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Bilstein PSS10 + Suspension refresh review
- AndyBeech
- Senior Member
- Posts: 1629
- Joined: Mon Feb 18, 2013 2:25 pm
- Location: Reading / Bath
Bilstein PSS10 + Suspension refresh review
Meant to do this for a while and as I've got some time and done a fair few miles plus track days, I thought I'd post my thoughts on the work I've had done this year which might be useful to others considering the same route. It's on a 90k miler Z4M Roadster.
Firstly, everything that was replaced....
Suspension
- Bilstein B16 PSS10 suspension package
- Powerflex (All purple) - Control Arm rear bushes (lollipops), Front and Rear Anti Roll Bar bushes, Adjustable rear camber arms, Rear shock top mounts
- Lemforder Front control arms (OEM)
- Lemforder RTABs (OEM) used with existing limiters (from research I decided on this rather than Powerflex, plus I already had limiters)
- 4 x Lemforder upper and lower rear wishbone ball joints (OEM) - Powerflex do a replacement, but I chose to avoid as OE are ball joints and the Powerflex are not
- Lemforder Steering Tie / Track rods - both sides. Mine had play so needed doing. I nearly went BMW as I wasn't sure who was OEM but I ordered from BMW and Lemforder and they are exactly the same comparing side by side, down to the markings. So sent the BMW ones back and saved about £200.
- FAG tie rod bellows and BMW grease
- Lemforder Front and Rear droplinks (OEM)
- BMW Rear spring pads
- BMW Front shock tower reinforcement plates
- BMW front top mount axial bearings
- Every single fixing replaced from BMW (Too many to mention) Subframe / Diff / Propshaft
- Subframe cleaned stripped and powder coated
- Powerflex Yellow subframe bushes - originals were starting to separate and needed replacing
- BMW diff mounting bush
- BMW diff output shaft seals / plates / all serviceable parts
- BMW diff input seals / plates / all serviceable parts
- Febi Bilstein Propshaft center bearing (99% sure OEM)
- Febi Bilstein Propshaft universal joint (or Guibo / Donut whatever you want to call it) (99% sure OEM)
- Millers CRX LS 75w140 NT+ Diff oil (Recommended so thought I'd give it a try)
- BMW fixings for all diff / prop / subframe parts possible (The diff carrier bolt mentioned above that is £16 is worth doing, an updated design that helps with the common M 'clunk'). Also diff oil plugs
Engine / Gearbox (+Inspection 2)
- Castrol 10w60 oil
- Mahle OX187D oil filter (OEM)
- BMW Coolant (Full flush)
- Castrol Transmax DEX3 Power Steering Fluid
- Mann cabin filter
- NGK DCPR8EKP spark plugs (OEM)
- BMW cam cover gasket - plus all rubber grommits / o-rings for spark plugs etc.
- BMW post cat o2 sensors x2 (Had an error code for bank 2 so replaced both)
- Hella 6PX 008 476-271 Throttle Position Sensors (OEM)
- INA Belt Tensioners / Idler pulleys / AC pulley (OEM)
- Contitech Drive belt + AC Belt (OEM)
- Redline MTL + D4 ATF gearbox oil (All the MTL topped up with D4 to the top - recommended by Opie and others)
- Wahler 462180D thermostat (OEM)
- BMW Water Pump (From leebmann24.de - a fair bit cheaper than from the UK but still BMW - still expensive though - there is no OEM part available unfortunately)
- All radiator / gearbox plugs, o-rings etc. from BMW
- All exhaust clamps replaced from i6 automotive (now ditched and ended up sleeving the exhaust where it meets the backbox as the flanges were rusted through)
- Vibratech Engine Mounts
- BMW rubber exhaust hangers
- BMW Fuel Filter / pressure regulator (Again from leebmann24, quite a bit cheaper than from the UK)
- Compression / leak test all ok - head gasket kit brought but will wait to replace for now
Brakes
- Custom brake cooling kit (From forum member Andre/Westersund)
- Motul RBF600 brake fluid
I've listed all the parts there as it may be useful for others looking to replace parts but want to save money buying from BMW when you can get the OEM part for sometimes a fraction of the price. I did a lot of research to make sure all parts that weren't from BMW were from the OEM so basically the exact same part without the BMW stamp on it. Safe to say I saved hundreds of pounds doing this, rough estimate around £600 minimum. Most OEM parts were from Euro Car Parts / Ebay sellers. All the bolts and fixings were from BMW however and there's no getting round these add up pretty quickly.
