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Things that go Whump in the Night
I am always amazed by the chain of events that leads to discovery. This past weekend, I was getting my MINI ready for winter. We don’t get a lot of snow here in Maryland, but when you car is only a few inches off of the ground, it doesn’t take much to slow you down. I figured the splitter would act like a dive plane in the snow. With that in mind, I decided to take off the splitter, close the brake duct holes, reinstall the fog lights, and trim a inch off of the bottom of airdam to gain some more clearance.
I had the car up on jack stands with the front wheels off. I remember looking down into the center bore of the camber plate (photo above) on the driver’s side, thinking it didn’t look quite right. I compared it to the other side and noticed the gap was about twice as large. I figured there must be some movement in the receiver, and since I had been working on the hub, maybe the downward pressure had made it droop. Then, as I reinstalled the wheel, and was pushing down to tighten the lugs, I heard a “whump”. The bearing had dropped out of the receiver. Even I know enough about suspensions to think, “not good….”
Sure enough, the urethane bushing had failed. The bearing was still attached to the top of the strut, but the strut was no longer attached to the receiver. From the machining that appears to have taken place, it looks like it has been loose for a while.
I talked to the manufacturer and they are going to replace the camber plates. That’s good news, and the car is still drivable, but I have to be careful to avoid large potholes. Once I line up the bearing, and lower the car to the ground, the weight of the car along with the compression of the spring keeps it seated, even when I jack the car up again. I can make it fail, but I have to put a lot of pressure on the hub to drop it out again.
So this presents an opportunity: If I’m going to have to have someone reassemble the struts, I might as well replace the shocks. (Quiet: Rationalization in progress.) I’m not yet good enough to really take advantage of coil-overs. Plus at $1200-$2500 I can’t afford them anyway. I’m thinking about 3 options:
- Koni Sport. The yellow Konis are adjustable. The fronts can be easily changed through the center bore of the camber plate. The rears are a little harder to use since you have to remove the shock to adjust them. I’ve heard good things from people who set the rears to the mid setting, then adjust the fronts to suit conditions. Soft for daily driving or in the rain. Hard for autocross/track. Designed to work with lowering springs.
- Koni FSD. FSD stands for frequency selective damping. That’s a fancy way of saying that the have a softer rebound rate for a quick (high frequency) compression such as seams on the highway or a pothole; and a hard rebound rate for slow (low frequency) compression such as on a smooth track. Sort of a cake/eating thing. They are not adjustable, but they compensate for the two primary goals of the daily driver/occasional racer.
- MINI JCW. The JCW suspension is designed to work with shorter springs which should help with the harshness of using stock struts on lowering springs. They aren’t adjustable and they don’t offer two distinct damping rates, but they’re OEM.
I’m leaning toward the Koni Adjustables. If I can dial out the harshness of my current suspension, then maybe people won’t worry about their fillings when they ride with me. The ability to make adjustments gives me something else to play with (or blame) next season. That’s a bonus.
Catching up with Fall Track Days & Progress on the BMW Stealth Project
I haven’t been keeping up with blogging so I’ll try to catch up with a few things in this post. With the economy in a tailspin here in the US, I’ve put my BMW project on hold for a while. There are a couple of advantages to this strategy: It preserves cash should we have to throw everything in the Volvo and head to Mexico; and if I wait until January, then the BMW will qualify as “historic” according to the great State of Maryland and I can skip the Maryland State Inspection (and associated fees).
Since I’m not making any progress mechanically, I thought it would be a good time to even out the flat black paint scheme. Here you see it before the attack of the black spray bombs.
And here it is afterward. You can see how far I’ve gotten by looking at where the door meets the rear quarter-panel. From that point back to include the roof remains to be painted. My goal is a uniform satin finish. Sort of Stealthy.
Back in October, I went to the Fall Driver’s School at the Shenandoah Circuit, Summit Point, WV.
It was a great three days of track time, but at the end of the first day, my friend hit the wall at the start of the main straight.
He and his passenger were both unhurt, but his 2005 Corvette was totaled. I was actually quite surprised how well the passenger compartment held up. He dropped a wheel off the outside of the turn going 85+ MPH and skidded across the track hitting the opposite wall with the car rotated about 110 degrees. Both airbags deployed as the car ricocheted off the wall. Now you know why I’m working on a dedicated track car.
Ah, There’s Your Problem
Well, there’s your problem. Your engine isn’t attached to your car.
I was going to start working on the drive-line today. I know the flex-disk is shot so I got a new one along with the center bearing for the drive-shaft. As long as the drive-shaft is out, I was going to replace the bushings for the shift linkage since it’s easier to get to when the drive-shaft is out.
As I was sitting in the driveway about to pull into the garage, I was thinking there was an awful lot of vibration from the engine. Maybe what I was feeling wasn’t all coming from the drive-line. The engine idles fairly smoothly (for a car with 214K miles) so if there was vibration in neutral, the source had to be something other than the drive-line.
