1995 318ti Suspension / Stock Height or Higher

[DigitalNY]

Okay, so back in October of last year I bought a 1995 318ti with 185k miles on it. The original owner was a BMW mechanic and it was his play-toy. It has an M3 auto transmission and M3 rear end (LSD) although I'm pretty sure it retained it's original 318ti brakes, etc.

Unfortunately the owner directly prior to me owning it decided to play with the suspension. It has bilstein's on it although I'm not sure of exactly which ones, I can't make out the label. The front springs will NOT stay centered on the upper support and I have no clue what springs he used on the front or rear. At least once or twice a week I have to throw a jack under the front of the car, reach up and haul the spring back to where it belongs.

The car is significantly lower in the rear than the front. Not only does it look ridiculous it also bottoms out in the rear on even minor bumps. The rear is shot dampening-wise and hitting a bump could scramble eggs in this car. It's time for new suspension but I don't have a ton to spend because I have other work I want to do at the same time (control arm bushings, ball joints, etc as well as getting the e-brake working (its missing the shoes and ancillary parts)).

Are there any low cost options for returning the car to stock height but keeping some of the aggressiveness of a stiffer spring rate? Explanation to follow...

A few times a year I work communications in fairly woodsy-twisty-dirt-road events (cross country ski events in the middle of nowhere, snoeshowing events and most recently stage rallies). I'd like to maintain ground clearance and some stiffness for when traversing rally stages at non-event speeds.

In the last rally we had a serious crash on the stage I was working and after the fire/ambulance crews were done and the wreckage cleared away I was asked to escort the competitors through the stage and on to the next stage because that particular stage was red-flagged for so long they had to cancel it completely due to time constraints. Although I was leading a parade of rally cars at non-race speeds (30-40mph) I realized that I had a lot of fun and wouldn't mind a little more aggressive suspension.

I'm not looking for rally-grade high end suspension because I'm support staff not a competitor and this car will never be turned into a rally car. Any cheap options for 15 or 16" wheels? The car has what I consider to be pretty low-profile 17's on it and I'm not a fan. Maybe I can find someone in the NY/PA/VT area that wants a set of scabbed up "Sport Edition" aftermarket 17" wheels and trade.

Anyway.. thoughts?

Ric

[DigitalNY]

Pics:

http://pics.digi.imap.cc/DSCF0058.JPG (Front Clearance)
http://pics.digi.imap.cc/DSCF0061.JPG (Rear Clearance)
http://pics.digi.imap.cc/DSCF0073.JPG (Front Suspension)

[cooljess76]

Whoever owned that car before you is an idiot. He put coilover springs on a standard strut. Not to mention, he probably lied about the tranny and LSD coming from an M3. For one, an M3 auto tranny is nothing special. It's no better than a 318ti automatic transmission. And second, an e36 M3 differential simply will not bolt up to the 318ti. Completely different rear suspension configuration. Unless he got one from an e30 M3, but this can easily be confirmed by looking at the tag on the differential's rear cover. If it says S4.44, it's a 318ti LSD, if it just says 4.44, it's a 318ti open diff. If it says S4.10, then yes it's probably an e30 M3 LSD. If it says 4.10, then it's an e30 open diff.

[spidertri]

Wow, someone put coilover springs on those front bilsteins, that's crazy. As you can probably tell, the stock front spring would be as large as the lower spring perch on the bilstein.

Unfortunately, there are no stock ride height, stiffer springs made by an aftermarket company. You could put stock non sport 328 springs on the front with struts for a 328 (monroe, bilstein hd, etc) and those should be a bit stiffer.

For the rear, you don't want to use springs/shocks from a coupe/sedan/convertible e36 because the suspension is different. You could get sport ti springs and some thicker spring pads to raise it up. Then get ti versions of the monroe, bilstein hd, etc to go with the springs.

[DigitalNY]

Originally Posted by cooljess76

Whoever owned that car before you is an idiot. He put coilover springs on a standard strut.

Yeah, like I said.. he decided to "play" with it.. I know it's not pretty, that's why I posted the pics.. lol

Spiderti: So for example the springs from a '96 328i? I'm just trying to get a model year range down so I can start searching for parts. I'm honestly kind of pissed that I have to go through all of this but oh well, that's what you get for buying a used car without thoroughly checking it out first. The engine compartment is in awesome shape so I figured the guy wasn't a total 'tard.

[DigitalNY]

Originally Posted by cooljess76

Not to mention, he probably lied about the tranny and LSD coming from an M3.

I'll have to jack it up, crawl under and check the diff. The story I got was that the original owner (not the last moron) wanted the 5spd automatic and that the car came with a 4spd. If you accelerate from a stop to highway speeds and count gear changes from first it does step through all the way to 5th so I'm inclined to believe that at least the transmission was swapped. It seems like a silly swap to me. Also, I thought that if you were going to swap into a 5spd that it would make sense to swap the A/M switch for the Sport capable switch (something else I'll have to research). More evidence that the tranny was swapped is that the indexing isn't quite correct on the shifter. To put it into drive I have to pull it back from neutral to the stop for drive without pulling up on the release lever. If I pull the release and put it into where D should be according to the indicator I'm in 3rd. I need to pull the trimwork and adjust the shifter.

Ric

[spidertri]

Yeah, 96 - 99 E36 328. I'm just thinking those springs would be stiffer since they support a heavier engine. You could also check out some pictures of the stock ti sport springs and see if that looks high enough for you. Bluebimma has run stock ti sport suspension and stock z3 m coupe suspension and said it is very similar, you could search his threads.

[DigitalNY]

Originally Posted by spidertri

Yeah, 96 - 99 E36 328. I'm just thinking those springs would be stiffer since they support a heavier engine. You could also check out some pictures of the stock ti sport springs and see if that looks high enough for you. Bluebimma has run stock ti sport suspension and stock z3 m coupe suspension and said it is very similar, you could search his threads.

I'll have to look up photo's / threads and check. I just searched on Monroe.com and they list 71515/71516 part numbers for a '96 328, which are the same part numbers for a 1995 318ti non-sport. At least that's a semi-low cost option, I found them for $81.91 per side.

Now I need to find some cheap coil springs to match, maybe even buy used. Unfortunately shipping on heavy springs is going to be expensive whether I buy new or used. Makes me wish the junkyards locally had any bmw's in inventory. I'm hesitant to buy used without having them in my hands and measuring unloaded length compared to spec so I at least have some idea of how beat up they've been run. I've seen springs that were ~1" + shorter than the should have been just from repeated compression and abuse.

Thanks!

Edited To Add: Oh, and the Monroe OE Spectra struts have a rebate going on right now so that makes them even cheaper. Bonus!