Luckily I managed to get the car to Darragh at Everything M3's in Banbury just before lockdown started so he had the car through most this period, working on putting it all together for me. In a nutshell, he did a great job, and is an all round great guy so I can highly recommend. (He also did my rod bearings but that's a separate post elsewhere!) On the road
The handling is transformed which is to be expected from the old 90k parts that were on the car! It's sharper, tighter, sportier and so much grip and feedback. The PSS10 shocks offer 10 clicks of adjustment which are very nicely located on the bottom of the struts, so adjusting takes seconds....though you do have to get on the ground to adjust the rear struts, no biggie though. It just feels like a proper sportscar now, which is great for me as a weekend / fair weather car. However....!
There is a price to pay with all this extra added stiffness and feel, and this is not just the suspension but a combination of the Powerflex parts as well. It is a harsher ride on rough roads, no doubt about it. It rattles more, is noisier and not going to lie, it *CAN* get tiresome on bad roads, which around where I am, seem to be quite plentiful at the moment. The caveat to this is....it only ever bothers me when the roof is up and I have no music / radio on. When the roof is down or music is on it isn't an issue, probably because the rattles and creaks are downed out by the engine noise / road noise and it becomes a pleasure again and so enjoyable to drive. Another point to make is I am driving on 19" wheels with rubber band tyres which certainly don't help matters and to be fair, it's not a whole lot worse than the standard set up IIRC.
On a smooth road however, it's just fantastic, so much better than standard in every way and feels composed, quiet and highly chuck-able. I wouldn't change anything I've had fitted, feeling the car working underneath you rather than sloppy old rubber components is a revelation.
On the track
It's not fair for me to go into too much detail here, as a) I'm a bit of a track noob at the moment b) I don't really have a lot to compare to.
What I will say is, I've done some driver training, most recently at Millbrook Proving Grounds and it handled beautifully, the instructor commenting numerous times how well it was set up and on many of the tests how balanced and composed it felt. These are guys that drive high performance sportscars well in excess of the cost of mine so I felt was pretty high praise.
On track itself, well I've only managed a few days at Abingdon so far which is an airfield track so not a proper test. But for me as a relative new guy to this, the car gave me so much confidence to push and explore the limits and I never felt out of control or the car was going to spit me off. It is setup fairly conservatively at the moment but you can really push it before it starts giving out to understeer and any failings in handling now are purely down to the tyres (and my skill!). The change of direction and speed you can take through high speed corners is pretty staggering but the car gives you the confidence to be able to do it. I've had no scary snap oversteer or unpredictable moments and coupled with M-Track Mode (cheers Meeko!), it's a beast on a fast lap. Obviously traction fully off will be quicker but not quite at that point yet! I do think at some point brakes are going to need upgrading but that's for another time.
As a quick note, I did get the car corner weighted and set up properly after all the fitting was done which is well worth it. It did weigh in at a rather portly 1551kg though! In conclusion, I can highly recommend doing a refresh when you get near 100k. Which probably shouldn't be a surprise! It's not cheap, but you'll definitely be missing out on performance on original components. The PSS10 also get's a big thumbs up, by far the best mod I've done hands down.
Feel free to ask any questions, otherwise apologies for a long winded post! Oh, just to add, the gearbox oil combo I used has made the gear change a lot slicker than previously with OEM fluid, can highly recommend that combination.
Firstly, everything that was replaced....
Suspension
- Bilstein B16 PSS10 suspension package
- Powerflex (All purple) - Control Arm rear bushes (lollipops), Front and Rear Anti Roll Bar bushes, Adjustable rear camber arms, Rear shock top mounts
- Lemforder Front control arms (OEM)
- Lemforder RTABs (OEM) used with existing limiters (from research I decided on this rather than Powerflex, plus I already had limiters)
- 4 x Lemforder upper and lower rear wishbone ball joints (OEM) - Powerflex do a replacement, but I chose to avoid as OE are ball joints and the Powerflex are not
- Lemforder Steering Tie / Track rods - both sides. Mine had play so needed doing. I nearly went BMW as I wasn't sure who was OEM but I ordered from BMW and Lemforder and they are exactly the same comparing side by side, down to the markings. So sent the BMW ones back and saved about £200.
