Elsa Schneider
..A name fitting for an Alpineweiß Walküre, but I hope to make this Schwarz E30 just as attractive as Alison Doody was in the Last Crusade.
Hey, I'm Z. This is my piece of shit.
A lot of you don't want an embellished story, so I've given you the choice skip this section and feast your eyes on the worst camera pictures in the world. Also, this will be the longest R3v post ever recorded:
[Well, I made a big leap of faith by driving up to LA with the only money to my name to pick up a car which had no history in 2010. All I knew about the car was that it was badged "325" and that it had aluminum bumpers (at the time, I didn't know shit about Super-Etas so I thought I could slap some Euro bumpers on later).
I contacted the seller through craigslist, and was told that he was selling it at a "low" price because the fuel pump needed replacing. I immediately drove up after looking at the DIY.
When I got there, he told me he was a R3v member. I didn't know what the hell he was talking about, so I made my way to the car. He was a nice guy, but the conversation kind of went stale when me and my lady friend just looked at him, dumbfounded when he said, "Are you guys on rev?"
After noticing a lot of body damage, the engine bay became my only concern because it was all I really wanted. After a slow drive with only one decent pull, we made our way back to the guy's parking spot.]
Despite a fucked rear wheel arch, rust in the battery tray cutting a hole under the taillight, a slashed, spraypainted, and partially tucked bumper in the front, millions of dings and scratches, and Jah knows what going on in the suspension department, I drove the car home for $1100. Then, I registered it with the pink slip that the guy received from the PO.
The first thing I did was adjust the e-brake, pull the seats out, and vacuum everything. Unfortunately, my camera is awful, so there is going to be a lot of disappointment in the documentation department.
I then moved on to getting rid of the crappy ASA wheels, putting chrome kidneys in, and replacing the fuel pump and plug wires.
After some spirited driving, I started hearing a knocking noise in the higher RPM range. I decided to change the spark plugs for some dumb ass reason because no one knew what the hell the sound might be. After some strange activity from my DME, I ended up blowing a head gasket. That's why you don't buy Bosch Platinums, but I wasn't lurking on R3v long enough to know. There was also a rumour that my car had some hidden potential, as it was an '88 and had all the telltale signs of being a Super-Eta.
I was pretty ecstatic at the thought, but the car needed to be repaired now. Because of school and work, I had to PAY someone to get the car up and running. A friend of mine suggested someone, who ended up taking his sweet ass time finishing the job, but he did it on the cheap so I can't give him too much crap. The thing that made me hot and bothered was that I could've taken that much time to do the same job for 2/3 of the cost while attending school and work full time.
Oh well. I ended up cutting the job short, as he was taking way too long, and drove my Super-Eta home with a headgasket, new fluids, "i" cam, intake manifold w/ TB, injectors, and a black box ECU. Unfortunately, the idiot who was gloating about his technical know-how never resolved the high RPM ticking.
After a 3 month hiatus from E30 driving, I had forgotten how good the car felt, and decided that I will never sell this car. Unless I'm able to trade it for an '88 M3.
Anyway, I put the Euro grilles and rear ashtray that were sitting on my desk for 2 months in and rejoiced in the amazing cosmetic changes that were occurring. I ordered some Houndstooth doorcards from Florida, and picked up a nice leather seat for the back. Unfortunately, I'm stuck between refinishing my seats in houndstooth or going back to classier tan leather.
I actually have a funny anecdote about OEM floormats. Ok, probably not very funny. My girl decided to get me some mats for my birthday. Because I have a tan carpet, headliner, and rear seat, she looked for tan mats. When we arrived at the dealer, they pulled them out and started cringing. When the parts guy looked at our faces, he started laughing. It turns out that the dealer decided to lump "champagne" and "natural" into the same box. Champagne looks more like green, so that's what we had in front of us. In the end, we exchanged the mats for black. I think they do just fine.
Oh, also, I have a crackless dash and 0 electrical problems. Anyway, I then picked up a S3.73 differential and a short shifter. I was told that it was a Z3 1.9, but after dropping it in it was evident that it was much shorter, and absurd to drive with. So I kept it in, naturally, until I broke it in. I also put in new shocks and springs in the JOM coilover kit. No problems other than noise and ride so far, but I probably should've just gone with GCs coils and adjusters with Bilstein sports.
With all these parts in my inventory, I was ready for Bimmerfest (thank you to the R3v members who liked my rustbucket enough to take pictures);
Something that I made at work for the San Diego crew, as well as the regulars of socale30lifestyle LA:
Leading the charge.
