(1) If anyone knows where these can be bought, I could still be tempted. Seemingly they're crafted from pure unobtanium!

(2) For similar reasons, I bought a set of M Contour IIs new from BMW. Impossible to get wheels properly refurbed over here and, with shipping factored in, new ones cost about the same. This means that I have a spare set to sell or refurb for track or winter rubber. The ultimate skiing machine...?

Have you priced those head units, I looked at them too... Quite a few hundred for a used one . I do keep looking at them too.

I didn't realise they are difficult to refurbish??