- FAG tie rod bellows and BMW grease
- Lemforder Front and Rear droplinks (OEM)
- BMW Rear spring pads
- BMW Front shock tower reinforcement plates
- BMW front top mount axial bearings
- Every single fixing replaced from BMW (Too many to mention) Subframe / Diff / Propshaft
- Subframe cleaned stripped and powder coated
- Powerflex Yellow subframe bushes - originals were starting to separate and needed replacing
- BMW diff mounting bush
- BMW diff output shaft seals / plates / all serviceable parts
- BMW diff input seals / plates / all serviceable parts
- Febi Bilstein Propshaft center bearing (99% sure OEM)
- Febi Bilstein Propshaft universal joint (or Guibo / Donut whatever you want to call it) (99% sure OEM)
- Millers CRX LS 75w140 NT+ Diff oil (Recommended so thought I'd give it a try)
- BMW fixings for all diff / prop / subframe parts possible (The diff carrier bolt mentioned above that is £16 is worth doing, an updated design that helps with the common M 'clunk'). Also diff oil plugs
Engine / Gearbox (+Inspection 2)
- Castrol 10w60 oil
- Mahle OX187D oil filter (OEM)
- BMW Coolant (Full flush)
- Castrol Transmax DEX3 Power Steering Fluid
- Mann cabin filter
- NGK DCPR8EKP spark plugs (OEM)
- BMW cam cover gasket - plus all rubber grommits / o-rings for spark plugs etc.
- BMW post cat o2 sensors x2 (Had an error code for bank 2 so replaced both)
- Hella 6PX 008 476-271 Throttle Position Sensors (OEM)
- INA Belt Tensioners / Idler pulleys / AC pulley (OEM)
- Contitech Drive belt + AC Belt (OEM)
- Redline MTL + D4 ATF gearbox oil (All the MTL topped up with D4 to the top - recommended by Opie and others)
- Wahler 462180D thermostat (OEM)
- BMW Water Pump (From leebmann24.de - a fair bit cheaper than from the UK but still BMW - still expensive though - there is no OEM part available unfortunately)
- All radiator / gearbox plugs, o-rings etc. from BMW
- All exhaust clamps replaced from i6 automotive (now ditched and ended up sleeving the exhaust where it meets the backbox as the flanges were rusted through)
- Vibratech Engine Mounts
- BMW rubber exhaust hangers
- BMW Fuel Filter / pressure regulator (Again from leebmann24, quite a bit cheaper than from the UK)
- Compression / leak test all ok - head gasket kit brought but will wait to replace for now
Brakes
- Custom brake cooling kit (From forum member Andre/Westersund)
- Motul RBF600 brake fluid
I've listed all the parts there as it may be useful for others looking to replace parts but want to save money buying from BMW when you can get the OEM part for sometimes a fraction of the price. I did a lot of research to make sure all parts that weren't from BMW were from the OEM so basically the exact same part without the BMW stamp on it. Safe to say I saved hundreds of pounds doing this, rough estimate around £600 minimum. Most OEM parts were from Euro Car Parts / Ebay sellers. All the bolts and fixings were from BMW however and there's no getting round these add up pretty quickly.
Luckily I managed to get the car to Darragh at Everything M3's in Banbury just before lockdown started so he had the car through most this period, working on putting it all together for me. In a nutshell, he did a great job, and is an all round great guy so I can highly recommend. (He also did my rod bearings but that's a separate post elsewhere!) On the road
The handling is transformed which is to be expected from the old 90k parts that were on the car! It's sharper, tighter, sportier and so much grip and feedback. The PSS10 shocks offer 10 clicks of adjustment which are very nicely located on the bottom of the struts, so adjusting takes seconds....though you do have to get on the ground to adjust the rear struts, no biggie though. It just feels like a proper sportscar now, which is great for me as a weekend / fair weather car. However....!
