My lil project and some ESS questions

[Paulr]

The looks beautiful, and well engineered. I am always surprised how people are prepared to spend so much time, money and effort on what is a pretty old car with high mileage! Must be the old Motor Trader in me looking at getting the maximum returns on my investment when I sell the car.

Saying that, glad you have done, looks great, bet it drives well too.

 

[GuidoK]

Must be the old Motor Trader in me looking at getting the maximum returns on my investment when I sell the car.

Dont forget that z4 prices in the UK are ridiculously low. Where I live a z4 in same trim costs about 3 times as much as one in the UK.
That said, cars in the UK are usually in far lesser state of maintenance. Probably partly due to their price, and partly due to the bad weather and that a larger percentage of uk cars arent garaged.
But if you look at maximum return on investments, you shouldn't even consider tuning.
Tuning parts themselves hold fairly well on value (better than new cars), so if you buy an lsd, or bbk or supercharger kit you can easily sell them on seperately for say 50-75% or new value, but bolted on the car they have ample added value.

 

[Paulr]

Must be the old Motor Trader in me looking at getting the maximum returns on my investment when I sell the car.

Dont forget that z4 prices in the UK are ridiculously low. Where I live a z4 in same trim costs about 3 times as much as one in the UK.
That said, cars in the UK are usually in far lesser state of maintenance. Probably partly due to their price, and partly due to the bad weather and that a larger percentage of uk cars arent garaged.
But if you look at maximum return on investments, you shouldn't even consider tuning.
Tuning parts themselves hold fairly well on value (better than new cars), so if you buy an lsd, or bbk or supercharger kit you can easily sell them on seperately for say 50-75% or new value, but bolted on the car they have ample added value.

We are lucky with the cars being so cheap - but it is a curse as well as you say, there are plenty of dogs about! I understand the yearning for tuning and creating a very personal statement, but I am always reluctant to take my car away from the manufactures specification as it means you limit the amount of people who will want to buy that car off you, making it much trickier to sell. However, your car has very subtle external mods that enhance the standard look as opposed to blinging it up, with some beautifully done mechanical mods that look factory fit, and as you say they are rarer over there, I don't think you will have an issue if you wanted to move it on. You just will not get back all your investment you put into it. It is still 100,000 mile 10 plus year old car. But you know that, and it was not what you had in mind when embarking on the project!

 

[Machine monkey]

I don’t think many people have built there dream cars (That’s kind of what i do) With the head ruling. It’s a hobby and a challenge and its decisions made from the hart. It’s also the fun of building stuff for me the research the build doing it with your mates. I could spend thousands of golf or going down the pub. Or following a team around Europe watching whatever it was that team played. So the way i see it i am just spending on my hobby. Will i loose cash o yes diffidently. That’s why i try and build what i can as cheaply as i can.

 

[GuidoK]

^exactly
Plus I also didnt buy my car with the intent to sell it.
Besides, my car is very heavily tuned with pretty much all Grade A components from premium manufacturers, and if I look what that has cost me over the years (and that is the tuning including all the maintenance, oil changes everything, just no gas/insurance and the price of the base car), it averages out at about £150,-/month
I know people who cant stand the urge swapping cars annually or so and losing much much more :roll:

Some people want a new car when they get bored; I just make it faster when I get bored :lol:

Just last month I was toying around with a brand new 718 cayman S on the german autobahn, and the performance was about on par.
Thats a £80k(!) car where I live. I'd say I have the bargain here :lol:

Maybe if you had it all done to your car it would be different, but I'm in the buildnotbought section, and building it is in the end what its all about for me.
If I had another car I would do the same. If that car was more expensive it would have cost me more money (parts for expensive cars are generally more expensive too), and if I started with a cheaper car, it maybe would have cost me less. But then again there arent many cheaper platforms around that are tuneable. You'd have to step down to a mx-5 or so.

 

[Paulr]

Can't argue with any of that! All valid reasons for doing what you enjoy, and that is what makes people so interesting!

 

[Machine monkey]

Can't argue with any of that! All valid reasons for doing what you enjoy, and that is what makes people so interesting!

Agreed but you are right. It’s not a sensible thing to do financially!! We can’t be like all Richard Rawlins!!

 

[Monkeydonkeyratmagic]

I just laugh off people that talk about "you'll never get that money back" fact is next year I intend to have a sub 7k spend that's quicker than these people splashing out 35k for a poxy A3 or a Golf R. Or worse...paying 8k to hire it for 2 years. Plus you try and get a convertible that's as feral and as rapid as a supercharged z4 that costs 10k tops and DOESN'T lose money. Oh a TVR or a porker that hemorrhages money in running costs, parts prices, constant breaking down and oh yeah costs 30k for a half decent one.
Generally when I say I'm investing X in my motors I mean I'm investing in the fun factor.

