New Guy - '87 325is

[RampageRR]

Hey all. Just picked up my first non-motorcycle BMW about a month ago. It's a 1987 325is with 13xxxx miles on the odometer.

It was a Craigslist find, a Florida/Georgia car with no rust but not running (overheating) and listed for fairly cheap. Seems like it'll be a good platform for a 5-6k mile a year car and occasional autox/track car.

I got it back to the house and after a bit of work, it's now up and running. Hoping the cluster I sent out to BavRest gets here soon so I can get it back in the car and get it out on its maiden voyage.

Next up is swapping out the ebay coilovers for either Bilstein/HR race or Ground Control coilovers and replacing the seats and steering wheel. The cardinal red leather looks good and is in actually fairly nice shape, but it's not really my style. Eventually I'll swap out the diving board bumpers for the newer style plastic (I have no idea what this entails, although I'm sure it's not a straight swap).



Interior after I removed the seat to shampoo out the carpet:

[spiDmang]

looks nice! And welcome

as for the late model stuff, the front end is basically plug and play. only modification required is chopping off the front tow hooks.

rear end is more complicated and requires fiber glassing

[richardb]

Now you need to get some ellipsoids in there!

DIY: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6iU7...j_RiNL9aEPy8w6

[RampageRR]

That's absolutely on my list, probably before the interior to be honest. Thanks for the video!

[RampageRR]

Got the cluster back last night and got it installed into the car. It looks fantastic, except for the fact that the car won't start now. Ugh.

I'm thinking starter at this point, but I won't be able to look at it until Friday or Saturday. I was really hoping to get it out on the road last night to see if the cluster repair would take care of what looks to be either a bad temp gauge or actual overheating.

I don't get anything on crank - just a slight click but no actual cranking or even a louder thunk noise. Since I'm at least hearing a click, I'm leaning towards the starter having taken a dump in the 2 weeks between having sent the cluster out for refurbishing and getting it back in. Do E30 starters go out often?

[Das Delfin]

Test your battery first. If it's been sitting for two weeks the batt is probably dead

[Blake B]

Hope it isn't the starter. I just finished that job on my car. Big pain in the waffles

[RampageRR]

Well, got it up and running. Das Delfin - you had the right idea. I didn't have a chance to look at the car for more than a couple of minutes after popping the cluster in, but the headlights were bright and I had 12v at the battery at that point.

I went back today and looked at it, and the battery voltage dropped below 8v once put into the start position. I put the car on the battery tender for the day and I got it started without any issues a little while ago.

Bad news: still overheats. At least I know it's truly overheating now that the gauges work properly. I'll look at it some more this weekend. I suspect either the fan clutch or a nasty air pocket (not super likely as I've bled it properly and I have heat out of the vents, but anything's possible).

Any other places I should check as far as common causes of overheating on an M20?

[RampageRR]

So over the last couple of weekends I've finally had some time to work on the car. It's no longer overheating, the starting issue has been fixed, and I was even able to put almost 40 miles on it last Sunday.

The overheating was a giant air pocket - I tested the fan clutch and temp sensor, which was all good. I ended up just draining the cooling system and starting over.

The starting issue - found the big cable going from the alternator to the starter was completely corroded and broke in my hands when I went to move it. Ordered the Bavarian Restoration engine cable upgrade kit which replaces that exact cable and a few others and now everything's up and running.

Next on the list is replacing the P/S reservoir and the two hoses coming off of it since it appears to be pissing fluid like a drunken sailor. Parts should be here Friday, so I'm hoping to have a daily driver worthy car by the end of the weekend. Wish me luck!

Here's a couple of crappy cell phone shots of the restored instrument cluster. It looks brand new again:

[Kershaw]

Nice dude. It looks good. Keep the early model stuff! It would look so good if you stripped the paint off the bumpers. Black/polished metal is a really nice combo, and over cardinal? That's just awesome. That driver's seat looks to be in incredible condition, wouldn't be surprised if it was reupholstered at some point. Definitely keep it conditioned or it won't look that nice in a few years. But if you wanted to trade them out for black (the original color of that car's interior) I'm sure you'd have no problem finding someone to trade.

We have an e30 meeting, every Friday night @ 730 at the Starbucks on Cherry Hill Lane and Route 1 in College Park. Right by the 95/495 interchange / Ikea. It's a bit sparse in the winter, but we still get some e30s out.

[RampageRR]

I agree on the bumpers, but I think I'm leaning more towards swapping Euro bumpers on just because the diving boards are excessively large IMO. I'd leave them chrome and it should look pretty good against the black.

I think the seats are still original - looking at the VIN shows a cardinalrot interior, and judging by the rock hard leather, I'd say it is still original. There are some cracks in it, but it does look to be in exceptional shape for being 30 years old. I'll end up either having it reupholstered in cardinal leather, or possibly doing it in cloth/microsuede if that's a possibility. I do like the black on red combo, so if at all possible, I'm planning on it staying that way.

Thanks for the heads up on the meets. That's pretty far from where I am at the moment, but I'll come out there for sure some time this spring/summer. Should have a good bit more progress knocked out by then.

[Kershaw]

That's interesting. Maybe only the 88s got the red carpet. Do you have red door cards as well? I thought it was 89+ that didn't get the full red interior, maybe I confused that with pre 88.

If the leather is hard, soak those seats repeatedly in conditioner every day for a few weeks. My seats looked similar when I bought my IX (although not as plush) and after a few years of neglecting I needed cardinal red duct tape to hold everything together. I just recently redid them and it was a pain in the ass. If you only have a few cracks, repair them now with leathermagic's kit. I really regret not taking care of my own seats.

[RampageRR]

It does have red door cards as well. You're probably right on the year switch as far as the carpets are concerned. I'm actually glad they aren't red on mine. I think that'd be a bit of overload if they were.

I was actually trying to research what kinds of leather restoring would be worth a try. Is Leather Magic a go-to brand? I need to do some more reading to figure out which kit I'd need to buy as I'm clueless on upholstery type work. I'm hoping it's salvageable, so if you think it's worth trying, I'll give it a go.

The front are super hard and have some small cracks all throughout, and the left bolster stitching has come undone, but otherwise they look to be OK.

[dishwab]

I had great luck with leatherique on my e46 seats, albeit those were 15 years newer

[RampageRR]

I hear conflicting reports about Leatherique, so I'm kind of reluctant to try it. I've heard it works really well, and then I've heard that it feels really odd and not like it would normally. I'll look into them a bit more as well, and hopefully one of these kits stands out to me.

Anyone have an idea of how many bottles/kits would need to be ordered to cover the entire car (both front seats and the whole rear top/bottom seat)? I'm guessing it would take more than one bottle.