M2 madness

[M3M3]

ok, finally took it for a drive after all the changes..still have a bit of winter gas in it, so did not utilize the "advance" map on the chip.

it worked.

ok that is a GROSS UNDERSTATEMENT!

yeeeeee haaaaaa!

ran up to 7k rpm several times with no "bang". idles smooth. power smooth. temp below half. butt dyno says quicker. huge grin from ear to ear.

JimG was in the right seat, and he is sworn to secrecy as to the velocity reached....

was having so much fun, forgot to put the camera on the back window to capture the exhaust note.

it sounds great, but i suspect Ray may have heard me from NOLA. it is a bit LOUD. i am going to have to get another rear section made with a bigger muffler. will use this rear at the track, but it is too loud for normal driving or long trips.

gotta put some new gas in it, shift to the advanced ignition curve and try again.

then put the 4.10 in....

:-)

[ray_]

You'll like the 4.10. ;-)

We need audio!

Cheers,

Ray

[M3M3]

Decided to try a more period look with the steering wheel. This is the wheel that came on the 75 when I bought it. I put the sportline I have been using on the car as soon as I started driving it. this one is not as fat as the sportline and the spokes are much less stiff.

Then put the driving lights back on. Simple. Two bolts and plug the wires back in. just in case there is some night driving at Vintage..

Then started the project I have been dreading. I hate doors. The window has never sealed completely on the drivers side and I have been putting off taking the door apart to try to fix. Oh well, sucked it up and dove in.

Used my custom door panel removal tool to get door car off the door.

And while I was in there, might as well put the new door brake in I have been holding on to.

Door apart. 3 hours of fiddling with all the window and door adjustments I have the gap mostly closed. Think the window mechanism is worn out where it slides. Another blunt order in the future. Sigh.

[M3M3]

used ultra-black gasket/sealant to reattach the door liner, waited for it to dry overnight before putting door back together.

end result is much better window fit. you can see in this pic where the window was hitting the b-pillar. not any more!

next up...ya know that little spring thing inside the steering coupler? there is a reason it is there..to ground the horn. guess what i just noticed was missing on my car? yup. two years ago when i rebuilt it, i left out the dang spring thing....which would explain my sometimes anemic sounding horn...doh!

and spent a few hours generating new fuel map. hoping for good weather this weekend to go out "tuning". there is also a vintage british car show this sunday about a half mile from my house. may have to bring my British Motor Works car over to check out the MG's.

[kris]

That exhaust looks loud! How about some sound before you swap it out?

[M3M3]

yes, i know...."this thread is worthless without video"! :-)

i plan on capturing some tomorrow while tuning. it will be easy to swap back and forth between this "track" exhaust and the street version. i have an appt for the week before vintage to have a new rear section fabbed up with a much bigger magnaflow muffler. street and track rears can be swapped in a few minutes as the connection is in the same location as a stock exhaust system. one clamp and it is off.

[mike472]

used ultra-black gasket/sealant to reattach the door liner, waited for it to dry overnight before putting door back together.

Is that the original door liner?

[M3M3]

heck no...it is a piece of random plastic sheeting i had previously been using as a painting drop cloth.....;-)

[jgerock]

there is also a vintage british car show this sunday about a half mile from my house. may have to bring my British Motor Works car over to check out the MG's.

Susan pointed that out to me in the paper. Supposed to rain all weekend but I'm up for some Bosch vs. Lucas arguments and the tii needs washing. I know my lights and wipers will work in the wet weather.

[M3M3]

Ok, you wanted sound/video. Here you go!

After shooting video, went and filled it up with Sunoco super and set the chip advance map to “more!”.

Holy crap. 1st gear redline at 7400rpm comes up instantly. With a 4.10 1st gear will be irrelevant…

I ran traqmate data acquisition after filling up. Did the same 3rd gear run in the same spot as I had done before adding cams, chip and exhaust. Data showed a 40hp increase from those changes.

Happy guy….

[M3M3]

nt

[ray_]

Gee, that's just awful ;-)

Will you dyno that thing?

M2 made the 600 mile trip back from Mid-Am without drama.

Cheers,

Ray

Ok, you wanted sound/video. Here you go!

After shooting video, went and filled it up with Sunoco super and set the chip advance map to “more!”.

Holy crap. 1st gear redline at 7400rpm comes up instantly. With a 4.10 1st gear will be irrelevant…

I ran traqmate data acquisition after filling up. Did the same 3rd gear run in the same spot as I had done before adding cams, chip and exhaust. Data showed a 40hp increase from those changes.

Happy guy….

[M3M3]

glad to here the trip went well! 600mi is lots of logging and tuning opportunity!

[ray_]

23 to 25mpg too! I was impressed!

;-)

Ray

glad to here the trip went well! 600mi is lots of logging and tuning opportunity!

[M3M3]

Sooo….i was unable to drive the M2 to Lothar’s BMW Vintage contribution awards party yesterday because when I went to start it, it showed the same @#$%^&* symptoms of massive rich running it did last fall. Argh! Last fall I spent tons of money and time chasing this issue and one day it magically started working again. Don’t know why.

Well, today I got after it again. Found the issue. I have learned twice now that the MAXX Alpha-N system is very sensitive to grounding. In this case, I run a traqmate data acquisition system in the car. the traqmate picks up a throttle position input from the ECU…same place the AN does. With the traqmate plugged into power (whether turned on or not), car ran fine. With traqmate unplugged, throttle position shows 3% higher than actual. This bumps the AN to a higher fuel map cell than it needs…more fuel…rich running. Plug traqmate back in to the power plug (not turned on), TP goes back down to where it should be. Unplug the TP input to the traqmate, car runs fine. Evidently in a plugged in but powered off state, the traqmate allows some of the TP signal to go to ground, changing the value the AN sees.

At least I know what the mysterious issue is now……

The interesting result of not taking the M2 to the wonderful event at Lothar’s garage…we took the 325it. My wife is starting a Vintage furniture biz called Semper Stylish

(semperstylish.wordpress.com)

and she found out Gretchen likes antiques too. So we went to a vintage BMW event and ended up coming home with a car full of not vintage car parts, but vintage furniture!