From Dad's DD to my new toy... M62B44 swap time!!!

[george graves]

Sub'ed!

[wspellmann]

Forgot to share the steering rack that I picked up at A&J's Auto Parts in Von Ormy, TX. If you are looking for specific parts, ask for Amanda, that woman knows her shit about Bimmers.

Anyway... it's supposedly a Z3 1.9L rack that I paid $150:shock: for.

Can anyone tell by the tag if I actually got the 2.7 L/L rack?

[jpod999]

I started with the exact same donor car, good luck with your swap!

[flyboyx]

praise to you for not installing a stupid cop out GM in your bimmer. where in texas? i assume near austin?

that 540i looks like it was a steal. just the trans should be worth almost what you paid for the car.

those wheels are pretty desirable, but they don't look good on that e39 anyway.

[wspellmann]

Hey everybody!!!

I'm new here, but thought I should go ahead and start documenting what I'm just starting on myself.

A little backstory... I've always loved Bimmers. My first car was an '84 635csi with a 5spd trans and seemingly endless bad thermostats. I loved that car, but I will admit that I treated that car like shit. It didn't even make it 3 years under my supervision. Fast forward a few decades and you'd see me in an '06 E90 325i with a 6spd. Was a good car, but I wanted more so I moved on to an '08 135i AT(sciatica in 3rd pedal leg at time of purchase) that showed me how fun boost could be and how bad run flat tires are for a bad back.

About 8 months after buying the 135i, my leg stopped hurting so fucking bad thanks to a good chiropractor and I missed the third pedal. So on it was to a low mileage Sparkling Graphite '08 E90 M3 6MT. It took me about 1/8mi to decide I was going to buy it after my test drive. I was in LOVE. That M3 and I had some great times at Texas World Speedway and Driveway Austin.

Late last year I was having a 'spirited' drive with my best friend and fellow track fiend. He was in front of me in his '10 Camaro SS and his rear tires threw up some pretty heavy debris. One of the rocks was big enough to chip the paint down to the metal, so I got the insurance co to pay for a front end respray. They did a such a good job on the paint that I started to not drive the car for fear of messing up the paint. I went to one HPDE at TWS after the respray and ended up leaving early because I just didn't want to damage the car out there. I put less than 1000miles on the car in a 6 month period and I was paying over $160/month on insurance for it.

Then, about a year ago, my dad got his own 135i to replace his 88 325is with 255,557miles (at least that's where the odometer stopped back in 2010). That little M20 is still chugging along after at least 300k on it.

Anyway, I bought my dad's E30 with the intention of doing an LS swap until I started having trouble finding an engine/trans locally. So I started looking into M6x swaps. Within 2 days I found a '97 540i 6MT on craigslist for $4500.

I contact the guy who immediately responds saying the car was totaled two days prior due to a blowout on I-37. He said after he was done with GEICO, he'd sell it for $1000!!! DEAL!!!:shock: And since the car was less than 15miles from home, I got it towed home for $100.

Here's the donor and the recipient immediately after the tow truck drove away...



Hopefully those wheels can be refinished properly. All four tires are pretty much brand new (less than 2k mi), and I figure if the wheels get back to their previous glory I can get my initial investment plus extra by selling them. Too bad 19's don't really work in E30s.

Anyway, as of now I have the 540 in the garage up on stands with the wheels and tires in the back of my truck ready to go get fixed up.

I've also been inundating the engine bay of the E30 with Simple Green Heavy Duty every few hours in advance of cleaning the bay up a little before pulling the M20 and Getrag out. Still need to go get the engine lift from my dad's house though.

More updates to come, stay tuned!