newbie e/i swap help

[Cooper]

I had an 89 M3 a few years back. It was a Sunday driver/track car and I really didn't do shit to it besides brakes wheels and tires, sold it to pay for a trailer and tow vehicle for my ITB GTI and the wife still rags on me about it. I got her an 01 30k mile 330xi a few months ago and got the BMW bug back.

I bought and parted out a rusted to shit low mileage 87is and have been fixing up a relatively rust free 256k mile 85e with the best of what isn't junk and a bunch of new stuff as a cheap, fun beater car.

I'm halfway interested in putting the 87i motor into the 85e chassis and have searched a bit on this and other sites for instructions on hacking the two harness's together but am not smart enough to have found anything specific for a m20b27/m20b25 swap from 87 to 85. Plenty of info for a swap into an 86 and up e but the motronic generations are different so it's not plug and play like a year newer car looks to be.

I'm sure its possible, is it worth doing?

Can anybody point me in the right direction for wire hacking help, linkage?

I'm really starting to hate the diving board look, btw.

[MikeE30325i]

this is exactly what i need too, 87 I engine into 85 E

[JoeMadoo]

It is worth doing. Just keep the harness and the computer on the engine, thats about it. Everything else should be the same.

The diving board swap is really worth doing also, in the front anyway. Take a look at my cardomain.

[MikeE30325i]

everything else is not the same, the temp sensor on the radiator, and the fuse box has different connectors coming out of it

[JoeMadoo]

Sorry Chief.

http://strictlyeta.net/technical/engineconversion.html

[Cooper]

Apparently the 85e and the 86e are a fair amount different.

[MikeE30325i]

we are talking about my friends 85e and he is putting a 87 I engine in it

[Cooper]

anybody?

[Cooper]

Thankfully the timing belt let go on my e motor today so I'm going to start the engine swap sooner than I thought..:p

I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong as far as searching and asking for help but I could sure use some input on this.

[JGood]

Hey Cooper,

I'm not sure too many people have actually done this. I have an 85 325e and am building a 2.7 stroker that will use motronic 1.3 (I think 87 325i's used this?). Anyway, I have some of the electrical manuals and some good links, shoot me an email or pm and maybe we can try to figure out what needs done, as I need to do it sooner or later as well. Two brains are better then one.

I'm going to start researching a little right now actually...

[JGood]

OK. Here's what I gather so far: Apparently 84-85 318i/325e cars shared the same rectangular c101 connector. It uses fewer pins then the 86+ c101, and they have the addition of a c104 connector to make up for the fewer pins at the c101. So, there are a few ways of wiring the c101 to take the new round plug. I guess it depends how close to stock and clean of a job you want to do. Here is the first thing I found, which appears to be incomplete...


318i Chassis -318i Engine- 325i Chassis-325i Engine- Function for 325i
White/blue -White/blue- White/blue- White/green
violett/green- Blue/White- Violet/green- Blue
Black/brown-Brown/green- Black/brown Brown/green
Violet/red- Green/violett(lg)- Violet/red(large guage)- Green/violet(S&L guage)
2(sg) blue- Blue- Blue- white
Blue/yellow- Blue/violet Blue/yellow- black/white
Green/yellow-Green/yellow(lg)- Green/yellow(LG)- Green/white
Green(lg)- Green(lg)- Green(lg)- Green(Lg)
Black/yellow(S&L guage)- Black/yellow-black/yellow-Black/yellow
Yellow/white-White/black- Fuel rate output
Black- Black- Engine speed output
Brown/black-Gray- Check engine light
Blue/black- Green/yellow
White/black- White/black
Red/yellow(sg)
Brown/violett- Brown/violet-Brown/violett-Brown/violett

sg=small guage
lg=large guage
s&L= both small and large guage

[Cooper]

awesome,

PM sent

Thanks

[MikeE30325i]

Sorry Chief.

http://strictlyeta.net/technical/engineconversion.html

dude the whole swap was summed up in 7 paragraphs? half of them having 1-2 sentences in them. that isnt a real reliable source. i just did the swap with my buddy and it was different. the radiator from the i only has one set of temp plug-ins, while the e has two sets. so it is different.

[Mr Deagle]

I made a mil-spec harness to connect my two harnesses together, but i havent figured out the tach signal

[MikeE30325i]

I made a mil-spec harness to connect my two harnesses together, but i havent figured out the tach signal

nice. you figure out the noise?