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Season 2000

During winter 2000 there was a lot of work done to fit a gearbox from Opel Ascona. It is a four speed unit with Quife's gear set changed for racing purpose.

There was made special bell housing and mainshaft to fit the box. Also transmission tunnel had to be modified.

A few meters of tube was added to rollcage to increase body stiffness. The advance curve of distributor was modified and a Crane XR-3000 pointless ignition system with PS91 coil was installed. After these modifications 127 hp was measured in a dyno.



Season 2001

Since Opel gearbox failure we were back in starting point with the driveline. From now on I only trust in BMW parts. Winter 2001 started by fitting a Getrag 265/5 close ratio gearbox from BMW 535. Big box also has a bigger 6-bolt guibo. Mainshaft is now a mixed combination of 5-series and -02 original. This time only minor modifications for the transmission tunnel was needed.



In garage there was laying one earlier cheaply acquired differential from e30 323i. It's limited slip unit with 3,23:1 ratio. I decided to take that in use. Because rust free rear subframes for -02's are getting rare I didn't want to destroy that. I used E21 subframe where I fitted a part of another subframe to get e30 diff fit. Earlier I gave wrong information that the differential was from M3. Later when I tried to find some shorter gearing I learned that it is a rather rare unit from 323i and there's no other ratios available.


All the old subframe mounting points were removed from the body with quite a bit of the floor panel itself. New mounting points were manufactured of 80*80 steel profile. They were welded to rocker panels so that subframe sits about 10 cm higher in body. Reason for that is to get swinging arms back to right position with heavily lowered suspension. New floor was made of flat sheetmetal. Differential also needed some more room inside the trunk which required modifying gas tank. Rear part of exhaust was totally renoved...


Rubber bushings of swinging arms were replaced with uniball rod arms. Camber and toe in adjustments are now the style BMW factory used in M3 racers. Front struts and inserts were shortened 40 mm and springs were changed to stiffer and shorter. New seat and 6-point harness had to be changed because of new regulations.



Oil cooler was installed behind new "modified turbo" -style front spoiler. Also hood was changed to one made of glassfiber. Later on summer also rearspoiler was made of used helicopter blade. Because of new heavier parts in driveline the rearbumper was removed. 70 kg ballast weights are still used.


Season 2002

No major changes this year. New engine was planned but it didn't realize for this season.


Season 2003

New engine was finally ready. Here's more story about EvoII engine.

Season 2004

In the end of 2003 I noticed the engine wasn't as powerful as before. Compression measurement showed that everything is not ok. With compressed air it was easy to see that two outlet valves were leaking. When opening engine I soon noticed that valves were had very much carbon deposit. There was no other reason found for leaking.



How can an engine that's used only at high rpm's be that dirty? Can't tell but I'm gonna change gas brand. Rod bearings were a bit scratched as were piston skirts. For that I can't tell other reason but oil beeing too hot and not working as it should all the time. Engine was put together with new sealings and rod bearings and bigger oil cooler from M535 was installed.



With more power the brakes were not up to their job any more. Easy solution -> bigger brakes. Well yes but it's never that easy. I got Wilwood Superlite calipers for front and Dynalites for back. To make installing calipers easier (plus bigger bearings) I got front struts from e12 518. I used e21 323i hubs to keep 4 bolt wheels. Disc's were selected from catalog according to dimensions: front e28 284mm reduced to 280 vented and rear e36 280mm solid. Both were redrilled for 4 wheel bolts and also adapter rings for center holes were needed.

Mounts for rear calipers were laser-cut and mig-welded to swinging arms. Master cylinder is about 22mm (changed before) and booster was removed now. Wilwood pressure reducer was installed in rear brake line already before - now it's actually needed. I didn't have much time to test the brakes before race. Only one day and it was raining whole time. During first race weekend they didn't work so good. Pedal feeling was very soft and brakes faded during race. Afterwards I changed silicone brake fluids to ATE Super blue racing and pedal feeling got a little better. Then I made the additional braces between caliper halfs which cheaper Wilwoods don't originally have. Feeling got a bit better again. We'll see how it works on track now.




Since I had found out that there's no other ratios available for my differential I had started looking for real "big diff" which I thought mine was. Now a friend had found a reasonably priced lsd for me. I already had 1:4,27 gears which were put in with lsd unit. So I had to cut up the trunk floor once again. Some more room needed at the back and new rear support. Battery was changed to small sealed industrial battery (17Ah) and moved in behind the seat.