cameras ready prepare to flash

[s14brent]

So cool to see these long term projects still liven their best life… one of these cars of mine will finally hang around….someday lol

Hopefully I'll still be here to find out what car that is! You've had some really cool cars though! I've just dove too deep to want to start over on something else!! (especially for a seat-time car, and occasional cruiser) I mean its only do-able if i purchased a semi-built (already swapped/caged) car that can take its place for track duties, but what's the fun in that - its kind of bad for my mental health because I will most likely tear it down regardless and go over everything again anyways, because unfortunately a lot (not all) of those cars are kind of slapped together haphazardly! btw i still have that back seat i got from you!!

-------

I managed to get some wrench time on the e39 wagon this week. Decided to finally throw the tie-rods in.




That second picture is the I/O tie rod bottomed out of adjustment....its about 1/8 toe out, so I think I'll be cutting some threads off the inner tie rod just to have that extra adjustment down to 1/16. The e39 feels night and day difference in steering response, so I actually might want to just leave it to be honest....also the increased steering angle feels great, for such a long car i can bust u-turns in front of my house now. I went ahead and ordered a m14x1.5 die in case I do decide to cut a couple threads off the inners though.



I went ahead and ordered 8" 10k swift springs for the rear. I really didnt like the idea of the springs dislodging every time i jack up the rear end. In all actuality...i really just probably need some height adjustable rear shocks (like BC's) however i fucked myself by having 60mm swifts on all corners, when BC's use 65mm springs. I'm really hoping someone on the e39 touring groups might have some for sale second hand since some of those guys prefer the SLS air setup in the rear and buy the touring kit just for the fronts.

-------

E30 content:

A videographer I met at our local drift events has been hitting me up to do a video shoot for MONTHS now. Our schedules just never lined up, and well I decided I should really do it before the car goes up on jackstands for maybe months.....



it needed a wash pretty badly......




my good friend ended up showing up to my house as I was prepping to leave to show me his new brixton wheels on his 992 turbo S - even more happy the video will have him in it tbh! really shitty how much traffic there was that night though.....I hope he got some good content LOL

[2mAn]

So cool to see these long term projects still liven their best life… one of these cars of mine will finally hang around….someday lol

[s14brent]

burnt myself out on friday....decided to throw in the welded 3.46 into the touring. Every bolt was absolutely caked up in crud, super messy job in the vegas heat.



so if you noticed....input flanges are different size/length.....buyer swears its the M/T flange from a late model 530i, but how would an A/T driveline fit onto a ZF320.....its a bit annoying since I did not source these parts myself. (bought the e39 half way through the MT swap!)

smaller flange that was on the original diff:




newer welded diff:




whatever.....swapped the input flange over and threw it back together. I did not remove the cores and check pinion resistance this time around....at least i know I have a good spare on the side if ever needed. Thankfully the BMW/GKN axles still look great. I added some SLG axle spacers and extended bolts since I've had luck with that same setup on the e30, these were actually the same size as the ones on the e30. I also took this time to finish up some welds on the exhaust since the night I did the vibrant muffler was windy and I think that's when I killed the 75/25 gas.



while i had the car up on jackstands I decided to drain the trans and refill with Redline MTL. The 18mm external hex fill plug was stripped.....that's not how i remember selling it, so I tried to find somewhere local with one and ended up ordering one online. I did hit the plug on the bench grinder.....i got a 17mm socket to fit pretty good, so removal will be easy at least

Unexpectedly I found a listing on good ol' craigslist. 17x8+18 ASA AR1's 5x120 74.1mm hub for a ridiculously cheap price for the whole set...



I've been wanting straighter spares for the e30, but I can also use these on the e39 when I decide to take it to a local event. Win-win....I had a full set of accellera 651 sports taking up space in my storage so I hit up the mobile tire homie to help swap them over and dispose of the old rotted tires it came with. I decided to get it done right away because I was already thinking about dropping them off to get refinished and powdercoated, plate is a bit full right now and i'd rather test these out first before dumping money into them like I did with the style 32's. for some reason, 17" 5x120 wheels have been sparse and people want $1500 for a set of style 32's now days, so these will work out perfect as spares hopefully!