Sure enough, both motor mounts were sheared and the engine was sitting about an inch to the left of center. It was easy enough to get the broken mounts out, but moving the engine back to center to lower on to the new mounts was a bear. I finally managed to get it to swing around and lower back down. Now that the engine is back in the right place, I have to see what else doesn’t line up anymore. Luckily I had some spare mounts in the garage, but that wasn’t how I had planned to spend my day.
8/29/08: Update. I decided to check the transmission mounts today. One was still attached. It’s amazing (or scary) how much more smoothly the engine idles when it’s actually attached to the car.
Stealth: Titled but not Fully Baked
At the end of week three I managed to patch together the broken headlight carrier, install a new headlight and re-aim the beams. I managed to save $50 by repairing the broken carrier. The black wheels look slick. Today I installed the new passenger seat (not pictured) I found on bimmerforums for that $50 I didn’t spend on the headlight carrier.
All-in-all the project is proceeding well, if more slowly than planned. I’m finding each little project takes about twice as much time as I think it should. That’s what happens when you have a 20 year old car I suppose. (Next year it’s “Historic”.) I have to work more on the family/garage balance thing. Too bad I have to go to work. Or sleep….
In Maryland, you have to pass the safety inspection before you can register a car. I got the car titled this week and got a 30-day registration to get it passed inspection. Looking at the inspection list, I think only the non-functioning speedo/odometer is holding me up now. My goal is to get the car ready in more or less stock configuration in time for the next CCA driver’s school 1 August. I think it’s doable.
Stealth: Out with the Old
I’m at the end of the second week of this project and have made some significant progress with only a few (unpleasant) surprises. I secured the battery in the trunk (no brick required) and patched the hole in the fender well from the inside — I still have to finish it off on the outside. I removed the excess trim from the trunk and the electric antenna. That was about 10 lbs. of weight. I replaced all of the light bulbs.
From the interior, I removed the backseats, back seatbelts, stereo, four speakers, some speaker wire, and the center console. Total of about 40 lbs. I also removed one of the two front seats, but I plan to replace that. I fixed and reattached the glove box, removed the annoying key chime, and fitted a new UUC shift knob. I installed a new steering wheel cover. The rotten shift boot is still waiting to be replaced. I relocated the window switches to the dash and found out the reverse light has been disconnected and is on a separate switch now. Now sure why.
Under the hood, I removed the cruise control servo (the brains are long gone); replaced the air cleaner with a K&N cone filter; removed the AC compressor, condensor, evaporator and associated hardware (weight savings alone 25 lbs. fore of the front axle). I replaced the blower resistor and the coil; new oil and coolant caps. I replaced all of the fuses and found a new fuse box cover. I replaced the leaky power steering fluid reservoir and both leaky low-pressure hoses. I cleaned up much of the mess associated with those leaks as well.
The dented right front fender proved to be a bit more complicated than I estimated. I knew I had to fix the front turn signal and replace a headlight, but once I got everything apart, I found the damage was more extensive, but not structural. I removed and replaced the fender liner. Removed the bumper and fixed the turn signal. I removed the air-dam and replaced the fog lamps with blanks (saving a couple of pounds at the very front). Once I removed the grille I found the headlamp carrier was broken. (That’s the one piece on back-order that’s stopping me from registering the car.) I straightened out the interior supporting members so I could rehang the fender. I decided to just pound out the fender and hit it with some paint. It is actually the best painted part of the car now (which says less about the quality of my painting and more about the sorry state of the paint job as a whole).
Since I had the whole front end opened up, I removed the AC and associated parts including the auxiliary fan (which I plan to eventually replace). The fan alone weighs about 5 lbs. Eventually I plan to remove the fan from the engine and run just with an electric fan, but not now. I had Safelight put in a new windshield as well.
As I was waiting for the paint to dry on the fender, I replaced the rotors and brake pads. I have stainless steel brake lines, but don’t have a pressure bleeder so I’ll leave that up to someone else to install. I also installed studs from Turner Motorsports. I bought new Falken Ziex 912s (195/60R14) to go on the stock 14 inch basked weaves. I looked at getting the wheels refinished, but at $40-$50 per wheel for sand blasting alone, I decided instead to just blast them with some paint myself. The photos show the car riding on snow tires as the paint on the wheels hasn’t dried yet.
I’m still hopeful that if the headlight carrier arrives this week, I can get the car inspected and registered to make the next Autocross on the 5th or later in the month on the 20th. With wheel spacers, I should be able to run my MINI autcross wheels. I have replacements for all of the hoses, timing belt, and water pump. I also have a colder thermostat to install at the same time. After that, I think I’ll fix the dubious suspension parts (control arms; tie-rods; bushings; & end-links) before the last track event of the season. That will give me the winter to get the race suspension (springs, shocks, sway bars, camber plates) and roll-cage installed.
Total weight savings so far is about 80 lbs. or just under 3 percent.
