BMW F21 M135iR aus Dänemark

[DaveS16 23]

Looks crazy but very good :-) How did you figured out what cable do you need to remove?

[VikingPower 513]

vor 2 Stunden schrieb DaveS16:

Looks crazy but very good :-) How did you figured out what cable do you need to remove?

Thanks! 
So for the CAN cable, i asked a friend about the color of the cable and where it would run from front to back, when that was found - it was straight forward to reduce the length of it, and solder it back together.

So for all the modules that already was removed, airbags, EDC, idrive, Aircon and such, in my case it was just a case of following the lines from the connections at the modules, all the way back into the FEM/REM/Fusebox and from there undo the wires in the connectors. I took picture of everything in their location, if i happened to make a mistake, it would be possible to trace it back. But so far, i havent had any troubles.
Im sure i could relocate the battery too and make the thick red + cables shortened down, but i plan to keep the battery at the rear of the car, also to keep the cable stripping a bit more simple. Otherwise im sure i could have saved a few kgs more - but im pretty satisfied by now, since it was my first time doing this work.  

[VikingPower 513]

Its details like these that really makes the difference on the interior.

[Minimallaeufer 127]

Thats nice, stripping the eletronic harness. Maybe its possible to hide some of the wires in the frame?

bearbeitet 11. November 2023 von Minimallaeufer

[VikingPower 513]

It for sure would be possible to due so. But you also have to consider in an event of a crash, that the cables arent cut or broken, which in the worst case scenario, could lead to wires making sparks and start a fire. 
So in that case, its not ideal either that the wires are routed on the outside of the cage. Human error at work, that i will correct as im working along.     

bearbeitet 11. November 2023 von VikingPower

[VikingPower 513]

So guys, 

Another small update. 
The KW clubsport has been upgraded for a new suspension. Reason for this, was that the Clubsport was at its very limit. Some of you already mentioned the bouncing of the car on my videos which was somewhat true - but i didnt lack grip even though the car would bounce a little it was primarily down to the comfort of driving the car. 

So for this ive been speaking with several enthusiast, friends and companies (obviosly not only 247) what my issue was and how to deal with them.
One of them even replied in the phone "i know nothing about your shitty engine and can't help you" even though it was the suspension we spoked about  
Also my engine works really good, so i dont know where this came from lol  

Anyway.

So with a lot of research done, i was ready to make the move, and the choice landed on a Pfeifer Suspension.  
Everything was made to order where Richard and I discussed the options so they would suit my wishes. What we ended up with here, is what i believe is the closest thing to a real competition suspension without the pricetag of a bling and exotic suspension but with a valving system that is durable for Nordschleife, GP tracks and even on the road. For my goal i'm sure it will fulfill my needs. 
I must say build quality is indeed really nice and the communcation + timeline was fullfilled to A+.. 

Just a fiy, if you already own a CS suspension and get it rebuild to a pfeifer it will cost you half the money in total - than a competition suspension from Nitron, KW, Moton, MCS and so on..
So think about it.. Do you want to spend the last 50% price for the maybe 10% extra performance?  
It wasnt worth it for me, because im not a pro racecar driver and im not chasing golden pineapples. 

bearbeitet 22. November 2023 von VikingPower

[VikingPower 513]

So after dismantling the whole wiring loom and removed every system and wires that i didnt needed anymore, i encountered an issue when i first started up the car. 

The issue was, that the cooling fan was running on full speed right from when you started the car until shurting it off. 

The other issue was, that it wasnt possible to bleed the coolant system for air, through the gaspedal procedure. So for a few days ive been scratching my head, looking up fault codes and so on.

But to be honest, its not easy to google and find an answer of "why is my cooling fan running on 100% after removal of heaterbox". 

But there was a small clue, the CDB804 code, stored in the DME, told me that the communication between the DME and IHKA was broken. I googled again and again.. and i literally found no one with the same problem.

So i started with the obvious thing, check the relay for the fan, yup it still measured 75ohms and also clicked the right way when putting a 12v scource to it. 