I've had the good nature to beat the shit out of an already beat up E30 at AutoX, twice.
Sean from Autobahn, lurking in Tech.
The second time was a killer, and ended up revealing the issue with the engine. All of a sudden, everyone was an expert on the problem and told me it was either a wrist pin or a rod bearing. To me, it seemed like a rod bearing had been spun due to oil starvation caused by the PO.
So, I got under the car with a floor jack, wood blocks, two jacks, and a semi-empty tool box. I ended up driving down to my mechanic to borrow some torx sockets for the flywheel cover and rented a cherry picker for a day, while spending two and a half days under a car, oil covering the cuts and bruises from taking off the oil pan, raising the car up in 20 different positions to remove it, taking the oil pump out, and breaking the bolts on the connecting rod endcaps.
Well, I found the culprit. Unfortunately, no pictures. :[ It would've made a great one, as the two bearing shells were stacked on top of each other, gold in color, paper thin, with flakes of bearing throughout the engine. I did my best to capture all the flakes, and noticed none in the oil journals. I sanded the crank down a tiny bit, placed all the new bearing shells in, and hoped for the best.
I ended up changing the engine and tranny mounts while I was down there. Writing about it really is a lot simpler, and my stubbornness meant that I finished the bearing switch quickly, but it meant I missed out on SoCalEuro.
Unfortunately, I've started to hear the noise again and am preparing to buy a new crank and possibly have the connecting rods machined and re-balanced. I'm reluctant to, because taking off the bellhousing is another story...
But, I've kept going. I put smileys in, have armed myself with spraypaint, I've kept destroying the crank that I have in there with somewhat (w)reckless driving, and am still making cosmetic changes here and there like putting in a Nardi woodgrain with a wooden Momo shift knob, as well as an "is" lip I picked up on the way to greanthumb's fanastic CarBeQue. Other mods include a KA motors CAI (really recommend that shit), steel-braided brake lines, and other stuff that I've forgotten.
Well, I'm sure none of you enjoyed that, but SWEDDILLIGAF.
I'm here because I love BMWs, and the frienemies I've met online and in person are a good lot.
Also, most recent pics of the car would be here:
I'm not going with the murdered-out look for long, trust me.
Hey, I'm Z. This is my piece of shit.
A lot of you don't want an embellished story, so I've given you the choice skip this section and feast your eyes on the worst camera pictures in the world. Also, this will be the longest R3v post ever recorded:
[Well, I made a big leap of faith by driving up to LA with the only money to my name to pick up a car which had no history in 2010. All I knew about the car was that it was badged "325" and that it had aluminum bumpers (at the time, I didn't know shit about Super-Etas so I thought I could slap some Euro bumpers on later).
I contacted the seller through craigslist, and was told that he was selling it at a "low" price because the fuel pump needed replacing. I immediately drove up after looking at the DIY.
When I got there, he told me he was a R3v member. I didn't know what the hell he was talking about, so I made my way to the car. He was a nice guy, but the conversation kind of went stale when me and my lady friend just looked at him, dumbfounded when he said, "Are you guys on rev?"
After noticing a lot of body damage, the engine bay became my only concern because it was all I really wanted. After a slow drive with only one decent pull, we made our way back to the guy's parking spot.]
Despite a fucked rear wheel arch, rust in the battery tray cutting a hole under the taillight, a slashed, spraypainted, and partially tucked bumper in the front, millions of dings and scratches, and Jah knows what going on in the suspension department, I drove the car home for $1100. Then, I registered it with the pink slip that the guy received from the PO.
The first thing I did was adjust the e-brake, pull the seats out, and vacuum everything. Unfortunately, my camera is awful, so there is going to be a lot of disappointment in the documentation department.
I then moved on to getting rid of the crappy ASA wheels, putting chrome kidneys in, and replacing the fuel pump and plug wires.
After some spirited driving, I started hearing a knocking noise in the higher RPM range. I decided to change the spark plugs for some dumb ass reason because no one knew what the hell the sound might be. After some strange activity from my DME, I ended up blowing a head gasket. That's why you don't buy Bosch Platinums, but I wasn't lurking on R3v long enough to know. There was also a rumour that my car had some hidden potential, as it was an '88 and had all the telltale signs of being a Super-Eta.
