[M3] Borrowed wheels and waking up the 2.3

[note: this post, like an air-cooled 911, is back-dated to when these events occurred] 

It's been a busy month. M3 has been mostly idle since the big road trip.

I got tired of rolling around on the stock 15s and ancient tires. Jon loaned me his 16" BBS RS. I don't know the model numbers but they're 16x8 with et 24 up front and et11 in the back. Looks nice!









Tons of space in the back even with ET11. Tires are 225/40.

I received a big box in the mail from Germany. 



The cams (284/276) and flywheel (Evo, despite my labeling) have been on the shelf for a while. Airbox and A-N is new. The car will be heading to Sacramento this weekend with Josh for installation.

It's time to wake this 2.3 up!

[M3] WHEEL POST!

[note: this post, like an air-cooled 911, is back-dated to when these events occurred] 

WHEEL POST! 

Good news: I have solved the 16" tire dilemma. I am going to solve it by not buying 16" tires at all.

If you've been following along, it has been my plan to have my 16" M5 wheels refinished in Nogaro a la Sport Evo. After many dead ends, I had a friend recommend a shop that THEIR friend was using, and that shop had their OWN shop they work with that could refinish his wheels in two colors. Whew. So I called up the intermediate shop and they said yes, this shop they use can "probably do it." I was told to expect $225-250/wheel for full refurbishment and paint in two colors.

I was scheduled to drop the wheels off Monday morning. Sunday night, I got to thinking. These 16s will be nice, but they are not the ULTIMATE wheel I really want to have on this car. There are some 17" options that, to me, are just absolutely killer. I plan to take that step eventually, so... why am I about to pay $1000 to have these 16s refinished, then throw $600 tires on them, if my heart's not set on it? Not to mention the hassle of trying to get these wheel painted correctly. The wheels are in nice shape as-is, they don't need the refurb and I would not recover any of the expense if I sold them.

So it came back to the list of 17s, all of them expensive. Here is my shorthand worksheet:

• BBS RS
  • (various sizes)
  • Good: look cool, period correct, reasonable pricing
  • Bad: want something a little more unique, have to find/build a set to spec
• BBS E50
  • (build to spec)
  • Good: amazeballs, DTM
  • Bad: Available new? Mg on the street?
• BBS LM276
  • 17x8.5 et18
  • Good: can buy new, look great, fitment good, quality
  • Bad: already had them, 2x local homies have them
• Volk TE37SL
  • 17x8.5 et15
  • Good: can buy new, perfect size and offset, light, strong, $3k ish
  • Bad: too similar to GTR, look huge, maybe too modern
• [Replica by NTM] BBS E50 style
  • Good: can buy new, period look, good sizes, aluminum
  • Bad: Replica, slightly different look? Priced like genuine
• Cinel DTM
  • Good: period correct, DTM, high quality, good fitment
  • Bad: $1400/each allegedly
• Livery Wheel Procar
  • Good: unique, fitment however I want, look cool
  • Bad: $1k/ea+, acquired taste, are they in business…?
• Fikse FM5 or P113
  • Good: high quality, fitment however I want, look cool
  • Bad: $1k+/ea, slightly too modern looking

Of the batch, the TE37s are the bargain at 70,000JPY (~$635) a piece. Unfortunately, those are exactly the same wheels that I have on my GTR. I kept coming back to the BBS E50s, Every E30M I see on the internet that really stops me in my tracks is on them, either DTM or street car. Believing that BBS no longer manufactured the wheel, I had the NTM/replica wheels as far as the shopping cart and ready for checkout a couple evenings ago.

Then, someone on FB mentioned that BBS would build me some for the same price. Thinking that he was yanking my chain, I asked him to point me in the right direction. He provided a contact at BBS Americas outside of Atlanta and in a matter of hours I had full details on what they could do for me. The representative explained to me that production of the magesium wheels had been halted few years ago, but enough people requested them that they dusted off the casting dies and tripled the unit price to make it worth their while. The rep threw a lot of information at me in a very short phone call, so this information is not 100% gospel, but he explained that BBS still offers 4 magnesium E50 centers in 5x120 bolt pitch. I asked him for a 17x8 et15 size, and he gave me two options: the first, his recommendation, was a 2" outer lip with a 6" inner lip. The second was a 1" outer lip with a 7" inner lip, same offset, with a different much more "deep" magnesium center. He provided some section drawings and I did my best Keynote engineering:



Note: the thickness of the center at the hoop bolting interface is 20mm, which is cut off in the drawing. True for both centers.

So I studied these drawings and determined that the 2/6" was going to be the better choice. I want the faces close to flush with the outer lip, like the race cars had, but the 1/7" was a little over-the-top. The center actually sticks proud of the lip (like those reverse-mount VW guys do... yikes) and there seems to be a very deep central pocket that could really change the look of the wheel. Some other tidbits I got from the rep:

• Shown above are 2 of the 4 magnesium 5x120 centers BBS still offers. The one I selected, 389, is the only one of the four that doesn't have tapped holes in the face for turbofans. (darn)
• Note the stock E30 M3 brake caliper profile shown in the 389 drawing.
• The 393 center was apparently initially designed for E30 M3 DTM applications, where big brake clearance was required.
• The 389 center is what was used on the H&R E30 demo car.