Then i checked the fuses too. I found fuse 43 was not connected properly, but fter fixing the socket, nothing changed when i started the engine - fan still blowing 100%. 

So i went back to the code CDB804 and checked what other people had encountered with that code. I always found guys having issues with the Air condition system + controller.. so i thought to my self, wait a minut - lets try retrofitting the control module and the controller.

And boom, problem solved, CDB804 code disappeared, the fan is not running at engine start up, and auto bleeding the cooling system now works. Great.. 

So lets see how we can connect the original controller to control the new 4" boat blower. 

Thats the next headache lol.. 

The pfeifer suspension will come with an update, soon too.. 😎

20231201_124259.mp4

[VikingPower 513]

So yet another small update on the suspension. 

After receiveing the pfeifer suspension, it was very clear that the damper was still too long for my application with the M235iR bodykit, the suspension compared to a normal KW CS should be build almost 40mm shorter,  otherwise you get way to much wheeltravel which makes it harder to control the kinematic changes/bump steer on the rear axle.

So right away, an email went in return, it was then very clear that they didnt know there is such a big difference on the bodywork heightwise compared to a normal 1er/2er body.
But after explaining in very detail, why this and that, showcased differences in pictures, they could then, afterall see what the issue was.
So with them and I being perfectionists, they took in the suspension and rebuild it..
I made sure they got something to chew on while doing so, and i made sure shipping was paid both ways, that was the least thing i could do, since they did the work on their shoulders. 
A+ for custumer service and for their timeline doing it so. 

So As shown on the pictures, 25mm was machined off the piston rod, and the mounting eye for the topmount was changed to a version that is 8mm shorter - so that combined = 33mm plus the adjustment thread on the lower part of the suspension, can be screwed in another 5-6mm, så that is now a damper, which physical is almost 40mm shorter, and with a damper with now 130mm travel, just like how touring cars also have. Propably 3-4cm bump travel from rideheight until bumpstop is coming into play - but there is only one way to test it out and see if it works or not..... 
If not, then we need to machine the damperbody too, and then there is nothing else that is possible to do.

spring rates out of the box;
front 140 and rear 150. 
but we have other spring on the shelf
120 front, 130 rear and 170 rear. 

So there is enough to play with. 
But seing alot of M cars with KW comp, they all run from kw with F140 and R150 set. at the ring, it seems a lot of companies like to run F140 and R180 springrates.. 

Christmas is around the corner too..
And hopefully the people who is around me, has listened to my best wishes, and placed DIY carbon production parts under the tree and Raspberry Pi computers..  Both things could make for interesting projects inside of the car  
Lets just say, i'm tired of having to use a phone everytime i enter the track or wants to datalog on the engine.....
 

bearbeitet 8. Dezember 2023 von VikingPower

[VikingPower 513]

Found a quite interesting picture of the compression of my rear dampers. 
So the dampers are fully fine not leaking or dont have any issue. The bump was fully closed, and then 1 click open. 170 spring used instead of the factory 120kg spring.
Yet, the compression at the wheels more than 50mm..
Its safe to say, that the KW clubsport was the limiting factor of the car, here its just very visible. 

 

So the suspension from Pfeifer is on its way back to pfeifer for the 2nd revision update.
We encountered that the bump travel was too short. We tried to make the damper physically shorter than the clubsport at the first revision, by reducing the piston rod. In theory it should work. But when we got everything in hand, and cut the bumpstop 16mm shorter + removed the 4mm scraper ring under that bumpstop, we had 22mm of free travel, from a little higher position than normal rideheight. That would mean at rideheight, we would only have about 15mm travel until bumpstop would interfere. So in some highspeed corners, we would actually be riding on the bumpstop too. 

There is really nothing bad to say about a process like this. They developed the suspension for normal bodytype cars, but with the cup car kit, you actually raise the fenderliner 40 or 50mm. I cant exactly remember which number, but it is a lot. So when you lower the car accordingly, you have a lot of droop from the suspension and you don't get a lot ofbump travel, because the suspension from factory arent designed to do so. 