[s14brent]

Nice bench. Bought myself a manual swapped E39 the other week too, E30 to 5 series pipeline is real

hahaha congrats!! what motor's in there?

-----

It took me a few days to wait for some tools to be delivered. I felt like the pinion preload was incorrect since the PO swapped to a MT input flange. I ordered a sub $100 dial torque wrench and 6pt 30mm socket to measure.




I'm really glad I did because it was reading 0.3 and after the slightest budge tighter its now reading .08 (spec is 0.6-0.8).These next pics are just to show the c-clip measurements (3.76 R and 3.72 L)



I cleaned up the crown gear bolts and threads and used some LOCTITE 271. I think 270* is the correct one to use but 271 is what i've used with my e30 diffs and I've never had an issue.




New Corteco axle input shaft seals




reinstalled - here's where normally i would do some backlash reading but without different thickness c-clips, the step is only asking for information that would bother me in the future. E39's don't have a diff cover gasket from the factory, and literally link you to a bottle of bmw RTV. I replaced the fill/drain aluminum o-rings and threw the gasket maker on to set.



-----
I fired up the lincoln mig and got to finishing welding up the gaps and all the back sides i missed last time (when i ran out of wire). Only thing i need to weld onto the trailing arms now are the secondary caliper mounts. I'll have to move the e30 and take some measurements and create a jig of sorts for that. I think I may move onto the front subframe next though!




- -06/19 update- -

did some more welding last night. almost forgot about these damn boomerangs on the the trailing arms



and I finally moved on to the front subframe. The condor front subframe ball joint reinforcements are meant to fit e30/e36/e46 apparently. I ended up cutting them up and fitting. they were thinner than every other reinforcement plate iirc 14ga.





now i can safely say the only thing left to weld is the secondary caliper mounts then I can finally move on to prep for paint. I will be using eastwoods rust encapsulator (bought 4 cans on sale during fathers day) and will probably pick up VHT all weather epoxy paint as a finish.

[econti]

Nice bench. Bought myself a manual swapped E39 the other week too, E30 to 5 series pipeline is real

[s14brent]

not a real car update but figured i'd just do a garage update dump. I spent maybe 3hrs in the garage this past week due to work schedule. Not a lot of progress, hoping to finish up the subframe(s) and trailing arms this week though. I got my 12lb spool of L-56 .30 wire.
While at work I ended up talking welders with a friend and we both came to the conclusion that the primeweld mig180 and tig225x are a helluva bang for the buck esp since that tig already comes with a badass CK torch. I end up scouring marketplace/offerup for them but apparently there was a fathers day sale going so he already placed his order for new machines, and meanwhile I found myself a really good deal I couldn't pass up on SMH!! I'm really just trying considering down-sizing maybe end of this year so I will see if this can replace my lincoln, if it doesn't work out, I can make my money back for sure! - I really like how the primeweld machine has post-flow so the weld just doesn't suck in contaminates. This will also give me a chance to un-f*ck my e39 exhaust with er309l and helium trimix.


this led to the whole "why am i still running drier plug receptacales, and made me swap out a few plugs to make life easier (without extension plug adapters 10-30p to 6-50p) and most importantly I'll be able to take advantage of the 50a breaker its on!

My CK torch finally showed up mid week.

Fast forward to Harbor freights parking lot sale this weekend. I wanted a designated table to tig on.....I need to kind of figure out garage layout still, but this works for now, the table does have legs, but I set it up in desktop config.

I picked up my e39 spare diff between work gigs on Thursday. Didn't crack it open until Saturday though.

I also found out that none of my c-clip pliers would work for the e39 (or e46) diffs that use that chonky 90mm c-clip. I actually found this one off amazon and the reviews were pretty bad, but they showed up and worked perfectly.

After talking with a buddy of mine, he gave me the class on welding diffs at his place. I'm pretty stoked, i used rise fab shops locking differential plates and I think it came out great!!


Hopefully more car updates soon, but I do feel every once in a while i get into these tool/garage mod posts.

