After sitting around lurking and searching the forum for over a year I have begun my own M50 swap. I have an 86 325es. It is a great car. It is far from being stock. For the interior I have a coconut can-o-scent air freshener, and the sound system I installed is a Blaupunkt set up. Blaupunkt head unit, speakers, and amps, I have an Infinity Subwoofer though; I bought it from a kid I worked with. I think he used the money to buy drugs. I tinted the windows and blacked out the chrome, I put on Zender side skirts and some super cool mud flaps I got at Bi-mart for $10.
For the suspension I have H&R Sports with Bilstein Sports, IE race adjustable camber plates, IE front strut brace, IE adjustable sway bars front and rear, IE rear camber & toe kits, M3 offset CABs and IE rear reinforced urethane strut mounts, running on 15” Zender Challenge rims with Falken Azenis RT 615 tyres.
Engine and drive train are closer to stock, I have an eBay short shift lever Ireland ceramic coated headers, cat delete and an “I” dual pipe exhaust.
Another piece of flair is my skid plate I made out of a road sign. It buts up against the back of the air dam and goes all the way back to the front cross member, Left to right it covers everything between the control arms. It is quiet a nice little addition to the car. I am no longer worried when I hit something in the road; I know it is just the skid plate hitting and not my oil pan. I don’t have a ton of ground clearance with it though. Being low to the ground isn’t all bad though, on multiple occasions I have used my car to plow the driveway (or city streets) when our little tractor and plow got stuck. With some Bridgestone Blizzaks WS-50’s and the es’s LSD I can get most anywhere I want to in the snow.
The M20B27 engine is nice and all but the valves can be a little ticky, the redline a little to low, and the vacuum leaks a little to frequent sometimes. Since I have modified most everything else on the car it only seems right that I modify the engine. I considered some form of M20 engine build or standalone for the M20, I also looked into an M30 swap but neither of those seemed really economical. The M50 swap seems the better option. It is a higher output engine with slightly newer and better technology than an M20. Plus it just looks really pretty in an E30 engine bay.
Currently I am a Graduating Senior at Walla Walla University. In June I will graduate with a Bachelors degree in Automotive Technology and a Minor in Business. I needed a senior project that showed I learned something during my time spent at the University so I chose this M50 swap.
With all of that junk said, please sit tight and hold on to your butts. This is the story of my M50 swap.
- Keanan
The M20 engine
For the suspension I have H&R Sports with Bilstein Sports, IE race adjustable camber plates, IE front strut brace, IE adjustable sway bars front and rear, IE rear camber & toe kits, M3 offset CABs and IE rear reinforced urethane strut mounts, running on 15” Zender Challenge rims with Falken Azenis RT 615 tyres.
Engine and drive train are closer to stock, I have an eBay short shift lever Ireland ceramic coated headers, cat delete and an “I” dual pipe exhaust.
Another piece of flair is my skid plate I made out of a road sign. It buts up against the back of the air dam and goes all the way back to the front cross member, Left to right it covers everything between the control arms. It is quiet a nice little addition to the car. I am no longer worried when I hit something in the road; I know it is just the skid plate hitting and not my oil pan. I don’t have a ton of ground clearance with it though. Being low to the ground isn’t all bad though, on multiple occasions I have used my car to plow the driveway (or city streets) when our little tractor and plow got stuck. With some Bridgestone Blizzaks WS-50’s and the es’s LSD I can get most anywhere I want to in the snow.
The M20B27 engine is nice and all but the valves can be a little ticky, the redline a little to low, and the vacuum leaks a little to frequent sometimes. Since I have modified most everything else on the car it only seems right that I modify the engine. I considered some form of M20 engine build or standalone for the M20, I also looked into an M30 swap but neither of those seemed really economical. The M50 swap seems the better option. It is a higher output engine with slightly newer and better technology than an M20. Plus it just looks really pretty in an E30 engine bay.
Currently I am a Graduating Senior at Walla Walla University. In June I will graduate with a Bachelors degree in Automotive Technology and a Minor in Business. I needed a senior project that showed I learned something during my time spent at the University so I chose this M50 swap.
With all of that junk said, please sit tight and hold on to your butts. This is the story of my M50 swap.
- Keanan
The M20 engine
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