redpriest HPDE journal

Nice to see you opted for the motorsport style gussets! Those seem to be often imitated but nobody comes close to what Tony does. His cages are on another level. I've been paying attention the last couple years taking note of a lot of shops around the country and nobody builds cages that fit as tight as Tony's. When we did our seat fitting at TCD, I noted how i'd previously not had that much headroom in previous BMWs, but then noticed how tight the cage was to the chassis and it made sense.

Did you decide what you're going to do for the motor? I've done a ton of research for our E36 widebody S54 race motor and talked to a lot of racers in the country with deep pockets. It's interesting, not a lot has changed since I stopped club racing 15+ years ago. Feel free to reach out if you'd like more info.

e36clubracer wrote

Nice to see you opted for the motorsport style gussets! Those seem to be often imitated but nobody comes close to what Tony does. His cages are on another level. I've been paying attention the last couple years taking note of a lot of shops around the country and nobody builds cages that fit as tight as Tony's. When we did our seat fitting at TCD, I noted how i'd previously not had that much headroom in previous BMWs, but then noticed how tight the cage was to the chassis and it made sense.

Did you decide what you're going to do for the motor? I've done a ton of research for our E36 widebody S54 race motor and talked to a lot of racers in the country with deep pockets. It's interesting, not a lot has changed since I stopped club racing 15+ years ago. Feel free to reach out if you'd like more info.

It's not a tight fitting cage if you use gussets that big between the tubing and the A pillar, lol. At least in that particular area.

The lateral bars and main hoop itself might be a different story, but can't tell from the one picture. I'm sure the cage is well done, just thought what you said about tight fitting is funny based on the photo OP posted lol.

tsk94 wrote

It's not a tight fitting cage if you use gussets that big between the tubing and the A pillar, lol. At least in that particular area.

The lateral bars and main hoop itself might be a different story, but can't tell from the one picture. I'm sure the cage is well done, just thought what you said about tight fitting is funny based on the photo OP posted lol.

Yeah the tight fitting part wasn't about the gussets. But thank you for making that assumption....

Those style gussets (for BMW Motorsport chassis) originally started on the E46 PTG/Schnitzer cars in 2001. Tony's are an evolution of them but very close to the original. They are meant to be a replacement for the FIA downbar. Talking to a PTG engineer years ago it was done to help clear space for ingress and egress for driver changes during endurance racing.

Regardless I see a lot of cages you can fit your arm between the cage and the chassis in a lot of areas. You won't find that with anything Tony and Joe at TCD produce. I am excited to see this car's cage once it comes back from paint.

There's plenty of clearance w the gussets. Love mine.

e36clubracer wrote

Nice to see you opted for the motorsport style gussets! Those seem to be often imitated but nobody comes close to what Tony does. His cages are on another level. I've been paying attention the last couple years taking note of a lot of shops around the country and nobody builds cages that fit as tight as Tony's. When we did our seat fitting at TCD, I noted how i'd previously not had that much headroom in previous BMWs, but then noticed how tight the cage was to the chassis and it made sense.

Did you decide what you're going to do for the motor? I've done a ton of research for our E36 widebody S54 race motor and talked to a lot of racers in the country with deep pockets. It's interesting, not a lot has changed since I stopped club racing 15+ years ago. Feel free to reach out if you'd like more info.

I'm going with a 4.7L Carbahn stroker + race cams + dry sump. I've heard there's potential reliability issues, so I figure I'll be a guinea pig and see how this works. My motor is already pretty tired and on the low side of power generation, so it needs to be rebuilt or replaced anyway.

If it blows up, I'll just get another. I'm very curious about rebuild intervals with this engine, so I'll also find this out.

Very cool on the stroker motor, I bet it'll make big power!

I'm very interested to hear your experience with Carbahn. Will you be staying with the DCT? Do they tune the ECU in house or is that on you? Will you go to standalone like a motec or life racing and a sequential?

Also curious to hear how you like dealing with the dry sump. I almost went that route with our race s54 then realized I would be really annoyed with the startup procedure of a dry-sump engine. But maybe Carbahn's system is essentially start and drive?

e36clubracer wrote

Very cool on the stroker motor, I bet it'll make big power!

I'm very interested to hear your experience with Carbahn. Will you be staying with the DCT? Do they tune the ECU in house or is that on you? Will you go to standalone like a motec or life racing and a sequential?

Also curious to hear how you like dealing with the dry sump. I almost went that route with our race s54 then realized I would be really annoyed with the startup procedure of a dry-sump engine. But maybe Carbahn's system is essentially start and drive?

They tune, afaik. I will attempt to stay with the DCT. I know there's potentially some issues with torque etc, but I don't really want to move to sequential unless I have to. Learning process so we'll see!

I didn't realize there was an onerous start up procedure for dry-sump - so we'll see there if there is one!

