road force simulator

[SBN]

Hi,

Some will know I have been trying to get rid of the wandering/tramlining on my e46 coupe 330i. Before I trade this in to get rid of something that is just driving me crazy I have heard people mention these road force simulators and how they display suspension wear and tear. I have googled road force simulator with little joy... Does anyone know of a centre in the south east/ east anglia. I figure another 100 quid may point to some simple and solve a lot of my issues and sort the car out.

Fyi, tyres are all bridgestones (new), correct psi, control arm bushes done, arb done, alignment done twice by bmw indie.

[buggalugs]

I have seen the 'wobble plate' type things, where you drive onto the ramps and place one of the wheels on a plate that moves around and allows you to see where the movement is. I had my E46 Touring on one a few weeks ago co-incidentally. Not sure what their propper name is sorry.

[AlfaSpider]

I'm sure someone told me kwik fit have the equipment to do this test.
I think all e46's are quite sensitive to camber change and undulations in the road, fitting powerflex bushed to the rear made a massive difference to mine.
The only other thing to check is your getting oem quality front wishbones and bushes fitted, the cheap ones last for 10k if your lucky. I'm going to give the meyle hd ones a go before the next mot.

[SBN]

The fronts have been done and are lemforder which I have heard are as good as meyle.

I have been back to my garage and apparently they have done this and all was ok. Bit dissapointed really, as I like this car but I guess I'm just not a fan of to much feedback and standard charecteristics as its being called.

Any one want. 330ci with 40k on the clock?

Gonna go back to a GTi

[buggalugs]

Wheels can make a big diff. too if they're big ones.

[SBN]

I don't understand this thing about wheels... I have the mv2 18's on... 18's are nothing new on cars. My vrs has 18's as have a lot of cars I own, they even used the same size tyres and I get zero tramlining or figity direction control.

Is it the staggered set up with wider rears... I wonder?

[a_bread]

SBN said:

I don't understand this thing about wheels... I have the mv2 18's on... 18's are nothing new on cars. My vrs has 18's as have a lot of cars I own, they even used the same size tyres and I get zero tramlining or figity direction control.

Is it the staggered set up with wider rears... I wonder?

As you said earlier, it may well be a price you have to pay for the degree of steering "directness", something which your VRS probably has less of. However, on more recent BMWs the trade-off has been improved - you still get the steering feel but with less or no tramlining.

The proportion of the time that mine gave me noticeable tramlining was so low that it didn't bother me.