3/9/2023 0 Comments Racerender 3 rotate track mapSome folks fixate on mounting these rear downbars to the shock towers, or tying into or rear subframe mounts, but we don't feel that either location is ideal for a majority of the roll cage equipped BMWs out there, nor this car. This might cause some controversy, but its something that makes the most sense to us. I asked Ryan to mount these diagonals to plates welded on top of the formed rear frame rails instead. Like I pointed out above, one of the main drawbacks from the pre-made roll bar kits is where they mount the rear downbars to the chassis - at the rear sheet metal inner wheel wells, which aren't the strongest location on the E46. The tubing still fits very tight to the roof - inches closer than the bolt-in rollbar kits made for this chassis. Using a template from previous E46 cages, Ryan bent up a slightly narrower main hoop out with 1.75" dia x. This kept the main hoop from touching the metal B-pillar structure, so the rear interior panels were also left in place - for now. Leaving the factory shoulder belt anchors in the B-pillar was a point of contention, but I wanted to keep the OEM 3-point belts functional for a while longer - in case this car was still street driven (turns out that was a good idea). ![]() The rear carpet section was removed and the floor was cleaned where the steel mounting plates would be welded in. Due to that realization we are going to do this type of custom 4-point more often rather than the 4-point bolt ins, with fewer compromises. Pleasantly surprised, and with the hours and materials added up compared to the cost of a typical 4-point bolt-in bar + install, it comes to about the same price. And in the end it took about 1/3rd the time (a hair over 20 hours) to completely fabricate and weld in this custom roll bar. I was still worried about the amount of time a custom 4-point it would eat up, so I kept a close eye on that. We also know a full cage would eat up 60 hours of "lost billable hours" + $800 in materials, so that's pretty expensive even for a shop owner (we always have a waiting list of customer fab work we can do). We can sometimes pull this off with shorter drivers or larger cars, but for me, in this car. Hitting your head on an upper cage/door bar without a helmet on is risky. Option 3 - a full roll cage - didn't fit this car's "daily driven track car" goals, as its almost impossible to make a "safe" roll cage that isn't dangerous on the street. Why? We don't do this type of "half cage" deal often. Option 2 - a custom, welded 4-point roll bar - would fit better than Option 1, but the time it would take was a bit of an unknown. I get why they do that, but its just a compromise.īolt-in 4-point roll bar kit fitted, welded together, and bolted into our blue E46 330 The rear downbar mounts (below right) are also "less than ideal" and not fitted well. The compromises of building around the interior keeps the tubing 2-3+ inches below the roofline in a semi-gutted car like ours. Plus I had done this in the blue 330 before. Option 1 wasn't really exciting to me as these bolt-in roll bar kits tend to be made to fit around interior bits (headliner, full interior panels, back seat) which we no longer have in this car. Build a full 6-point roll cage that is welded into the car. Build a custom 4-point roll bar and weld it into the carģ. Buy a pre-made 4-point roll bar and fit it, weld it together, and bolt it inĢ. Making the decision to build this welded in roll bar involved some internal debate over which of these 3 "rollover protection" options we should use for this car:ġ. This track has a tendency to "eat cars" - each year it seems there are more cars damaged at TWS than at all other road courses in the state of Texas combined. It was time for a new set of Hoosiers.Īfter the TDE event the next track on the schedule was TWS with NASA, and I was determined to not run at this track again without a roll bar and real harnesses. By my last session Sunday the tires were really falling off and I was slowing down. She got more comfortable in this car than ever before, and really liked the brakes, handling and grip. Amy had a blast and finally drove the 330 for an entire day. The weather was beautiful and we had fun - but the lack of competitive element always leaves me. I hadn't run the 3.1 mile configuration at MSR-Cresson since 2013 so I was a bit rusty, but managed to run some quick-ish times (2:33.593) in two of my three sessions. ![]() ![]() He had read the build thread for this car so he was excited to ride along - even if we didn't have harnesses in the car yet (they were installed shortly after). I had a "evaluation ride" by one of the Instructors that runs with TDE a lot on Sunday to see if I "have what it takes" to run in the red group and possibly be an instructor with this HPDE organization. Re: Vorshlag BMW E46 - Daily Driven Track Car Project
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