There is a price to pay with all this extra added stiffness and feel, and this is not just the suspension but a combination of the Powerflex parts as well. It is a harsher ride on rough roads, no doubt about it. It rattles more, is noisier and not going to lie, it *CAN* get tiresome on bad roads, which around where I am, seem to be quite plentiful at the moment. The caveat to this is....it only ever bothers me when the roof is up and I have no music / radio on. When the roof is down or music is on it isn't an issue, probably because the rattles and creaks are downed out by the engine noise / road noise and it becomes a pleasure again and so enjoyable to drive. Another point to make is I am driving on 19" wheels with rubber band tyres which certainly don't help matters and to be fair, it's not a whole lot worse than the standard set up IIRC.
On a smooth road however, it's just fantastic, so much better than standard in every way and feels composed, quiet and highly chuck-able. I wouldn't change anything I've had fitted, feeling the car working underneath you rather than sloppy old rubber components is a revelation.
On the track
It's not fair for me to go into too much detail here, as a) I'm a bit of a track noob at the moment b) I don't really have a lot to compare to.
What I will say is, I've done some driver training, most recently at Millbrook Proving Grounds and it handled beautifully, the instructor commenting numerous times how well it was set up and on many of the tests how balanced and composed it felt. These are guys that drive high performance sportscars well in excess of the cost of mine so I felt was pretty high praise.
On track itself, well I've only managed a few days at Abingdon so far which is an airfield track so not a proper test. But for me as a relative new guy to this, the car gave me so much confidence to push and explore the limits and I never felt out of control or the car was going to spit me off. It is setup fairly conservatively at the moment but you can really push it before it starts giving out to understeer and any failings in handling now are purely down to the tyres (and my skill!). The change of direction and speed you can take through high speed corners is pretty staggering but the car gives you the confidence to be able to do it. I've had no scary snap oversteer or unpredictable moments and coupled with M-Track Mode (cheers Meeko!), it's a beast on a fast lap. Obviously traction fully off will be quicker but not quite at that point yet! I do think at some point brakes are going to need upgrading but that's for another time.
As a quick note, I did get the car corner weighted and set up properly after all the fitting was done which is well worth it. It did weigh in at a rather portly 1551kg though! In conclusion, I can highly recommend doing a refresh when you get near 100k. Which probably shouldn't be a surprise! It's not cheap, but you'll definitely be missing out on performance on original components. The PSS10 also get's a big thumbs up, by far the best mod I've done hands down.
Feel free to ask any questions, otherwise apologies for a long winded post! Oh, just to add, the gearbox oil combo I used has made the gear change a lot slicker than previously with OEM fluid, can highly recommend that combination.
Last edited by AndyBeech on Wed Sep 30, 2020 12:41 am, edited 4 times in total.
Z4MR - Gruppe M, Bilstein PSS10, CSL's + 18" CSL reps with semi's, RTAB Limiters, Powerflex’d, PF Camber Arms, K-Sport BBK / RSL-29, GC Camber Plates, Strut Brace, Exhaust valves, custom brake cooling, complete underside refresh!
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- Member
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Bilstein PSS10 + Suspension refresh review
Wow what a "freshen up"
Can I ask how much that all was?
Can I ask how much that all was?
- TomK
- Senior Member
- Posts: 2367
- Joined: Fri Jan 25, 2013 11:50 pm
- Location: West London
Bilstein PSS10 + Suspension refresh review
Proper job! Glad you went with the pss10, ive not been a huge fan of the kw kit i have tbh.
Met daragh at the ring, seems a good guy and the quality of work looks great.
Thanks for sharing
Met daragh at the ring, seems a good guy and the quality of work looks great.
Thanks for sharing
MC[IB], CSL airbox, Schrick 288/280 cams, 4.44FD, UUC SSK, SS race cat back, AP CP9660[F]/5144[R] brakes, Apex ARC-8 with AR-1 or PS5, KW ClubSport 2-way, Turner spherical arms, PMC uniball rtab, VB engine mounts, Rogue pulleys & RSMs, Tillett B6, half cage
- AndyBeech
- Senior Member
- Posts: 1629
- Joined: Mon Feb 18, 2013 2:25 pm
- Location: Reading / Bath
Bilstein PSS10 + Suspension refresh review
Thanks, I'd hate to add it all up. But being honest, and I probably went a bit overkill, all parts and the labour was around 4-5k I imagine. I spread it all out over around 3-4 months accumulating parts through winter when the car was off the road though which made it more palatable. All in all it was worth whatever the actual cost was, no point having a performance car when your not getting the most out of it with worn parts. Having said that, you have to stop somewhere, for example I could have done the head gasket and a full diff refurb but will wait until they actually need doing (were all inspected and fine for now).
