TehRaydarlover's AWD Lover

[TehRaydarlover]

Hello! This is my build thread for my ix, but first story time.

I must say I have pretty much fallen in love with this car. I didn't even know what an E30 was until I found this site while looking for a smaller AWD car to handle the MN winters and get me from collage and back. My roommate at the time owned an Audi 90 and I liked it a lot, he would let me drive it occasionally and basically let me hone my manual skills in it. I started looking at similar Audi's which eventually led me to BMW's. With my collage kid budget in mind I began searching Wikipedia and other online stuff, I eventually found out BMW made a small AWD car in the late 80s, neat. Browsing Craigslist and generic google searches eventually resulted in a FS ad on what other page but r3v haha. The car was located in Lansing Michigan, and I was in Milwaukee, WI for collage. I got extremely excited and called the guy and essentially told him I'm going to buy it lol. One 4AM bus ride later and I was in Lansing. I'll never forget getting off the bus and walking aimlessly to the parking lot looking for an older silver BMW. I came around the corner and parked all by itself was the car (mind you I had never actually seen an E30 in person before this lol). It was amazing haha, the sunlight was just right and the car looked epic, I was pretty much speechless I must have had the stupidest smile on my face lol. I drove it back to his house, killing it leaving the parking lot haha. He signed the title over to me and I gave him the cash. Then drove it back to MN, the car never skipped a beat! I purchased the car in the spring of 2013 and it has been my daily driver up until about the start of summer 2015. Since first buying the car I've graduated from Milwaukee School of Engineering and am now a mechanical engineer. Over the past few years I've become really passionate about these cars and they've kind of taken over my life lol.

On to the build!

I keep changing/updating this but the overall plan for the car is to restore the car while simultaneously (over)build the engine and drivetrain to "handle" ~5-600HP. I want the car to be clean and classy when you look at it but when you pop the hood or get on the gas you get a bit of a surprise haha. I've also kept in mind the idea of a numbers matching car so all of the original drivetrain parts will be removed and stored. That is none of the original drivetrain parts will be used with the turbo motor. I want the ability to be able to take this car back to an original "unmolested" state if I so choose to. I know this is more of an American muscle car thing but whatever.

Here are my build specs so far:
Metric Mechanic 3.1L turbo stroker bottom end: 134.5mm rods, hard anodized forged pistons with surface turbulence (giggidy) and S52 crank
New OEM valves with MM surface turbulence
VAC valve springs
VAC titanium retainers
VAC billet rockers (early design)
Shrick 284 cam (still on the fence)
ARP head studs and main caps
Extended spline length front drive shaft (thanks Juuso)
CAtuned HD rear axles
NEW DOTR 325ix transmission (its okay to be jelly)
Rebuild rear diff (see post #56 for write up )
Rebuild transfer case with rebuilt VC (see page XX for write up)
Built front diff w/extra spider gears (see page XX for write up)
Rebuilt front axles
Megasquirt 3X with full sequential coil over plug
Econoboost gauge
SI shift lights
George Graves AFR gauge

I have a head that was ported by Paul Burke but I'm kind of leaning toward doing some porting work on another head myself.
As far as the turbo goes I'm still researching but as of right now I really like the Borg Warner Airworks S300S3X

I've been stock piling a lot of ix specific part in preparation for any rainy days:
front diff x3
oil pan x3
front drive shaft x3
rear drive shaft
front cv shafts x2 sets
transmission x2
transfer case x3
rear diff x2


I'll try and keep this first post updated with the build specs as I decide on them. I've put a lot of time and resources into this so far and I'm nowhere near complete, but then again its really fun so idgaf

Pics! This was soon after I bought the car:


This was last summer:


Then last fall:

[meanEG]

those itb's look sweet.

[TheTacoMan]

Where did you get a 885 head on solid works?
I may bother you for that later on down the road for some projects I have in mind.

[TehRaydarlover]

Thanks

I found it online somewhere. I just use it for a rough mock up, a lot of the dimensions are wrong.

[TehRaydarlover]

Jaguar E-type and Ferrari Dino from a car show today

[litu]

oops I did not notice this project, it seems very interesting.......

[AWDBOB]

Excited to see where this goes!

[kid325e]

Sub'd! Love where you're taking this.

Been slowly stockpiling parts for my iX build! Keep up the great work!

[TehRaydarlover]

Excited to see where this goes!

Me too haha. I've been following your thread dealing with the GC coilovers, awesome work. I'm hoping you will have everything figured out by the time I am ready for the conversion haha.

[AWDBOB]

Me too haha. I've been following your thread dealing with the GC coilovers, awesome work. I'm hoping you will have everything figured out by the time I am ready for the conversion haha.

Thanks, man. I have a fresh set of axles and the sleeves that I need to raise the car up a tad more, so fingers crossed this will fix my axle issues once and for all!

[TehRaydarlover]

Bit of an update, I noticed that both of my drivers side front cv boots were torn so I decided it was time to swap in the axles I rebuild a while ago. One thing kinda led to another and I ended up replacing a lot of parts.

Got every thing pulled apart. Out with the old and in with the new

[TehRaydarlover]

Took me two long days to get everything disassembled... break time, off to Europe :)

5 days in Paris, France


4 day in Luzern, Switzerland




Saw my first touring and it was an ix :') thing was unbelievable must have just been restored. You could perform surgery on the underside of this thing. I tried knocking on the door but no one was home :(



3 days in Salzburg, Austria


Then finally 3 days in Munich, Germany


Picked up some euro goodies at a junkyard in Munich


THEN THE BMW WELT AND MUSEUM!!!





Another 325ix touring!!

neat

Cleanest m20 ever

Z1

2002


The ///M division, I was the first person in the museum because I had to catch my plane to go home, not sure if you are suppose to go up on the platform the cars are on but no one was around so I did haha.











Flying over Greenland

[TehRaydarlover]

Enough fun back to Minnesota

Cleaning my smileys



Got everything ready to be put back together when I noticed a bit of a problem. Broken subframe bolt :'( Funny I didn't even notice it broke until I came back from vacation and was ready to put it all back together. The bolt stayed in the subframe when it came down.


I bought an extractor and tried to get the broken subframe bolt out but nothing would work. Soaked it in penetrating oil for 3 days, tried heating it with a torch, nothing... ended up drilling it out and retapping the hole. Put the subframe back on and the new bolt fit perfectly! Thank God! Such a relief seeing I had to drill it out with a hand drill.


Got the new smileys installed and the city lights all wired up after dealing with finding a break in the passengers side wiring.


Got the new front driveshaft all welded and painted


So after all the work I now have rebuilt front axles, new control arms with m3 offset bushings, motor mounts, power steering rack, pump, and reservoir, upper strut mounts, all new belts, euro smileys, German check panel, and new fluids in the front/rear diffs transmission, and transfer case. I also tracked down the broken wire for my oil level sensor so now I have no lights on the dash or check panel! yay :)

As a reward for all the work I went to a car show and found a 1957 Isetta! So cool!

[litu]

Cool

[TimeMachinE30]

Good work.

How's the interior?