So after poring over photos available online, and drawing up these sections based on the drawings he provided, and even throwing it into CAD to get a rough idea of the look - I pulled the trigger today. 17x8 et15 square setup in gold. I consulted a couple of old chassis friends from Tesla and they said that new-cast magnesium should not be a problem on the street. They look like absolutely torture to clean but I can live with it because they are amazing. I love how they look, I am excited for the gold on a silver car, I love that they're magnesium and that they were used on the racecars. The centers are $675/ea and the 4 finished wheels will set me back $4700. It's almost double what I've ever spent on wheels... or really any aftermarket part for any of my cars. But this M3 is the one that I'm putting all the good parts, the 'keeper' that will get all the dream parts and look just how I want it to look. And again, it would only be $1600 more if I went through this whole exercise to re-fit the 16" M5 wheels.

I am keen not to over-tire the car, which is why I'm going with a square setup... I don't think the M3 needs staggered wheels. At this time I am planning to run 215/40 up front to make sure I don't have fitment issues, and I am on the fence about whether to do 215 in the rear as well or go up to 235/40. I have plenty of time to think about it, as the wheels are probably about 3 months away.

[M3] Little changes, 16" wheel and tire woes

[note: this post, like an air-cooled 911, is back-dated to when these events occurred] 

[also note: I have condensed multiple forum posts into this entry, please forgive awkward transitions]

I installed a few small bits and bobs here and there. First was the e30ig (innovative goods) one-touch window module. This slick component goes in-line between the vehicle harness and your window switches, and converts them to 1-touch function. It took nearly 2 months for them to arrive from Eastern Europe but it was worth the wait. They work perfectly and while it's a small thing, I love the convenience. Apparently I didn't take any photos showing them fitted but you can check the website.

The next thing, another small one, was the passenger side mirror glass. The magnification was strong, too strong, so I bought a $14 wider angle piece from Latvia via eBay. You can see the difference in field of view in these images. Way better.









The new mirror glass is TYC part number 303-0071-1. It says it doesn't fit M3, but it does. I'm not sure if it's getting hung up on a heated mirror option or something but it fits the same as any E30.

My car's got a fair few rock chips on the front end and the wipers have not been spared. I pulled them off to refinish them, that is still work in progress. It's rainy so I can't paint them, it's rainy so I need to use them on the car. Lose-lose.





So it's just been maintenance and projects at home over the past couple of weeks. I haven't been crazy about the feel of my brake pedal - good stopping power when you get there, but too much pedal travel required to get to it - so I bled the brakes. Side note, I am really enjoying my new QuickJack setup I bought earlier this year, I was on the fence for 3 years about spending the money but it's so great.



In fact, I like it so much I used it on my Focus to do the brakes...



...and on my wife's car to rotate the tires.



Speaking of invaluable tools: pressure brake bleeder. If you do brakes with any frequency, get one. I'm lucky that the same cap fits my E30 reservoir and my Focus RS. Makes flushing the fluid an absolute breeze.



My car runs quite a bit of rear camber with the H&R spring setup and I found that my right-rear was shot. Oof. Outboard channel of the tire was at 6/32", inboard at 2/32", and you can see that they need to be replaced pronto. After this post I'm off to shop for 16" tires, I suspect it will be slim pickings. It has been my master plan to have the wheels refurbished in Sport Evo style with Nogaro centers when new tires were needed, but I'm not sure now is a great time to do that. The good news is that I have a set of stock 15s with good tires that can swap in to keep the car on the road. Do I have any options to adjust the camber in the rear to not keep destroying tires?



In any case, the brake bleed produced some tired-looking fluid and I've got a better pedal feel now. Previously it was so low that I couldn't heel-toe and that's no good... that ability has been restored. I am doing my best to avoid human contact but every now and then I slip out for a little Point-A-to-Point-A drive and enjoy the empty roads. Stay safe everybody!

I've got 15mm spring pads in the mail. Since that tweaks ride height, and I have no idea where the alignment on this car is, I will have it aligned when I get new tires fitted.

When I took the Model 3 to the tire shop for new rubber I took my 16s and had the tires pulled off so the wheels can be refinished. I thought wheel refurb was a pretty easy thing but apparently there aren't tons of places in the area that can be trusted to do a good job. It seems like every place has 9 good reviews and 1 horror show review, and that's enough to give me pause. This reminds me of my ordeal trying to find someone to do the bodywork on my last Lachs car, a search I eventually abandoned. With all of the automotive shops out there these days, it amazes me that it is nigh impossible to find someone who does good work, stands behind it, communicates well, and charges fairly. To me that is the most basic of operating requirements to run a business. In the Bay Area it is the exception, and those few shops suffer from their own popularity and you need to wait months for an appointment. Or they charge $175 an hour. Sorry, went off on a tangent there.