[s14brent]

I am not a welder but like you I weld stuff. I cannot weld in Vegas 110*, Phoenix 110 + or Inland Empire 105* summer heat. My concentration falls off. I wear all the protective gear mostly because of skin cancer concerns so I am impressed with your welds in those conditions. In talks with certified welders, I asked how they deal with a mistake or ugly weld. Answer, grind out and reweld.

thanks man! it's honestly pretty brutal. I drank maybe 6 bottles of water doing those parts.....i'm pretty ecstatic with results shown, i know theres still room for improvement, but the last few times I tried to use my mig they came out TERRIBLY probably due to being windy days and being under the car on jackstands, but theres maybe 2-3 welds that i want to grind down and rehit (mostly the first set of welds done). And yeah, its really crazy how fast you can feel dizzy behind the welding mask respirator & sleeves. (not fully geared up) Most of this was done at night at about 95°, I can't imagine 110°, kind of why i'm trying to get this step done now. I still don't know how i'm going to line up the secondary caliper mounts without the wheel bearing/rotor/calipers mocked up like last time....I might have to mock something up to bolt down all 4 bolts in place while I weld it. I'm also a little bit worried about how it's gonna go with er309L doing the mild to stainless bits on the exhaust (o2 bungs/can lambda) as I really need to practice when my new tig torch arrives - i haven't touched the tig in like 3 years unfortunately. Also is it crazy I kind of want a 2nd mig machine just to use this bottle of helium tri-mix I have sitting. I definitely know that I won't be getting a refill of the stuff since i have the tig but it could definitely help out doing the under the car exhaust stuff. I don't want to just zap it with er70s like a muffler shop would. All this garage equipment takes up so much space and money, but I really enjoy doing everything myself.

[OSAH racing]

I am not a welder but like you I weld stuff. I cannot weld in Vegas 110*, Phoenix 110 + or Inland Empire 105* summer heat. My concentration falls off. I wear all the protective gear mostly because of skin cancer concerns so I am impressed with your welds in those conditions. In talks with certified welders, I asked how they deal with a mistake or ugly weld. Answer, grind out and reweld.

[s14brent]

well i finally started to do some welding on the e30's new rear subframe+trailing arms. it's been quite the journey just to get here I'd say LOL. Last post I had just purchased a new tank of 75/25 which was much needed. I didn't mention how I tried to start practice tig welding when I found out my chinesium torch had bit the dust. It actually split in two places. Lucky me.




Well, a new US made CK 17 torch/hose/dinse plug combo set me back right under $300, and i'm still waiting for it, so that's fun. I decided I should fit up and tack all the reinforcement plates sooner than later.



Most of the inner plates (nearest to the diff) had to be bent or trimmed to for a nicer fit.

the gusset by the abs sensor was a pretty poor design, so I had to cut the 90 degree corner out and give it a little bend so it could fit up nicely.



The rear sway bar mount went on nicely (i've tried to fix this photo link, not sure why it won't show the update)



Garagistic boomerangs are always a pain in the ass to bend to fit....(its even worse because i'm actually mounting them a bit higher than normal due to DTM adjusters...) I will have to work on that slowly whenever I have more time.



Stim-tech rear shock reinforcement looks lovely. I'll have to finish this one up as well but it does definitely weld better once its heated up.





rear diff mount







and that's when this happened:


just ordered another $70 worth in consumables to continue next weekend. Overall happy I finally started doing this, but its very HOT here and I'm going to have to split this between day and nights. Even though there are some areas that aren't the cleanest, i'm pretty proud as I'm definitely not a a welder, but i'm happy with these results.

I think Thursday (next week) i'll be picking up the spare e39 diff. So on Saturday I might plan to clean that out and prep for welding as well as finishing up the rest of this job.

[s14brent]

Be easy to make that fitting in a lathe, brass is so wonderful to work with

i'm gonna have to ask around....my local buddy who usually makes stuff for me is out of the country for like 3 more weeks BUT I have kind of a bad taste in my mouth from the lack of support i'm getting from that company already, i'd rather not run any of their products and just maybe do a tank swap and call it a day.....I just gotta make sure I start each event with a full tank and i'm fine. I'd still like to relocate the fuel filter and make some of those lines -AN in the rear if I can.