So normally you would buy a competition suspension, they are already around 40mm shorter than the clubsport suspension, atleast in the KW range. 

So from here on, the length of the whole damper setup is perfect at 510mm long, compared to the 550mm CS damper setup.
The damperbody are now to be shortened, i have asked to have the body shortened either 20 or 25mm. Which should mean that we get some, if not all of the piston rod travel in return that was machined away on the first revision, and then still be able to keep the same physical length of 510mm. 

Its a very delicate process but i feel comfortable now for them to nail the last part. 
So next time someone with a m240i cup car kit come to buy their product, they know exactly now what involves that process for a suspension setup. 
Another guy i know of, sent his M240 directly to KW who then build a custom V5 racing for his car.. That havent been quite the cheap option, as what im doing here.. 

So far, i know of 4 streetdriven Cup cars, 2 with off the shelve suspension from KW and 2 with custom build suspension, the last 2 is sitting at lower rideheight than the 2 running the off the shelve products.. 
Then there is 1 who is not street driven who is running a BC racing.. His are also very high in rideheight. 

Oh this became a longer post than initial thought.. Oh well..   

bearbeitet 14. Dezember 2023 von VikingPower

[VikingPower 513]

Some of my favorite pictures from the 2023 season. Could probably make a calender with these pictures and have that hanging in the garage. 

[VikingPower 513]

While waiting for the pfeifer suspension to get fully finished, ive started doing some other small work, that i need to have done before next season. 

So for christmas, i got a small starter pack of carbonfiber laminating. I just finished laying of my first piece which in total should be around the 1.5mm thickness. I have no idea what im doing, so i started out by doing a square of 50x25cm. If it come out to weak and thin, i can then cut it in half and glue them together and they will then be around 3mm thickness. 

I also got a 10.1inch touchscreen and a raspberry Pi4, which i have been installing an Android system on and mounted on the backside. 

This i will experiment with, to see if it can run 2 apps, side by side in a hot car.

im going to use MHD app for logging the engine parameter, temperatures for oil, water + gearbox

RaceChrono Pro for laptiming.

So far, the homemade tablet works as intended, but i still need to figure out how to integrate it into the car, hardwire it up and first by then, i can see if it really works.

In theory it should works just like a phone, but i fint it more convenient, to have it all in one box hardmounted into the car. Just turn on the raspberry and then you are off to go.  

I know you can buy a system from AIM who can do that and also replace the OEM speedo, but 300eur vs 3000eur is also something to consider. The weight of the Pi4 + 10.1" screen is 455 grams, so its not the biggest weight penalty for such a system really. 

 

bearbeitet 28. Dezember 2023 von VikingPower

[VikingPower 513]

[VikingPower 513]

Today, i demolded the carbon. 

So with the 650gr cloth it makes the surface just a little ruff, but for where the part is going to be mounted, its function over form anyway. 
The whole thing is 1,35mm thick and is just flexible and strong enough for the application where its mounted. Great Succes! 
Eventually i will drill a big 4" hole into it to mount an airhose to the blower, which i plan to mount in the upcoming days too.
Plan is to make an enclosure in the engine compartment on a later time, so it can draw fresh air from the outside. I'm still thinking about, where i want to draw the air from, i see 2 posibilities, 1 is from the underside of the windscreen like the M240 cup car have or suck the air from the wheelwell, i see pros and cons on both solutions, so i will have to think more on this subject.   

bearbeitet 29. Dezember 2023 von VikingPower

[VikingPower 513]

Enginebay are now fully closed off into the interior.
A small but very welcoming side effect for doing so, are an additional weight saving of 313grams compared to OEM materials, used in the same places.
I'm starting to develope an addiction to carbonfiber..  

I don't really think it has been expensive either to build these 2 parts. 
A strip of 25cm x 1m 650gr carbon fiber clotch + 37.5 gram hardener mixed with 125gr epoxy resin. + 50 gram PVA mold release. 

