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Purple Tag Steering Rack

Given the age of the car and the condition of the steering rack I decided that I should investigate a rebuild or upgrade. My research brought me to a great thread over at M3Forum written by forum member Volke - Comprehensive Steering Information Thread (updated to NAM3Forum link). It seems as though the dead feeling I had been experiencing on my stock rack was due to the progressive nature of the stock E46 M3 rack. An "upgrade" or remedy to this would be the CS/CSL steering rack, E46 330i steering rack or a few options from the Z cars. Taking my research back over to M3Cutters (as M3Forum better serves LHD cars and my car is a Euro, hence RHD) I found that the E46 330i Steering Rack is normally noted with a "Purple Tag" on RHD cars and so a common upgrade is the Purple Tag Steering Rack upgrade. 

As I dug further it seems that as this steering rack came off a more standard car they were cheaper and easier to come by - especially refurbished/rebuilt - and showed comparative value over getting my stock M3 rack rebuilt. It only took me a quick search on GumTree to find a local Steering Rack re-builder that was trading in rebuilt BMW steering racks to find a rebuilt ready-to-go Purple Tag rack for a good price.






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