Beiträge von Noggie

Had my 1990 850ia with Hartge upgrades on a local dyno known as "The heartbreaker".
It put out 266hp and 276ft-lbs (376nm) on the rear wheels.

With 20% drivetrain loss that should be 332,5 hp and 346ft-lbs (465nm) in the engine.
Hartge's mod are listed as 353hp and 475nm so thats not bad for å 16 year old car.
Now to look for those "lost" hp's.

Heres the 2 runs with my car.
notice the dip between 3400 and 4100rpm (in the torque graph), suspect someting's not right, anyone else have a run on their car?? Or have a theory on what causes this dip?

http://www.bmwccn.no/nor/kapittel3/fora/Upload/3117.jpg

I have an automatic transmission on my 8, and I've noticed that the gear shifter rod gets heated during driving, i cant't feel it if I touch the gear knob, but if I hold around the rod (the leather cover) I can feel that it's warm, not hot, just tempered.
haven't paid much attention to it, because I thougth it was just a little heat transfer from the gearbox, and thougt it was normal.
It's my first car with an automatic so maybe I should look into it, maybe do a service on it (though it had a service only 28.000km ago) and install that extra cooler.

thanks, will look into these.
I've got all the time in the world to do this, I'm about to park the car for the winter, and it won't be used again untill April at the earliest.
So i've got plenty of time to tinker with it

I'll probably do the conversion my self, but leave the mapping to an expert.

I'm confident I'll be able to do this mod, I've worked with the electrical systems on airplanes for 10 years, and now I'm working with oil rig drilling controll systems.

Concidering that the engines in our cars are "ancient technology" and prone to problems
I was thinking of replacing the whole engine controll unit and the ignition unit.
thereby removing the stoc distributor caps, and the injection sytem completly.

The replacement system I was looking at is made by Haltech.
http://www.haltech.com/e6x.htm

By doing this I could discard having engine electronic problems in the future, and because then I can map the enging in any way I want, to tweek the last power out of the engine.

Anyone tried to do a mod. like this on an 850???

Why do this?
Well, I'm going to replace just about every part of the ignition system anyway, replase the exhaust gas sensors, and maybe even the air flow sensors aswell.
So instead of putting the same stuff back on the engine, why not replace the old technology for some new stuff.
It might actually be cheaper to do the upgrade then replacing the stock parts.
I live in a country where things are expensive, just replaced the spark plugs and they set me back more than 200$ (US) WITH a huge discount, (asking price was over 400$) mind you these where top of the line NGK Platinum spark plugs.
So paying 1400$ US for a Haltech system is peanuts..... Just the distributor caps with rotors are 450$ at my BMW dealer.

This might not be related to you're problem but I'll post it anyway.

Yesterday me and a friend was out driving in my car, and he started playing with the passenger seat controls. when he put the seat back fully forward the seat would'nt go back again.
All the other adustments worked, just not the seat back.
I pulled over and I started looking for blown fuses or something simple. No fuses was blown and I could hear the click of the motor when I tried to move the seat back forward, but not when I tried to move it back.
I then suspected the switch, since I knew it got power, after wigeling the switch the seat back moved a bit back, more wigeling and the seat was finally in a normal possision.
Checked with BMW and it turns out that all the switches are in one switch pack, not an expensive part (about £30 here in Norway), but I'll try some electrical cleaning before I replace it.

So it might be a switch in you're case too. A cleaning could be worth a try

Red stuff brake pads bites a little better than standard BMW brake pads.
The other area where they exeed the standard brakes are heat resistance, they will obtain the bite at a higher temperature than standard pads, thus reducing the chance of brake fading, which is good on our heavy e31's.

On the down side they wear faster than standard brakes, and cost more.
They also require some warm up before they work properly, the first time you brake the bite is less than standard, but when they get tempered they bite better.

I've used Ferodo DS2500 for track use (on my e36), and that is a pad I recomend.

EBC pads are good, but for everyday use you really don't need them.
EBC Turbo Groove rotors are no good, lots of guys in the Norwegian BMW car club has had problems with them, they crack or gets twisted causing vibrations when braking.

BMW standard brake pads are really good, so unless you use the car for track use, stick with the standard ones.

Today I got a reply back from Hartge after I made an inquery about the mods that was done on my 8.
Looks like this indeed is a special car.
sadly since the mods was done in 1991 when the car was one year old Hartge has no computer record on my car, with the help of the reciepts from 1991 they concluded that these changes was made:

Hartge head gasket
Hartge cam shafts
Hartge rear sports exhaust mufflers
Hartge rear diff rebuildt to 3.45:1
Hartge reprogrammed ecu and automatic transmission
Hartge enigine rebuildt, they think it was 6.0L

power output: 353hp
torque: 475nm/4350rpm
top speed: 278km/h

If the engine really is 6.0L that would make it the biggest engine in any 8-series car?
I believe BMW only delivered a 5.0, 5.4 and a 5.7 v12 and that includes the Alpina B12 models.
I'm not sure if it really is 6.0L, the torque is only raised 25nm, one would expect more if the engine volume was raised 1 whole litre.
I guess the only way to know for sure is to take the heads off, and I dont intend to do that

Since I was part of the thred hi-jack earlier I'm now back with some on topic stuff

Got my 1990 Hartge tuned 850Ia yesterday and have had a few passengers after that.

my brother: this car is 16years old??
one of my friends: Mad scientist laugh, jumping and cheering.
same friend: drive through a tunnel and floor it, I want to hear it close to the rev limiter reflected of the tunnel walls. (window rolled down)
friend: it like a plane
friend: it just keeps pulling and pulling 'till you don't dare anymore, crazy.
friend: the eyes of that guy at the bus stop almost fell out (laughing)
friends stepdad: you arrived in style, what car is that?? (not a passenger but who cares)
friend: people sure are looking at us.