I had this baffled REMUS 3.5" exhaust tip from a beat to shit exhaust. I already talked to a friend about some welding so I had him try to salvage this piece for exhaust 3.0 on the car.

I got lucky and got a chopped up early production syncro-design mid pipe. I didn't know the early production units were just mild steel, however it made it a lot easier (cheaper) to get back to a usable state.



all welded up


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I've been ordering different consumables and even ordered another angle grinder (air) just because prep has been so excruciating in the las vegas 100°F+ weather. I'm weird and didnt want to run the garagistic RTA reinforcements again so I ordered the SRS kit and Stim-tech rear shock reinforcement. Turns out the SRS kit won't work with how my trailing arms were shortened to run the MRT DTM kit so i'll be running the garagistic boomerang afterall.







I actually ran out of 75/25 gas for my mig, so I had to drive 40min away to go swap a bottle out. There are closer places but the one 40 min away charges like 55% less (kind of insane and totally worth it). I also bought myself new tig torch (furick) gas lens kit to start practicing again. Clearly I have a lot of welding projects in my future, and I would love for everything to have wayyy nicer welds this time around.

So the problem with running 318ti rear TA/hubs is that the hubs are +20mm more than stock e30 hubs and +17.5mm more than z4 hubs on e30 TA's. That means if I wanted to keep all 4x e46 325i rear calipers (and functioning parking brake) i'd have to upgrade to a rear rotor that has the same 294mm rotor but with the hat to match the increased hub offset. Luckily this was easy to find by just searching for "318ti rear brake upgrade" and all the info was on SRS-concepts site. So I ordered up some zimmerman rotors from FCP. I could not find if my caliper adapters will be the same, but I can always add a couple washers and longer bolts if I need to order new adapters after I mock it up.




------

e39 touring update:

turns out 525/530i tie rod assy is the same thread/pitch as e30/36/46 which means i can add a little cheap angle to it since I have some old tie-rod spacers for the e30.



I also sourced a 530i 3.46 188k open differential out in socal that already has the MT input shaft flange swapped out on it. (e39's are annoying like that, AT/MT have different length input shaft flanges on the diff and 2 different sized drive shafts of course) So it's kind of a pain trying to find this combo in a face-lift e39 right out of the box basically. The plan is, he'll actually be bringing it out to vegas in 2 weeks, and I'll just pick it from whatever hotel he's staying at on the strip. I already bought the weld-in plates for the diff, and another pair of SLG axle spacers. I'm sorry I can't help myself, I have to slide it.



What's brilliant about all this is I'll be able to swap it back if I hate it or am planning a longer road trip with it but I do want to try and have some fun with this thing while the e30 is down, so this is kind of a high priority suddenly and then I'll start actually working on the e30 slowly again.

[econti]

Be easy to make that fitting in a lathe, brass is so wonderful to work with

[s14brent]

I finally registered the e39 touring at the dmv this week. I just have to wait for the plate in the mail finally, I didn't realize they don't keep the non personalized 1982 rep blue plates on hand anymore. Basically left with another moving permit LOL!
I haven't been doing much work in the garage recently, but I did replace both VL2020 batteries in the keyfobs and now keyless entry is working again.



oh and I also got euro corner lamps and replaced some crusty bulbs. I also did something ghetto and noticed the new OEM diffuser wasnt clicking in really well into the bumper. I actually dabbed some silicone and propped it up to set after noticing that after this picture.



-------e30 content?!?!-------

I started to clean up/prep the trailing arms and rear subframe for reinforcements. It made me realize I wanted to run different designed TA reinforcements this time around. Since the MRT/DTM style mods make the outer arm shorter, the garagistic gusset style doesn't really fit without chopping it up. I wanted to run a bar style that welds on top and below the pinch this time around so I ordered the SRS reinforcement kit JUST for the bar. Since I don't like the garagistic or SRS shock mount reinforcements, I ordered the stim-tech version which imho is the best available. It's quite ridiculous, but I really want this set to be the last set I do for this chassis.



I think* this is a mix of garagistic & condor reinforcements.



