B.I. Official e34 lowering, new suspension, wheels, and thrust arms!

[HDhandyman]

OK new guys, so you read all the stuff about upgraded suspension, wheels, lowering springs, upper and lower control arms, & 750 il bushings, but you still don't know what the hell Billsteins, H&R, Sachs, Lemforder, or M parralels are? Well, this is the thread for you!

I'm a new guy too, and a few weeks ago I decided to undertake this project. I wasn't sure if I could do it. But, after consulting some of the seniors here, they encouraged me to undertake this project. There is a lot of info on all of this stuff already, but I decided that it might be nice to take the next few weeks and build a thread about this stuff with really nice photo documentation and dummies questions answered. So, here goes....

P.S. I'm just gonna update this every few days as I have time. Everyone please feel free to chime in and offer expert advice. Still, my goal here is the completed tutorial so you can just consider this thread under construction for the next few weeks. And thanks for everyone's help!

OH YEAH, NEW GUYS! DON'T BE AFFRAID TO ASK DUMMIE QUESTIONS WHILE WE CREATE THIS FORUM OR THEY WON'T BE ANSWERED FOR FUTURE GENERATION E34 WRENCHERS.

First things first, I had to clean the garage and build some new shelves to get some of the crap out of the way






next step...figuring out what we want, why we want it, and how to get it.
upcoming photo documentation...tools

[dacoyote]

Everyone grow up.. don't make me come back there...

[Evan]

this thread is a great idea. i cant decide whether to sell my 540 or upgrade the suspension so im looking forward to reading about your experience. as for the drama...

[HDhandyman]

OK, so a little history on why I'm doing this.

Initially, I was only just becoming educated about the potential for problems while I was pursuing another project. My 525i is an automatic and I wanted to look into converting it to a 5 speed. So, I contacted Whit (Lowell) because he is one of the finest minds on the forum, and his garage specializes in "said" conversions. Upon his advice, I contacted a certain gentleman who was more than willing to put everything together for me and even consign my old auto Getrag transmission. Bottom line, the total quoted to me was right around $1300.00 after consignment which is almost exactly the total we are looking at for this project, guys (wheels and tools not included). Ultimately, I discovered that I would rather own an old e28 5 speed (just for fun) than mess up a good thing with the car I've got. I'm still on the hunt for that perfect e28.

So, I decided to take my car to the wheel and brake Indy to find out what the state of my current (stock) suspension was, and what it would cost me for upgrades. Bottom line, they are excellent "nationally recognized" mechanics, but no way can I let myself pay the $3600.00 they quoted me with all of the above (suspension and wheel upgrades). However, I was more than willing to pay the $20.00 they charged me for a complete assesment of my car's current state of affairs. Found out that I need new thrust arms (upper and lower control arms), bushings, springs, shocks, and I already know that my tires are bald. So guys, going to the wheel and brake Indy for an estimate is an excellent way to get this project started because if you're like me, you don't wanna miss the stuff that you are supposed to fix while we're making upgrades. In fact, real maintanence is the catylyst for this whole project.

Parts--ask anybody on the forum, there's only one place to go, BMA...
http://www.bmaparts.com/
This place does more business in quality parts than anybody else, so they can afford to provide goods at a cheaper rate, plain and simple. The best thing to do is to call BMA and ask for Patrick or Yves (brothers) because they carrier many more parts than those listed on their website and offer expert advice about E34 parts and service.

What we want--well, we know that we need new control arms( upper and lower), these belong to the front suspension. And we know that we need new bushings...here comes an upgrade--this is where the 750 bushings come in. You can now get new control arms with the 750 bushings already pressed in, for cheap.

control arms

$85.00 ea. to be exact. PART #s BMW017988 and BMW017989

So, we'll pick up two of those, one for each side, and we'll pick up a set of the upper thrust arms (with 750's pressed) as well.

$99.00 ea. to be exact. PART #s BMW017990 and BMW017991

The bottom pic doesn't show the 750il bushings pressed in to the upper control (thrust) arms, but they will come that way if you order the part number specified from BMA. You may want to read ahead a couple of posts for a debate on whether or not the 750 il's are for you!