I was pretty ecstatic at the thought, but the car needed to be repaired now. Because of school and work, I had to PAY someone to get the car up and running. A friend of mine suggested someone, who ended up taking his sweet ass time finishing the job, but he did it on the cheap so I can't give him too much crap. The thing that made me hot and bothered was that I could've taken that much time to do the same job for 2/3 of the cost while attending school and work full time.
Oh well. I ended up cutting the job short, as he was taking way too long, and drove my Super-Eta home with a headgasket, new fluids, "i" cam, intake manifold w/ TB, injectors, and a black box ECU. Unfortunately, the idiot who was gloating about his technical know-how never resolved the high RPM ticking.
After a 3 month hiatus from E30 driving, I had forgotten how good the car felt, and decided that I will never sell this car. Unless I'm able to trade it for an '88 M3.
Anyway, I put the Euro grilles and rear ashtray that were sitting on my desk for 2 months in and rejoiced in the amazing cosmetic changes that were occurring. I ordered some Houndstooth doorcards from Florida, and picked up a nice leather seat for the back. Unfortunately, I'm stuck between refinishing my seats in houndstooth or going back to classier tan leather.
I actually have a funny anecdote about OEM floormats. Ok, probably not very funny. My girl decided to get me some mats for my birthday. Because I have a tan carpet, headliner, and rear seat, she looked for tan mats. When we arrived at the dealer, they pulled them out and started cringing. When the parts guy looked at our faces, he started laughing. It turns out that the dealer decided to lump "champagne" and "natural" into the same box. Champagne looks more like green, so that's what we had in front of us. In the end, we exchanged the mats for black. I think they do just fine.
Oh, also, I have a crackless dash and 0 electrical problems. Anyway, I then picked up a S3.73 differential and a short shifter. I was told that it was a Z3 1.9, but after dropping it in it was evident that it was much shorter, and absurd to drive with. So I kept it in, naturally, until I broke it in. I also put in new shocks and springs in the JOM coilover kit. No problems other than noise and ride so far, but I probably should've just gone with GCs coils and adjusters with Bilstein sports.
With all these parts in my inventory, I was ready for Bimmerfest (thank you to the R3v members who liked my rustbucket enough to take pictures);
Something that I made at work for the San Diego crew, as well as the regulars of socale30lifestyle LA:
Leading the charge.
I've had the good nature to beat the shit out of an already beat up E30 at AutoX, twice.
Sean from Autobahn, lurking in Tech.
The second time was a killer, and ended up revealing the issue with the engine. All of a sudden, everyone was an expert on the problem and told me it was either a wrist pin or a rod bearing. To me, it seemed like a rod bearing had been spun due to oil starvation caused by the PO.
So, I got under the car with a floor jack, wood blocks, two jacks, and a semi-empty tool box. I ended up driving down to my mechanic to borrow some torx sockets for the flywheel cover and rented a cherry picker for a day, while spending two and a half days under a car, oil covering the cuts and bruises from taking off the oil pan, raising the car up in 20 different positions to remove it, taking the oil pump out, and breaking the bolts on the connecting rod endcaps.
Well, I found the culprit. Unfortunately, no pictures. :[ It would've made a great one, as the two bearing shells were stacked on top of each other, gold in color, paper thin, with flakes of bearing throughout the engine. I did my best to capture all the flakes, and noticed none in the oil journals. I sanded the crank down a tiny bit, placed all the new bearing shells in, and hoped for the best.
I ended up changing the engine and tranny mounts while I was down there. Writing about it really is a lot simpler, and my stubbornness meant that I finished the bearing switch quickly, but it meant I missed out on SoCalEuro.
Unfortunately, I've started to hear the noise again and am preparing to buy a new crank and possibly have the connecting rods machined and re-balanced. I'm reluctant to, because taking off the bellhousing is another story...
But, I've kept going. I put smileys in, have armed myself with spraypaint, I've kept destroying the crank that I have in there with somewhat (w)reckless driving, and am still making cosmetic changes here and there like putting in a Nardi woodgrain with a wooden Momo shift knob, as well as an "is" lip I picked up on the way to greanthumb's fanastic CarBeQue. Other mods include a KA motors CAI (really recommend that shit), steel-braided brake lines, and other stuff that I've forgotten.
Well, I'm sure none of you enjoyed that, but SWEDDILLIGAF.
I'm here because I love BMWs, and the frienemies I've met online and in person are a good lot.
Also, most recent pics of the car would be here:
I'm not going with the murdered-out look for long, trust me.
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