RE: Barbarian Strut Brace...

["Fadeev, Alex" <Alex.Fadeev@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

> E36 M3 Coupe in the drive, and now have a couple of Q's for the
> group. Has anyone rec'd or investigated the new Barbarian strut 
> brace? It looks like a mother of a bar (for $475 US, it should
> be!), but I was curious if any of the masses have any comments
> on this unit. I was going to order the Dinan bar, and then 
> stumbled upon this one. What would be the lists top 3 choices 
> for braces, front & rear?

Greg,
	A while back consensus was that the only worthwhile brace for E36
chassis was the factory convertible X-brace. X-brace is available from your
local dealer for around $120 and can be installed on most E36 bodies (there
were some issues with some years not having factory pre-drilled holes).
	From the E30 perspective, the rear strut brace is useless and you
have to be really good to tell the difference with the front E30 brace. E30
chassis is not nearly as stiff as that of E36. 
 
> I've seen numerous "cold air intakes"  and have found the Dinan
> unit to be the cleanest of all, however, at $450 US, it's also
> the most costly. Is it just me, or is this an enormous amount 
> for an 18" long piece of CF, w/ a K&N attached to it? I've got 
> a CF solo seat on a '95 900 SS Ducati, that would surely make 3
> or 4 of these intake tubes that was made in Italy, and shipped
> for considerably less. Are there other CF Mfg.'s of intake 
> tubes out there?

	Yep, there are.
	That same while back, 'The' air intake set up was a K&N filter
shielded away from the engine (search the archives at:
http://www.eskimo.com/~dalus/search.html)
	Since then Jim Conforti has come out with his own cold air intake
with a foam filter retailing for the same cool $450
(http://www.bonnevillemotorwerks.com/techtips.html). 
	My guess is that shielded K&N setup still works.

have fun,
alex f

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