Das Beast: My E30 track / street build

[Mwishlist]

Yep, sounds like an e30. . .

[dvallis]

Spent tonight chasing the brake warning idiot light. Checked all the bulbs, cleaned contacts ... still no luck. Then it came to me. I got over zealous in my weight reduction and optimized out the high brake light.

Some light fabrication later and the 3rd brake light was back. No more idiot lights.

[dvallis]

And, now the power windows don't work. Driver's side was stuck down, so I spent the day driving with a left earplug. At least not totally deaf yet.

Pulled the door cards, since they were going anyway.


And after some internet searching I found THIS unmarked wonder of engineering, right in the middle of the dash. :curse: Of course that's the power window and sunroof reset breaker. Obviously!

[dvallis]

Suspension arrived today. It was a good Craigslistt find. Bilstein / Eibach coilovers sized for an engine swap.

[E30 Wagen]

+1

That's what I did. I went back and forth forever trying to figure out what engine, na vs. turbo, etc. so in the meantime I sorted all the suspension, brakes etc. Yes the car is still slow, but it handles great, brakes great and feels solid as a rock. Now that I found a swap engine, all I have to do is drop it in and go.

I had lots of fun in a stock eta on some bilstein and vogtland springs at my last HPDE... Unless you're actually going to race in a series or something I never get the point of spending hours and hours stripping a car down "because racecar," seems like a waste. Just make sure the engine isn't going to blow up, has solid brakes, tires and suspension and then go have fun hitting apexes and stomping on the gas pedal.

[dvallis]

Unless you're actually going to race in a series or something

I am going to race in a series or something. It's a NASA STx / GTS car.

[dvallis]

So here is some useful information. I combed all the "engine weight" threads, found guys that actually weighed engines, cross referenced to a lot of external sources, threw out the data that didn't make sense and came up with this table. Let me know if you have corrections based on real data (ie. put an engine on a scale) PM me if you want to spreadsheet. Board won't allow XLS attachments.

11/1/15: Updated table with M20 figures from KaMotors M20 turbo kit

[dvallis]

Progress. I found a late model plastic bumper white E30 in good shape at a local scrap yard. Pulled the front bumper, valance and rear bumper myself. Looks like I got in a fight with a really large cat though. Freaking scratches all down my arms from reaching inside the body work.

Here's the bumper cleaned up and valance hammered fairly straight.



Metal bumper removed. After a lot of grief. There was no way in hell for my hands to fit behind the bumper and remove bolts holding it to the shocks. So I took a "Big Pocking Wrench" and beat on the bumper until the shocks extended. It was a 5 minute job then. None of the posts I found mentioned the Big Pocking Wrench step. This is a good shot of an early model valance.



Late model valance in place. You can't see it but the tow hooks are interfering with the fit. I eventually bent them down out of the way.



Final product with bumper in place. I'm missing air ducts, fog lights and a lip. This is only temporary though. I have a 325is air dam arriving Tuesday. Will need to put the early model valance back on instead. No big deal now though. I can pull everything in 15 minutes, versus 3 hours the first time. ;-)

[dvallis]

When a moderator or admin reads this, please move the thread to Forced Induction. Doing an M20 Turbo now, not a swap. - Thanks

[dvallis]

Outside running lights on the new bumper plugged in just fine. Front turn signals were another matter. Had to splice plugs from the plastic bumper into the old wiring harness. Good thing I pulled them from the yard.

Many of you guys may already know this, but for those who don't here's an interesting factoid. If your turn signal bulbs are blown or the wiring is shoddy, the blink rate changes from 1 per second to something faster. BMW engineers used the harness resistance as part of the delay. Pretty clever diagnostic trick.

[dvallis]

Simple project last night. Remove the floor carpet and add to the "for sale" list. So far so good.



Except it devolved into this. FYI, your floor carpet goes all the way under the heater core. Very thorough German engineering but was that REALLY necessary?



Things eventually got better. Everything still works (miracle) and it's still drivable.



On the bright side I removed 52 lbs, so we're down to 2,539 lbs

Floor mats 9 lbs
Glove box 6 lbs
Center console 6 lbs
Dash trim pieces 0.25 lbs
Stick boot 0.25 lbs
Dash 18.5 lbs
Front kick panels 2 lbs
Front speakers 5 lbs
Misc dash crap 5 lbs

TheRealE30 will have to wait for that floor carpet until I do the heater core delete. So far that looks like a real beatch.

[jaywood]

Specs on turbo build?

[dvallis]

Going with the KaMotors Canyon Crusher Kit (no affiliation) It will be a track car and I like what he's done with optimizing for high RPMs. Keeping the M20 because it's light and aiming for 400 HP.

Engine wise I'm going to do ARP head studs, Cometic 0.140 head gasket (~ 7:1 CR vs 8.5:1 stock), gasket rebuild kit (BMW 11 12 9 059 240) and a fresh timing belt. Everything I researched says this will be good for 400 HP all day.

[2mAn]

When a moderator or admin reads this, please move the thread to Forced Induction. Doing an M20 Turbo now, not a swap. - Thanks

Might as well just move it to the Project forum instead :up:

[dvallis]

Yeah. It's a project.

Some days are better than yesterday. Here's some 325is goodness that arrived from UPS today. Had a craigslist Good Samaritan ship it all the way from Raleigh. (Thanks Martin !) Decided I'll pay the karma forward and ship any damn anything anywhere. See my For Sale posting.

Time to make it fit. I think it needs old valance + new bumper + is airdam.