My E30 Rehabilitation! ft. Boost Noises

[jeenyus]

gotta love seeing the e30 put to work.

[zwill23]

gotta love seeing the e30 put to work.

Werk werk werk werk...

[zwill23]

Aligning My Rubber and Preventative Maintenance

Since I picked up the Euroweaves with a decent set of tires, I decided it was time to take advantage of the camber and toe adjust-ability that I added to the subframe. I took the car to Soulspeed and was very impressed with the work and time that they put into the car. The first question I was asked when I got in was, "What numbers are we looking for?"

Well, shit... can't say I've ever been asked that at the generic alignment places I've taken cars in the past.

I essentially asked for a setup with Motorsport in mind with the intent that I'll be doing autocross for the first time soon. All in they probably spent 2 hours aligning the car, which was a bit of a shocker considering how rough my car looks, especially compared to the high-end vehicles they're accustomed to dealing with.

Those rear camber / toe adjustments seem to be pretty tricky and were the most time consuming part of the process.



Here were my final specs, I'll be using these as a baseline for future tweaking:



Pre-alignment:



Post-alignment:



After the alignment I rented a fender roller from Soulspeed so I could take care of the rubbing. I asked the alignment guy about the rubbing / poke on the drivers side rear tire specifically and he said it isn't an uncommon issue, and that he sees it a lot with the Stance guys where it proves to be a bigger problem. Stacked tolerances, how parts were installed, weight distribution, etc. can all play a part in this. The car is no show queen, and at the end of the day I was still able to get a proper rear-end alignment so I'm satisfied.

Rub-a-dub-dub:



Fenders rolled, all I really needed was to fold the lips over. No more rubbing!





The car handles extremely well now, the difference is night and day. Rear-end adjust-ability is a must have for lowered E30's.

Cooling system fun Round 2.

Although the coolant flush I mentioned in the previous post helped, it wasn't enough to cure my cooling issues. As the Texas heat crept to 105 deg, I noticed my temperatures creeping a blip past the halfway mark on my temperature gauge during highway cruising. Interestingly enough, cruising around town and sitting in traffic the temperatures were fine. This tells me the clutch fan was doing its job, but during highway cruising at elevated RPMs the radiator wasn't able to keep the engine cool enough - a common symptom of a clogged radiator. At highway speeds there is no reason why my radiator shouldn't have been keeping my engine cool...

Seeing as I had a lot of rust in the system when I drained the coolant last, I suspected rust was clogging the radiator. I did a full system / radiator flush twice to ensure I got it all out.

After dumping nearly half my coolant all over Kid8's garage I was a bit more prepared this time around. The cardboard helped with the splash zone, but tying a rag around my exhaust helped catch the coolant that ran down the exhaust while draining the coolant from the block.

Setup:



Holy RUST:



I hooked up the hose to the radiator and flushed it for a couple minutes until the water ran clear, there was a ton of rust trapped in the system. I flipped it over and shook it a while with the hose still attached to get the rest out.



Since the E30 is the daily now, its a lot easier to justify giving her some more love ;) New expansion tank!



After a drive with the Austin E30 Coalition, one of our members had their throttle body heater gasket blow out and dump half of their coolant... I figured mine was ticking time bomb so I resealed it with RTV "The Right Stuff," which I've had a ton of success with. I know a lot of people block off the throttle body heater, but I wasn't ready to take that project on yet.



Next, I rewired my auxiliary fan temperature sensor. The plug disintegrated and I chopped the plug connectors off a while back (stupid), so just fixing some past mistakes:



Recycled an old plug:



Continuing my coolant system refresh, I installed a new coolant temperature sensor for the temp gauge:



I addressed my ignition system next with a fresh cap and rotor. I've read some people remove the clutch fan to gain access to the rotor, but a 1/4" ratchet with a short 8mm socket took mine off without much trouble. No need to remove the clutch fan.

New vs. Old:



Safe to say the old rotor was on its way out:



New rotor installed:



At this point, short of a bottom end rebuild, I'm not sure what else I could do to make this M20 run any better. The sewing machine feels smooth as butter.

Feels good, man.

[Zeemz]

Great thread and awesome work!

