Midnight Mending

R

rbhynes

Member
 Preston
So I pull up at the restaurant earlier on this evening, I'm taking a new colleague out for dinner and we have decided to take the Z - partly because it's fun, but mainly because he's american and we just had a conversation about how he has never driven a 'stick shift' before, so I'm not getting in his hire car.

Anyway we are just walking toward the entrance and from behind is the unmistakable sound of metal that has been under stress relieving itself - BANG.

We both turn round, it sounded like it came from the direction of the Z, but we can't see anything. So we go in, have a great meal and leave.

On exiting the car park there is a metallic rattle just as the rear tyres run over a drain. Odd.

It continues happening on any moderately severe bump and after a mile or so I figure out its coming from the offside - got to be the infamous BMW snapping spring.

So after a tender drive home worrying incessantly about the rattling broken spring piercing the tyre, I get home.

Suit off, jeans on - wheel off and sure enough....

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So now I need directions on what springs to buy. It's a 2006 3.0SI Sport, so is it Eibachs, if so what ones & where to buy from.

I'm also sticking on 265-40-18 tyres, so nothing too low.

Thanks all!
 
Impressive! I've not heard of anyone witnessing a spring snapping from OUTSIDE the car before - I did hear mine break but that was driving along with a chunk fell out and bounced along the tarmac.

This is usually the cheapest place: http://www.motorsportworld.co.uk/detprod.asp?productcode=E10-20-010-01-22&PID=1081224 (although I've not compared that at all). Ignore the -30mm bit, that refers to non-sport suspended cars hence will only lower your Si by 15mm.

Eibachs are certainly the way forward :)
 
Yeah weird eh.. Conventional wisdom would say that the spring would break when under max load, not when perfectly stationary and about as light as it gets - the fuel light was on and nothing was in the boot..

Is there a type of eibach? When I have bought them before there was Pro & Sport. Do the same options exist for the Z?
 
a11y said:
Impressive! I've not heard of anyone witnessing a spring snapping from OUTSIDE the car before - I did hear mine break but that was driving along with a chunk fell out and bounced along the tarmac.

This is usually the cheapest place: http://www.motorsportworld.co.uk/detprod.asp?productcode=E10-20-010-01-22&PID=1081224 (although I've not compared that at all). Ignore the -30mm bit, that refers to non-sport suspended cars hence will only lower your Si by 15mm.

Eibachs are certainly the way forward :)
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Cheers for that! Set on order and will be fitting them this weekend if delivery & weather permits. Pretty cheap, significantly less than eurocarparts version!
 
Stuart Truman said:
That looks like classic metal fatigue. Good luck with replacements
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it's a stress corrosion crack, but interestingly the corroded area is really small in comparison to the cross section, means BMW use really brittle spring material - but you don't need a metallurgist to work that on out; any pot hole will do...
 
Won't the 265/40r18 tyres knock your speed0 out (by about 5%) as they're bigger than the stock 255/35r18. It might feel like you've got a loss in power too!
 
Glad to hear another converting to Eibachs :thumbsup:

Eibach don't offer the Sportline springs for the Z4, they only offer the Pro ones. I remember from my past that Sportlines give a bigger drop (on Clio 172s it was ~15mm for the Pro's but 30mm for the Sportline - I stupidly instead went for Apex -40mm's that looked awesome but rode horrifically!). I guess a bigger drop than the Pro's really isn't sensible on the Z4!

Oh, and VvroooomM deserves a :rofl: for that comment...
 
a11y said:
Impressive! I've not heard of anyone witnessing a spring snapping from OUTSIDE the car before
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Mine went at the end of a cruise, the car was parked up for about 2-3 minutes before it went bang... There were about 8 of us stood by the car at the time chatting about the great route we had just driven.

Made us all jump...
 
VvrooomM said:
U did say you'd just had an American in the car!!


Tapatalking on my iPhone.......
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haha, yeah, I was looking for an excuse myself, but it was the drivers side that went....
 
Gazhyde said:
a11y said:
Impressive! I've not heard of anyone witnessing a spring snapping from OUTSIDE the car before
Click to expand...
Mine went at the end of a cruise, the car was parked up for about 2-3 minutes before it went bang... There were about 8 of us stood by the car at the time chatting about the great route we had just driven.

Made us all jump...
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Thats weird, mine was also sat for 2-3 mins before it went. Wonder if there's something that happens, cooling/thermal soak when the cars just stopped after a run.
 
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