GTS3 E46 - Back to fun

[D_Eclipse9916]

Car has been sitting around collecting dust while I finished up the LS1/M3 project and projects around the house.
Time for some act right:



Pulled the rest of the vinyl off and found vinyl...under the vinyl... This vinyl sucks, old and leaving residue even with the heat gun.



Since it was down on power I also did a leakdown test. All results were good (after dealing with a faulty fitting for my compressor). Motor is fairly clean, but has an oil filter housing gasket leak. Ordered the $5 gasket and won't take long to replace.



Moving on to the brakes, I did an inspection of the brakes and found a cracked rotor on the right side. As I was wiggling, I also noticed the suspension wiggling. Turns out a bolt was backing out of the subframe that holds the control arm to the car. I did a nut and bolt before the last event, so it was loosening up between then. I pulled that bolt out (and the corresponding one on the other side), cleaned up the threads, reinstalled with loctite and double nut.

I also replaced the rotor, unfortunately they are custom so costing me $135 a pop each rotor. As I was ordering those, I dreaded looking up pad prices for the front and rear race BBKs. Turns out it uses the same caliper as a lot of circle track and NASCAR teams so pads are dirt cheap (ebay search turned out LOTS of $50-$100 set of brand new pads for Performance Friction). The pads are usually $250-300 per axle for stock calipers, so this offsets the increase in rotor cost.



I also pulled the side windows, gutter "trim", and the dash. In doing so, found the Balance Bar Adjuster broken. Hence why I wasn't getting the desired changes when I was testing on track. Used Race Car problems..



The car is ready for bodywork now and I just need to find a good bodyshop to do it.