I am really surprised that you were rubbing on Euroweaves especially with 205s.

I plan on adding adjustable sub frame mounts when I do my bushings as well. Only bushings I haven't changed are my Sub Frame and RTABs and hope to take care of that this winter.

[Levy3Poop]

How hard was it to do the adjustable sub frame? I'd like to get the whole garagistic rear subframe some day

Sent from my SM-N910V using Tapatalk

[zwill23]

Great thread and awesome work!

I am really surprised that you were rubbing on Euroweaves especially with 205s.

I plan on adding adjustable sub frame mounts when I do my bushings as well. Only bushings I haven't changed are my Sub Frame and RTABs and hope to take care of that this winter.

Yeah... I'm surprised as well. In the future I'm going to have to readdress the issue if / when I decide more meat is necessary. I'm curious if I have a bent trailing arm or if I didn't install parts 100% correct. For now I'm satisfied though, the alignment turned out well and the rear end feels solid. Time to just drive the damn thing! :devil:

I highly recommend the adjustable mounts, beyond just tire wear, the handling of the car totally transforms. Your car looks stellar by the way! Very clean.

How hard was it to do the adjustable sub frame? I'd like to get the whole garagistic rear subframe some day

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Well if you're welding in the camber and toe plates yourself it is definitely a job. It took me two weeks all in, but I was very meticulous with everything. I also addressed a bunch other problems like my shifter and such.

If you're just swapping in an adjustable subframe with tabs already welded I would budget a full weekend to be safe, especially if it's your first time. After doing it a few times on my car / friends, it is probably a 6-8 hour job.

[kid8]

Great thread and awesome work!

I am really surprised that you were rubbing on Euroweaves especially with 205s.

I plan on adding adjustable sub frame mounts when I do my bushings as well. Only bushings I haven't changed are my Sub Frame and RTABs and hope to take care of that this winter.

I feel like these tires run wide, I rubbed on mine and wasn't as low as Zwill is running.


Keep up the good work man, car is looking great!!

[zwill23]

Keep up the good work man, car is looking great!!

You flatter me ;)

[sonomabimmers]

love this thread! cars looking clean. whats up with Austin E30 Coalition? y'all got a fb page or a thread id love to meet up next time.

[zwill23]

love this thread! cars looking clean. whats up with Austin E30 Coalition? y'all got a fb page or a thread id love to meet up next time.

Heh, "rough" I'd say is more accurate, but I appreciate it.

Nah, no FB group. It's pretty informal, if you PM me your email I can add you to the email list.

[Kershaw]

Until you acid flush your block, you will always have rust issues with your coolant system. I would try hooking a hose up to your block drain or sticking it down a coolant pipe and trying to flush as much crap out of the block as possible. Just let it run through for 15-20 minutes.

You're doing really good work though.

[zwill23]

Until you acid flush your block, you will always have rust issues with your coolant system. I would try hooking a hose up to your block drain or sticking it down a coolant pipe and trying to flush as much crap out of the block as possible. Just let it run through for 15-20 minutes.

You're doing really good work though.

Thanks man!

Yeah you're right, I thought of this and was a bit concerned that acid flushing the block may damage the radiator / hoses. The system has been flushed several times at this point so I feel confident I've flushed a majority of the rust out of the system.

I'm sure the rust will inevitably come back, but I'm hoping since it is now filled properly with coolant it will be okay for a while. I'd like to do a proper engine rebuild at some point in the future, so just pushing her along for now.

[zwill23]

Graveyard Shoot

Cleaned up the car today, so I figured I'd snag some pictures. Considering this ol'girl was raised from the dead... the graveyard seemed appropriate ;)

The only camera in my arsenal is an iPhone 5s, so working with what I've got here. Enjoy!

[Levy3Poop]

Cleaned up the car today, so I figured I'd snag some pictures. Considering this ol'girl was raised from the dead... the graveyard seemed appropriate ;)

The only camera in my arsenal is an iPhone 5s, so working with what I've got here. Enjoy!

Lookin' good, señor!

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[AusScare]

Awesome thread and great progress on bringing this back to life! Look forward to seeing it visit the bodyshop at some point in the future so that the exterior matches the rest of the car! Keep up the good work.