Meanwhile I have put any turbo plans on the back burner AGAIN. I would rather have a better sorted version of my current car. I'll be reposting some old pics here for a refresh, but there are some new things in the mix. I have part of a chopped up syncrodesign midpipe that should be arriving next week. I'll be hopefully practicing tig soon, but I'll be making sure to extend that piece and add 2x o2 bungs for the stock o2 and can-lambda. I am thinking about adding a vibrant super-quiet resonator after the o2's on a flange or v-band and just running straight ss pipe out the back.







hm....I couldn't find a picture of my spare front subframe that i've had laying around for at least 4 years now OR the stimtech rear strut tower reinforcements. I'll probably pull it out of storage this weekend. The front subframe already has the normal reinforcement kit components welded on there (swaybar endlink mount, motor mounts, & the gusset under the mount), I will be adding the ball joint reinforcement from condor "while i'm there". I've got quite the laundry list of things to do this next step. I plan on getting a new bottle of 75/25 and a second bottle of argon for a purge setup. I want to drop the gas tank finally to inspect and at least at minimum relocate the fuel filter up into the trunk and have that rear section -AN and maybe 1 or 2 bulkheads in place..

I tried to setup a 034 motorsport FP34 fuel surge tank with a bosch 200 fuel pump. Turns out they don't support the 044 replacement (bosch 200) and really just expect you to find a used 044 or china rep to use with it. I have to figure out if i can use the bosch 200 in a different setup now. I ordered 3 different fittings already and unfortunately none of them are the answer I needed. I basically need a longer M12x1.5 F to M10x1.0 M. I reached back out to them and its just crazy to me that they have 0 interest in making the newer pump work with their product. whatever....i should have gone with a radium or nuke setup from the start. The fitting i'm having issues with is the brass fitting in the photo below. The check valve (silver) fitting shown on the pump would be removed. I've gotten close but the distance is wrong still.



I may take this to a friend to see if can machine something one-off for me.



Oh, and here's some pics from a local meet i dropped by last week. I'm feeling sad that i know car will be down for a while and I'll most likely miss the next 2 events. I still need to consider in costs for dyno time/tuning and getting a tow to my alignment guy at the end of this next big step.

[s14brent]

--more e39 content--

I was missing this right rear trim, thankfully they are cheap and still available unlike a lot of the other wagon interior bits. I'm mainly missing a touring rear bench seat and LR door panel in black, but at least the door panel should be easy to find.



I wanted to add something to change up the look of the car to be a bit more aggressive. I am actually not super familiar with whats available for the e39 m5 bumpers and ended up ordering a cheap ebay lip that was shipped from socal (so i got it in 1 day).
Fitment was actually decent, but the finish was horrid. I had to fix the bumper bracket anyways so it was a good reason to have the whole bumper off again.


time to do my favorite thing, sanding (sarcasm). Luckily it didn't take long with some 320 and 400 grit. I probably should have done a pass with 600 at the end tbh



Unfortunately I'm not going to wait a week+ to get a bottle of SEM trim black, so I used a bottle of rustoleum satin black that was laying around.



and finally mounted up.





Next up is getting the rear windows working...really hoping it's nothing too expensive since both sides can definitely add up! TBH it might be a while before I tackle that..i'm just patiently waiting for my appointment at the DMV to register this already! Once I can get it registered I can park it on the driveway while the e30 is being worked on - which is the huge part.

-----05/03 edit-------

I ended up ordering a new metra radio harness, there were some issues with the old one (multiple loose pins). I also ended up thinking it was a speaker issue (which it kinda was).....PO had installed some audiobahn speakers in super chopped up housings.....decided i'd rather have paper stock speakers for now (pulled an uncracked set from the junkyard - first time going in what seems like forever) and eventually i'll upgrade to some bavsound door speakers. Also, the audiobahns were just lightly twisted and e-taped of course. I left the tweeters in for now.



I got the window regulators in. I actually was planning to go with bremmen parts via fcp euro for lifetime warranty, but the RR side was not in stock and $50 more than the lemforeder version that was in stock at ECS, so i ordered one from each place.
Tell me why the lemforeder was a different design regulator and had me confused for a bit.