Now i can continue working on the cold air feed to the cabin.  

[VikingPower 513]

Nankang CR-S are available also with E marking. 
Here's some measurements. 
This set can be sold for 1550eur incl shipping to DE.  

bearbeitet 19. Januar von VikingPower

[VikingPower 513]

Crazy looking sidewall too. Almost like a slick.

[FllSnd 394]

Looking good. As soon as my current set of AR-1 is finished I'd like to try the CR-S. Are you an official seller or where did you get them from?

bearbeitet 19. Januar von FllSnd

[VikingPower 513]

vor 49 Minuten schrieb FllSnd:

Looking good. As soon as my current set of AR-1 is finished I'd like to try the CR-S. Are you an official seller or where did you get them from?

Me too, i still have about 50% tread left on the AR1. 

I'm not an official seller or in any form close to that, but as part of my small business i also supply parts for cars.
Since i don't have a warehouse i can keep cost a bit down. But this set i have available are at my place though. So there is a relative short lead time on this set. 

[VikingPower 513]

Update on the suspension; 

Last week we received the suspension from Pfeifer. 
After 4 months of development, sending parts, mainly the rear assembly back and forth between each other for several times, we finally managed to meet our goal.
Its not a secret that the manufacture was a litle out of comfortable waters, but that goes for our side too. Both parties had to learn something new.

From start to finish;
We reached out to pfeifer and explained what we wanted, what we currently was looking at from the competiters. We had some wishes to what we wanted, because knowing from experience that an off the shelve suspension won't fit the cup cars body and the direction we are going with the car. You could go directly and buy a racing suspension.
But then the prices are also in a different league and that does not come without issues either.
Hence why a guy i know, sent his car directly to KW, for them to develop the exact suspension for his car. You don't get that for baby money.  

So to make it very simple, we wanted a rear suspension very close to the racing suspension, a true coilover setup. Because down the road, we can then throw the stock lower control arm into the bin and use the one from the cup car, to have the rearend fully uniball setup. 

This bought some problems into play though;
The top mount would extend the full suspension about 30mm, so that meant, when the damperbodies had the exact same overall length as the KW clubsport suspension, it would lose 30mm of suspension travel. So after mounting one side, we lowered the car, took the car out in the driveway to turn it around, and then we realised that the suspension was riding directly on the bumpstop.
OK, now what.. 
So a message to pfeifer, and then after some discussion, they advised, to use a topmount who was a little shorter, and then we could cut the pistontravel down by 25mm. So instead of having a total of 150mm bumptravel we ended op with 125mm. 
We agreed but had a feeling that it wasnt sufficient. Well afterall, they are the experts, so we rolled with their advice. (at this point we still believed they had experience with the m240i cupcar). 

Just before christmas, we received the 1st revision of the suspension. We did our measurements on the table. Everything looked okay, we was very close to have the same dimension as the racing suspension. But there was a feeling it wasnt going to work, more on that later.
On the table, we saw around 7cm's of full bumptravel with the stock bumpstop at full extension.
Oh well, easy fix, we removed 16mm of the bumpstops and removed the plastic shim-ring underneeth it. That way, we gained about 20mm extra bumptravel. So ca. 9cms of bumptravel, and now a suspension that was about 40mm shorter than normal CS suspension.
 Nevertheless, we mounted the suspension. The most amount of bumptravel we had available with this setup, was 22mm but at a rideheight 1cm higher than normal, to make room for cornerweight adjustments. 
Then we started comparing with the CS damper. Allright, that had 36mm of bumptravel available, and we used 34mm of it. So it was very clear that sub 20mm wasnt going to cut it. 

Another email, and a long phonecall was done. At this point, it was just a week before Christmas, and we knew nothing was going to be done until after New Year.
To make it short, we then told pfeifer exactly what we wanted from the 2nd revision.
We wanted this exact damperbody length, we wanted this exact piston travel, and we wanted this exact length of the whole assembly.
Our goals was met! And that is absolutely crucial, otherwise the suspension would'nt have been optimal for this car. 