Cheers Tom. Now I've done a few days on track and got some good learning in, I'll hopefully be able to join you and Dave on a proper track next year at some point.
Darragh's deffo got himself a niche with SMG to manual conversions and as a diff specialist but I'd trust him to take on any job. Hanging around for a day with him at his place while he did some work was good fun and he knows these cars inside out. Got some pretty funny F1 related stories as well!
Last edited by AndyBeech on Wed Sep 30, 2020 12:11 am, edited 1 time in total.
Z4MR - Gruppe M, Bilstein PSS10, CSL's + 18" CSL reps with semi's, RTAB Limiters, Powerflex’d, PF Camber Arms, K-Sport BBK / RSL-29, GC Camber Plates, Strut Brace, Exhaust valves, custom brake cooling, complete underside refresh!
- MrPT
- Lifer
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- Joined: Sun Oct 21, 2012 7:44 pm
- Location: Bucks/Oxon
Bilstein PSS10 + Suspension refresh review
Fantastic post. Glad it was all worth the expense and effort.
2008 Z4MC: heavy wheels | crap suspension | skittish rear end | wobbly engine | not enough induction noise | underwhelming turn in | inconsistent braking | lardy battery | chubby steering wheel
2006 Z4 2.5si: gone
2006 Z4 2.5si: gone
- TomK
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- Joined: Fri Jan 25, 2013 11:50 pm
- Location: West London
Bilstein PSS10 + Suspension refresh review
look forward to it, if only to show you how much faster the coupe is but seriously keep me posted. Dave's knocking it out of the park these days with a 210,000 mile c6 vette, it's a monster, but I think we might just have the edge on him (have to try rather hard mind!).
He's really making quite the name for himself isn't he with these 2000 series cars... I've moved house some way recently and so my shop of choice is now not really convenient at all (it never really was in the first place but hey), and also they hinted that they just weren't really interested in keeping the custom as there wasn't much money in it anymore which is kind of understandable.AndyBeech wrote: ↑Wed Sep 30, 2020 12:08 am Darragh's deffo got himself a niche with SMG to manual conversions and as a diff specialist but I'd trust him to take on any job. Hanging around for a day with him at his place while he did some work was good fun and he knows these cars inside out. Got some pretty funny F1 related stories as well!
He just seems to be the go to man now for this era of cars, I try and do most of the work now myself (read dave does it ) but a diff refresh/change(?) is on my mind, I know who I'll be calling.
Hope to see you soon, on track would be fun. Cheers
MC[IB], CSL airbox, Schrick 288/280 cams, 4.44FD, UUC SSK, SS race cat back, AP CP9660[F]/5144[R] brakes, Apex ARC-8 with AR-1 or PS5, KW ClubSport 2-way, Turner spherical arms, PMC uniball rtab, VB engine mounts, Rogue pulleys & RSMs, Tillett B6, half cage
- AndyBeech
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- Posts: 1629
- Joined: Mon Feb 18, 2013 2:25 pm
- Location: Reading / Bath
Bilstein PSS10 + Suspension refresh review
Ah yeah if that's the Vette he had at Combe that day then yes, it looked like a monster from where I was watching! Well I'll take the fact you've got some nice buckets and harnesses on yours are probably worth a fair bit of time! Tbh one of the other best mods I've made is a £30 CG-Lock for the seatbelt, without harnesses they proper hold you into the seat, wouldn't be without it on track now makes so much difference surprisingly.TomK wrote: ↑Wed Sep 30, 2020 12:27 amlook forward to it, if only to show you how much faster the coupe is but seriously keep me posted. Dave's knocking it out of the park these days with a 210,000 mile c6 vette, it's a monster, but I think we might just have the edge on him (have to try rather hard mind!).He's really making quite the name for himself isn't he with these 2000 series cars... I've moved house some way recently and so my shop of choice is now not really convenient at all (it never really was in the first place but hey), and also they hinted that they just weren't really interested in keeping the custom as there wasn't much money in it anymore which is kind of understandable.AndyBeech wrote: ↑Wed Sep 30, 2020 12:08 am Darragh's deffo got himself a niche with SMG to manual conversions and as a diff specialist but I'd trust him to take on any job. Hanging around for a day with him at his place while he did some work was good fun and he knows these cars inside out. Got some pretty funny F1 related stories as well!