^ This was the L rear with bremmen parts replacement.
v this was the R rear. safe to say they were both proper f****d


While all the door panels were off, I added some glue to the pockets in the door cards and had them clamped in place overnight. They are often loose and rattle unfortunately, pretty much a perfect opportunity to do 3/4. Meanwhile my 30 day temp-tag has officially expired, and my DMV appointment isn't until the 15th. I'm pretty happy with the progress made within the 30 days.

[s14brent]

We'll hopefully be there for a speccy if the holiday timeline matches up, if you see two aussies with freshly grown beer guts come say hi. Rabid for it, they seem like great events.

hell yeah. have a great time out there!!

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had a bit more time to work on the e39 this week. the rear sway bar refresh came in. Right Rear end link was separated.



They are not super fun to change, 1/4 turn at a time with 2 wrenches - hands were hurting the next day from something that should be a lot easier to just swap imho. Also on the LR I screwed up and with the ultra thin 16mm wrench I somehow knocked the blue retaining clip off the bushing.....I spent like 45 min trying to get it back on until it basically deformed and was unusable. To just get things moving forward I used some safety wire and will just keep an eye on it.




I got the Turner metal sway bar bushing brackets and tossed the factory aluminum ones away. These are a bit overpriced imho, but I didn't want to take my chances modding up a 7 series RSB bushing bracket in case I end up going poly (i guess there are some fitment issues with that combo). I just got some febi bushings to pair along with it for now.




I really wanted to put the mtech rear bumper diffuser on, and i kind of hated the muffler that was on there. I ordered a flat black vibrant single tip muffler, but ended up ordering the wrong part # on accident and got the 3" vibrant exhaust vs 2.5" (1147 vs 1146) and due to just time constraints decided to make it work with a reducer. Turns out the APR muffler that was on there had some cracks in the muffler so it was time to ditch it. Unfortunately my welder decided to fight me all day long with the wind, welds look horrible but its on there and no leaks afaik. I will need to buy another bottle of 75/25. I think I may still replace the little bottle resonator with an ultra quiet vibrant resonator in the future so I will redo the whole rear section again in the future, but for now i'll try and drive it more - so far its been much better!





I decided to get the car smogged finally the next morning. It passed with no issues! My DMV appointment isn't until May 15th, looking forward to getting this thing plated already!



I have been complaining that the e39 steering feeling a bit heavier than i recall, i thought maybe it was because of the smaller 350mm wheel on there, however a larger wheel wouldn't make it feel THAT much better imho. I then remembered the e36 m3 had a restrictor built in the high pressure hose, and that the e46 restrictor is in the banjo bolt. Super common for the drift dudes to delete the restrictor with no issues. Confirmed the banjo part # is the same between e39/e46 on realoem and decided to give it a go!




I took it for a quick drive and it feels SOOO much better. I guess its more sensitive to steering inputs and not as sleepy - I wouldn't describe it as "too light" either. I'm glad I did this because I got to dump a lot of the mystery PS fluid and help flush out the system little by little. I really do think the PO put the wrong PS fluid type in. I definitely want to drive it a bit more spiritedly now!.Unfortunately I did not go to the 04/20 auto cross. There is a bit more testing/dialing in needed. I didn't think a half day was worth the prep/drive/money and will go when the car is a bit more dialed in. Truth is, I need to do a trans fluid service on it - i don't know if i mentioned it but the detents are starting to go and the 5th gear lean is sometimes present. I won't be pulling the trans to do that now, but in hopes to feel cleaner shifts I'll put in an order for some Redline MTL and I'll do that before I start changing focus back to the E30 which is basically after this is plated.

[econti]

no, i have a few local buds going out there though that will be drifting. I am curious to see the track layout in Barstow though! If they have events there more often that is a quick drive! I honestly haven't had time to even think about the e30 lately, and I need to get back to finishing up the the welding on the 318ti rear trailing arm setup and reinforce the spare rear subframe and get finally get an alignment before I drift the car again. Probably won't be doing any drifting until night events start. I'm planning to hit the local scca/auto-x on the 20th hopefully! I'm actually thinking about tackling a few other things "while i'm there" but its already super hot in my garage. Its been over 100°F a few times this month already!

We'll hopefully be there for a speccy if the holiday timeline matches up, if you see two aussies with freshly grown beer guts come say hi. Rabid for it, they seem like great events.