Ready for a Rally


by Berck

Finally, I managed to start fixing things faster than I was breaking them this weekend.

First up, the alternator. The internet let me know that some E30s refuse to charge the alternator if the charge light wasn’t working.  There’s some disagreement about what year that change was made, or if it was universal. My charge light wasn’t working, but I was pretty sure that it’s never worked.  But not certain.  I verified that with the ignition powered, I got 12V field/excitor voltage to the D+ terminal which is the thing that gets interrupted with a busted charge light.

With that in mind, I turned to the spare alternator from the second engine, but it subjectively looked worse than mine.  It’s also filthy.  But mostly I reasoned that it was very likely that the failure was the voltage regulator, and I didn’t want to condemn an entire alternator if the problem was just the voltage regulator.  Here’s the Bosch regulator that was on the unknown alternator:

The one in the car was not Bosch and the lettering was impossible to make out.  I swapped this one in, and the alternator worked just fine.  The charge light never comes on.  Not sure if it’s burned out or bypassed in some way.  The aforementioned joys of a car with an unknown history.

I wanted to replace the 20 year old seats with modern containment seats.  Irish44j’s photos make me think it’s maybe possible to fit an HTE-R XL in there, but it’s not certain.  My codriver is quite a bit smaller than me, and he claims he fits comfortably in an HTE-R 400.  In fact, he had one that he’d purchased for a Pike’s Peak car that didn’t run this year, so he gave it to me to install it.  So I set about installing this seat, and it gave me fits.

First, it’s about an inch narrower than the seat I had.  I’m unclear about the wisdom of mounting a seat with spacers and longer bolts (seems maybe bad), so I flipped around one of the seat brackets which took up right about the right amount of space.  I still had a heck of a time getting it in there, I think the brackets are *slightly* too tight now, but I did, eventually, get it.  For reasons that make no sense at all, the seat is now farther forward.  This is apparently due to the new seat just sitting farther forward of the mounting points than the old one did, but looking at them doesn’t look that way.

I really need to move the seat brackets after about 2 inches, but given that I was running out of time, I think this will work fine.  I needed to move the fire extinguisher forward a bit, and Jack has less leg room now, but I could fit in there and he’s shorter than me.

My harnesses went out of date in 2022, so I installed new Sabelt ones.  I really like Crow harnesses because the material is soft and easily adjustable, but the SFI-only certification is a bit frustrating.  And while you used to be able to send them back quite a few times for re-webbing for like $60, they will now only reweb them a single time.  Which means only 4 years out of a set.

I’m loving the adjust-at-the-buckle 2″ lap belts these have.  Super easy to get the lap belt much tighter than with the standard pull-up 3″ belts.  The shoulder belts are pretty hard to adjust because they’re so stiff, though.

I put the old co-driver seat in place of mine, because the cover on mine is torn and it made tech upset last time.  If I and the car make it through this event, I’ll figure out how to get a proper containment seat on my side, too.

I got the ugly new graphics badly installed.  I worked really hard on the last decals, and I’m annoyed at having to replace them with uglier ones so I spent less time on it this time.  Trimming the windshield banner carefully is hard, and the black hides mistakes way better than the white.  Oh well.

I’ve driven about 60 miles and it seems good.  I cranked the idle up too high (about 1,200rpm) to keep the oil pressure high enough at idle to not flip the fuel pump shutoff relay.  This would be bad for a street car, but I think it’s fine here.  My impression is that the car is slower than it was with the old engine, but that could just be in my head.  The new clutch is way stiffer than the old one, but it’s also fine.  My $30 ebay short shifter is working great and makes it easier to get it into 1-3-5 while belted in.  I should probably get one of the tall ones and bend it a bit, but this is fine for now.

The rear lights (which they actually checked at tech last year) like to stop working.  Removing and reinstalling the bulb fixes it for a little while.  I decided to pull them all and spray them with contact cleaner hoping that they’d at least work long enough to get through tech this year.  Of course, one of the tail lights disintegrated on removal.  Drove to the auto parts store to acquire a replacement.

I also plugged the new inspection port on my transmission with a rubber plug.

Went ahead and loaded it on the trailer!  

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BMWs are Dumb


by Berck

The machine shop called to say that three valves were bent, and they were having trouble locating replacements. I quickly browsed all the German car part sites, and most of them didn’t have any intake valves in stock, but ECS tuning did. That should have been a warning sign, but I just ordered them with overnight shipping and figured it’d be fine.

