I finally bought a Z4 - Ownership thread!
- Thread starter DaveP
- Start date
Oh no! Amex is usually one of the best at customer support, so fingers crossed!
Have you got space for a second set of wheels and tyres? As you could run a track specific set with cheap semi-slicks on such as Zestino Gredge, NS2R or Accelera 651 (not advised).
In terms of track ready road tyres... Yes the 4S is one of the absolute best. I have the same issue as you running 17" wheels when finding sets of UUHP tyres.
The only options seems to be:
Michelin Pilot Sport 4S (only 1 size in 17" I believe)
Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2
Less desirably, but can be used for a few laps at a time on track:
Bridgestone Potenza Sport*
Continental Sport Contact 5 (newer models not available in 17")*
Goodyear Eagle F1 Asymmetric 6
Continental PremiumContact 6 or 7*
Michelin Pilot Sport 5 (surprisingly disappointing on track due to overheating)
Yokohama Advan Sport V105S*
* - denotes ones I have not personally tried on track yet.
Have you got space for a second set of wheels and tyres? As you could run a track specific set with cheap semi-slicks on such as Zestino Gredge, NS2R or Accelera 651 (not advised).
In terms of track ready road tyres... Yes the 4S is one of the absolute best. I have the same issue as you running 17" wheels when finding sets of UUHP tyres.
The only options seems to be:
Michelin Pilot Sport 4S (only 1 size in 17" I believe)
Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2
Less desirably, but can be used for a few laps at a time on track:
Bridgestone Potenza Sport*
Continental Sport Contact 5 (newer models not available in 17")*
Goodyear Eagle F1 Asymmetric 6
Continental PremiumContact 6 or 7*
Michelin Pilot Sport 5 (surprisingly disappointing on track due to overheating)
Yokohama Advan Sport V105S*
* - denotes ones I have not personally tried on track yet.
You've absolutely nailed my 'research' findings too. My biggest problem is that I don't really want to run two sets of tyres. I've been down that road in the past, and it was just constant faffing. I want to be able to jump in my car and drive it without worrying about what tyres I've got fitted. Not being able to carry a spare set in the car also rules that out.TheDan said:
Semi slicks are, in my experience, absolutely miserable on the road. I couldn't bear spending 6hrs+ in the car to the Ring listening to a sound like 4 shot wheel bearings. The Cup 2s look too marginal to run in the rain, which is backed up by a good mate who runs them on his R35 and only takes it out in the dry.
I'm currently running the Eagle F1 6s, but they are just too soft. I gave the sidewalls an absolute battering on Monday, and tyre temperatures and pressures were just rising too quickly. The Potenza Sports look the part, but the review I read said that they suffered similarly after a few laps on track.
All of which leaves me still chasing down these elusive last few sets of Pilot Sport 4S. Grim.
Dropped off to fit the diff this morning, hoping to get it back tomorrow! Gearbox specialist did sterling work on the rebuild, and for a very reasonable cost too. Frustratingly he had a really hard time getting hold of the output bearings (mentioned something about them being tapered, and NLA), but thankfully the existing ones were in really good condition.
Diff is going in with new poly mounts from Powerflex, which should tighten up the on/off throttle transition a bit more. I've asked them to take a look at the prop donut and replace if it's knackered while they are in there too.
We chatted briefly about them fitting a Sorek gauge, and lack of familiarity with the car made them a bit hesitant. They were open to the idea, but not knowing about running power cables through bulkheads etc. was just holding them back. Bit of research needed on my part, I think.
[ref]Usel[/ref]/[ref]enuff_zed[/ref], any suggestions from your significant experience of fiddling with these things? Will need to run a cable through the bulkhead, and potentially a second back from the fusebox to the sender.
Diff is going in with new poly mounts from Powerflex, which should tighten up the on/off throttle transition a bit more. I've asked them to take a look at the prop donut and replace if it's knackered while they are in there too.
We chatted briefly about them fitting a Sorek gauge, and lack of familiarity with the car made them a bit hesitant. They were open to the idea, but not knowing about running power cables through bulkheads etc. was just holding them back. Bit of research needed on my part, I think.
[ref]Usel[/ref]/[ref]enuff_zed[/ref], any suggestions from your significant experience of fiddling with these things? Will need to run a cable through the bulkhead, and potentially a second back from the fusebox to the sender.
Up behind the glovebox there is a small electric fan that blows air into the electrics box in the engine bay to cool the DME. You can feed wires through that hole into the electrics box, then out through one of the grommets that the other wires enter/exit through.
