Modern ABS for a tracked 240 (Teves MK60 swap)

[rb92673]

Thanks!

 

[Sander]

This is great, did you have to reprogram the abs unit to work well in the Volvo?

 

[DrZiplok]

This is great, did you have to reprogram the abs unit to work well in the Volvo?

No re-coding was required to make it work.

We did use the usual BMW Tools (INPA in particular) to bleed the unit; I suspect a lot of the cheap Chinese scantools will do it as well.

 

[DrZiplok]

Found a better sensor for the rear axles, no longer requires painful carving of the strain relief, etc.

It's a Nissan part (in my case a cheap clone sold under the 'Autex' brand), cross references 479007S025, ALS624, 5S10761, SU12214, 084-4776, 411.482.

EDIT: race-tested this last weekend, works just fine for us with ~1mm clearance to the reluctor.



STL for the bracket

 

[mikep]

Nice work, first time I have seen this thread.

 

[mck1117]

Dredging this thread back up from the grave to report that I've now repeated these results! I run a 1991 240 sedan in Lucky Dog, and did the same ABS swap on my car. I ran a track day with the car yesterday, and ABS works flawlessly. Great success!

I ended up using the Nissan sensor on all four corners of the car.

In the rear, I had SendCutSend make me tone rings out of 3/16" steel that I pressed on before the wheel bearing, just like above. Made a bracket out of aluminum angle stock that shares two of the bolts for the wheel bearing retainer plate (dial indicator to check end play on the new wheel bearing). I have the DXF of the tone ring if anybody else wants to cut one. They were $7 each, which I find insane and amazing.

For the front, I used 240 ABS hubs with a similar bracket bolted to the brake shield holes.

 

[liam821]

A very common swap for BMW E30s (which incidentally also used ABS-II) is the Teves MK60 as fitted to the E46 (2001+) M3. Actually, this unit is a common swap into many platforms, as it runs standalone and can be flashed with some fairly interesting software. Even stock, however, it's a much better, smarter unit.

Actually only came in the 2003.5+ (LCI) e46m3 cars. The earlier cars all had the MK20 system.

There are three ATE part numbers for the MK60 on e46m3s:

ATE 10.0960-813.3
ATE 10.0960-818.3
ATE 10.0960-817.3

The first 2 came on the standard M3 and the 817.3 came on CSL and ZCP.

The 813.3 and 817.3 are supposedly able to be flashed with the BMW motorsport software, but the only people claiming to do this charge a lot and it's unclear if they actually know how to do it. I'm told it's just better to buy a Motorsport MK60. If I remember correctly, the Motorsport MK60 has the 817.3 part number but the software is entirely different. More on the motorsport software in a bit.

The 817.3 has an extra pin on the connector for the M-track button. M-track can be added to the other 2 part numbers easily through NCSExpert/NCSDummy by repurposing the DSC button to be single push for M-track and 3 second hold for DSC off. NCS expert also allows you to change steering rack and brake setting on the 813.3 and 818.3 to work with the ZCP steering rack and brakes. At that point, they become no different in function from the 817.3 other than lacking the provision for the M-track button as far as we have been able to tell.

Back to the motorsport software. The motorsport software is actually pure, high performance ABS and it deletes DSC and traction control altogether. By high perfomance ABS, I mean that it has a higher threshold before it kicks. The street ABS kicks in earlier and is tuned with more safety in mind instead of track performance.

 

[122power]

No abs! All about drivers feel.
But ill read this thread anyway.

 

[AnthonyHardy2]

Actually only came in the 2003.5+ (LCI) e46m3 cars. The earlier cars all had the MK20 system.

There are three ATE part numbers for the MK60 on e46m3s:

ATE 10.0960-813.3
ATE 10.0960-818.3
ATE 10.0960-817.3

Do you know why you can't just use the ABS system from a regular non M3 E46? Were the other E46s MK20 regardless of year or is there some other issue I'm not seeing?

 

[mck1117]

Do you know why you can't just use the ABS system from a regular non M3 E46? Were the other E46s MK20 regardless of year or is there some other issue I'm not seeing?

You can! I did. It works totally fine. Any 2003+ E46 has an MK60 with the better yaw sensor. Mine is from a 2003 330i ZHP.

The benefit of the M3 unit is that it is theoretically a little better for "sporty" driving (I have no idea if this is true with respect to the ABS operation, but certainly is with respect to the stability control not getting in the way). Some M3 units (not sure which) can be reflashed to the motorsport firmware, which is far superior ABS than the road car configuration.

But - it depends on what you want out of it. If you want it to be a safety device in the rain, an anti-tire-flat-spot device, and a crash-prevention device, the non-M, non-motorsport ABS is more than enough. That stuff is what I want it for on my car, so I'm fully satisfied with the non-M ABS. Even though it's not "proper motorsport ABS", it still lets you brake harder later, since you know that you'll just feel ABS instead of a full lockup, sending you off in to the weeds.

 

[liam821]

Do you know why you can't just use the ABS system from a regular non M3 E46? Were the other E46s MK20 regardless of year or is there some other issue I'm not seeing?

tl;dr;

e46 2000-2003.0 = mk20
e46 2003.5+ = mk60

Don't bother with the mk20. You can pick up an mk60 from a 330i for $50.

The non-m MK60s have different programming and different part numbers from the m3 units. Although they physically look the same. I don't know if there are any internal differences between the non-m and m3 systems other than the programming. They do have the same plug ends though. I do know that 817.3 has another pin to enable m-track mode from a separate button, where the others can be programmed with to with m-track mode but it uses the DSC button (press once to enable mtrack, hold to disable DSC).

