M3 Update

The project of the weekend was some new brake pads and rotors on the BMW M3. You can spend thousands of dollars on brakes for these cars, but the stock brakes are not bad by any stretch of the imagination. Rather than bling it up with fancy cross-drilled and/or slotted rotors that sell for several hundred dollars EACH, I went with an OEM equivalent rotor by Centric, purchased from rockauto.com for a handy $62 each. I've bought lots of rotors before and these are the nicest I've ever gotten. The hub area and hat are coated in black, as are the outer edges and the insides of the vanes in the vents. That pretty black paint may burn right off under track use, but should last a long time and keep the hubs looking nice for a while with street use.

For pads I went with another OEM equivalent from Ate (pronounced AH-tay). I've been using Ate's high performance brake fluid in my racing cars for years, but had never tried their OEM replacement parts before. Much to my pleasure and surprise, when I pulled the old pads off I noted the name Ate on the original pads, clips, and yes - even on the M3's calipers. So these aren't just OEM-equivalent. Ate is an OEM supplier to BMW.

Anyway, you can see from the photo that I also painted the calipers red. It's overdone, I know, but I like it and that's all that matters. The calipers were slightly rusty and not looking great, so the paint freshens things up a bit. I used some Dupli-color ceramic caliper paint, applied with a small brush.

So far life with the M3 has been pretty good. No mechanical problems have come up, but I've done a TON of maintenance, cleaning, and general refurbishment. One of the best improvements I made was fixing the sunroof headliner. It is supposed to slide back and forth under the glass moonroof. The tiny plastic guides that it slides on had long ago left their stations and the headliner was now all loose and floppy and wouldn't open more than a couple inches. For about $25 in parts and an hour of my time, the sunroof now operates as it should and there's no more flopping around above my head. Now that the brakes are up to snuff, my only remaining mechanical concern is an oil leak that I need to chase down and fix, and doing a flush of the cooling system.

Warming up your engine and your oil

Recently the subject of warming up a car came up. Most modern cars warm up very quickly and the water temp gauge reads "normal" within a couple minutes of starting the engine. Based on cars I've owned that have oil temperature gauges, I have observed that the oil takes significantly longer to reach full operating temperature than the coolant does. Something like 10 minutes at highway speed in the Corvette, and a similar time in the M3. The Miata has a much smaller oil capacity than either of those cars, though, so the oil should get to full temperature a bit sooner.
It's important to get your oil up to full operating temperature fairly often so that condensation and unburned fuel that finds its way past the rings can volatilize out of the oil. So, if your daily commute to work is less than say, 5 miles, go for a longer drive every few days so that the oil can get nice and hot (~200-220+ F) for a while. Your engine will thank you.

More on my new toy

As alluded to in the previous post, I have recently bought something new. I had been toying around the with idea of selling my Corvette and I mentioned it to the wrong person. Next thing I knew, he referred a coworker who was REALLY looking to buy a Vette. I showed the car and he made me an offer on the spot. So then I had to go through with it! Anyway, the sale of the Vette freed up my monthly car budget and netted me a little cash, so I went out and bought a 2004 BMW M3. Here's more pics.

I've had it a few days and like it very much. It is a LOT of fun to drive, and looks like a million bucks. Due to the fact I'm not made of money, the M3 I bought has a few miles on it and needs to get caught up on maintenance, but overall it's still a pretty young car and is in really nice shape. I'm not afraid of cars with high miles because I do all maintenance myself and that saves me a lot of money, and I keep my cars in top shape at all times. There is a TON of info on these cars out on the web so I'm confident I can tackle anything that might come up. Parts are plentiful and while there are a few that are priced like they are gold plated, most are reasonably priced.

We really miss the Vette, though, and will have another one before too long. We might get into a C6 or get another C5.

I don't know the history of this car, other than I am the fourth owner and it has been in Florida most of its life. I have a LONG list of maintenance items and a couple very minor repairs that I will try to document here on this blog. Should be fun.

A New Relationship Begins