Bonus being the wires enter the cabin right by the fusebox.
Bonus being the wires enter the cabin right by the fusebox.
I didn't in the end, although it's not off the table. I can't justify an M-Factory or Quaife given the value of the car, so I'd probably end up going with a Blackline. I've had TorSen diffs in the past, and I like the way they drive on the road.Micke said:
Going to see how things go at the Ring next month, and decide whether I stay as I am, invest more money in the car, or chop it in for something with a bit more punch.
Picked the car up this morning, with its new diff installed. The change is quite remarkable. On the 20-something minute cross-country drive from AP Tuning (shout out to an excellent motorsport garage if you're in the Norfolk area) the car felt noticeably more peppy and keen to accelerate. I didn't notice that I was making more gearchanges than I previously had, but first gear is definitely a lot less useful than before. Overall, huge positive and I wish I'd done it sooner.
The bonus is that the garage tackled some really annoying 'while you're in there' jobs, including tidying up the rear subframe while they fitted the polybushes and cutting out the old exhaust bolts to fit new hardware. Prop donut was in fine shape, so no need to replace it.
There's a slight noise on drive engagement that I'm not too worried about right now, given that the transmission specialist confirmed there was no play in the diff. I'll monitor it on Monday's tuition day and potentially look to get the transmission guys to take another look if it gets any worse.
The bonus is that the garage tackled some really annoying 'while you're in there' jobs, including tidying up the rear subframe while they fitted the polybushes and cutting out the old exhaust bolts to fit new hardware. Prop donut was in fine shape, so no need to replace it.
There's a slight noise on drive engagement that I'm not too worried about right now, given that the transmission specialist confirmed there was no play in the diff. I'll monitor it on Monday's tuition day and potentially look to get the transmission guys to take another look if it gets any worse.
One slight fly in the ointment is the gauge fitting. We had a nosey around the engine to look for the Vanos banjo, and it looks to my untrained eye that it's going to be VERY tricky to get a threaded banjo and a sender fitted in the required space. This photo from PelicanParts shows the problem, and it's a water hose that runs right below the Vanos bolt, and it bolt itself is angled towards the hose.
The sender and its gubbins would need to fit in the space where the pink arrow is, and I'm just not convinced there's enough room.
Better picture below, with the Vanos banjo in the bottom-middle.
Am I looking at the right thing here? Can any of our M54 gurus confirm?
The sender and its gubbins would need to fit in the space where the pink arrow is, and I'm just not convinced there's enough room.
Better picture below, with the Vanos banjo in the bottom-middle.
Am I looking at the right thing here? Can any of our M54 gurus confirm?
Thinking out loud here, could I simply replace the factory pressure sensor and code out the factory oil pressure warning?
enuff_zed, you're probably the only person who can answer the second part of that.
If so, that would be a dream because I could just use the factory wiring for power to the sensor. I'm out of my depth here, unfortunately.
RealOEM says it's an M12x1.5 and there appears to be enough space to fit an aftermarket sensor.
https://www.realoem.com/bmw/enUS/showparts?id=BT52-EUR-08-2003-E85-BMW-Z4_30i&diagId=11_2201
It would mean using this adaptor to fit the sensor, which doesn't seem too onerous.
https://www.speedingparts.co.uk/p/fuelsystem-an-fittings/an-fittings-an-hose/spd-an-fittings/mm-npt-npt-reducer/m12x15-m10x10-reduction.html
enuff_zed, you're probably the only person who can answer the second part of that.
If so, that would be a dream because I could just use the factory wiring for power to the sensor. I'm out of my depth here, unfortunately.
RealOEM says it's an M12x1.5 and there appears to be enough space to fit an aftermarket sensor.
https://www.realoem.com/bmw/enUS/showparts?id=BT52-EUR-08-2003-E85-BMW-Z4_30i&diagId=11_2201
It would mean using this adaptor to fit the sensor, which doesn't seem too onerous.
https://www.speedingparts.co.uk/p/fuelsystem-an-fittings/an-fittings-an-hose/spd-an-fittings/mm-npt-npt-reducer/m12x15-m10x10-reduction.html
Great shout. My research suggests it's just a switch with a single wire, rather than a proper sensor. So in theory it should be really easy to dupe the ECU/cluster into thinking everything is fine.j3nks79 said:
Either connect the wire to ground (closed switch) or leave the sensor on the wire (open switch), depending on what the 'OK' state is. I'd assume the former.
