Just another vert. A white one.

[Driftin]

I haven't posted here in forever. Makes me happy that a real forum is still active and is still the best source of information for the e30. Maybe I am old now, but man, Facebook suuuucks. Instagram suuuucks. Anyway, I have had this white 91 convertible for a quite a while now, and it is time for it to get it's own thread for no other reason than I want a place to document my time with the car. I bought this car on Friday April 12 2019 on a business trip down in Phoenix. After work I hopped on craigslist, and bam, there it was. White e30 convertible, runs well, needs some work, slight damage to front end. I went and checked it out, looked alright to me, so met up with the guy again the next day and handed him $3600. Skipped my flight back home to SLC, put the top down, looked at the rainbow overhead and started heading north. Success.
The drive back to SLC is a great way to get to know a car. Wide open space, no traffic, beautiful scenery. Little chilly in April, but that is what jackets are for. Made it back to SLC where I parked it next to it's older sibling the he53 540i.

Over the next few months, it got the timing belt changed, the front ding repaired, and the seats reupholstered. Check out the little euro fleet.





More to come bringing it to current day.

[Driftin]

The car came with a folder full of records and receipts including receipts for bilstein b8 and h&r springs. So that is a good start. The seller also included a new set of ST swaybars and all hardware. So got those installed.

[Driftin]

Chinzy ass ground straps must go. Make your own beefy sealed from the elements one. Replace the timing belt and get some seat covers installed. The seat covers were perforated leather from Lseat. The quality is so so. I probably would try something else in the future. I put them on about 4 years ago, and I admittedly have left the top down in many situations where I should not have, but I am fairly disappointed with how they have held up.

[Northern]

Are the new covers also from Lseat?

[Driftin]

Yeah, they are L seat. I'll have to take some updated pictures of how they have worn. The rear seat bottom leather is failing. I am not the best about putting the top up when I am not driving the car, as it generally doesn't rain very often in the summer out here, but I'd give the quality a solid, meh, it's ok.

[Driftin]

So after getting it running pretty well, I drove it and drove it and drove it for the next couple of years without too much issue. Driveline clunk? meh, whatever. Rear end clunk? meh whatever. Then it began to stall occasionally, and get weird idle, and an occasional check engine light. I forget the code, but it was a mixture code. I traced the leak to injector orings. I pulled the injectors, took them to a local shop who gave them a solid cleaning and flow test before and after. solved my mixture problem, and made er hum again.

[Driftin]

The driveline clunk and the sloppy shifter, and the oil pan leak, whatever. What finally led to the last bit of work, and really gettin the car tight again was a clunk that developed in the steering. That needs to be addressed. So I dove in. The result was a big pile of parts to install. I mean, while you ar in there, ought to do x, and y, and z, and..... My wife loves it when I spread parts around the living room while watching hockey!




I was able to locate the source of slop to the ujoint and flex disc area of the steering column. I pulled the joint and upon further inspection discovered that the rubber flex disc, while soft was ok, but the plastic centering bushing was not. There was slop in the steering column where it inserts through the flex disc into the upper half of the ujoint. There is a small plastic sleeve that slides into the metal upper u joint piece that centers the steering column shaft. The shaft had play in the sleeve, and would knock back and forth ever so slightly (felt more than slightly in the car) creating a clunk at the steering wheel. I couldn't find a sleeve to replace it, and a used ujoint assembly is pricey and who knows if condition is any good?!?! so I went with amore solid connection to the wheel and bought a garagistic poly flex disc. Much more solid connection.

[Driftin]

Along the way, my daughter decided that we needed to clean up the emblem on the trunk.

So i let her at it. We'll keep it like this.

[Driftin]

So, while we were in there with the steering column, I decided it was time to install the oil pan that I have had sitting in a box for the last 3 years or so, and get the cracked JB welded cludge job out of there. It was like that when I got it, and it never leaked too bad! But yeah. Lets get that sucker out and a fresh one in. I used a harbor freight engine hoist. Lifted the engine from the top a bit. Dropped the subframe a bit on the bottom, and held it in place with longer bolts. I was able to clear the oil pump pickup easily, and was very easy to do. People make this out to be a lot harder than it actually is. I used a cork gasket because that is what I had laying around.



Much Better.

[Driftin]

Next on the agenda was driveshaft. So I yanked it out of there. It had a pretty good clunk going on where the two pieces connect, and the whole thing needed to be replaced. So. Texas driveshaft specialists came through... http://www.driveshaftspecialist.com/
Showed up super fast, was around $550 delivered I think? Very reasonable. We'll see how it holds up. But it does appear to have rebuildable ujoints. so that is good. After I yanked the old one out I figured I ought to do the shifter bushings as well since they are accessible. So I ordered up the garagistic rebuild kid and slapped it in. The rear shifter carrier bushing was TOAST. Like completely failed. So, rebuild shifter, install. Install driveshaft.

[Driftin]

And to just about bring us current, I had to replace the rear sub frame bushings. They had also failed, and were clunking. Again, these get made out to be a nightmare on the convertible, and they just aren't that bad. Worst of it is drilling out the prior bushing remnants from the frame. That was the most time consuming piece of the whole ordeal. I used the torch and socket method to remove the old bushings, and they were pretty much toast. The Ireland Engineering bushings went in nice and easy. No pics, but an Ireland Engineering strut bar was added to the engine bay to help tone down the cowl shake. The x brace from garagistic only just arrived, so has not been installed yet.





And, we are ready for a test drive! I headed out to Immigration Canyon which is right by the house. With the top down it got a bit chilly, but the handling on the car was radically improved with all the work completed. The rear end felt nice and tight and composed with the rear sub frame bushings replaced, and the steering was fantastically connected compared to the soft rubber flex disc and play it allowed. The IE strut bar made a huge difference in chassis flex, and the car was overall much more enjoyable to drive.




A few more bits have continued to roll in.

The Garagistic x brace arrived, and I assembled it. Quality looks decent, however I did have to chase the threads on one of the holes with a tap as it was not quite finished from the factory. Really looking forward to the increased rigidity this will provide.



Sitting around thanksgiving with the in laws back east for turkey where it was cold and rainy meant lots of time watching football and surfin the web looking for car parts, and wouldn't you know. I found some. And they are arriving. Pelican had some weird deal on some of the Maxilites, so I grabbed a square 16/7 setup of Alpina reps. $220 a piece delivered. Bam. I am going square, not staggered, because while you can find good tires in 205/50/16, and good tires in 225/45/16, you can't find them in both. And I ain't about maxin out my stance with wide tires, I just want something that is easy to fit and makes the car fun to drive, I went with the 16x7. Oh and did I mention I found a deal on them?

[2mAn]

Its going to look great with those wheels, and Im all for a square setup. Thats a fun cruiser, not a time attack racer. Coming along nicely!

[Mike36]

Following

[Tzantushka]

Looking great.
And looking forward to your thoughts on the X-brace.
Their older bolt together version looked janky.

[82eye]

cool car. nice work. those wheels are gonna transform the look.