Starting my M54B30 swap...

[Elysian]

I think somebody needs a supercharger on his M54. That'd be sex.8)

No thanks, but a turbocharger is in the plans now.

[slammin.e28]

I think somebody needs a supercharger on his M54. That'd be sex.8)

[Elysian]

Tonight, I decided to just randomly search CraigsList for M50, and the very first hit was for an E34 M50 oil pan! I've been seeing some pretty high prices recently, so this is a very welcome listing. It was just listed about an hour ago, and I've already been in contact with the seller, should be able to get it tomorrow. It doesn't have the dipstick or the oil pickup tube, but I'm alright with that, my mechanic is already going to take care of the oil pickup tube. Guy wants $100 for it, which is far lower than I've been seeing.



On another note though, I won't be able to do much after getting this, as my Pathfinder(my DD) decided it no longer favored the transmission that's in it. It's stuck in Drive, lever works perfectly, so it's not that. I've run a solvent through it to see if it was just some crap clogging the valvebody(Seafoam trans flush), no such luck. I'll be swapping it out for a 5 speed, will cost me around $500. I hate auto's anyways, so it's a welcome change. Also going to be out of town from August 13th to the 22nd anyways, so no work then either.

[Elysian]

So you used an e30 booster?

Haven't done anything yet. Still need the E34 M50 oil pan before I do anything, and the trans brace I ordered wouldn't hurt either.

Took the valve cover off, and holy hell is it spotless. 150k on the clock and you'd never know it.




That's with 14k oil changes and 7k filter changes.

[brandonj1]

I did some measuring, and it seemed like it was possible that it'd fit, but I'd need to measure again to be certain. It seemed like there was JUST enough clearance.

So you used an e30 booster?

[Elysian]

The 01 is now gone :( It really pisses me off to no end that BMW designed the rear subframe mounts so poorly, and basically forced me to have to get rid of one of my favorite cars ever. Words can't even fully describe how pissed I've been about this...

[Elysian]

86 is now in the garage, and the 330 is ready to leave here. I have decided to go with an M50 ECU because the wiring was so incredibly painful to try and remove from the E46, and I had a time constraint thanks to this craptastic city.

[Dirtboy]

This sounds like a good project. I've always wondered what my TS2+ M54 would be like in my e30... lol.

Keep us posted!

[Elysian]

Not a lot of progress thus far... Trying to get all of the wiring out of the 330 so I sort through it (with the exception of wiring for lighting, I don't need that). There are 5 M50 oil pans on car-parts.com within the state of Texas, only one has an asking price, so I'm going to call around and see what the others want. The one with the asking price is fair, but I'd also need the dipstick+tube and the oil pickup... I also got the rear subframe back on the E30, it's going to live in my garage from now on, to keep the city off my back about it. The ZF trans may be spoken for, I know of someone interested in it, so that'll help move things along, if that sells I'll likely buy my cage, a 6 point, from a local guy. I also checked out the rear diff since it's out of the carrier, turns out it's a 2.93 LSD, so a gearing swap will be the next step there, saves me some money already having the LSD...

[Elysian]

Got the rear subframe out of the E30 and did some measuring. The E24 subframe I got would fit under the E30 no sweat, like you said, the mounts are about half an inch apart. The only thing I have to do to fit it is grind down the bead along the side of the subframe by the mounts on each side, and only a tiny bit of it would need to come off. Probably would patch it up with a weld, so it doesn't cause an issue structurally... I'm concerned about the spot where the shock/spring mounts on the E24... With the E30, the shock mounts below the axle, on the E24, it mounts directly above the axle, so I'm concerned it's going to cause some headache when I get the subframe mounted in the car. I also measured how far from the subframe mount the rear wheel was on the E24 rear end versus the E30, and it'd move the wheel rearwards about 1/4", maybe slightly less, so I don't think that's an area of much concern.

Still waiting to hear about the E34 oil pan...

[Elysian]

Just got done pressure washing the engine bay. I also got a free M24 rear subframe minus diff, gonna see if theres any parts i can use to get 5 lug out back. Also picked up E36 M3 spindles. Really enjoying working on this project so far. A local friend is going to try to find me the E34 oil pan+pickup+dipstick for a fair price.

[Elysian]

Gonna be getting a pressure washer pretty soon so i can clean up the E30 under the hood and undercarriage.

[Elysian]

I have 5/8" clearance between the manifold and my 320i booster. I forget exactly how much larger the e30 booster was, but it might fit....

I did some measuring, and it seemed like it was possible that it'd fit, but I'd need to measure again to be certain. It seemed like there was JUST enough clearance.

[hoveringuy]

Engine is out. Going to try to find the E34 oil pan locally this weekend. Also going to try to find the brake booster.

I have 5/8" clearance between the manifold and my 320i booster. I forget exactly how much larger the e30 booster was, but it might fit....

[Elysian]

Engine is out. Going to try to find the E34 oil pan locally this weekend. Also going to try to find the brake booster.