Projekt M3: Stage 1
1995 BMW M3
The US E36 M3 is kind of the bastard child of BMW’s Motorsports cars. While the rest of the world got a true motorsports built motor in the US we got a massaged version of the standard 3 series inline six. Despite this short coming the E36 M3 is still an amazingly capable car on and off the track which is why we have chosen one as a project car. Also the E36 generation is currently at what we feel is the low point for price so it was a perfect time to pick one up cheap and bring it back to life as a street/track car to thrash. Our goal is to make a faster and more capable E36 M3 for less then you can purchase an abused but younger E46 M3.
Since our car will see some heavy track time we did not focus so much on the cosmetic appearance as much as we would if this were to be a show car. The goal was to find the most solid mechanical car for the least amount of money and I can say we bought ours at the bottom of the price range. A quick search on craigslist found us our gem. A 1995 at only $4000 this was the cheapest car running we could find. Since we would be going through it to make it track ready it should be no big deal right?
The first order of duty would be a heavy mechanical refresh starting with maintenance. Upon getting the car back to the AE HQ the car ran great and had me feeling confident. Unfortunately on the way from LA to the boys at HG Motorsports in La Jolla the accessory belt let go and the water pump stopped long enough to blow the coolant reservoir. 100 mile tow later we begin:
///M Plan:
Stage 1- Suspension
Stage 2- Brakes
Stage 3- Wheels/tires
Stage 4-Apperance
Stage 5- Interior
Stage 6- Supercharger
Stage 7- Blow it up!
Stage 8- S54 Swap
As you can see our M3 is a little rough around the edges so before stage 1 could be started a tune up was planned replacing the belts, tensioners, water pump, thermostat, spark plugs, fuel filter, air filter, and giving the car a full inspection.
The budget for the project is $15k, less then the cost of a tired E46 M3. We are not including the cost of labor since most of the work can be done yourself in your own garage/driveway. We will document the installs and report on the results of the added parts along the way. We will get the car on track to test the improvement made by each upgrade.
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Tagged | bmw, bmw m3, e36 m3, m3 build, project car
