IronJoe's back in an e30... 1989 Zinno M3!

[IronJoe]

After four years without a gasoline-powered vehicle, I'm back in an e30!
IMG_2364 by IronJoeT16S, on Flickr


Oldschool r3v'ers may remember my Henna M3, which was taken out by a distracted driver in late 2015:

https://www.r3vlimited.com/board/forum/general-forums/members-rides/337894-tribute-to-my-totaled-henna-m3

iPhone 4 Final Backup 860 by IronJoeT16S, on Flickr

Then, I took the guts from that car and re-shelled them into a cabrio chassis, complete with OEM steel bodywork conversion to replicate the E30 M3 cabriolet:

https://www.r3vlimited.com/board/forum/general-forums/members-rides/the-project-forum/351051-let-s-make-an-e30-m3-m3-s14-cabrio-clone-project

43115108392_1b31ec602d_o by IronJoeT16S, on Flickr

I then sold this car on BaT in 2019 to fund the purchase of a 1980 BMW M1 that never came to fruition. So I bought a Tesla Model 3 Performance (groans from audience). My work-life had changed a lot and I was commuting 3+ hours a day, the autopilot and free charging at work made the choice very attractive.
Tesla_Performance by IronJoeT16S, on Flickr


Like 2mAn, I cannot possibly leave well enough alone so the car eventually got suspension, Supergloss Mamba Green metallic vinyl wrap, carbon front splitter/rear spoiler, and Fikse wheels.
Edit_P3140151 by IronJoeT16S, on Flickr

When the Panini hit in 2020 I was sent home from work and am now a 100% remote worker, so I don't have a commute and basically just drive around town. Mid-2022 I decided to entertain the idea of getting back into an e30. I found a local Mtech1 in rough shape that would have been a great project, but it ultimately fell through my grasp. For a good reason, it would turn out.

Being honest with myself, I really wouldn't be satisfied with anything less than another e30 M3. My Henna car was the best car I've ever owned and I missed the drive so much. So, I started watching the market closely with intent. When the market started to soften in 2023, I knew I had one last chance to jump back in before these were all untouchable at my level of funds.

Enter: the ugliest eBay '89 M3.

110070253 by IronJoeT16S, on Flickr



Listed on eBay for $65,000. I took one look at this car and hated it. A "regular" red after I had owned Henna red? Couldn't do it. The wheels were horrible, ill-fitting, and gaudy. I hate Tan interior. Oh, and it had "10k on a rebuild" listed with absolutely zero additional information. It had only one thing going for it, it was local-ish (Oregon).


After months of seeing very average cars go RNM on BaT, shells going for $20-30k, private party listings for driver-quality M3s with tons of miles listed for six figures, I kept coming back to this ugly eBay '89. I watched it listed time and time again and fail to hit the reserve, and the Buy It Now price kept dropping. When it dropped to $50k I made the call.


I went to see the car and got a chance to look at the owner's paperwork. My heart skipped a beat when I read that this was a fully built 2.5L S14 with serious top end work, aluminum flywheel, and lots of other little goodies. Simply put, the owner didn't know what he had. I drove it and couldn't believe how hard it pulled for an S14 - it felt more like a mini S50! Could I... learn to love this car?

IMG_2123 by IronJoeT16S, on Flickr

I kept my poker face and we struck a deal. I could afford the car, but not the sales tax I owed once I got back to WA which was going to be another $5,000. So I went home and for the second time in my life, I sold everything that wasn't bolted down to afford an e30 m3.


Once the check cleared I took an Amtrak train down to Oregon on a Friday afternoon and drove the car home. The tach was inop, the too-wide rear wheels scraped EVERYWHERE, and the clutch was unbelievably stiff. Other than that, everything on the car "worked" but I couldn't wait to get it home and make it my own.


20231030_111855 by IronJoeT16S, on Flickr

[82eye]

excellent grab !

[IronJoe]

Here's where it starts to get fun. When I got it home, I started putting together my goals for the car as well as going through the history and documentation to see what the car is (and what it isn't! more to come on that).