They called shortly after delivery to let me know that the exhaust valve was correct, but the intake valve was the wrong size. After much searching, it turns out that the 6mm intake valves on the M42 were only used for one year, and they’re NLA from BMW. After much searching, it turns out that Rock Auto, of all places, actually has some aftermarket ones readily available. They don’t, of course, list the valve in a part search for my car, but once I managed to find the magic part number (RV1359), they appear. And unlike most sites, Rock Auto actually lists all the relevant dimenstions in a diagram, so I was able to be sure they were the right ones before ordering. Unfortunately, while RockAuto would happily ship next day, they said they wouldn’t ship for 3 days.

Luckily, they lied, and the shop got the valves on Friday, in time to return the head to me on Saturday.

Not good as new, but hopefully good enough:

A continued annoyance when reassembling this thing: BMW can’t be bothered to mark TDC (or anything else) on the M42 crank pulley. Just… why not? Yes, the stock flywheel has a hole that lines up with a hole in the case that you slot a tool through to lock the crank in TDC, but I don’t have a stock flywheel. And you still have to locate TDC to stick the tool in. This seems like the most basic thing you do to make an engine serviceable. I’m so over BMW. Problem solved for now:

I got it mostly bolted together on Saturday evening (at least everything with sealant on it) so it could cure overnight. Finished up Sunday morning. Cranked it over to prime the oil system, got 30PSI of oil pressure on the starter motor. Then flipped on the fuel pumps and hopped out to leak-check the fuel system.

I had a geyser of fuel spraying from one of the braided stainless hoses on the firewall. It had leaked there once before, and tightening the connector fixed it. It did not this time.

I pulled the fuel hose, cut an inch off the end and reattached the AN fitting. An even bigger leak. Curious how I bungled that so badly, I did it again, and it leaked again. This time when I pulled it off, I noticed the rubber hose inside was cracked several inches. I cut it off past where it was cracked, reattached the connectors and tried yet again. This time the geyser came from the middle of the hose. At this point, I’d probably been screwing around with this hose for 3 hours, I was drenched in fuel and furious.

After looking it up, apparently it’s normal for this stainless braided rubber fuel hose to disintegrate after just 5 years? This stuff is probably as old as the original build (2007), but what the hell? OEM rubber fuel lines often last 40 years with no problems! I think the fact that it spent a year drying out when the engine was disconnected is probably the biggest problem.

Anyway, AN-sized braided fuel line isn’t something that auto parts stores seem to have in stock. I ordered a bunch of replacement stuff from Amazon, this time PTFE (teflon) which supposedly lasts longer than the rubber. But it won’t get here until tomorrow. And registration for Rally Colorado ended last night.

So, I went ahead and registered even though I have no idea the car even runs, much less drives. I have 9 days. I’m sure it’ll be fine?

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THE rodeo


by Jonah

Wedgie, Holly, Heather, Nikki, and I went to a rodeo up in Woodland Park yesterday. Evidently, Holly, Wedge, and Max won tickets to it at Cowboys the night before. It was a celebrity rodeo benefitting abused kids, which meant that the competitors were locals, who knew what they were doing, and celebrities, who we’d never heard of. They’d get out in the ring and totally screwed up whatever the event was taking place.

One lady, the people sitting near us called “Lori,” competed in some event where a man would run up, grab a young roped steer, and wrestle it to the ground while his female partner would grab a ribbon tied to its tail. Dennis looked in the programs Holly managed to steal and discovered that “Lori” has been in several movies I’ve never heard of (including _Pumping Iron II_) as well as Divorce Court. Dennis and I looked at each other and said, “Divorce Court? But… I thought that was real?” Lori returned to the stands we were sitting in and was congratulated by all for winning the event. “I better get a buckle,” she said, “Last time they gave me a plaque.” Out of the crowds of people in cowboy hats, Levis, and boots stepped a woman in stretch pants, heels, and a leopard spotted scarf. “Lori,” she smiled, “can we interview you?” A kid with a camera labeled with some local TV station came up, and they performed it right there.

None of us really knew what was going on, so a lady behind us clued us in about the events. “Team Penning is harder than it looks,” she said during the last event, “Three strangers who’ve never worked before have to go into a herd of calves and separate four of them wearing the same number (the announcer calls out), get them down the ring and into that little pen. If more than five calves that aren’t that number pass that imaginary line in the middle between those two guys with flags, the team is disqualified.” So we shouted encouragement to the participants and clapped when one team led by a lady in a matching red outfit finally got two calves in before time was called.