 

[Beedub]

Really nice work.
I am loving the fact there are some nice clean fast non Ms out there. I think the non M car is overlooked as a track weapon. Obviously some things need changing. Much of the same stuff the M needs to be a true track beast. And this is look very well done with some really nice kit.

id guess the above car is quite abit quicker than ///M now.... prob around the same power but with way more TQ.

It’s not just the S/C either. Diff brakes suspension. And all for probably what an M would cost. But a much better set up track car than any standard M. So it makes perfect sense to me you want a z4 track day car and don’t have spare 20k buy the non M and spend 10k you will end up with a car that’s quicker anyway? Would take some good deals to get all this done for 10k i know and a lot of work yourself. But doable i think in the UK.

OP do look into changing your steering from electric to Hydraulic. I have done it and only had a very short drive in the car since. But I can promise you won’t regret the money spent and time doing it.

yeah this car is perfect really, so clean and i love the focus to the build, one of my new faves. must be a riot to drive, it would take some ///M to keep this in its sights .... probably an equally modded one.

 

[Piper1]

It does come with larger injectors which do sit higher causing the cowling to also sit higher and can cause the issue that I have pending your strut brace as the brace does contact the cowling now.

Prior to the bbk and the adjustable camber plates I had a strut reinforcement plate that sandwiches the strut tower with the strut brace. I’ve seen so many 240s blown out strut towers from too stiff of a set up I wanted some extra rigidity and now with the camber plates of course those reinforcement plates don’t fit so I plan on fitting those as a spacer to lift the strut brace up enough to give space to the cowling.

Do you have a picture of the injectors and one of how they now fit in the car?
I'm just very curious what type/brand of injectors they use in the stock manifold.

With the twinscrew manifold you get bosch style injectors (but the aluminium manifold that comes with it is very different). Red ones like these:


I dont know how many cc injectors they are though. Some say 315cc/min but ESS removed the partnumbers from them so ESS want to keep that a secret.

Mine are grey, I didn't take a pic of them pre but can snap a pic of them installed as they sit. the pic I snapped tonight really was too close up with the cowling just shifted so I will get a better one up hopefully by the weekend. I'm sorry for the delay response on this one it's been a few weeks worth of moronic issues at work.

 

[Piper1]

So this has been compiled over the last few years and was finally clean enough to be deemed pic worthy.

It certainly is picture worthy! Lovely looking car and sounds like a lot of fun too!

Thanks, can you believe I still think it's dirty lol maybe the OCD kicking in but it's been great driving. I wish where I work now didn't use so much salt come winter time. Prior to a few years ago it was my daily driver but with how our winters have been our parking lot at work is like a gravel road just with salt so I've been putting it up due to tat now when the first sign of our lot gets pummeled.

 

[Piper1]

Really nice work.
I am loving the fact there are some nice clean fast non Ms out there. I think the non M car is overlooked as a track weapon. Obviously some things need changing. Much of the same stuff the M needs to be a true track beast. And this is look very well done with some really nice kit.

Hey thanks, I must admit I've been trolling some of your builds for a while and I'm still scratching my head at how much of a mad scientist you are :wink:

 

[Piper1]

id guess the above car is quite abit quicker than ///M now.... prob around the same power but with way more TQ.

I'm not sure how much quicker, I guess I'm still thinking it's in the end equal to a shade hair at best quicker modestly. I wish there was someone close by with an ///M just to have a jaunt next to and see. The best time comparison that I can offer as the quickness, for the past 2 years I had leased a mustang eco boost premium performance package (performance package has 3.55 instead of 3.31 diff gearing) and on 0-60 pulls I'm now a 1-1 1/2 car length quicker and if you put any belief to the 0-60 ratings at all the eco boots performance package is rated at 5.3 0-60. Prior I was about 3-4 car lengths slower, Unfortunately it really doesn't show true for what the kit will really push out but it was the only base I could really get for the first 2 gears at least. There's only a hand full of z4s in the area and I've only talked to 1 who had an ///M quite a few years ago now.

 

[Piper1]

I'm going for the ESS in spring. Not splurging out like 10k just going for the standard kit and a set of KWs. OP that looks like a very meaty install you've got there. How are you finding it going about day to day trips?

In the warmer months I do drive it daily. In a year without a heavy vacation driving year I only do about 7k or so. For the past couple of years it's only seen warmer months. For daily if you look at just the s/c kit alone for those worried about fuel economy I really haven't noticed enough to even worry about. It feels great and has breathed a new life into the car that I was hoping for. It will all depend on how your taste of driving is and what you want to get out of it. In the end though this kit from ess is running $4295 still think of PM things you're going to need to do, there's quite a bit so from a budgeting standpoint don't read the kit price as your bottom line, in truth give yourself that 10k (a high estimate for this kit if you do just s/c) to work with as things will come up that you might want to do and budget for it ahead of time.