Sadly that does mean it's not going to be possible to rob the sensor of its power, but not the end of the world.
Well, yesterday was hot but brilliant!
I'm a huge fan of Mark at Drive Limits, and this is my second visit to the sessions he runs at North Weald airfield. Mark is an instructor at the Porsche Experience at Silverstone, and an all-round driving god. He runs these full-day sessions for 4 drivers/cars, and teaches car control on the limit in a nice, safe airfield environment.
https://www.drivelimits.com/
Having raved about it to my trackday friends, I was joined by one of them yesterday who's getting to know his new M135i track car. The day covers a few different elements of car control, but the main focus of the session is about cornering on the limit. We repeatedly threw our cars into a right-angled corner (on a huge open piece of tarmac) at 70-80mph and Mark coaches different techniques to use combinations of steering/brakes/throttle to get you round in one piece.
Lots of this sort of thing: https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=1095425334769688
As you can imagine, there are loads of smoky spins and tankslappers while you're getting a feel for the car, but by the end of the day you're confidently chucking the car in and hauling it around. Highly recommended for anyone who wants to learn a bit more about how their Z4 behaves on the limit in a safe environment.
This was my first visit since changing quite a lot on the car, so I had Mark spend some time with me on on suspension setup. Even with a more aggressive alignment AND the coilovers and polybushes AND a square setup, we were still struggling to dial out some of the understeer at the limit. The solution felt counterintuitive, but we wound back a bit of the damping on the front which immediately brought the back end to life. By the end of the fiddling we'd managed to tweak it to a much more neutral feeling chassis, with a back end that could be provoked into moving around under power and on trail-braking. Very happy with that.
This was the first time the shorter diff has been used in anger, and there was good and bad. Cruising on the motorway at 80 was absolutely fine (~3200rpm), and the shorter final drive has REALLY reduced the drop off in oomph between gearchanges. This was one of my biggest bugbears of the standard setup, meaning you had to rev the car almost to the limiter to avoid bogging down in the next gear.
However, all is not well with the diff. I noticed a slight whine just at the point of neutral throttle (a few mm before lifting off or accelerating), which sounds a bit ominous. Given that the next month is HECTIC for me with work travel, I'm going to drop it back to the transmission specialist and prepare myself to find another diff if he can't figure out the issue.
I'm a huge fan of Mark at Drive Limits, and this is my second visit to the sessions he runs at North Weald airfield. Mark is an instructor at the Porsche Experience at Silverstone, and an all-round driving god. He runs these full-day sessions for 4 drivers/cars, and teaches car control on the limit in a nice, safe airfield environment.
https://www.drivelimits.com/
Having raved about it to my trackday friends, I was joined by one of them yesterday who's getting to know his new M135i track car. The day covers a few different elements of car control, but the main focus of the session is about cornering on the limit. We repeatedly threw our cars into a right-angled corner (on a huge open piece of tarmac) at 70-80mph and Mark coaches different techniques to use combinations of steering/brakes/throttle to get you round in one piece.
Lots of this sort of thing: https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=1095425334769688
As you can imagine, there are loads of smoky spins and tankslappers while you're getting a feel for the car, but by the end of the day you're confidently chucking the car in and hauling it around. Highly recommended for anyone who wants to learn a bit more about how their Z4 behaves on the limit in a safe environment.
This was my first visit since changing quite a lot on the car, so I had Mark spend some time with me on on suspension setup. Even with a more aggressive alignment AND the coilovers and polybushes AND a square setup, we were still struggling to dial out some of the understeer at the limit. The solution felt counterintuitive, but we wound back a bit of the damping on the front which immediately brought the back end to life. By the end of the fiddling we'd managed to tweak it to a much more neutral feeling chassis, with a back end that could be provoked into moving around under power and on trail-braking. Very happy with that.
This was the first time the shorter diff has been used in anger, and there was good and bad. Cruising on the motorway at 80 was absolutely fine (~3200rpm), and the shorter final drive has REALLY reduced the drop off in oomph between gearchanges. This was one of my biggest bugbears of the standard setup, meaning you had to rev the car almost to the limiter to avoid bogging down in the next gear.
However, all is not well with the diff. I noticed a slight whine just at the point of neutral throttle (a few mm before lifting off or accelerating), which sounds a bit ominous. Given that the next month is HECTIC for me with work travel, I'm going to drop it back to the transmission specialist and prepare myself to find another diff if he can't figure out the issue.