It was a fun time, even though we had to listen to country music all the way there, all the way back, and it was playing over the loud speaker in the stadium.

That night while we were picking out a movie at Blockbuster in Monument, Dennis whispered, “Hey, Jonah, wasn’t that lady in red over there in the rodeo?” Sure enough.

Maybe she was renting a Western.

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High Plains in the Blue No. 5 Vee


by Jonah

Turn 1: Make sure your tires are warmed up. Brake early, around the 2nd to last braking marker pylon. Once the right rear wheel settles, add gas. Be on the throttle before or on the apex. Mash the throttle between 1 and 2.  

Turn 2: You don’t need to brake. Downshift to 3rd, making sure you’ve given the throttle a nice blip to get the revs up. Leave a car width from the inside, apexing a little late, which will help you have enough track to track out. Unless you’re side by side with Jean, in which case stay right up against the inside.

Turn 3: Take very fast

Turn 4: You’ve gone down the back straight with the throttle on the floor,  checking the gauges and mirrors, shifting into 4th when 3rd has given you all it’s got. You’re at the end of the pavement and going as fast as this car will go. You’re terrified because now you have to turn to the right.  Tell yourself it’s a fast turn, it’s a fast turn, it’s a fast turn. Lift. Pussy out and brake.  Turn and realize you had plenty of track.  Promise yourself you won’t brake next time, knowing full well that you’re going to be just as terrified next lap.

Turn 5: Aim the nose to the outside pylon. Brake, but not as much as you think you need to.  Go deep, then turn. Track out.  You didn’t use all the track.  You didn’t need that much braking.

Turn 6: Go downhill, staying to the outside.  Brake between the last two braking pylon markers, hard but smooth.  Smooth is fast.  Downshift to 3rd. Don’t apex until you see the blue and white curbing, then hit the edge of the curbing.  Let the slickness of the paint on the curbing rotate the car as your right rear tire slips on it.  Add just enough gas to use all the track to the other side, then it’s full throttle all the way uphill.

Turn 7: There’s no wrong way to take this in a Vee.  Let 3rd take you uphill and shift up to 4th.

Turn 8: Brake hard between the last two braking pylons (sometimes the last one has been knocked down).  Downshift to 3rd.  You come nearly to a stop.  Turn and ride the edge of the curbing.  The Barrons like to drive on the curbing, but it’s so bumpy, and they have treaded tires. Track out to the curbing on the outside.  The cut off between 6 and 13 is there, and you can use that pavement when you run out of track.

Turn 9: Go downhill as fast as you can,  shifting into 4th near the bunker on the right.

Turn 10: Lift because you’re a pussy.  The track flattens out right next to the apex. Hit that flat area, and you’ll be alright.

Turn 11:  Downshift into 3rd between the last two braking pylons, giving the throttle a good bit of gas before letting out the clutch.  Go a little deeper, then turn in, apexing a little past the beginning of the curbing.  Between going uphill and the engine braking, you don’t need to touch the brakes.  When you track out to the rumble strip on the left, using every bit of track, it feels like nothing else.  “You know what feels even better?” says Jack, “when you put one wheel in the dirt!”

Turn 12: Ride that amazing feeling.  Think that if everyone could experience this, they’d want to go racing too.

Turn 13: Don’t shift into 4th; just wring it out to the top.  Brake hard. Go deeper than you think, then turn the car, hitting the curbing with your left tires, letting it rotate you.  Then mash the throttle downhill.

Corkscrew: Bounce off the curbs as fast as you can.  Shift into 4th once you’re going uphill.  Think about how you’re not going to brake quite as much at the end of the straight heading into turn 1.

Me and Jean in our 5 cars

High Plains Raceway track map

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That time I flew a spy plane.


by Berck

Google thought it’d mention that this photo was taken 14 years ago.

Usually when it brings up images like this (taken at Jackson Hole, WY), I start to wonder about my career choices. I suddenly wondered what happened to Mesa’s Dash 8’s. So I looked up this one since its N-number (N455YV) was right there, and discovered that it eventually made its way to the U.S. Army, who turned it into a surveillance plane. And then it was destroyed in a terrorist attack in Kenya.

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