Larry's 89 Zinno E30 M3 build

[jhaurimn]

God, I love your car.

I will be watching/stalking this progress thread. Your car is absolutely stunning. The red paint looks so nice. :D Customer service you got from vorshlag definitely doesnt sound pleasant though.

[f50nut]

Suspension arrived from Vorshlag. They are an official dealer of AST and I had the spare strut mounts shortened and built into AST 4100 coilovers. Overall the fit and finish is great, and Vorshlag did a nice job powdercoating the old housings.



Here's everything. Added brand new brake dust shields. You can also see the e28 bearings. Not pictured are the new abs rings pressed onto the back side of the bearing.





Swift springs and Vorshlag plates.



Big fan of these adjusters. So much nicer than dual locking aluminum adjusters.







Rear springs



Old vs new



Rear adjusters







Well this sucks, the allen bolt that holds the rotor on is too soft. I stripped both sides and had to make new allen keys to get these out. Will need to replace these with new, but for now, they're all I have.





Yes I put a jack stand under there ;)



It was 100 degrees that day.



Sorry no pics of the actual installation. Was under a time crunch to get this done. But here's the final result:









Drives beautifully.

Only complaint is that I couldn't adjust the fronts any higher without spinning the threaded tube on the front housing. Called Vorshlag and they blamed this on me, that I must have loosened the gland nut that holds the tube on. That's absurd. I had to go out and buy a gland nut wrench to finish the assembly job for them, since they didn't apply enough torque to the assembly. Another thing, I will have to shorten the front bump stops because there isn't enough travel when I match the fronts and rears. Pretty disappointed in their response after spending so much money on having these built.

That said, I like their plates and this is a great overall setup.

[f50nut]

Im looking to purchase an e30 m3 soon. I am worried I wont be able to find an evo 3 spoiler when I get it. Hopefully I have your luck!

There are some good carbon fiber replicas out there. Not ideal, but better than nothing.

Great build so far. I'm working on the getting my s54 swapped e30 M3 perfect at the moment. Finned diff cover, VAC's BBK etc.
The little things certainly add up but it's fun!

Glad you already know about Guten (great bunch of people)

Where in NY are you located? I'd love to check out the car if you're ever near the south shore of L.I. Good luck on the build over the winter....

Sounds awesome. S54 e30 M3 is a dream car for sure. I'm out in L.I. all the time, my family is out there. Would be great to catch up. PM me.

[*freshm3]

Great build so far. I'm working on the getting my s54 swapped e30 M3 perfect at the moment. Finned diff cover, VAC's BBK etc.
The little things certainly add up but it's fun!

Glad you already know about Guten (great bunch of people)


Where in NY are you located? I'd love to check out the car if you're ever near the south shore of L.I. Good luck on the build over the winter....

[jhaurimn]

Im looking to purchase an e30 m3 soon. I am worried I wont be able to find an evo 3 spoiler when I get it. Hopefully I have your luck!

[f50nut]

Wow, fantastic work & attention to detail. Keep it up!

Thank you :up:

[f50nut]

New undamaged Evo 3 spoiler arrived



So it's off for paint along with some Evo brake ducts I found (not pictured)



Loaded up and ready to go. That's my GF's GTI.



And these finally arrived :devillook

[CorvallisBMW]

Wow, fantastic work & attention to detail. Keep it up!

[f50nut]

those turbofans are amazing. great work

Thanks :D

Looks great Larry! EVO III under trays are pretty hard to find. Glad you managed to find one.

And about that front bumper gap.. Mine has it as well on the driver's side. It's such an eyesore :down:

Thanks, I'm glad I found one too. Was worried after the EVO II spoiler didn't ship out...always preferred this one anyway.

The bumper gap is super annoying. I might try to modify the mounts to pull the bumper in a bit. Levent says it may be due to the car having been towed from the factory hooks at some point, extending the bumper shocks a few mm.

[SteadyAim.]

Looks great Larry! EVO III under trays are pretty hard to find. Glad you managed to find one.

And about that front bumper gap.. Mine has it as well on the driver's side. It's such an eyesore :down:

[Dj Buttchug]

those turbofans are amazing. great work

[f50nut]

Your attention to detail is awesome. Can't wait to see this one through. Where was the car located previously in MD? Just curious.

Thanks a lot. It was near the Silver Spring area.

[M42Technik]

Your attention to detail is awesome. Can't wait to see this one through. Where was the car located previously in MD? Just curious.

[f50nut]

Decided to change directions and build a set of RSs to run turbofans.

With Bimmerfest coming, I was lucky to find this set of RS 212s. They needed a serious rebuild. New waffles, caps were shot. Lips and barrels were shot. Had them shipped directly to Paul Ehrlich for the rebuild.



This is around the time Asim and I decided to manufacture our own turbofans. This will be a large part of what we're doing with our new company, Livery Wheel. See my sig for details.

Using these as our inspiration, we started modeling our own fans, making adjustments where the original BBS fans fell short in terms of fitment. We're also seriously modifying the back side to accommodate big lips and our manufacturing process.













Things got extra exciting when this showed up



Carbon flap for the rear Evo 3 spoiler. It'll have to be drilled to fit, along with the carbon front splitter that showed up.

Since I don't have an original splitter handy, I had to create my own template using the highest quality materials available...printer paper :eyebrows







Test fitting the bumper back on. That gasket on the hood is an Evo 3 one-piece bumper gasket. Also not pictured is attaching the rear end of the undertray to the original S14 splash guard.



...and here's the result. I chose to set the splitter to "nurburging" as per BMW's original ad for the Evo.









All I can say is wow. This is how M3s should look. Completes the front end in my opinion and I swear the nose feels planted. Going over hills at speed the car no longer floats, but dives on the way down.

Adding this uneven hood line to my to-do list.

[f50nut]

Gave up on Turner and the Evo 2 spoiler, and got an Evo 3 undertray and splitter :D

I LOVE the look of this spoiler. To me it completes the front of these cars.



Also decided to run a carbon splitter instead of the OEM fiberglass one.



Installation:



Taking pics of everything so I remember to put it back in the same place

Turn signal bulbs



Fog light harness.



Tucking everything to the side.



Surprised to find an Evo intake trumpet was already installed.



The tray is just a giant piece of plastic. There's a channel along the front edge where you install a rubber gasket. This seals the undertray against the bumper.



I'm hoping this means it's real.



The gasket is just a compression fit, held in by these ribs.



Mocking up the undertray on the bumper with painter's tape.



Test fitting the carbon splitter.



These holes up front secure the front edge of the undertray to the bumper. I'm holding it on with these bolts for now, but they are eventually replaced by semi-permanent plastic pins that are hammered into place.



Undertray installed.



Just drilled through an original E30 M3 bumper. Have some whiskey.