As for the car's spec, here's what I ended up bringing home:
1989 BMW M3 Zinnoberrot/Natur
203k miles
Clean title, no accidents.
Partial repaint on pass. side due to being keyed
Tons of maintenance and new parts
Evo II front chin spoiler
Evo III door sills
OEM Euro grills
Sparco strut brace
H&R Sport springs/Bilstien sport shocks

2.5L rebuild completed ~12k miles ago by a shop in Portland, OR.
11:1 compression JE forged pistons
Bigger valves 40mm intake and 36mm exhaust
Portmatched head and throttle body flow
Balance and blueprinted block
Grp A headgasket
Aluminum flywheel
Sachs sport clutch

20231030_112009 by IronJoeT16S, on Flickr

First priority was getting rid of the 18" Rotiform wheels. I made a deal with a fellow r3ver and secured a set of e28 M5 wheels. They're almost identical to the 16" e30 M3 Sport Evolution wheels but with a slightly more aggressive offset and look right at home on an e30 M3.

Since this is a 2.5 car, I decided right away I wanted some Sport Evo accents on this car. Starting with painting the centers of my new wheels Nogaro silver.
Untitled by IronJoeT16S, on Flickr

Untitled by IronJoeT16S, on Flickr

Once this task was complete, I had them mounted on Toyo Proxes in the factory-spec 225/45R16. This is a tough size and there aren't many choices but so far I've been happy with the Toyos. Unfortunately since the 18s were a taller overall diameter, putting the correct size wheel/tire made the wheel gap from the H&R Sports that much more pronounced. I didn't like the overly cushy feel of the Sports, so suspension moved further up on my to-do list.
Untitled by IronJoeT16S, on Flickr



Next up was exhaust. This car already had a catless resonated center section but the factory silencer was simply too quiet - I like a little exhaust note to go with my ITB intake sound! I had been really happy with the Rogue Engineering Diablo exhaust I mounted on the M3 cabrio replica, so I ordered another for this car. It's got a nice deep tone without any rasp or drone. Not the greatest pic but I like the dual walled tips:

Untitled by IronJoeT16S, on Flickr



It was about this time that I started digging a little further into the car's history, and found some VERY interesting details about the engine rebuild.

[2mAn]

Damn... I think I need to get another E30 now...

[IronJoe]

Damn... I think I need to get another E30 now...

Yes... Yes you do!

excellent grab !

Thanks! It's been a dream come true and I think I did fairly well considering the current market values. Not a steal, but a solid price for a straight car.

[iansane]

Welcome back to the e30 life. That's a good looking car.

[gone002]

nice work.... i will ingnore the tesla . welcome back to the darkside ! =)

[Panici]

I can see why the E30 chassis called you back after driving a silent tesla.
Yes they're fast but they have no soul. There will always be a faster car.

Talk about a score with that 2.5L S14! I bet it absolutely sings, I'd love to hear it.

Subscribed. Your M3 already looks very clean, excited to see what you have planned.

[moatilliatta]

No place like home. Thank you for removing those wheels! 16" are perfect minus tire choices. Nice score on the M5 wheels and great replication of the EVO wheels! Smoked side markers.. What's Next?

[reelizmpro]

Welcome back Joe. Nice looking car and I'm sure it will turn out better than it was. Did you sell the Tesla?

[IronJoe]

I can see why the E30 chassis called you back after driving a silent tesla.
Yes they're fast but they have no soul. There will always be a faster car.

Right you are. I bought it mainly for commuting, which it is great at with Autopilot and such, but unless you are absolutely stomping on the go-pedal, it isn't fun to drive. The novelty of 0-60 or whatever does indeed wear off and as you said, there will always be a faster car. I don't want to play that game, I'd rather rip around in an old 200hp BMW.

Welcome back Joe. Nice looking car and I'm sure it will turn out better than it was. Did you sell the Tesla?

Thanks Barry! Good to hear from you. I still have the Tesla, although it doesn't get driven much as my wife's car is the "family" rig and I now bring out the E30 every chance I get.

[IronJoe]

Here's the most interesting part of this journey so far... diving into the engine rebuild. As mentioned, this car was advertised as having ~10k on an engine rebuild with no other details. After googling the VIN I found the previous-previous owner and was able to confirm that this was rebuilt to a 2.5L back in 2004, and got a treasure trove of documentation and photos from the car's previous lives.

But digging into the parts list from the rebuild, I noticed something glaringly absent: there's no line item for the 2.5L crank, which is easily the most expensive single part of a 2.5L build. This was a high-end rebuild which cost over $10,000 in 2004 (you could easily buy a whole E30 M3 for that price back then) so what gives? Eager to suss out this mystery, I remembered that the 2.3 and 2.5 crank hubs attach differently. I checked the crank hub and sure enough, this car has a normal 2.3L crank nut, instead of the 2.5L crank bolt. So what gives? It's got way more torque down low, this has to be a 2.5L, right?