There are a number of part numbers, but there were three basic versions on the 2003.5+ e46.

non-m: 325i/330i/ZHP. m52/m54 engine, no LSD. The ZHP had a quicker steering ratio.
Small brakes
m3std: All non-competition models (convertibles/coupes) etc. LSD, standard m3 steering ratio, larger brakes
ZCP/CSL: Competition models here in the states, in Europe they had the CS and CSL models. These had the quickest steering ratio, m-track mode on a button on the steering wheel, and the exact same LSD as the m3std models. Largest brakes.

There are only two models that can accept the "motorsports" software flash, 813.3 and 817.3.
With the true motorsports software you have complete control over all the settings. So if you want to send your unit to 3dmmotorsport or TRF to get that done, make sure you have one of those two. If not, you're gonna be stuck with whatever programming is done by BMW.

With that said - all units can be programmed (to a degree) using the BMW INPA software. You can program a non-m MK60 system with all the m3 zcp/csl settings and vice versa. A lot of these settings have to do with the fact that the M3 has an LSD while the non-m models (325/330s etc) had an open diff and different brake sizes (piston area etc).

Here is a breakdown of the settings between the three models:

https://liam821.com/MK60-Comparison.pdf

Some other tidbits of knowledge:

> The CSL settings raise the slip and yaw thresholds above the stock programming. It also adds M-Track mode for users with an E46 M3/330i without the ZCP package.

> The e46 wheel speed sensors has a recommended air gap between the sensor and the trigger wheel is 1.0-1.5mm (0.040?-0.060?)

> The e46 (and most other BMW?s) use a 48 tooth trigger wheel. However, you can use anywhere from 40-50 teeth so long as all four wheels have the same tooth count.

> You don't have to use e46 sensors, you can also use: Corvette C6 and newer (any with yellow sleeve over sensor wires), Nissan 350Z & 370Z, Ford Mustang 2015+, Bosch DF11 sensors, Honda S2000 (AP2), most modern sensors seem to work okay.

 

[blkaplan]

If this is just being used to control ABS, do things like the M-track mode, etc... make a difference at all?

Seems like if you wanted stability control it would be more important?

 

[liam821]

If this is just being used to control ABS, do things like the M-track mode, etc... make a difference at all?

Seems like if you wanted stability control it would be more important?

Some of the settings do matter to braking and the ABS system (such as brake piston size), some of them do not (all the mtrack mode settings).

 

[OVERDRIVE]

If this is just being used to control ABS, do things like the M-track mode, etc... make a difference at all?

Seems like if you wanted stability control it would be more important?

To add stability control you need a steering angle sensor, and connection with the ECU to cut throttle at minimum.

 

[liam821]

To add stability control you need a steering angle sensor, and connection with the ECU to cut throttle at minimum.

Yeah, having DBW (drive-by-wire) is really the key since you want the ECU to override whatever input the driver is giving.

 

[mck1117]

The non-m MK60s have different programming and different part numbers from the m3 units. Although they physically look the same. I don't know if there are any internal differences between the non-m and m3 systems other than the programming. They do have the same plug ends though.

Afaik all E46 hydraulic units are the same, but the brain is different. We're running an M3 brain on the 330i valvebody and it seems to work perfect. Did a full endurance race weekend (in the rain/damp/dry mix, ~14h running) on it like that without issue.

With that said - all units can be programmed (to a degree) using the BMW INPA software. You can program a non-m MK60 system with all the m3 zcp/csl settings and vice versa. A lot of these settings have to do with the fact that the M3 has an LSD while the non-m models (325/330s etc) had an open diff and different brake sizes (piston area etc).

> The CSL settings raise the slip and yaw thresholds above the stock programming. It also adds M-Track mode for users with an E46 M3/330i without the ZCP package.

You can sort of turn the non-M unit in to a CSL, but not quite. You can change some of the stability control limits and tell it you have an LSD, but there is no way to get the more aggressive ABS tuning from the M3 without an actual M3 module. You can turn any M3 module in to a CSL, though. We've run both the 330i brain and CSL-ified M3 brain, and the M3 does a better job of ABS.

 

[rb92673]

Afaik all E46 hydraulic units are the same, but the brain is different. We're running an M3 brain on the 330i valvebody and it seems to work perfect. Did a full endurance race weekend (in the rain/damp/dry mix, ~14h running) on it like that without issue.



You can sort of turn the non-M unit in to a CSL, but not quite. You can change some of the stability control limits and tell it you have an LSD, but there is no way to get the more aggressive ABS tuning from the M3 without an actual M3 module. You can turn any M3 module in to a CSL, though. We've run both the 330i brain and CSL-ified M3 brain, and the M3 does a better job of ABS.

Have you tried using this system as stability control or as an electronic limited slip? At our last Sonoma race it rained all weekend and the E46s were very fast in the rain.

 

[mck1117]

Have you tried using this system as stability control or as an electronic limited slip? At our last Sonoma race it rained all weekend and the E46s were very fast in the rain.

As far as I know the mk60 doesn't do eLSD, it just has an option to tell it there's a mechanical LSD present so it changes the stability control/ABS algorithm with that in mind.

I haven't tried to get stability control working on our car, I think if we added a steering angle sensor and sent the right CAN messages to lie about the engine controller being present it would work, though.

 

[rb92673]

As far as I know the mk60 doesn't do eLSD, it just has an option to tell it there's a mechanical LSD present so it changes the stability control/ABS algorithm with that in mind.

I haven't tried to get stability control working on our car, I think if we added a steering angle sensor and sent the right CAN messages to lie about the engine controller being present it would work, though.

I found some training guide, it looks like it is speed limited at 24 mph in regular mode and 42 mph if you hit the DSC switch. Probably not very useful on track. More like a G80.

 

[mck1117]

We also have a real diff (clutch type from Gripper), so I never bothered looking.