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WORK IN PROGRESS

DEVELOPMENTS ON JOHNNY'S 318iS

We've been heavily involved with the 320iS's little cousin the 318iS.  It belongs to a friend/member of our service crew Johnny Sprinter and has come to stay with its Uncle at the the Bruv's for some serious work.  He's been inspired by the results and performance of the Bruvsmotorworks BMW and some development from our car has been carried over.

The rolling shell came pre-caged from ebay and all that glitters isn't gold especially when you collect it. Turned out it had had a bash at the front and been badly repaired. Since Christmas 2007 we've gutted it and cut the creased stuff off the front and put new in, in all the right places (basically all the front forward of the turrets). We've put in new x-members and inserts for the sump guard and put in seat mounts and a platform for a vertical handbrake.

Skinned engine mount tabs on x-member.  Cracks are common on the Right Hand side.

We've got a mint e36 m42 motor out of an e30 318iS that we started to build with lightweight lifters, oversize throttle body and Dbilas 280 cams. However, a German Trader tried stiffing us with some 256 schricks instead, which we found out as soon as we started dummy building/timing. We've eventually been refunded our brass and have sourced some Catcams with uprated valve springs. 

We've progressed with oil cooling and baffling as I know this engine will be "given death" so as a precaution we have introduced a horizontal baffle for braking. Its a bit suck it and see but here goes: 

Heres the prototype M42 oil filter lid / take-off for the oil cooler, the oil should come up the centre and return down the outer where the oil filter used to be. Obviously we'll need a remote filter head now but that should help us carry more oil. I think `Think Automotive' do an m42 take-off now, but they didn't return my enquiry and i'd already thought of this.  My mate Mr Pilgrim sorted the design and finished it off. 

Engine mounts: After a bit of reading up on the German E30 318iS `Cup` cars we have chosen some E34 520i Engine mounts and `fluked` some early 6 series gearbox mounts to replace the poor standard ones. All the fixings are identical but the rubbers are very strong....and they aren't a lot of money.

As for brakes we've got 285mm (i think) VAG discs for the front to which we'll add e30 m3 calipers via. an adaptor and at the rear we've got 280mm Z1 discs with m3/7series rear calipers (see e30.de). Jonny went to compbrake in the week and got a bias box to replace the servo.

We put new bearings in the arms, and cut down backplates just to hold the parking brake.  The rear beam is Polybushed too.
Shell was painted inside and out, and assembly started:

iS Bumpers fitted, and the engine is dummy installed to sort sump guard and electrics:

Coilovers, tarmac style with Challenge internals to put in.  Superflex bushed ARB links, and Powerflex ARB bushes:

Instrument panels ready for wiring, and the magic wand 8^) .  Underside shot just showing poly diff bush:

We used an M42 diy solid lifter for measuring piston to valve clearances, its threaded internally to adjust the height.  The dummy build established we required upto 2mm deeper cut-outs for 278'ish high lift cams:

piston and rods were seperated and balanced, surprisingly they were not very good by s14 standards.  Bottom end was built up retaining standard pistons for now.

Biggest Catcams you can get retaining hydraulic lifters (swapped for lighter vag ones).  Verniers as standard - very handy:

Maximum lift positions sorted before the cams and head fitted, then accurately marked for dialling in, full flywheel size protractor used for dialling.

Head ports very shabby as standard (e36 engine used), loads of steps esp. under the valve inserts, injector cutouts needed to be made bigger to match the e30 injectors and inlet manifold.

Flywheel circumference reduced and flywheel back side lightened too:

Then it is fitted, with an oversized throttle body:

Almost there, Just needs mapping and an MSA log book:

We had some good news today, the engine exceeded our expectations and produced some decent power.
Its very responsive and thanks to wayne's mapping at Chipwizards, spits magical flames out of the exhaust on over-run! it makes us smile anyway!
From the chart we can see things start moving at about 3750 and the M42 provides good power from 5500 to 7000 rpm.
Considering its just an L+B standard 1.8 bottom end + some mild headwork + some 278 cams (still on hydraulic lifters)+ a 3mm oversize T.Body - we are quite pleased:

Oil cooler installation, with a big thank you to Keith:

E36ti twin speed electric fan conversion:

Complete now with MOT and RAC logbook

DEVELOPMENTS FOR OUR 320iS