Amateur Tuning Tip/Story
I dropped into Rated-M3's lounge and he was driving (drum roll......) an M3 '04, set up to Monday's specs. He commented that it was uncontrollable in turn one (HSR-Reverse). So I get in mine, and there it is. The back end is all over the place, just like a MR car. Apparently when BMW says 'perfect balance', they're not talking about banked corners. I tried to fix this problem with MR cars in another lounge and failed. This time, I followed the pointers posted from Gar in some other thread. One idea was 'To fix mid corner oversteer, lower rear spring rate' So I did. Result: It was bad. Even worse than stock. So I went the other way. Stock was 9.1, I raised it to 12.2 - a big adjustment, but this is how I operate. It worked! I was quite surprised. It still owned the esses too. With 250hp (to get down to 450PP), it's not the fastest on the straight. Still, Rated and I ended up taking 1.5 seconds off of the lap times, making it competitive with my other cars (except the RX8 )
Dude Summary: Raising the rear spring rate on BMW M3 '04 made the car stable in a fast banked corner. This Might work for MR cars....needs testing!)
Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!
I was getting the same issue with the '04 M3 and tried the same thing you did by lowing the rear springs. Didn't even think to increase them. ima try that.
Yes, thanks turbo! I was fiddling with everything but the rear springs while following the same tuning chart. I think a different concept applies to fast corners
. I was having 'some' luck with the dampers until you revealed the secret. Thank goodness I don't have to use that spoiler. If they had different styles, I would consider it, but the 3 available just don't sit right on the M3.
So now, turn 1 can be taken flat out, but the esses get a little tricky with the higher rear spring. I dialed out the imposed understeer with everthing else.
1' 11. 172" was my best. Chasing down a 1' 10.7xx", I can say that the M3 has the abitiy to practically out turn the faster cars, its only downfall is the straight. Which at HSR-R, the finish is a draft contest.