Through all this, i can only say, that the process was long, but it has been very fair.
Both sides, gave their best to make each other happy. And from our side, we are satisfied with the outcome. 

Yesterday, we went out in the car, a very short drive. But on some very rough country roads, with potholes and rough tarmac. The dampers works really well and fare really compliant. Obviously needs to adjust the settings and have the car aligned again. But out of the box, it feels miles better than the CS 2 way, which wasnt compliant at all.


 

[VikingPower 513]

First set of Nankang CR-S to ever hit the road in Denmark. 
Unlucky for me, the ar1 which was mounted on the car got a puncture. Luckily i had a set of CR-S in stock, so might aswell mount those. 

Out of the box in damp and cold road, suuuuper sketchy!
Noise very low, comparable to Cup2. Feedback is lacking compared to Ar1, but this is based on 100kms driven so far. 
Lets review that, when i get a chance to scrub in the tires on track.   

[VikingPower 513]

Alright, time to gve a little extra verdict on the CR-S. 

A few days ago, we had low temperatures, but full sun and dry road surfaces. Temps where +4 degrees. 
I did a short drive, 20-30kms, going to fuel the car, and then drove some back roads, with more bumps and twisty roads. 

Alright, as soon the tires got to just about palm heat ca 30degrees or so, the rubber goes from very hard, to a delicate soft touch. Think of ar1 soft when ar1 is stored cool. With the temps around palm warm, the grip was coming in nicely, tire seems to be more predictable. I didn't push on at all, i just tried to feel the dynamics.. The sidewalls are pretty stiff, but so far, i don't feel the tire rides as hard as the ar1. My friend Henning, used sometime ago a phrase, that the AR1 feels like riding on concrete tires. The CR-S doesnt have this feelign when they gets a little heat.
They do have that feeling when they are very cold and the surface are damp, but that is not a surprise, when you feel the rubber is very hard from the manufaturing process but also stored cold.  
Ive parked the car up again for several weeks, snow just landed here 2 days ago, again, so testing is set on pause so far.
I still feel the tires remind me of cup2, but with more feedback, and less mushy feel. 
I have to say, cup2 is not a tire i would like to drive, so with the CR-S distincing further away from them, is imo a very good sign. 
Noise level are still very low, i do prefer a tire that is loud, because my diff screams so much, that its hard to hear the tires squeeling in the corners. So for me its a new learning curve. But i am going to address the noise of the diff, to lower it a bit. Involving a plate over the axle containng some sound absorbtion material. if i can lower something 2-3db, that would be absolutely awesome.
The quaife helical geared diff is a no joke when it comes to sound level. I would say even a sequential will have a hard time overpowering the noise level.. 
We went off track here.. 

A couple pics of the fitment of the 265/35-18 cr-s on a 10j. Absolutely perfect fitment. The 9.5j is too narrow imo, which is advised by Nankang. 

[Seventyeight 496]

vor 20 Stunden schrieb VikingPower:

i do prefer a tire that is loud, because my diff screams so much, that its hard to hear the tires squeeling in the corners. 

I like how you fix a problem with another problem 

[VikingPower 513]

Gerade eben schrieb Seventyeight:

I like how you fix a problem with another problem 

Some people see a half empty glass.. I like to see a half full glass  

[VikingPower 513]

Made another carbon fiber panel. This time for the interior. 
I also managed to mock up the new computer for datalogging and laptiming. This is build on an Raspberry Pi connected to a 10" touchscreen, running on android system. It is useable with google play too, so you can use google maps, youtube or stream music directly to your headphones, when driving between track over smaller distances. The sky is the limit basically for this system. 
Carbon fiber plate and computer are currently set to cure after being fully glued together. another 24 hours has to pass by, undtil it possible to build more into the console. 
Computer, screen, carbon plate, weighs less than 700 gram. 

[VikingPower 513]

Over the weekend a little more happened, thanks to Froonki for making this..
 

 

bearbeitet 4. März von VikingPower