E30 BMW’s in LeMons

E30 BMW’s in LeMons

E30’s are considered passé and cheaty in LeMons. But there was a day when an 80’s or early 90’s BMW 3 series was an obvious choice. A wave of used E30’s hit the market in the late 90’s and early 2000’s. I assume this was because yuppie baby boomers bought them, moved to the suburbs, passed them down to their children, and then got rid of them when their kids gave them back. In that era, E30’s were available for a couple hundred dollars all day long, and stories of them being given away were not uncommon.

            But, the scrap yard, the spec E30 series, drifting, and LeMons itself chewed up the supply of E30s while creating a demand for them. And now they aren’t cheap anymore… Which makes them cheaty (unless, maybe, they are rusted out four doors with automatic transmissions).

            The passé thing is a little more nuanced. Like the miata, the E30 BMW goes around corners like it is on rails without modification. There are, perhaps, small gains to be had in expensive aftermarket components. But the things are so good out of the box that there isn’t much you have to do with them to make them fast.

            On the opposite side of this spectrum stands our old Opel GT. That thing wouldn’t handle for shit. We cut up the A-arms and welded them back together different, drilled new holes and re-mounted our upper ball joints, had a semi-truck maintenance shop make a new front leaf spring for us, re-enforced the living shit out of everything in the front end, and put together a Frankenstein big brake kit. 

It helped. The car got quicker. It was interesting, fun, and relatively cheap to build it. We had to use our own brains, and our own skills. And the word “creative” wouldn’t be abused to describe a few points in the process.

You’re probably starting to feel the moral of the story here. If you start with something truly bad, you can be creative. You’re not going to fuck it up.

If you start with an E30, you really aren’t going to make it a lot faster with basic hand tools and a stick welder. In fact, it’s a lot more likely you will slow it down.

So, it’s boring. Boring and cheaty… Or at least it usually is.

But the E30 is a pretty little car. And it really isn’t as cheaty as people think.

First, the E30 has a MacPherson strut front suspension. MacPherson struts are generally scorned by serious racers as cheap-ass 1980’s junk that can’t produce a proper camber curve, can’t withstand high lateral loading, can’t be adjusted and tuned, and belongs on a mini-van.

The rear suspension is probably worse. It uses a trailing arm design that can’t do anything but let the rear wheel flop up and down in a semi-circle. Some people call it a “semi-trailing arm” because the arm is mounted at a 15˚ angle instead of being mounted on a line parallel to the line an axle would define. But that seems silly to me. The defining characteristic is that the rear hub flops in a semi-circle instead of being held in a more or less parallel orientation by a four-link or similar setup.

And the power train certainly isn’t anything special. They have massive straight six engines that push the center of gravity higher and farther forward than it needs to be without making much power, and functional five speed manual transmissions.

So, why are they fast? Because they’re light and simple.

Sources differ on the exact curb weight of an E30, but everyone agrees it was a fudge under 2,500lbs. The spec E30 series uses a minimum weight of 2,700lbs, at the end of a race with the driver and safety gear in the car.

Un-sprung weight, resting directly on the wheels, is really bad. It tends to cause the wheels hammer into bumps with tremendous force, and then to hop off the track after the bumps, fighting the springs and shock absorbers as they try to hold the tire steadily against the race track.

The E30’s crude independent rear suspension moves the massive rear differential off of the wheels, and onto the chassis. Earlier versions also had little four bolt hubs, adequate but lightweight brakes, and no upper suspension links anywhere on the car, all of which greatly reduced un-sprung weight.

The next BMW in the series, the E36 was about 600 lbs heavier, and the rear suspension was a multi-link design that produced better suspension geometry, but added complexity and un-sprung weight. They also switched to larger, five lug hubs, and bigger brakes. Things slid downhill from there. And the newer models are so heavy they will put ruts in a gravel driveway like a heavy truck. They still handle well, but it’s because they are technological marvels, not because they are light, simple, and beautiful.

So, I would actually like to see more E30s in LeMons. I just want to see people go lighter instead of heavier. Instead of an LS swap, use a smaller engine, maybe even a motorcycle engine or a two stroke. Carefully use the roll cage to support and stiffen the chassis, and then cut out all the extra sheet metal. Cut the middle out of the roof, hood, trunk lid, doors, and floors, and replace them with fiberglass or aluminum panels.

A light, tidy little E30 like that would be a joy to drive, and to race against.