He just seems to be the go to man now for this era of cars, I try and do most of the work now myself (read dave does it ) but a diff refresh/change(?) is on my mind, I know who I'll be calling.
Hope to see you soon, on track would be fun. Cheers
I will keep you posted and look forward to it! Sure I can learn a lot from you guys.
This spending spree is all your fault by the way, I nearly sold mine before I climbed into yours round Combe and got a taste for what's possible ! So thanks Seriously though, glad I didn't sell, never had so much fun in a car until now!
You won't go wrong with Darragh mate, especially with anything diff related Unless Dave moves into that sector, maybe you could twist his arm to give it a go!
Thanks MrPT, appreciate it
Last edited by AndyBeech on Wed Sep 30, 2020 1:28 am, edited 1 time in total.
Z4MR - Gruppe M, Bilstein PSS10, CSL's + 18" CSL reps with semi's, RTAB Limiters, Powerflex’d, PF Camber Arms, K-Sport BBK / RSL-29, GC Camber Plates, Strut Brace, Exhaust valves, custom brake cooling, complete underside refresh!
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- Lifer
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Bilstein PSS10 + Suspension refresh review
That’s a brilliant write up and very very useful for the parts. My M is being retired until spring as changing back boxes at the weekend I found a diff leak, quite a bad one as well. I’m hopefully doing a full refresh and a bit of a concours build on it, it’s only on 38k miles but underneath is showing its age, engine/box out, the lot. Replacing every bush but I’m going with OEM as I don’t want the harshness of Powerflex as I’m not going to track it......I don’t think..... I’ll be stripping all parts as I’ll have a soda and vapour blaster in very soon, plus hopefully a powder coating booth. Mods will be KWV3’s, Vibratech engine mounts, AP 6 and 4 pot brakes, RTAB’s, OEM CSL’s already on and Remus or Supersprint back boxes. I’ve probably bought half Tom K’s old stock....
Your list has reduced my research time quite considerably so many many thanks and well done on a top job.
Your list has reduced my research time quite considerably so many many thanks and well done on a top job.
M roady...OEM CSL’s, strut brace, Remus back boxes, ZHP
MR2 MK 2
E89 35i project car...mapped 365bhp, M4 stoppers & wheels, KWV3’s, H&R front ARB, M3 front arms, strut brace Eisenmann cat back race exhaust, VRSF downpipes inbound
E89 35is
G29
MR2 MK 2
E89 35i project car...mapped 365bhp, M4 stoppers & wheels, KWV3’s, H&R front ARB, M3 front arms, strut brace Eisenmann cat back race exhaust, VRSF downpipes inbound
E89 35is
G29
- TomK
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Bilstein PSS10 + Suspension refresh review
Happy to hear that, good cars. Enjoy
MC[IB], CSL airbox, Schrick 288/280 cams, 4.44FD, UUC SSK, SS race cat back, AP CP9660[F]/5144[R] brakes, Apex ARC-8 with AR-1 or PS5, KW ClubSport 2-way, Turner spherical arms, PMC uniball rtab, VB engine mounts, Rogue pulleys & RSMs, Tillett B6, half cage
- Vanne
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Bilstein PSS10 + Suspension refresh review
I enjoyed reading that, nice post and keep up the good work.
2007 EuroSpec Z4///MC Building/Developing Z4 GT3
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Bilstein PSS10 + Suspension refresh review
That’s one heck of a comprehensive refresh, I’ll bet it feels great and such a pronounced change must make the cost seem irrelevant
Glad that you’re happy with the car and the work, I think the PSS10 will be the direction I take when the time comes and I expect I’ll take a similar approach to the bushings as you did-a little sharper but not too far down the track car road.
1550kg does seem a bit hefty but I assume you had a fair bit of fuel and ballast in the drivers seat? It’s a shame BMW couldn’t lay off the engineering pies when making these cars as there isn’t much easy weight to strip from them without compromising their usability/comfort.
Glad that you’re happy with the car and the work, I think the PSS10 will be the direction I take when the time comes and I expect I’ll take a similar approach to the bushings as you did-a little sharper but not too far down the track car road.