Now, our total so far is $400.00. It's important to point out here that these prices are for OEM Lemfoerder parts. Please be sure to use Lemfoerder parts, or you'll have to do this every year.

Next time in the "What we want, why we want it, and where to get it? Photos=tools" section I'll discuss my options for shocks, strutts, and lowering springs, and we'll sort out our Billsteins from our Konis (Sachs too), and our Eibachs from our H&Rs!

[Scott H]

last time I checked they were about $115/each with the bushing pressed in, and it's been documented that the E34 M5 bushing is more durable than the 750 bushings.....this brings the upper arm price to ~$130/ea with the bushing pressed in

[HDhandyman]

last time I checked they were about $115/each with the bushing pressed in, and it's been documented that the E34 M5 bushing is more durable than the 750 bushings.....this brings the upper arm price to ~$130/ea with the bushing pressed in

Here's the mail.

Yves Bright
<yves@bmaparts.com>to me
More options Feb 13
Hello Steven,

Per our conversation, here are the prices for the suspension parts.

Thrust arms - $99.00 each Lemfoerder arms with 750il bushings pressed in
Control arms - $85.00 each Lemfoerder
Sway bar links - $21.00 each
Idler arm - $35.00

Looks like I mixed them up. Still, the price total is the same. I've edited "said" post. What's up with the M5 bushings? Give us a link, Scott!

[Scott H]

only countless posts about them....along with most other things related to suspension.

Last I paid $130 for lemforder arms with M5 bushings......two months ago.

Thrust arms - $99.00 each Lemfoerder arms with 750il bushings pressed in

What's up with the M5 bushings? Give us a link, Scott!

[hakwuzhere]

Im about to go through the same thing... ordering Vogtlands and Koni adjustables... Ill try to document my progress here as well....

PO did a full suspension overhaul about two years before I bought the car, and it sat in his garage for the greater portion of that, so Im not doing thrust arms or anything (unless it looks really bad in there)

[Jon K]

I was invited here by HDhandyman to talk about control arm bushings.

I had originally installed upper and lower control arm bushings (new arms) with 750i bushings (new) from BMA Autoparts. The setup seemed to alleviate 90% of my shimmy issue but there still remained a little bit of shimmy. I replaced a couple of my tie rod ends and it went away mostly.

Less than 10,000 miles later I had decent shimmy again at 65 mph. I had originally followed the installation procedure of setting the car on the ground and torquing the bushings to the spec. However, I was sort of frustrated with that theory and the whole installation process annoyed me. I decided enough was enough and ordered the Grunt's Polyurethane control arm bushings. Because these are for the upper control arms (to replace 750i bushings) I was able to use a special BMW tool to press the old bushings out and new bushings in while the control arm was still attached to the car. This made the job 10x easier and only took about 45 mins to do the bushings.



I think that was around 140,000 miles on the odometer and I am now at 184,000. I have ZERO shimmy issues - the front is very solid and very well connected. When you get up above speed limit speeds... lets say 65+ you can sometimes feel a slight "roughness" or minute vibration - but this is from the bushings being solid and not due to failure or anything like the shimmy experienced with 750i bushings. Some people suggest that M5 bushings are more solid than 750 bushings but quitely honestly I love that the Grunt bushings have no bizarre torque scheme (loading the car etc). You just torque until they're tight, i'd say 80ft lbs or so. Put the car on the ground - drive home. They provide great feel of the road and the handling is not too harsh - my car is on 17" wheels (235/45 front 38 psi) and 3mm M5 spring pads along with the polyurethane bushings and it's not very harsh IMHO.


Here is a picture of the contraption I made in order to get the ball joint end out of the strut base. The tool used to press the bushings on the car allowed me to never have to do this again!

[Scott H]

early. The M5 bushings should last longer than the 750 bushings....

I was invited here by HDhandyman to talk about control arm bushings.