Bmw e21 M50B25 Swap

[dirkvanraalte]

Assembly begins

Finally found some time to start with building and replaced my phone's screen so I was able to make some pictures.













It goes quite fast I have to say. I might drop in the engine in a week or 2.

Only thing I was wondering about was how difficult it is to install an E34 M50 sump in an E21, anybody knows?

I'm still searching for a sump, prices are rediculous I think.

[lukeADE335i]

The e34 sump hangs down pretty low in an e21, so you may need to mod it if your car is moderately low?

Anyway, Pictures speak 1000 words - note the M50 here is mounted at the M20 angle to use the e21 gearbox (and maintain the speedo drive), so if you adjusted the angle of the e21 gearbox to suit the M50, the sump should be more level than in this photo (and give a little more ground clearance), but still would hang down well below the bottom of the radiator support. Note that this is not my car, but belongs to a guy who posts on another forum I post on - he ended up modding the sump and adding a Greddy lower sump which was much lower profile and wider with "wings" for extra capacity from an SR20.

[dirkvanraalte]

Thanks for your reply,

I am aware of that problem but fortunately I joined a rallyteam at my school and already found someone who is going to weld it for me for free. But you are talking about swapping another pan on it? Kinda interesting because I don't have the money to buy the E34 one. Unless somebody here has one for a good forum price? ;)

[dirkvanraalte]

Found some time to refurbish the gearbox, was leakig a little so put some new seals on it.



Also made some bushings so my shifter is completely solid now, I'm also going solid trans/engine mounts so no worries about cracking the shifterplate.



Also sitll looking for a E34 sump but they are rare and expensive...

[dirkvanraalte]

Just bought an oli pan for way too much money but hey I needed it.

Also I'm going solid motor/transmission mounts, so next thing to do is finding some scrap pieces of aluminium and some time at my school to make the mounts.

Should come out something like this:

[dirkvanraalte]

Well finally got the sump and also made the mounts. And found a nice bag of yellow plated bolts. These bolts are quit hard to find overhere but used originally.

I also got a free e36 316i rad, anybody know if these fit well?

[dirkvanraalte]

Engine is in!

I have been quite busy for the last few weeks and now the engine is in!

FIrst fitting without transmission, barely fits!





After that I decided how I was gonna tilt the engine, tried some different motor mounts and stuff and eventually came up with just a piece of steel fron the scrapyard. Piece of cake!:)




Still on the original engine support on the exhaust side, the one I use is somewhat lower so the egine will tilt some more.





Also no need to weld the oil pan in this position.





Now i need to make a transmission mount and have to take a second look at the shifter plate.

Gr.

[CorvallisBMW]

Oh man, you may not like those solid aluminum motor/trans mounts... they are brutal.

[dirkvanraalte]

haha yeah its a little experiment and otherwise i will turn them into some poly mounts, we are able to custom make them at our rallyteam. But it takes time and I just want the motor in.

Also transmission noise is awesome. ;D

[dirkvanraalte]

Well some updates, been busy with a lot of things as you can see.

Assembled the front end, Repaired the front vallance but steel needs to be painted. This is just some silver I had left.





Bought the right intake.





And I started remove some rust from the sills and on the back of the car. Got some work to do here. :nice:

[LowR3V'in]

Hows the radiator situation on that?

[dirkvanraalte]

first going to use the stock 320/323 which is in the front cut out. Maybe swapping something better in but in both cases i'm going electric fan (at the front) for clearance.

[dirkvanraalte]

Still busy in the rear wheel boxes. ofcours the best thing to do is just weld in new ones but I aint got no money for that.

and a front end photo