1550kg does seem a bit hefty but I assume you had a fair bit of fuel and ballast in the drivers seat? It’s a shame BMW couldn’t lay off the engineering pies when making these cars as there isn’t much easy weight to strip from them without compromising their usability/comfort.
RUBYIMOLACARBON
- R60BBA
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Bilstein PSS10 + Suspension refresh review
Very comprehensive thread, some good work you have done there.
Having just reinforced the rear end of my M3 in summer I too also see the benefits of refreshing suspension components and the like once your car gets to a certain mileage.
I have a question on the weight however, is that 1551kg dry or wet?
Having just reinforced the rear end of my M3 in summer I too also see the benefits of refreshing suspension components and the like once your car gets to a certain mileage.
I have a question on the weight however, is that 1551kg dry or wet?
Current: 2002 E46 M3
Current: 2005 997 Carrera S
Gone: 2004 R53 Cooper S
Gone: 1998 E31 840Ci Sport
Gone: 2007 Z4 E86 3.0Si Sport
Gone: 2001 Z3 E36/7 2.2i San Remo Individual
Gone: 2015 F21 116d M Sport
Gone: 2012 A3 Sportback 1.2TFSI
Current: 2005 997 Carrera S
Gone: 2004 R53 Cooper S
Gone: 1998 E31 840Ci Sport
Gone: 2007 Z4 E86 3.0Si Sport
Gone: 2001 Z3 E36/7 2.2i San Remo Individual
Gone: 2015 F21 116d M Sport
Gone: 2012 A3 Sportback 1.2TFSI
- AndyBeech
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Bilstein PSS10 + Suspension refresh review
Thanks mate, it was a kind of 'all-in' or probably sell decision. I think I've made the right choice, money is there to be spent and enjoyed!beanie wrote: ↑Fri Oct 02, 2020 9:37 pm That’s one heck of a comprehensive refresh, I’ll bet it feels great and such a pronounced change must make the cost seem irrelevant
Glad that you’re happy with the car and the work, I think the PSS10 will be the direction I take when the time comes and I expect I’ll take a similar approach to the bushings as you did-a little sharper but not too far down the track car road.
1550kg does seem a bit hefty but I assume you had a fair bit of fuel and ballast in the drivers seat? It’s a shame BMW couldn’t lay off the engineering pies when making these cars as there isn’t much easy weight to strip from them without compromising their usability/comfort.
It's pretty close between the PSS10 and KW V3's from the research I did. I went for the PSS10 personally as I got a good deal on them in the end which was a fair bit cheaper than the V3's at the time and the adjustment on the V3's would've been wasted on me for now. I like the single knob on the bottom which is quick and easy to adjust, less messing more driving! You won't go wrong with either choice though.
Only bit of advice if you do get them, the springs don't come with any kind of silencing and I noticed the front springs knocked slightly at first over bumps near the top of them (could see evidence of a bit of spring to spring contact when looking). Brought some Tein rubber silencers for a couple of quid since and all good now though.
I should've added, the weight was with a driver in the seat and IIRC nearly a full tank of fuel. Tried to get it down to 3/4 of a tank before the weighting but didn't have time in the end!
Z4MR - Gruppe M, Bilstein PSS10, CSL's + 18" CSL reps with semi's, RTAB Limiters, Powerflex’d, PF Camber Arms, K-Sport BBK / RSL-29, GC Camber Plates, Strut Brace, Exhaust valves, custom brake cooling, complete underside refresh!
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Bilstein PSS10 + Suspension refresh review
Thanks for the tips, it’ll be a while for me yet I think but one day!
I don’t know what you weigh but an almost full tank with a nominal 75kg driver would mean you could take 100kg off the measured weight for a car with half a tank. Probably around 125kg if you were to assume no fuel.
I don’t know what you weigh but an almost full tank with a nominal 75kg driver would mean you could take 100kg off the measured weight for a car with half a tank. Probably around 125kg if you were to assume no fuel.
RUBYIMOLACARBON
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Bilstein PSS10 + Suspension refresh review
Hi and thank you for the post.
Why don't put redline oil on diff and engine also?
How many litres on diff and gearbox?
And what do you mean with the combination of MTL and D4 on gearbox?
Thank you
Z4 M roadster, 2006, saphirshwarz / Sepang Bronze Hell full walknappa (LTA8)