944 turbo finally started up after tons of work.

[creaky fossil]

I wanna go for a cruise in this bad mofo.

I want to drive it, hell with just riding in it!

[Crampedon]

Small Hijak, I am thinking of selling the legend after 33 years of proud ownership.
Built to the hilt, been sitting covered in a tight garage. In Maui. 10k

[basinbeater]

man how do you work on that thing with all that crap jammed in the engine bay?
Nice looking car. I love bimmers.

[Plainview]

Cool car but running your signal wires parallel with the high voltage secondary wires is a no-no.

[Crampedon]

Cool car but running your signal wires parallel with the high voltage secondary wires is a no-no.

Que? I 'd have to open the hood but I think the wires bundled with the plug wires are the hot leads to the coil etc.
Open to suggestion always, but the thing will chirp the tires in 2cd. It fucking screams.

I have searched the earth for the sticker from the 70s' " BMW 2002 fastest 2-liter made"

BasinB, 2002's are the easiest engines and cars to work on, tons of room, super simple and you can still get every nut and bolt on them pretty cheap. In High school I went through 3 of them, hard. at 21, my dad was visiting me on Block Island, and we were walking down Ocean ave and a guy I knew had this car in his yard. My dad well knew my passion for them. My last one got wrapped around a tree in Darien Ct. and I was afoot a few years. he helped me buy it. That was in 1981. When I got settled in Maui in 88 I drove the fucker to SF and shipped it here. 2 years into owning my bike shop I threw 5k into it and here it sits!

Check out http://www.2002ad.com

I think about sending it to them and letting them just cherry it out and keeping it another 20 years.

[basinbeater]

That looks pretty easy to work on. I would really like one of those. You should post more pics and some video.
I love bmws! I currently drive an e46 in the winter, and it is nice, but I had an e30 ix for a while that I did a pretty serious refresh on recently and I loved that car! Porsches and bmws. The late 80s cars in particular have the best build quality of any cars I have worked on. If I didn't go the 944 turbo route, there would be an e36 m3, or a e30 325is in the garage. I guarantee you there is another e30 bound for my garage at some point.
I think it is interesting how certain cars are deemed so good by people, 2002, e30, Porsche 911, Toyota land cruiser, that little cottage industries sprout up to support them, and if you had the coin and wanted to buy a basically new car, you can find one.
As an extreme example, look at singer with the 911, or icon land cruisers. Very few cars achieve that level of devotion from fans.
No post mentioning my e30 is complete without pics...
1988 325ix. 5 spd manual, 6 cylinder, awd, snow machine.

[Alaskan Rover]

Nice ride!! 17" wheels on a 44? I assume you're going to go with something like 235/15R17? But will they even fit on a car that was originally set up with what? 225/50R15? I guess the ultra low profile will make up for the wheel height.

Back eons ago when I used to race SCCA Solo II division, 944s were always the car of choice in the non-modified H class for their awesomely tight handling. I drove an Omni GLHS which was a Carroll Shelby-prepped Omni with slot car-like handling and just enough pep to do fine in Solo II events, but I remember the ZR-1 drivers were sometimes surprised by being taken by a 944 Turbo for overall lowest aggregate times ALL CLASS....and in those days, the ZR-1s were basically king of the SCCA non-mod world, so that is saying something for the cornering ability of the 944. It took corners with a surprisingly elegant precision! Anyway, my buddy with the 44 later did a whole bunch of suspension tweaks that made the car even tighter, after he jumped to modified class...so I presume you'll be doing that as well. Good job on locating the better chip set...but keep an eye on your cam!

I happened upon a beautiful non-turbo 44 just a few weeks ago that was for sale for $3500 in what looked like totally unmolested condition with a decent red professional repaint and re-stickering. I would SURE like to find a 911 in that price-range....ANY 911. But I would really relish one of these:

[basinbeater]

yeah Rover, nothing like that in this price range. In fact, a 5-10 years ago, you could grab a beater running late 70s early 80s 911 for like 10-15, now a decent one is in the 20k+ range. They have sky rocketed in value.

Update: I got the exhaust welded up with an 02 sensor bung for the wideband, and had a couple of leaks on the test pipe (PO install) cleaned up and sealed. Placed an order for suspension yesterday. Shout out to Jamal for the heads up on the Koni sale. I bought from Paragon just because they had all the other bits I needed as well, and also perform a slight modification to the strut insert to work with the 944 coilover system they also sell.
Parts coming include the following:
Koni sport shocks
19mm adjustable rear sway bar with bushings
Delrin Front sway bar bushings for stock 951 s 26.8 mm sway bar
Paragon front adjustable ride height kit (coilover conversion kit) with 200lb springs.
Ball joint replacement kit from Paragon. Labor intensive, but cheaper than $500 per front arm...

This stuff should go along ways to tightening up the suspension on the car, and making it handle better. If I still need more stiffness, next round will be stiffer springs up front, and replace the torsion bars and spring plate bushings. That job is a freaking nightmare though, so I bet it will stay like this for a while...

If you need a set of Koni's call Jamal!

[jamal]

Heh, thanks for the plug. Yeah, now is the time of the year to buy konis if you're shopping for new suspension- Yellows and the FSD are some of the best sets of shocks you can get for under a grand.

