Building a great E34 540i?

[Bad Sir Culation]

I have fancied one of these for a while..... I am going to be buying a diesel soon to get myself sorted over the next 12 months, but once it comes back to buying something thirsty and fun, I keep thinking about one of these.

I've always wanted to own a V8. What are the best mods to make a really nice drivers' car out of the E34? I mush prefer the car's looks and dimensions to the E39.

I'd want a manual, and preferably sub 100k miles, but these things seem to be seriously thin ont he ground now.

What are a good set of aftermarket shocks for the car? Should the steering rack be upgraded to the M5 equivalent? Would a remap and breathing mods make it nicer to drive? Are there any other essential mods/upgrades?

[Sam T]

If you find a good one, you'll have great fun.

Alpina dampers/springs weer said to do the business, the standard M-Tec set up is harsh as hell. Use 235/45 & 255/40x17's, on 8.5 & 9.5 rims. 18's make little difference to grip, but you can feel the effect of increased unsprung weight and the lower aspect ratio does nothing the ride.

Leave the steering, you won't notice the difference in real life. Similarly, don't bother with M5 brakes; expensive and heavy. The standard ones are fine for road use. If you must change them, use 840/850 4-pot Brembo's on the front.

But..........., DO find an LSD, as the ASC+T is a right nonsense and spoils the fun, shutting down at the slightest provocation.

My 540 manual felt unbreakable, but I always worried that the M5 that followed it might go bang, if I overdid it!

[Paul.B]

I had a 540i 6-speed manual with the following upgrades ............

Vortex Supercharger (circa 412 bhp at about 7psi) Std internals.
GAZ Coilovers front & rear.
AP Racing 4-pot calipers and approx 320mm disks at the front (std rears)
Genuine Alpina 18" wheels.
Poly Bushed suspension.
Yoko R888 Tyres.


I used it on trackdays and it was an absolute hoot. Thirsty though!! Mine was stripped out with Racing seats etc. Before stripping the interior out it was a very subtle Q-car.

ETA: The V8's have a Steering Box, not a Rack. Not too much you can do with these except make sure it is properly adjusted to take all the slack out.

Edited by Paul.B on Tuesday 19th July 08:32

[Six Fiend]

Mine had an LSD and the ASC+T should have an on/off switch on the centre console. Hoot Factor 11

Fabulous cars!

[filski666]

The ASC+T isn't that bad if you put it into development mode - press and hold for about 10 seconds - then it applies the brakes to slow a spinning wheel but doesn't cut the engine - not as intrusive as full on mode.

Has anyone ever managed to find poly bushes for the rear? My 540i 6 speed is currently in pieces, and I am considering making some rear bushes if I can't find any. Might as well do a batch - anyone interested?

Has anyone tried the Bilstein kit for the 540? - any good?

[filski666]

Paul.B said:

I had a 540i 6-speed manual with the following upgrades ............

Vortex Supercharger (circa 412 bhp at about 7psi) Std internals.
GAZ Coilovers front & rear.
AP Racing 4-pot calipers and approx 320mm disks at the front (std rears)
Genuine Alpina 18" wheels.
Poly Bushed suspension.
Yoko R888 Tyres.


I used it on trackdays and it was an absolute hoot. Thirsty though!! Mine was stripped out with Racing seats etc. Before stripping the interior out it was a very subtle Q-car.

ETA: The V8's have a Steering Box, not a Rack. Not too much you can do with these except make sure it is properly adjusted to take all the slack out.

Edited by Paul.B on Tuesday 19th July 08:32

does AP do a kit for the 540 - or did you have to make up an adaptor bracket?

[Paul.B]

I used Powerflex Bushes front & rear on mine. You'd need to check with AP Racing about the Brake fitting kit. Ray West fitted them and I can't remember if they came in the kit or he had to make them.

[Huff]

It takes <10mins with a philips driver to just remove the butterfly blade from the ASC throttle body and totally disable the slow throttle interference (- you can't just unhook the actuator or it will give a fault light). It's like dev mode without the button-pushing hassle.

[filski666]

Paul.B said:

I used Powerflex Bushes front & rear on mine. You'd need to check with AP Racing about the Brake fitting kit. Ray West fitted them and I can't remember if they came in the kit or he had to make them.

Interesting - was it a while ago? I have all the bushes powerflex do for mine, but at the rear they only do the subframe mounts and the anti-roll bar mounts (which are the wrong size as I fitted a larger E34 Touring Nurburgring Edition ARB on mine ) - but they don't seem to do anything for the suspension arms

http://www.powerflexshop.com/index.php?cPath=25_87

[Bad Sir Culation]

Thanks for the advice guys.

Due to getting silly quotes for a 320D at the minute, I am actually very tempted to bring this forward and get one ASAP, and team it with a small diesel daily driver. Depends if Flux allow you to run 2 cars on your policy....

Is there any point fitting M5 ARBs etc.?

[Huff]

PS just dont bother with breathing mods. The standard air filter set up is a cold-air intake - its intake should have fit through a plastic blanking piece behind the RHS headlights, which stops engine bay warm air getting pulled in. The filter is far more than large enough - no gains to be had here; and if some ijit has drilled loads of holes in the bottom half of the airbox (as had happened to mine) - tape over or replace with an intact one from a scrapper.

You can however just pull the intake trumpet/restricter out of the front of the airbox for a tad more 'rumble'

Edited by Huff on Tuesday 19th July 14:55

[filski666]

Bad Sir Culation said:

Thanks for the advice guys.