The answer, it turns out, is a little nutty. It took some sleuthing, connecting with the (now-retired) owner of the shop who did the work, deep dives into the 20 year old rebuild documentation, and conversations with the E30 M3 SIG members who were around back in the day to come to the right conclusion.

The standard 2.3L S14 has a bore of 93.4mm and a stroke of 84mm for a total capacity of 2,302cc. The Sport Evo 2.5L motor is both bored and stroked, 95mm bore and 87mm stroke for a total displacement of 2467cc, or 2.5L if you follow conventional engine rounding (tenth of a liter).

When going through the paperwork for a previous for sale ad, the description was that the car had been "bored out to 2.5L" and in the specs from the engine builder the pistons labeled as 96.4mm diameter. So my 2.5L engine is actually *not* a stroker like the Sport Evo S14B25, but actually an overbored S14B23 with the factory stroke! A bore of 96.4mm by the factory 84mm stroke yields a total displacement of 2452.4cc, which is *just enough* to round up to 2.5 litres. This revelation was baffling to say the least.

Here's where it gets even more interesting. All the "experts" I shared this information with swore up and down that boring the factory 2.3L block from 93.4mm all the way to 96.4mm was impossible. I was told by some reputable SIG members (I won't name names here because sorry, they are wrong) that 95.5 was the maximum, or else you'd start cutting into the water jackets. And even if you were able to get away with such an aggressive bore, it wouldn't last. Eventually I was able to find out that back in the '90s, Dinan offered a "2.6L" S14 which was a combination of the Sport Evo crank and an overbore to 96mm. Unfortunately other than verifying its existence I have not come across any other details.


Well this car's existence proves them wrong. I have since gotten in contact with the now-retired owner who's shop did the rebuild and confirmed that yes, they special ordered 96.4mm forged pistons from JE for this build and bore & honed the block to match. The reason? This build was completed back in 2004. Sport Evo cranks were not available to US buyers at the time like they are now. I actually got in contact with a SIG member who imported two of the first 2.5lL cranks into the US, and him and his engine builder had to fly to Germany in person to make it happen. So my car was owned by an enthusiast that wanted the 2.5L, couldn't source a crank, and instead kept the original stoke and overbored the block.

This car has now done roughly 13,000 miles in this configuration. While that's not a lot of driving in twenty years, it's got enough miles under its belt for me to be confident in driving it without fear of it blowing up.

So that's it, the story of the "impossible" 2.5L S14.


One of the great gifts I received from the previous-previous owner was photos from the engine rebuild. Here you can see just how thin the distance is between the cylinders.

[reelizmpro]

I've never heard of an S14 with a bore that large, since most don't go that far. I believe most people say that 95mm is the max bore of the 2.3L because it leaves a margin of safety. Besides, why punch out (max overbore) the block and risk it when you can stroke it? BTW, the 87mm evo crank was always available through the right channels and you can use the stock or evo headgasket. What head gasket was used for your engine?

Here's an old link to Gustave's Sonic testing of the the 2.3 block.

https://www.e30sport.net/tech_articles/engine-tech/sonic/sonic3.htm

[IronJoe]

I've never heard of an S14 with a bore that large, since most don't go that far. I believe most people say that 95mm is the max bore of the 2.3L because it leaves a margin of safety. Besides, why punch out (max overbore) the block and risk it when you can stroke it? BTW, the 87mm evo crank was always available through the right channels and you can use the stock or evo headgasket. What head gasket was used for your engine?

Here's an old link to Gustave's Sonic testing of the the 2.3 block.

https://www.e30sport.net/tech_articl...nic/sonic3.htm

Thanks for the link! I didn't intend to sound so snarky but it came out anyway it's just frustrating when people throw around the term "maximum" and "impossible" because they read it on the internet, and if you have evidence to the contrary you must be full of it.


I believe you that the Sport Evo crank could be had if you knew the right folks... but back in the early 00s I doubt your everyday average M3 owner could walk up to the US BMW dealer and get one. From feedback I received from one of the first US-built 2.5L owners, the only way to get a crank other than from a third party import/export in Germany was through Australia. My car's engine rebuild took a year back in 2003-04 with a large part of that time waiting on parts. Or, maybe the PO that commissioned the rebuilt was just being lazy, cheap, or both. I’ll never really know as I’ve not been able to make contact with that owner.

This car runs the Group A headgasket which should bump up the CR another quarter-to-half point from what I've read, so that puts it roughly in the 11.25:1 CR ballpark.

[parkerbink]

Awesome! Congratulations!