All passengers smile widely and has a satisfied laugh when I accelerate.

I love this car, it really boosts my ego

I agree with TallTony,
I live in Norway so our insurance system differs a bit from other countries systems.
When I quickly converted my insurance to £ I ended up with approx. 500£.
I'm 29 years old and that price limits me to drive 8000km (5000miles) a year, no driver under 28, and to install a tracker system in addition to the stock alarm system.

First of all I just want to share my own comments when I test drove my car for the first time. (before I bought it)

"I'll NEVER go tired of that sound" (refering to the engine)
"with an engine sound like this, who needs a stereo??"

Just bought the car so I haven't had any passengers in it yet, will be back with passenegr comments later.

Totally agree when it comes to looks, the factory head unit looks alot better than an aftermarked one.
In my case I just have to realize that there har been some technoligical development since 1990, and from 1997 (e36 head unit) aswell.
there are head units out there that doesen't look that bad, and that can be matched to the BMW's orange/red instrument lighting.

In my case I think I'll sacrifice looks for function, the factory unit might look better, but a new one sounds better.
And I can always put the factory system back in if I ever decide to sell the car (not that I think that will happen)

My 850 from 1990 has a cassette/radio and a 6 disc cd changer in the back (trunk/boot whatever you call it)
so it is possible to have a cd changer on the original early 90's e31.

In my old E36 I used the 1997 Business cd/radio on aftermarked amps.
To get a signal the amps could use I used a product that Stinger makes that is called a "slocII".
The sound is ok, but to tune the system is nearly impossible, the gain on the amp is not linear the first 1/4 turn and nothing happens, then suddenly the volume increase 2-3 times if you move the gain 1 degree.
If you have several amps (like I had) it's impossible to get the same level on all amps.
The sub's (had 2x12") did not follow the level of the other speakers.
when I was playing low, the bass was gone, when I was playing at a normal level it was ok, when I was playing loud the bass started "clipping" the bass was distorted and not playing pure tones. I.a.w the sound was crap.

I do not recomend this setup, because of the sound quality and the near impossible task of tuning in the amps.

If you are afraid that the car will loose value with an aftermarked cd/radio, just make sure you can refit the original cassette/radio when you sell the car. And that's no problem.

These are the pictures I've upploaded to the Web so far.
Can post some more later, when I find the time and place to uppload moore pictures.
As you can see the car looks quite stadard.

http://www.bmwccn.no/nor/kapittel3/fora/Upload/2527.jpg

http://www.bmwccn.no/nor/kapittel3/fora/Upload/2528.jpg

http://www.bmwccn.no/nor/kapittel3/fora/Upload/2530.jpg

The car has no plates because I haven't got the car from the dealer yet, there was some small rust spots on the sunroof and they will fix that before I get the car.

The interior needs a little TLC, and I intend to upgrade the Soundsystem, the car has the original 10 speaker sound system, with a cassette player in front an a CD-changer in the rear.
sadly the system picks up som generator noise, so I have some work to do there.
I drove the car on some very bumpy roads to check the suspension an bushings, and they seeme to be in good shape.
Need some new wheels since the AC Schnitzer wheels on the car is starting too look their age (fitted by Hartge in 1991), they have som corrosion spots and tell tail singns from hitting curbes.

The car has been driven only 125.000km and had a huge stack of recipts from services, including the recipt from when the car was bougt and the one from the Hartge mod..
The car set me back 30.000 euro, whitch actually is cheap here in Norway.

I have one of those E36 cd players (1997) from my old car.
This unit does not have any RCA output, only way to connect this to an aftermarked amp is with a converter, sadly the quality of sound is deteriorated through this converter and I do not recomend it.
The converter uses the signal form the speaker output on the head unit an converts it to an RCA signal.
If you're amp has a high level input you can connect the speaker output directly to the amp, but then you need a cable with a special plug.

The easiest thing to do is to get an aftermarked system, most car stereo specialist have speakers that slots right in to the original mount, without any work to be done to the cars interior.

Hello everybody.

Today I bought an 1990 Hartge upgraded 850IA.
Stumbeled across this site and decided to join.

My car seemes to be a litte special, I can't find anything about the uppgrade Hartge made to my car on the web.
In 1991 the car was modified in Berlin by Hartge, after it had run 19.000km. The power was raised to 356Hp and the torque to 475Nm with a cylinder kit and new camshafts.
The diff was replased from a 3.15 to a 3.45 diff, the suspension was upgraded and a sports exhaus was fitted.
Hartge has guaranteed this car to 280Km/h.
All in all the mods cost 22.000Dmark in 1991.

Does anyone here know anything about this mods? cant find anything on the web about it.