Due to getting silly quotes for a 320D at the minute, I am actually very tempted to bring this forward and get one ASAP, and team it with a small diesel daily driver. Depends if Flux allow you to run 2 cars on your policy....

Is there any point fitting M5 ARBs etc.?

depends - do you want to do this:



if so then the rear ARB off an E34 Touring Nurburgring Edition is the thickest one BMW do - I never found any bigger aftermarket ones - not for the rear anyway - and who wants a bigger front ARB anyway????

[Bad Sir Culation]

filski666 said:

depends - do you want to do this:



if so then the rear ARB off an E34 Touring Nurburgring Edition is the thickest one BMW do - I never found any bigger aftermarket ones - not for the rear anyway - and who wants a bigger front ARB anyway????

Yes, yes I do!

I'd like to make it as nimble as a car like that can be.

[Six Fiend]

My last trip in Brian my 540i with a Torqueflow exhuast. Was trading him for my X-type.

It's not a great vid but there's the odd bit of good noise

http://s462.photobucket.com/albums/qq349/SixFiend/...

[Bad Sir Culation]

The noise!

Do you miss it?

[Six Fiend]

Bad Sir Culation said:

The noise!

Do you miss it?

Hell yes. It was fabulous and my second (had a 525i SE auto previously). The up/down side was setting off car alarms all over the place as I rumbled by in narrow streets It was also a bit excessive in the cabin at 30-35 and 70-75.

Giving it beans through the gears with the windows open was lovely. One of my neighbours told me she likes the Jag but loved the BMW. Apparently it was all about the noise. My friends all loved it too and everyone called him Brian (Blessed loud y'see).

As a car I really miss it. Smooth, ludicrously comfy, utterly solid. Great looking and not too bad on fuel.

The problems needing attention were:

Auto box in need of rebuild (big delay and clunk selecting reverse plus other oddities)
Hydraulic brake servo leaking, eninge bay has no room for the cheaper vacuum type (£900 for the part!)
Dampers and bushes needed all round
Steering box adjusted as much as poss and still loose
Ramapant tin worm in body rear and doors
Various other bits and bobs
Respray

That lot was going to cost big and I needed a reliable and cheaper to run car. I'd spent a fair bit on him and it was a hard choice, full restoration or sell and buy something newer. I don't like E39s in the same way and wanted something with similar performance and an interior I felt at home in (I like leather and real wood). Early X-type 3.0se manual fitted the bill, it's just a bit quiet at the moment but that's only a few hundred notes to sort out and I can do it myself...

If I can ever get the money together I'll have another E34, one without holes in the tub itself, and get it up together to keep until I drop

Of all the cars I've owned and driven my E34s have just had that special something for me.

Even when the first one assaulted my wallet (cooling and air-con system replacements) I enjoyed every minute of it!

Edited by Six Fiend on Wednesday 20th July 08:46

Edited by Six Fiend on Wednesday 20th July 13:50

[Paul.B]

filski666 said:

Interesting - was it a while ago? I have all the bushes powerflex do for mine, but at the rear they only do the subframe mounts and the anti-roll bar mounts (which are the wrong size as I fitted a larger E34 Touring Nurburgring Edition ARB on mine ) - but they don't seem to do anything for the suspension arms

http://www.powerflexshop.com/index.php?cPath=25_87

Sorry, I think you are right about the limited availablity with the rear bushes. I found the best upgrade to the handling by far were the GAZ Coilovers. They were the same ones a few of the Race chaps use. The car had after market decent springs & dampers fitted before I changed to the Gaz, but they were 'fast road' whereas the GAZ were competition!

The AP's were fantastic and never showed any signs of wilting on track days. Even repeated big stops at Donnington, Oulton park and Rockingham. They did chew through pads though!!

The R888's were perfect for the track. I never really tested them on the road in the wet though.

I did like that car but very expensive to track on a regular basis. 120+ liters of fuel in a day. Pads after every 2-3 days and disks after 5-6! Tyres were not too bad actually but I have a fairly smooth driving style.
It sounded the nuts. The car also had a bespoke stainless exhaust. V8 bellow with the supercharger whine also!

Around Donnington it would live with an M3 but the CSL's would drive away. Much quicker than an E39 M5 but the weight loss and brakes helped big time.

[filski666]

ok, that video made me dig this out and upload it to youtube......my 540 with no silencers.

I was working on it, and a bloke couple of houses down kept revving his engine and it sounded dreadful, so I had to let him hear what a proper engine sounded like heh heh heh

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdZ1c0C-pCI

just out of interest - this is the exhaust which will be going on my car when it eventually gets back on the road.....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4D9gNGmuLZ8&fea...

Edited by filski666 on Wednesday 20th July 12:47

[Six Fiend]

Yum!

[Bad Sir Culation]

filski666 said:

ok, that video made me dig this out and upload it to youtube......my 540 with no silencers.

I was working on it, and a bloke couple of houses down kept revving his engine and it sounded dreadful, so I had to let him hear what a proper engine sounded like heh heh heh

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdZ1c0C-pCI

just out of interest - this is the exhaust which will be going on my car when it eventually gets back on the road.....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4D9gNGmuLZ8&fea...

Edited by filski666 on Wednesday 20th July 12:47

Yup, the BMW is definitely my preferred V8 option