Begun, it has.

I went with the 4.6L versus the 4.7L at the expense of ~15 hp. The rationale is that the 4.6 is more reliable ... and if there's an issue with the motor, it's possible in some instances to save it via boring it out to 4.7L. We'll see. This is an enormously expensive science project, should be fun.

I'd bet a carefully wrapped plenum underside, filter neck, and lower airbox would keep intake air temps a few degrees cooler and make up the difference.

Congrats, so awesome!!

redpriest wrote

Begun, it has.

I went with the 4.6L versus the 4.7L at the expense of ~15 hp. The rationale is that the 4.6 is more reliable ... and if there's an issue with the motor, it's possible in some instances to save it via boring it out to 4.7L. We'll see. This is an enormously expensive science project, should be fun.

Wow. Just wow. I used to bitch that an S52 race motor was $9k.

redpriest wrote

https://i.imgur.com/bIHYuDk.png

Begun, it has.

I went with the 4.6L versus the 4.7L at the expense of ~15 hp. The rationale is that the 4.6 is more reliable ... and if there's an issue with the motor, it's possible in some instances to save it via boring it out to 4.7L. We'll see. This is an enormously expensive science project, should be fun.

Probably a dumb question, but does this actually include the engine or just the rebuild kit (crank / pistons / rods / valve springs etc)? Reading the invoice, I read it as you supply an existing s65?

slcook54 wrote

Probably a dumb question, but does this actually include the engine or just the rebuild kit (crank / pistons / rods / valve springs etc)? Reading the invoice, I read it as you supply an existing s65?

Includes everything - the motor is ready for install. I turned in a core; they had a 4.6 off the shelf ready to go, just needed the cams + dry sump installed.

While there's some sentimental value in running the engine that originally came with my car, it wasn't worth waiting 3-4 months.

redpriest wrote

Includes everything - the motor is ready for install. I turned in a core; they had a 4.6 off the shelf ready to go, just needed the cams + dry sump installed.

While there's some sentimental value in running the engine that originally came with my car, it wasn't worth waiting 3-4 months.

kind of a raw deal for them if you think about it... someone is going to get a core with 300+ track days on it. lol

track use voids warranty. OOF

the "track use voids warranty" thing is kinda bullshit. track use isn't necessarily abuse.

derbo wrote

track use voids warranty. OOF

Big oof, hope it all works out

Do you have a date that you're looking for the whole car build to be done by? I'm really excited to see the finished product!

For people that are offended by the warranty: Most race parts don't come with any warranty at all. In this case, I think the warranty could be useful during the tuning process. For instance, you need to tune the motor, most likely on the dyno. Let's say there was a production problem with the engine. There's a fair chance the problem will show up on the dyno. You haven't tracked it or abused it, so technically the warranty could help. An engine builder can't be responsible for a guy with a 6-speed over-revving the thing and destroying it. Too many unknowns. DCT avoids over-rev issues, but you can still pound on the engine in other ways that could hurt it, or have it tuned with a really high RPM redline that is bad for it. So, I'm not surprised that the warranty doesn't cover the track/race uses.

I've heard these stroker builds have one season in them before needing rebuilds. What have you heard?/What are your expectations?

derbo wrote

track use voids warranty. OOF

i hear carbahn doesnt care about HPDE stuff, but actual racing series are different.

wow, you're nuts. Please go to the EAS dyno so we have some standards to put it against! Can't wait to see it out there / con you into letting me drive it.

dogbone wrote

Do you have a date that you're looking for the whole car build to be done by? I'm really excited to see the finished product!

I think we are imminent for at least some shakedown soon, but the goal posts have slipped before - was supposed to have the engine 3 weeks ago but Carbahn kept delaying delivery dates.

I have some other parts incoming throughout the year so the build isn't by any means complete. It's time to replace the big old steering wheel with a KMP wheel but that's a couple weeks out from now.

I have an AFFF fire suppression system installed, a carbon dash from Bimmerworld, a couple Recaro RMS 2700G seats that are on back order, and some other goodies on the way.

We've done some additional strip down work but I'm not sure where we're at right now. I'm keeping the heavy ass metal doors for right now for security reasons; I don't have an enclosed trailer yet so the car has to sit exposed on top of the open one for some periods of time, so I need to keep the riff-raff out.

Goal is eventually sub 3k lbs so I'm hoping we can get there and do whatever measures we need to take to get there.

dogbone wrote

I've heard these stroker builds have one season in them before needing rebuilds. What have you heard?/What are your expectations?

I have also heard that too. I asked the question but didn't get a firm answer as to what the rebuild window was. This is my expectation going in - so I'm committed to this science experiment.

In any case I will be public about the results of the experiment; I'll be the guinea pig! If it doesn't work out I can always put in a stock engine. YOLO

I love E92 M3 science experiments!