Another N52 swap attempt!

[Striker01]

Car is running well and I have a couple hundred miles on the swap now. Few small items to still workout but overall extremely pleased with it. I'm getting a brake switch implausible code a lot, need to chase that down and see if I switched the wires at the ECU or something, hoping if I fix that the cruise will magically start working. On some cold starts it will stumble and almost die but runs fine once it recovers, doesn't throw any codes. I replaced the PCV hose but it still does it so I have new VANOS solenoids on the way.

It's amazing how hard this car pulls now, I'm still impressed every time I drive it!!!

Finally got my front panel and plastic bumper back from the body shop, that was a 10 week fiasco. She's still not super pretty but looks way better than the 88 metal bumpers did.



I'm happy with the engine bay, with the exception of the intake. Now that it's driving I'll come up with something better. Also need to figure out AC lines at some point.

[Striker01]

Wanted to give an update after a month or so of driving the car. It runs great and is still a hoot to drive. I replace the VANOS solenoids to try and solve an idle hunt that it does on cold starts sometimes, that didn't fix the issue, I guess its just a "feature" of this engine. The car starts every time hot or cold, just hunts for a few seconds before settling in. I had 22RPD bump my idle speed to 875 RPM, at stock 775 it rattled the car pretty good. That was a huge improvement, so much smoother now. I'm guessing the poly engine/trans mounts are the culprit.

EPAS is great, no complaints with it. Hoveringuy sent me the variable assist based on speed controller for the EPAS and its awesome, so much better than adjusting manually while driving.

The ibooster works great as well. I'm not quite happy with the reservoir setup but hopefully will have an over complicated solution after amazon makes a delivery today. The 2002 remote booster seeps where I tried to attach it to the master, I used some stupid expensive epoxy, for poly, but that didn't seem to fix the problem. Most of the reservoirs that come from other cars are tilted forward due to different firewall shapes. They work but my brake fluid light flickers under acceleration. You can't use the hall effect sensor built into them because they are normally closed as opposed to our e30s. The master cylinder mounted reservoirs also make intake removal more difficult than it needs to be.

I still need to mate the N52 AC hoses to the E30 ones, hopefully I can get that done soon.

I have one major issue that is preventing driving it now. The Lantzfab clutch kit. I DO NOT RECOMMEND BUYING THEIR KIT!!! It fits and really improved the clutch feel and pedal engagement location but their 3D printed clevis is junk or they cut the threaded rod from the willwood too short. Mine failed after about a month and another member's failed after a day. I was in contact with them and they offered to send another clevis but that won't fix the issue. I would believe I possibly did something wrong if 2 of their kits didn't fail in the exact same way.


Here is my clevis.



Another member here.



Here is how little thread engagement mine had, barely more the width of the jam nut. This is with the clutch pedal on a lower plane that the brake pedal, with the pedals even I didn't even want to try and run it.

[Striker01]

Made a new clevis for the clutch. It's not pretty but not bad for a couple hours with a bandsaw and belt sander. It's about 10mm longer than the Lantzfab one and hopefully aluminum threads will fare better. I made it 8mm wide and added 1mm nylon washers and a little silicon grease to prevent metal on metal rubbing. I can't test it until I get my brake reservoir re-installed but I don't foresee any issues.




I never noticed this clevis bolt has the clevis sleeve offset. Strange

[Maxhouse97]

Congrats, the car looks great! Love your persistence. Any chance you could weigh the car?

[Striker01]

Congrats, the car looks great! Love your persistence. Any chance you could weigh the car?

Thank You!

Maybe at some point. The only scales I could use are the truck stop ones. lol

[Striker01]

The brake fluid reservoir sitting tilted forward and causing the fluid level light to flicker was irritating me so with my brother's welding help I finally came up with a solution.

Here is version 1. It leaked from the 1mm walled square tube we used for the hall switch and the top didn't look great due to trying to keep heat down to keep from melting the float. I also had to mount it higher than the fuse box due to the location I chose for the AN fittings on bottom.



Weird side track here. While installing this thing I found myself in about the most interesting predicament I've seen while working on this swap. I dropped a 10mm end wrench and it didn't hit the floor. Didn't think much of it until I went to put away my tools, just grabbed another one to finish up. Couldn't see it from up top so I lifted the car and searched around from the bottom side, still no luck. Finally after wedging my hand in the very crowded area of the frame rail I found it. I probably should've bought a lottery ticket after this, the odds of it dropping through this hole can't be very high. The picture doesn't due justice for how crowded this area is, to even get anything other than my finger tips on it I had to remove a bunch of stuff that was all installed prior to the engine!



After bumping it fully into the frame rail I made a trip to Ace for the smallest diameter magnet I could find and managed to snake it back out.



Back on track. Version 1 didn't work out so on to version 2. Re-designed so float could be installed after welding with sensor mounted to the outside. The switch will work with 1/8" aluminum between it and the magnet. Also put the clutch output on the bottom and moved all fittings outboard. Allowed this one to be mounted lower than the fuse box lid. It's baffled for each output so any one leak will only leak out to 1" above the bottom of the reservoir.

