The Cart Before the Horse: Spec 3 Build

[Senor_Taylor]

Quick update before March VIR.

Installed new sway bar bushings in the front. Picked up a spare trans for $100. Wired up the fan than Kaan gave me with the help of Tom. Wired up always hot so I can run it with the car off. The fan is a lot smaller in comparison to the radiator than I thought, but it's better than nothing. Also have fiddled with the car here and there in the last 2 months like removing everything from the trunk and pulling the headliner.

Decided to enter an autocross to test out the car before driving 4 hours to VIR and really "sending" it. The car has been extremely reliable and trouble free and it continued the trend this weekend. Seeing as I've been driving a turbo, fwd hatch on all seasons for the last year, I wasn't sure what to expect with something NA, RWD, and on race tires, but I was pleasantly surprised by how predictable and easy to drive it was. The main lesson learned was that I don't have the balls to push these tires anywhere near what they're capable of just yet and it'll take some getting used to throttle-on oversteer again since this is the highest horsepower RWD car I've owned.

My runs were nothing to write home about, but I wouldn't say there were slow. I was keeping up with a stock-ish 330i. My inputs are jerky and inconsistent and I was more "hurling" the car than driving it. Oh well, I'm not here to be competitive. I've been worried about 2nd gear being crunchy, but I didn't run into any issues as the day went on, so either the new gear oil finally made it up to those synchros, or I've stopped shifting so aggressively. This is my first car with a short throw and I think I just need to slow my 1-2 and 3-2 shifts down to give it more time to sync.



This gave me a good chance to give everything a "dry run" with packing all of the tools and tires in the car, getting it there and swapping things over. Getting comfortable in the car with a helmet and feeling what cold race comp tires are like. Overall, I'm pleased and VERY excited for VIR this weekend.