E30 Brake adjustment

[Rob Bentley <rbentley@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Fellow Digesters

I've recently been fiddling about with my brakes on my E30. It's a right
hand drive (as I live in England) but the guys with left hand drive cars
/should/ be able to follow my procedure, and try the same trick on their
cars.

Now, since I bought the car a year ago, the brakes have always been crap. I
did new disks and pads all round, (Pagid disks and pads, highly recommended
for the British driver), and also fitted 6 stainless steel brake lines. The
dealer then bled the system, and they were still crap.

By crap, I mean that there was 2 inches of initial pedal travel, before the
"bite". Once the pedal had been pushed these 2 inches, the "bite" was good,
and the car stopped well.

So, further adjustment was necessary. On left hand drive cars, the brake
booster is on the left side of the car, the same as you left hand drive
cars. There is a rod that runs along from under the pedal, to the booster.
The booster is like a can of coke, with a straw in it. Push the straw deeper
into the coke, and the brakes come on. We need to set the "at rest" position
of the straw to be deeper into the coke.

Get your head under the glovebox, and loosen the 17mm locknut. Use pliers to
unscrew the shaft, to make it protrude further into the cars interior.
Tighten the locknut.

Suddenly, the pedal feels right. Press it a few millimeters, and the car
starts to slow down.

BUT, the pedal is now too high, and isn't in line with the clutch. To lower
the pedal WITHOUT adjusting the feel of the brakes, turn your attention to
the rod running across the car. Loosen the locknut at both ends, and turn
the rod a couple of turns. The pedal returns to it's former position.
Tighten both locknuts, and that's it.

Now I've never played around on a LHD car, but I imagine the setup is
similar, without the rod running across the car.  I guess the "can of coke"
adjustment is similar, and there is probably some other simple mechanism to
adjust pedal height. Take a look around - once I saw what was down there,
adjustment was obvious.

This adjustment makes the world of difference, and probably applies to most
BMW's. The new pads made a big difference too, but the stainless lines
didn't do much for my street driving. And the "racing" fluid did nothing.
Track use would probably be a different story, but I haven't been to the
track recently.

Hope this is some use to someone out there, feel free to comment on my
rambling,


Best Wishes to all,

Rob Bentley
ENGLAND

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