Bonus, my brother was much happier with his welds on this one! Thanks dude!!

[Striker01]

Made a shelf for it to sit and mounted it to the ibooster. Version 1 one was bolted straight to the booster and it was tricky to get installed.



Float switch works great!



Finished product.



Almost forgot. The piece that connects to the MC came from a company in the UK.

[Disterber]

This thread is very inspiring!
Any luck on the cold start idle hunting?

[Striker01]

This thread is very inspiring!
Any luck on the cold start idle hunting?

Thank You!!

I've changed the Vanos solenoids(no help) and PCV hose, the o-ring on the valve cover connection was pinched. It seems to be better but not sure if the hose fixed it because I reset all adaptations and did the valvetronic re-learn procedure shortly after changing the PCV hose. I also replaced all the coil packs, some were original.

[Striker01]

Now that the swap is running and I've put 600ish miles on it, it's time to get things exactly how I want them. Exhaust is hopefully on my final revision, details in the exhaust thread, I love how the N53 headers/supersprint s52 swap combo turned out. Cooling system is almost complete, the last silicone adapter I needed arrived today, I think! Just finished getting AC plumbed and it's holding vacuum.

I used a combination of Z4 stock compressor lines, new soft barrier hose and weld on hose barbs to mate with the E30 stuff.

Pressure side was relatively simple, cut the Z4 compressor fitting off, orient it as necessary and do the same on the e30 condenser side. I think we even used the Z4 soft line, I can't remember, so just 2 tiny welds for this hose. Added bonus the M20 hose used to rub on the frame rail, plenty of clearance with this one.




Low pressure side was a little more in-depth. Had to swap the orientation of the compressor fitting, changed from East-West to North-South and rotate the elbow. So a weld for the new orientation and one for the new barb. To switch the orientation I had to remove the locating pin from compressor. Getting it bolted on was not fun at all but possible.



E30 stock low side hose was re-oriented and the new barb welded on. New soft hose and some heat protection.




I had more pictures of the process but can't find them. Sorry guys.

[Striker01]

This post is another what not to do. Sometimes I should just settle with well enough!

With the electric water pump hoveringuy realized getting heat was a problem sometimes. The solution was to have the tune set to just run the water pump at 20% all the time. That solution works just fine but I wanted to let the ECU run the water pump as it pleases and add a small Aux pump for the heater core for the very few times I drive it when its cold. Hoveryinguy and adam.nonis were kind enough to share the M50 type intake manifold they came up with, with me. Huge thanks to Adam for building it!!

That manifold clears up a ton of real estate under the intake manifold so I decided to clean up some wiring, reroute heater stuff a little neater add an Aux pump. I mounted the "crab box" to the block with a bracket Adam designed then mounted an aux water pump to that. I thought thin walled aluminum tubing would be a good solution over rubber or silicone lines. Here's how it turned out.






This little pump is cool. Only draws 3 amps and is super quiet. It's relay controlled on when the heater core valve is open.




I thought all was well until I drove in cold weather. I got heat without issue but started getting codes for intake air temps. After a drive I parked in the garage and the car idled for maybe 10 minutes while I hooked up INPA and checked for codes. The IAT code was back so I opened the hood a realized that my temps on the intake side were insane. The high temp resin intake manifold was so hot it felt malleable and I couldn't put my hand on the aluminum intake tube. The stock runner part of the intake was hot but not like the stuff further from the engine.

At the same time I changed the intake and heater plumbing I'd also gotten my new headers back from coating and didn't know where to start. I ended up bore scoping the headers, cats looked brand new so no clog there, also the car ran fine so I didn't really think that was the issue.

The only thing that I can figure is that the aux pump moved enough water through the heater core that the radiator wasn't doing anything, all that heat was radiating off those thin aluminum pipes and cooking everything on the intake side. My coolant gauge was normal and the aux fan never kicked on.

[Striker01]

I could've just converted back to how I had is setup before but that wouldn't be any fun and I didn't like the silicone hose crossing under the radiator so back to the drawing board.

My radiator had a pin hole from one of my "upgrades" so decided to just redo it all, this time with all silicone hoses and AN10 fittings for the heater core. With the Aux pump there is no need for the expansion tank to be on the driver's side anymore. I have the heater plumbed on a closed loop to the hot side of the radiator, so the radiator can still operate as intended; heater on or off. The expansion tank will fit in the battery tray, just has to be shortened a bit to clear the hood.





Just a little massage to the M3 beauty cover

[Striker01]

To prevent tons of worm clamps I decided to try out gates heat shrink hose clamps, remains to be seen how they work out. I tried to use pre-made bends wherever possible.

New plan for driver's side, no more super conducting aluminum and hoses further from intake tubing.



This crazy looking piece goes from the expansion tank to the thermostat housing.



Installed





Just need to finish up the small overflow hose and hopefully good to go.