Ok, one thing has always really bothered me about my Touring. Compared to a sedan, the Touring body is REALLY flexible. Between the 4 foot opening in the roof, and the huge opening in the back, there's just not enough structural rigidity to do the E34 chassis justice. With a lowered stiffened suspension, this problem is just amplified, especially in the rear.

Long-term, I want to do some seam-welding underneath the car and maybe in the back end of the interior as well. For the moment, though, there was one thing I thought would be worth trying: A rear strut tower brace.

Since I'm going with the local BMWCCA chapter next week to SD to enjoy some challenging mountain roads, I thought this would be a good opportunity to slap something together that might help.

One of the biggest (and most complicating) requirements I had was that it must be easily removable, and cannot impinge on cargo space. Having a semi-permanent bar would make having a Touring pointless for me, since I am CONSTANTLY hauling around junk that requires me to fold down the seats. So I needed a bar that would be stiff enough to hopefully have some effect, but be easily removed in just a few seconds.

Here's what I did.

My temporary metal shop set up in the driveway today (garage is under construction...a whole different story )


Some 3/16" plate steel I used to make the tower plates: