My 1988 e30 325ix - Garage'd

[15Michaeljoseph]

This honestly made my day. Thanks for the kind words. As I see a light at the end of the tunnel I'm getting excited to actually drive the car again! Flux welder is as difficult to weld sheet metal with as they all say.

It sure is, but nobody's happy until they spend $600+ on a welder and gas. I know I can't justify a cost like that, and my little flux machine does a decent job for what it is. I helped user DasDelphin patch his e30 vert up with it too (pics in his build thread), as well as some fender rot patches on a friend's old Nissan Sentra and a Dodge truck. As long as it holds, I wouldn't think twice... Though I will say cleaning the flux and blobs off the welds gets annoying after a while. Copper backing plates help with the burn through, though, and otherwise it's not too bad or too complicated. Plus, no cylinders of gas to blow up the garage lol. Anyhow, props to you for going against convention and doing it your own way! Good luck with the rest of the car. Sent from my moto g(6) using Tapatalk

[jeenyus]

It sure is, but nobody's happy until they spend $600+ on a welder and gas. I know I can't justify a cost like that, and my little flux machine does a decent job for what it is. I helped user DasDelphin patch his e30 vert up with it too (pics in his build thread), as well as some fender rot patches on a friend's old Nissan Sentra and a Dodge truck. As long as it holds, I wouldn't think twice... Though I will say cleaning the flux and blobs off the welds gets annoying after a while. Copper backing plates help with the burn through, though, and otherwise it's not too bad or too complicated. Plus, no cylinders of gas to blow up the garage lol. Anyhow, props to you for going against convention and doing it your own way! Good luck with the rest of the car. Sent from my moto g(6) using Tapatalk

Thanks man! I really appreciate it. Gonna need to look into that backing plate. The only thing I've found to help with burn through is just turning down the wire feed speed to like a 2.5 or something. Also you're totally right. Cleaning each weld gets so annoying and makes the process extremely tedious.

[jeenyus]

Just wanted to test out the seam sealer before going for it on the crucial spots so I fixed this little rusty area in my driver's side wheel well. I'll paint it black and then I'm sure nobody will ever know. Also I am wondering if anyone knows what the part is right behind the spot I fixed? I took some pictures best I could, but no part numbers to help me.

[s14brent]

oem horn? i dont think i had that tray under mine though....but my car came missing a lot of shit also lol..

edit: nope....i see your horn next to it in one of the other pics....no clue homie

[rzerob]

It's the OBC horn.

[jeenyus]

It's the OBC horn.

So like an OEM alarm system? Or the chime that goes off at freezing temps?

[rzerob]

So like an OEM alarm system? Or the chime that goes off at freezing temps?

The chime is made inside the cabin at freezing temps. Can you imagine driving down the street and a horn goes off when it reached a certain temperature? The OBC horn is part of the OBC immobilizer/alarm. On original equipment you could set your OBC to keep your car from being started until the correct code was inputted to the OBC. If you inputted the code incorrectly three times the OBC horn would go off.

[jeenyus]

The chime is made inside the cabin at freezing temps. Can you imagine driving down the street and a horn goes off when it reached a certain temperature? The OBC horn is part of the OBC immobilizer/alarm. On original equipment you could set your OBC to keep your car from being started until the correct code was inputted to the OBC. If you inputted the code incorrectly three times the OBC horn would go off.

lol! Oh I can imagine it! This is an interesting little part. I'm sure it doesn't work though. Would I cause any issues removing it? Seems unnecessary if it's not working.

[rzerob]

lol! Oh I can imagine it! This is an interesting little part. I'm sure it doesn't work though. Would I cause any issues removing it? Seems unnecessary if it's not working.

I have a 13 button OBC I installed on my ix and never installed the OBC horn and it works as it should without the horn functions obviously. But if you are going to remove it remove the wiring harness to it as well. There is no point leaving it there if you are not going to use it.

[nando]

The chime is made inside the cabin at freezing temps. Can you imagine driving down the street and a horn goes off when it reached a certain temperature? The OBC horn is part of the OBC immobilizer/alarm. On original equipment you could set your OBC to keep your car from being started until the correct code was inputted to the OBC. If you inputted the code incorrectly three times the OBC horn would go off.

Man, almost 20 years of E30s and there's still stuff I didn't know. Never heard of the OBC horn before!

[rzerob]

Man, almost 20 years of E30s and there's still stuff I didn't know. Never heard of the OBC horn before!

I came across one as part of a package deal with the 13 button OBC, stalk, wiring and horn. I passed because I only wanted the 13 button OBC.

https://www.realoem.com/bmw/enUS/showparts?id=1293-USA-01-1989-E30-BMW-325ix&diagId=62_0069

#20 just states it as horn.

[jeenyus]

Tackling the other side of the car (passenger) and I would like this to show clearly why these jack stand should just be removed. First picture is the side view of the jack stand. You can see how the rust found a nice place to party. After removing the plate I found a good amount of rust that will require me to rebuild this corner as well... Blah.

[jeenyus]

Ok, I cut out all the rust and wire brushed the shit outta of it all. That's always fun. I don't think it is that bad honestly. I will have to rebuild the corner even though I really hoped I didn't have to. It's all fine though simply because the angles are easier this time around. Here are pictures of the holes I cut.

[88e30ix]

I'm in the same boat as you with the rust and same locations too! Good job!!

[jeenyus]

I'm in the same boat as you with the rust and same locations too! Good job!!

Thanks man! hopefully this weekend we can get this taken care of. This seems easier than the driver's side. Just some rectangles from an easier position than the others. Hopefully this weekend I can get it fully patched, but i gotta remove that heat shield under there which is a pain in the ass.