The many gremlins of a Rusty 88

[Rusty88e30]

Hope someone can Help/Has any input on this,

As the title states I have a Rusty 88 e30 that has some serious gremlins/issues. Its actually my younger brothers but I help him with working on it. The car is probably the roughest and most beat up e30 I've ever seen. To start, there is a rust hole in the front right fender, sunroof, and two large holes in the trunk. Next multiple wires are cut across the car. The previous owner chopped up the battery cables and installed an electrical box with a removable fuse as an "anti theft measure", but my basic multimeter skills say otherwise. The brakes are super spongy. Suspension is shot and the front control arms are missing both ball joints and rattle at low speeds. I've urged him to junk it or use it to donate the drive train into a better shell but he is hell bent on at least keeping car running for now. It currently is not running due to the cooling system having totally failed. Long story short I've looked that over enough to determine that the water pump and fan clutch failed and thankfully no additional damaged occurred. As for the rest of the car, I've looked it over enough to have a good idea what has to be done mechanically to make the car at least safe/run, but I am totally stumped on the electronics. The car drains batteries overnight and I suspect the alternator and butchered battery cables are in part to blame. I also noticed the OBC is always on even with the ignition off. With the car off the screen says "---UHR", I'm sure I'm misinterpreting it but that is what I see. Fuses 12 and 23 keep blowing, and the relay for the low beams is also bad. The radio is bad but I checked the harness and it is getting 12v. Also the speedometer stopped working. Setting aside all the other issues the car has, I've decided at least to look further into the electrical gremlins. If anyone has any experience with these issue or something similar please chime in, any advice is welcomed!

[tomstin]

WOW! Sounds like you have your hands full with this project. Agree on sorting the electrical gremlins to at least get the basics of the car functional. First, find your wiring diagrams here: http://wedophones.com/Manuals/BMW/
Then, purchase to good multi-meter. Pulling fuses should help you isolate which circuit is draining the battery.

Where are you located? Maybe a local member would be willing to lend a hand????

[Rusty88e30]

tomstin We are out in the southern Virginia area Hampton roads. Thanks for the link! I have the Bentley manual and I've been trying to write out everything on the circuits that are inoperable and go from there. And yes certainly is a handful doesn't help I have my own my own project that I am overhauling the suspension on :/

[mike.bmw]

What's the goal for this car? Daily driver? Fix and flip?

Before doing anything, I'd pull the interior (and get underneath) to make sure the rust is something you are prepared to tackle. If not, it's not worth your time fixing anything else.

Sounds like the wiring may be a challenge, but pulling the interior will help you trace the wires throughout the car.

Some cluster issues can also be related to a bad SI board (or bad batteries in the SI board).

Regarding the OBC, pull the radio and OBC to check the wiring behind that. I wonder if a PO spliced some wires incorrectly installing an aftermarket head unit.

Hopefully the safety/mechanical fixes will go smoothly once you get passed the other stuff. Good luck!

[Rusty88e30]

Basically my brother has owned the car since July 2018. Only paid a 1k and it’s a auto with known rolled backed odometer lol. In the past three years, he drove the car hard despite myself and a dealership telling him to at a minimum service it timing belt water pump etc. but he didn’t listen and that’s when the cooling system blew up. We had a body shop I trust look the car over and the estimate to correct the rust was right at 5k. So for now I’m not sure what he wants but I agree about the interior. The dash and the door cards are mint despite the rest of the interior being non existent. And it’s gives the added benefit of making it easier to search the electrics. For the OBC it wasn’t working when he bought it he replaced the fuses and I discovered the radio wasn’t even wired up, I wired it up and that’s when the fuse blew. Checked the radio with a power supply and it fired up no issues, also it was a ancient pioneer unit from the late 90’s. For now I’m just helping him “tinker” with it every now and again with the hope it will at a minimum be road worthy.