One of my friends shares some space with a porsche guy. Always eye candy when I'm down in AZ and go visit, last time I saw a couple of older turbos plus a 996 turned track car.

[4matic]

yeah Rover, nothing like that in this price range. In fact, a 5-10 years ago, you could grab a beater running late 70s early 80s 911 for like 10-15, now a decent one is in the 20k+ range. They have sky rocketed in value.

Update: I got the exhaust welded up with an 02 sensor bung for the wideband, and had a couple of leaks on the test pipe (PO install) cleaned up and sealed. Placed an order for suspension yesterday. Shout out to Jamal for the heads up on the Koni sale. I bought from Paragon just because they had all the other bits I needed as well, and also perform a slight modification to the strut insert to work with the 944 coilover system they also sell.
Parts coming include the following:
Koni sport shocks
19mm adjustable rear sway bar with bushings
Delrin Front sway bar bushings for stock 951 s 26.8 mm sway bar
Paragon front adjustable ride height kit (coilover conversion kit) with 200lb springs.
Ball joint replacement kit from Paragon. Labor intensive, but cheaper than $500 per front arm...

This stuff should go along ways to tightening up the suspension on the car, and making it handle better. If I still need more stiffness, next round will be stiffer springs up front, and replace the torsion bars and spring plate bushings. That job is a freaking nightmare though, so I bet it will stay like this for a while...

If you need a set of Koni's call Jamal!

What is track vs street time on this car? All that suspension stiffening will make it undrivable on bumpy public roads. You won't be able to keep the rubber on the ground.

[Mazderati]

200 lbs. springs and Koni sports are tame relative to race springs and valving. They're fine for the street.

[Mazderati]

[jamal]

Yeah 200lb/in is pretty soft, in the realm of stock wheel rate on a ~3000lb sports car. If it was going to be on the track a lot with sticky tires I would probably start with double that. Also, "race" suspension doesn't mean uncomfortable either. Idea is to keep the chassis stable and the tires in consistent contact with the ground, which doesn't happen on super stiff springs and overdamped shocks (suspension setup for track/race cars is kind of my thing).

[basinbeater]

It will be very street friendly. I typically like stiffer cars, the freeway to work is pretty smooth and fast and twisty. It will get a bit of track work, and with the new setup, I won't be able to go real sticky on the tires, it will be too soft. We'll see how it goes, should feel tons better than current 140k original shocks.

[Mazderati]

Yeah 200lb/in is pretty soft, in the realm of stock wheel rate on a ~3000lb sports car. If it was going to be on the track a lot with sticky tires I would probably start with double that. Also, "race" suspension doesn't mean uncomfortable either. Idea is to keep the chassis stable and the tires in consistent contact with the ground, which doesn't happen on super stiff springs and overdamped shocks (suspension setup for track/race cars is kind of my thing).

Truth. I've a set of coilovers with 616 lbs. springs that ride better than the original 275 lbs. springs with aftermarket shocks.

[iceman]

The numbers in that Porsche ad^^ are kinda funny by todays standards - 217 HP! 0-60 in 6.1 seconds!

not dissing the car, just saying

[abraham]

The numbers in that Porsche ad^^ are kinda funny by todays standards - 217 HP! 0-60 in 6.1 seconds!

not dissing the car, just saying

Heh I just saw the claimed numbers for the new koeniegsegg are 1500 hp and 248 in less than 20 seconds.

Also, cool thread I like following these project threads

[bushman]

I'll be putting these on my car this spring. Claimed lowering 1.5" and much improved handling. We'll see.

[4matic]

Claimed lowering 1.5" and much improved handling.

Improved handling under what conditions? Everything is a compromise. Slapping on a set of lowering springs to improve handling is not a singular event.

[digitaldeath]

Improved handling under what conditions? Everything is a compromise. Slapping on a set of lowering springs to improve handling is not a singular event.

ideal conditions


OP how much you selling that whip for now that you've fixed it up?

[Timberridge]

This thread started out so well. Now 4matic is arguing about spring rates and contact patches.

[4matic]

This thread started out so well. Now 4matic is arguing about spring rates and contact patches.

I'm wondering why spring rates and contact patches are not an acceptable diversion to this thread? I've chased my share of handling improvements and wasted a lot of money.

[jamal]

My car is about an inch and a half lower than stock, but I didn't just throw on a set of springs to do it. Struts are better and slightly shorter, bumpstops are shorter, and rates are more than double stock to keep it from bottoming out. Also have extended ball joints and tie rods which mostly fix the geometry issues caused by lowering, and replacement bushings everywhere in the suspension to keep my alignment where it's supposed to be. Handles great on pavement, fun on smoother dirt and gravel, and a little scary in snow and ice because of the bigger swaybars. In short, I've taken a subaru and made it pretty impractical for winter in montana and daily driving, but it's a lot of fun the rest of the time.

Anyhow, no need to overthink it on a street car: good shocks, not too low, good tires, and a decent performance alignment are pretty much all you need.

[basinbeater]

DD, It's yours for a cool $15k. That's probably on the high end, but I have probably 11k into it right now. Is $15 steep, yeah, but not really interested in selling.

[BmillsSkier]

"It's been lowered is just another way of saying it's been ruined"

- Jeremy Clarkson

(Rad thread, BB enjoying following it)