 

[Piper1]

I'm going for the ESS in spring. Not splurging out like 10k just going for the standard kit and a set of KWs. OP that looks like a very meaty install you've got there. How are you finding it going about day to day trips?

My coment was brakes ess suspension a diff and a z4 for about 10k you could just about do all that.

Yes sure. I wasn't disagreeing with you. I'm just saying I'm not going all out like that. Be way too easy to spunk a few K on brakes and diff. I'd rather burn through 5 sets of regular pads and discs than spend it on a nice big fancy set .

One thing I am wondering is how well standard wheel width holds up or should I chuck a bigger set of CSLs on to cope.

Prior to the K Sport bbk I had done the 3.0si brake conversion on the front and had eibach 15mm spacers on the front 25mm on the rear Wheels were stock turbine 17x8.

The KSport 330 fronts barely cleared the wheel weights to the caliper and the spokes on the turbine wheels barely clear the outer side of the caliper with the 15mm spacer. Another issue is the brake hats are thicker than a stock rotor, and one thing that I ran in to was not having a comfortable amount of thread left from the longer lug bolt that is used on the 15mm spacer. If you used eibachs 20mm spacer it bolts on then wheel to the spacer just like the 25mm does that I had on the back. If you did that there wouldn't be a problem with stock wheels to the smallest K Sport bbk offered.

All that being said I sent over to Apex the templet from K sport to make sure they'd fit and the minimum that would clear with no spacers would be 8.5 width least on the EC7. If you decide to go wider up front then you're going to need to worry about clearance and rubbing if it's a concern for you. If you drop your stance as where I'm at going with a 18x9 with a 255 35 18 you will have the occasionally rubbing, mainly at full lock to the inner plastic and making sure you set enough -camber for fenders unless you want to roll them. If it's your daily, wouldn't go down that route due to tire wear alone, that all depends on you, another give and take for performance/longevity of tires battle.

There'd be nothing wrong if you wanted to stagger on your daily so you've got plenty of options especially staying stock brake configurations.

I had spent many days and nights in discussions with apex and many locally around about this stance set up and under/over steer along with making sure things were matched right and not just put to fit to "make it work" and counter acting what I set to accomplish at the start of it.

Also food for thought I put 235 40 17 falken Axenis 615k on my turbines and it was a nice flush fit and a great gripping tire.

 

[Piper1]

The looks beautiful, and well engineered. I am always surprised how people are prepared to spend so much time, money and effort on what is a pretty old car with high mileage! Must be the old Motor Trader in me looking at getting the maximum returns on my investment when I sell the car.

Saying that, glad you have done, looks great, bet it drives well too.

Thank you it's a pleasure for sure.

I'll give you a bit of history with this for me.
I started looking in December of 2010 for a z4 to pass my way, in Februray of 2011 an '08 just happened to cross my path at the local bmw dealership. Test drove it Monday, all was great came back Wednesday to make the deal and the car sold. A blessing in disguise because on Thursday we found out Boarders Books and Music where my wife worked would be closing their doors for good, which she stayed through 3 liquidating stores till they were all done. The '08 on my single retail income at the time was now out of the price range so I was back to the drawing board. Come May this '03 popped up that was in perfect price range with 64k on the clock so I jumped at it. At the time I had an 87 supra as my track and project car, never ever thought I'd be modifying the Z4 in anyway....that is until I added myself to the broken spring list LOL. the rest is history. Over time it has been much easier to work on mods rather than a lump payment with the "get an ///M" frame of mind.

A couple years ago the Mrs. and I test drove a C7 Corvette stingray and a Jag F-Type S. We had talked about entering a second 2 seater into the mix, and were left with a dilemma, think about another 2 seater or try for a kid...if we had a kid not practical for 2 2seater cars in the mix and what do ya know we had a kid LOL. So the deal was to work on what I have and not worry about a new ride. So here we are kid just had a great 18 month check up and my wife's already saying the Z4 is his first car lol. It's honestly been the longest owning car I've had to date and hey why not keep it longer.

I think by the end of the day if what you've done to any car brings a smile to your face then you're getting more than what you just put into it. We're also a Jeep family and as funny as it is my winter beater now is her 2000 Wangler, and with the bulk of high dollar mods being done to the Z decided to lease a 4 door wrangler for the baby mobile. So sure in the end have a bit of a car payment for a few years but still not hefty as the others that we would've picked from.

 

[Machine monkey]

Really nice work.
I am loving the fact there are some nice clean fast non Ms out there. I think the non M car is overlooked as a track weapon. Obviously some things need changing. Much of the same stuff the M needs to be a true track beast. And this is look very well done with some really nice kit.

Hey thanks, I must admit I've been trolling some of your builds for a while and I'm still scratching my head at how much of a mad scientist you are :wink:

Thanks that’s very kind. But I am sure we can drop the scientist!!! Keep the work going and do look into the steering conversion.