you start. When you exceed the power and the stress tolerance that the engineers designed into the car, you’re going to break things from time to time. Only a chump tries to blame the original manufacturer when his or her customized car breaks.
You can take some tried-and-true steps to have fun and achieve a good outcome when modifying your car. Read the following and give them careful consideration before you start.
One: Play Safe
Safety must always be a primary concern when you’re working on your car. I knew a guy who died when his car fell on him. He owned a set of jack stands but didn’t use them that day, probably because it was just a quick little job. Get yourself a set of good jack stands and a quality large-size floor jack and use them every time.
Similarly, be smart when you’re making changes to your car. Don’t go out and drive hard on brand new parts or brand new work. Have other people check the work whenever possible. Even professionals make mistakes from time to time; people leave nuts untightened, forget to adjust new parts, and leave fluids unfilled. Any of these mistakes may happen to you, and if you play with cars long enough something will happen to you, probably multiple times. At best these mistakes are embarrassing, usually they are expensive, and at worst they can be dangerous or lethal. Be smart, play safe, and you’ll have a good time.
Two: Learn about Your Car
You need to read and learn before you whip out a wrench or whip out your checkbook. The world is full of people who have spent a lot of money on their cars only to find that they have a ride that is slower and uglier than when they started. The final tragedy is that they’ve cut up so much of the original car that they can’t ever get it back to stock.
It pays to do your homework. Learn what’s available for your car and what fits on your particular model. Also, learn from what others have done before you. You can purchase a full shop manual for your year and model from Bentley for under $100. Your local BMW specialty shop has valuable information and expertise for you. Enthusiast and club publications, such as Roundel and Bimmer, can keep you up to date on new products and developments. You can also use Internet forums, but bear in mind that the quality of information from these sources is highly variable.
Three: Understand What You’re Doing and Why
Before you spend a penny or grab a wrench, sit down and think through what you want your car to do for you. If you’re looking at competition, make sure you have the current rulebook in front of you. The worst thing you can do is show up to race with some minor modification that just landed you into the “unlimited” class in an otherwise stock vehicle.
Do you want to design your E36 for supreme handling for autocross competition? Do you want to enter hill climbs or drive at open track days at a road racing circuit? Maybe you just want to look great, sound great, and hit Cars & Coffee this summer; there’s no shame in that. The point is, when you know what you really want to do, you can start your plan to get there.
Whatever your goals are, your car should be built so that it functions smoothly and comfortably, in harmony with you as the driver. If you overdo one aspect of a car and neglect another, you’ll have problems. Ask anyone who ever built a really fast car and never thought about his brakes! As you consider, plan, and build your car, think about balance and the real-world driving you’re going to do. For example, if you go to one or two track days every year, but you have to drive your car to work every day, a set of track-ready coil-over shocks is probably not the best choice for you.
One of the most common mistakes people make when building a performance car is they try to make a car that’s excellent for two (or more) very different purposes. Trust me, a performance rally car isn’t going to be any good at an autocross, and a really pumped racing car makes a terrible daily driver. If you try to split the difference between two radical applications, you end up with a car that isn’t particularly good at anything. Get your vision and your budget together and build your car to do one thing really well, or build it to everything pretty well.
When you know what you want to do and you understand the rules, you can usually come up with a comprehensive shopping list. That’s where this book is designed to help you, by going over many common modifications people make and the major options on the market. You can read what’s involved in a given modification before you decide to dive in yourself, take it to a pro, or leave that part on the shelf.
Four: Define Goals and Objectives
You need to be realistic about what you can afford and what you plan to do with your car. Diving in and modifying your car always costs more than you expect. You need to double your estimate because it’ll still cost more than you expect. So make an accurate budget and realize that Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither will your car be done next weekend, or next month. That’s why you see so many people driving around with half-finished cars.
My suggestion is that you start with a notebook. I use a paper notebook for each project car I have. The notebook stays in the car and I use it to log changes I make and results that I notice. Some people prefer a spreadsheet or a blog; use whatever works for you. The point is to get into the habit of logging what you’ve done and the results you saw. The more objective data you have (lap times, dyno sheets, and so on) the better your log is.
For most people, the car they’re modifying is also the car they drive to work every day. There’s usually not a lot of downtime available in the car’s schedule. And some people aren’t handy with a wrench, so take this to heart: if you’ve never done serious work on your car before, upgrading the brakes or installing a turbo on your daily workmobile is a bad way to start.
Divide your shopping list into functional areas: engine, transmission, suspension, brakes, interior, and so on. This book is divided into chapters on that basis to help you. In each functional area, list the things you want to do and the price of each item you need. Don’t forget labor costs, gaskets, and fluids. If you’re doing the work yourself, be sure to account for the cost of tools you need to buy.
With a good shopping list in your hands, and a total budget that will probably surprise you, it’s time to prioritize.
Most new builders start with cosmetics. This is only natural, but I think it’s backward for a performance car. In general I like to improve handling and braking before I put money into the engine, and I leave cosmetics for last. Who wants to scratch or dent an expensive paint job when a wrench slips?
With your itemized and prioritized list of modifications, you should be able to make a budget and a schedule for work that fits your finances and your calendar. Don’t sweat it too much if you get behind on the schedule; everyone does. Right now the trick is to enjoy the journey as much as the destination.
Five: Have Fun and Don’t Overextend Yourself
One key to a successful performance build is to make sure you reward yourself from time to time. There’s nothing as satisfying in a project as being able to tell the difference when you’ve made a change. So schedule your mods to make sure that you get a noticeable goodie from time to time. Maybe that means putting in the racing seat before the urethane bushings, but that’s okay if it keeps your interest in the project.
There’s a trap out there that you have to keep in mind, because it can grab you and cause no end of pain. The trap springs when you become financially overextended in your car and then run into trouble. The world is full of cars for sale where the owner has $25,000 in receipts and is looking for $10,000 or best offer by next weekend because he has to pay the mortgage. Don’t be that unhappy person if you can help it. It’s worse if your car is half-done, because if you can sell it at all, it’s probably worth less than when you started.
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