Meine 1989 325ix

[Big swifty]

My second BMW. Had a moderately rusty 1979(?) 530i years ago as a station car. Anyway, have always loved the 325ix. I’m a diesel fan so never worried about it’s relatve shortcomings compared to the M cars. I picked this up from a guy around the corner. 1989 sedan. He was the second owner and kept really good care of it. I have ALL the service records from day 1 in an organized file. Shweet. It looked pretty good underneath with little or no visible rust. I knew there was some rust under the rear passenger flare I wanted to take care of. A good friend owns a body shop and I wanted to make it a cherry so off it went. Unfortunately, I don’t have any original pictures before it got to the body shop.
Here is most of the restoration to it’s full glory

Insert a clean 1989 Zinno 325ix picture here.

Off with the bumpers and skirts… The horror.

REAR









FRONT







Rear driver’s side




The passenger sill and front door bottom was naturally rough as well. The driver’s side wasn’t too bad.

Driver’s fender needed just a bit of love.




From this…



To this…



I considered bailing on the project, but the low mileage, pristine interior (crack free dash, perfect no-rips comfort seats (I actually found them horridly uncomfortable and swapped in E36 power seats), blah, blah,blah swayed me to soldier on. We purchased an aftermarket fender, a used door and an OE BMW rear for the section we needed.







Getting there.

[Big swifty]

Northeast and other salt-prone regions folks ... Have you checked behind your flares?

[Big swifty]

Some more progress…





Driver side done.





Crappy picture but you get the idea



Passenger side done.







Yummy.



From the booth.









Interior pictures to follow…

[lambo]

croikey

amazing turn around!

[litu]

Awesome project..... i love that it looks soo sweet :)

[davidayeee]

Looks amazing. Can't wait for more pics

[phreshkid]

is that a drywall screw holding the rear bumper trim on?

[MR 325]

Nice save!

[pilotskillse30]

Great Job!

[Big swifty]

So as I said earlier, I found the stock “comfort” seats very flat and unsupportive. Coming from my Vanagon syncro captain’s chairs with armrests, I also missed that feature. I got a good deal on e36 M3 power seats. The drivers bolster was a bit beat up so I dismantled it and used a leather repair kit (Magic Mender). Came out pretty good. I added aftermarket heat to both seats too. My original comfort seats had heat. Not so for the power e36’s.







I thought I saved more pictures of the seat upholstery project. Here is the seat just before the heaters are going in. They adhere with very thin, non-crunchy double stick tape. I despise hog rings. I’ve used zip ties instead on 4 sets of seats that I retrofitted with aftermarket heaters. They hold up fine for me.






E36 console.





Tight fit with both e36 seats and console.




Z3 shifter with lighted ZHP knob. Did the Garagtastic bushing replacement. I prefer the e36 window switches. Going to add the e36 window lockout that I already have as well.



Gonna clean up the shift gaiter/surround. A bit too “poofy”.





Rewrapped, small Mtech2 steering wheel. Oh yeah.




Swapped 6 --> 13 button OBC.



Cluster trim rings.




Still have to put in the digital voltmeter and replace the SI board batteries (econometer not working and tach intermittent.

Turbo next? Car has A/C that I will absolutely not delete. Spoda be a challenge to add FI and keep A/C in the ix.

[Big swifty]

The seat heater switches are visible in the console cubby.



Needs a wash and wax



I need to get the rest of the inserts for the e36 console.

[TehRaydarlover]

Looks awesome, keep up the good work!

[TheTacoMan]

I cant see any pics?

[EyExR]

Killer! I love the last shot big time. Especially with the stock iX wheels on there. Clean and classy.

Care to share the details of the process? Good looking work.

[Big swifty]

Killer! I love the last shot big time. Especially with the stock iX wheels on there. Clean and classy.

Thank you! As stated...needs some cleaning.

Care to share the details of the process? Good looking work.

What part?