323 to 331 Build

[el bimmer]

Nice!

[Saascat1]

Nice!

Thanks el

[e30_luv_]

Before the livery goes on, may I ask what the lovely light/pale green (?) color is?

[Saascat1]

Before the livery goes on, may I ask what the lovely light/pale green (?) color is?

Sorry If I spell this wrong, I've just finished putting colour on and didn't take note. But here goes: platatengrun-metalic. I know thats not right, but should get you in the right direction if you check BMW colour scheme. :)

In the light it was quite nice, just not very race car. It also was starting to crack the duco and peel in a few spots.

[Saascat1]

It was time to tackle the rusty floor pan and let me tell this had caused many a sleepless night. The rust was up the firewall and across the battery shelf. If you are not sure why this was such a problem, take a look in there sometime, there is quite a lot of complicated structural steel in there and not much room to swing a grinder, or error for that matter.
My friend Bryan and I decided that the best approach was to cut the section into two halves, do the floor first and then the firewall.
I drilled out all the spot welds on the 1/4 cut along each side of the chassis rail. Then cut the chassis rail from the bottom of the floor pan and separated them with an air chisel. I then cut down the outside of each chassis rail on the car, across the back end, along the side of the trans tunnel and back across the front. I gotta say I was shitting myself the whole way, I REALLY didn't want to fuck this up.
I then trimmed the "new" floor pan and left about 3/4" overlap for spot welds.
Bryan set to with his gasless MIG:
Again apologies for missing some photos.

and again,

[Saascat1]

Time to delete the wheel well, no need for a spare at the track except in the pits.
I helped a mate replace his bonnet, hood for y'all in the northern hemisphere, and in return got to take the cutting wheel to the old one :D
A few careful measurements and this is what i got.

Now you see it......

Now you don't.....

What hole?

I retained the cross brace, although I trimmed it down a little, spot welded it in and then sealed both on top and underneath with construction grade exterior sealant (Sikaflex). I now have a piece of Ford Fairlane permanently attached to my car, probably be the best performing bit of ford in recent history.

From there went back to finishing of the Firewall.

Done, welded, sealed, stronger than ever. It is a great feeling knowing that the body is now structurally sound, watertight, and in one piece again.
Time for a Beer!

[Saascat1]

So, all this looks like it's happening pretty fast.
I am still getting up to the present day from the beginning of the build, November 2011, and in some respects I have glossed over quite a bit of background work. Mainly 'cause it's not very interesting, or there were no photos taken and it would have been pretty dry reading.
The other thing I want to say is that I have the luxury of being able to periodically devoted weeks at a time to this project, I am currently on leave and am spending the next two weeks doing little else, as I have done for the past week. I consider myself very fortunate in this respect.

Anyway...........

After many, many hours of sanding and filling, and sanding and filling, and sanding some more. It was decided that a showroom shine and perfect lines were not going to destiny of this particular E30, rather, clean lines and the odd imperfection here and there. The nett result to judged as a whole, the sum of it's parts and not to be picked and poked and sneered at for flaws. After all, this is a race car i'm building not some show pony too precious to see the light of day.

The days of preparation came to an end, and it was time to see what dividends were to aid for the hours of toil.
My friend Bryan had said before we started to paint, "a woman can look great naked, but she looks better in lingerie". What he was trying to say was once the trim and wheels and lights and all the little things go back on, any small dints we might have missed would be disguised by the whole. Wise words, I was just going to cover them with stickers :D

So, undercoat........
Bryan on the Spray Gun, me on the Lens and being a good TA, moving the lights, and generally staying out of the way.




Now for some more sanding and then time for colour.
Gigidy gigidy

[Saascat1]

Oops..........

Not sure what happened there. Was the right way up on my computer. Must be the "Down Under" thing.

[kamotors]

nice work

[e30shmobberr]

looking great so far mate!

[Saascat1]

looking great so far mate!

nice work

Thanks Guys.
I'm almost caught up to date, next post will be Racing Livery

[Denny]

Great work on the pans... very impressive work :)

I 100% understand the sleepless nights... my first E30 did that to me too...the rust was much worst :(

[Saascat1]

Great work on the pans... very impressive work :)

I 100% understand the sleepless nights... my first E30 did that to me too...the rust was much worst :(

Cheers Denny
That's good to hear. It was one of those moments in the build that gave an immense sense of satisfaction. A huge obstacle faced and overcome. Sorry to hear that you had worse, is there a build thread for yours? I'd like to read it.

[koko]

This is sick. what paint are you using? Did you buy a stoker kit of did you piece it together yourself? Total cost so far? Good work.

[Saascat1]

The long awaited day finally arrives, time to put some new clothes on my baby:

If your thinking of doing stripes, I cannot stress enough the value of GOOD tape.

Some hours later..............

And,

and,

and lastly..........

The paint scheme is intended to be an homage to early E30 team race cars, and while I have no illusions that either I or my car will ever reach those dizzying heights, it's my way of paying tribute to the men and machines that inspired me.
When I get the wheels back on and on the trailer to get the roll cage installed, I'll take some better photos in normal light.

I try to get another post in today, and that should get me up to speed. Being a noob, i can only upload 5 photos at a time so I'll have to stop here for now.
Thanks to all who've viewed, and especially those posted back :D