I called up one that seems to be of good repute and the guy shot me down immediately when I described painting the wheels two-tone with Nogaro centers. "We only spray one color, we don't do any masking or anything like that. I think you want a body shop!" Well... to me it's not supremely difficult - one tape line, and there is physical step in the lip to guide you, not on the basketweave part, OEM colors. I did get in touch with one local paint shop and he's mulling it over.

One thing I need help on: the inside of the Sport Evo rim is Nogaro, which is BMW paint code 243. I am not sure of the paint code for the 'normal' silver bit that goes on the lip. Google tells me it is BMW code 144 "wheel silver" but it seems that color is applied on E46, E90, etc. If anyone can offer paint code insight, or wheel refinishing guidance, it is greatly appreciated. The FB crowd already told me to just buy Sport Evo wheels, but from where I'm sitting they're backordered, the center caps who knows, and they're $2500 anyway. I can pay a fair amount on this refinishing and still come out ahead.

When it comes times for tires - it's well-known that there is not much at all in 225/45R16. It's funny to search the forums and see that it's been dire for a decade at least... there are 2010 threads where people are complaining about the same. So if you're searching this in the future, hello! Did we recover from COVID? Did we solve automotive autonomy? Is this the point where China overtook the US as the world's leading superpower? Did we send humans to Mars? Do the 2022 F1 cars ACTUALLY solve the dirty air problems and improve passing? Sorry, shelter-in-place is getting to me.

For posterity, these are the 225/45/16 tire choices as of 3/28/20 in the US from TireRack:
Dunlop Direzza ZIII - $160.36 
Toyo Proxes R1R - $150.36
Yokohama Advan A052 - $210.74
Toyo Proxes R888R - $148.99

I know that opinions will vary on this, but I am disappointed that all of the options are high-grip, high-performance tires. On my last car I went from the Kumho all-season whatevers that came on the stock 15s to Dunlop Direzza Z2 Star Specs on 17s and it really changed the feel of the car. Ultimate grip is cool but with this low-power RWD configuration it's sad when you can't chuck the back end out now and then. Too much grip is a real thing. If you've been on high performance tires for a long time with your car, throw your neglected 15s back on for an afternoon and you might be surprised at how different the whole car feels.

But beggars can't be choosers, and I am set on the 16s, so at this stage I believe I will go with the Toyo R1Rs. From the reading I've done it seems that they perform well in the wet. I don't go out for fun drives in the wet, but I do go on fun drives up on Skyline boulevard, which is misty and foggy most mornings and there can be a fair amount of water on the road.

[Focus] New street wheels and tires

[note: this post, like an air-cooled 911, is back-dated to when these events occurred] 

Mountune UK was alarmed to hear about my experience, and they've asked me to send the dead pads back for their engineers to review and share with the supplier. They have offered to send me a new set of pads, unfortunately I can't feel comfortable with their track compound again so they're going to send me street pads. I will update this post once they share their findings.

The road to recovery started Wednesday night when I reinstalled the stock brake pads, and continued yesterday when I ordered new caliper boots and brake discs. I took the next step today, bringing my car in to install new wheels and tires.

I went through my wheel selection process in post 29 above, and at that time I was deciding between the Fifteen52 Podiums and the Holeshot flow-formed option they were teasing. In the end while I liked the look of the Holeshot, the size (19x9, et45) was just a little bit too aggressive for me and I went instead with the Podiums. To go with them I picked Michelin's Super Sport replacement, the Pilot Sport 4S.

I swapped out the stock lug nuts for a set of McGard's SplineDrive lug nuts. I've used these lugs on my Miata and my GT-R with excellent results. They don't rust or wear down, the seat of the nut spins independently to avoid chiseling paint off the wheels, and the black finish on my Miata hasn't faded whatsoever after 8 years of California sun. I expect to pull my wheels off frequently and the posts about people twisting up the stock lugs convinced me to make the change.

First look on its wheels, center portion and faux centerlock nut not yet installed.

I was really relieved to see how well these fit, as I agonized a great deal over offset and wheel and tire size.

On the ground with center caps installed. The only thing I forgot was hubcentric rings - these wheels are 73.1 versus the car's 63.4mm hub. Ordered some and they'll arrive tomorrow.

So here are the final facts and figures:

Wheels: Fifteen52 Podium, 19x8.5 et45, frosted graphite

Tires: Michelin Pilot Sport 4S, 245/35R19

Nuts: McGard SplineDrive

Suspension: stock

Aggressive driving is on hold until I get the brake discs replaced, so driving impressions for these tires will have to wait. But I love how the wheels look!

[Focus] Four big boxes

 [note: this post, like an air-cooled 911, is back-dated to when these events occurred]

Got a little something in the mail...

Plan to mount them up after my track day on Wednesday.