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Finally bought an e30! 1989 325i Coupe

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    Finally bought an e30! 1989 325i Coupe

    After about 4 years of searching I finally found an e30 that has what I was looking for! I was looking for a 325i or "is" coupe with manual trans and little to no rust that has less than 170k. This car has no rust on the body but does have a baseball sized hole in the driver floor pan. The only issue was that the car was 8 hours away. With the windchill at around -20 the whole way there it made for a cold drive to Plainfield Illinois from Lincoln Nebraska, but we made it there and back in good time and didn't have any issues.



    The car on the other hand does have some issues that need to be addressed. The front turn signals and fog lights aren't working for some reason, but the biggest issue with the exterior is the m striping on the driver side fender and hood. The fenders and hood don't sit flush together on either side so I will have to figure that out as well.




    The interior is fairly clean with no cracks in the dash and the leather has held up fine for its age. It does need a new radio installed as well as heater/AC work and a new bushing for the shifter. Luckily the previous owner gave me the bushings to redo the whole shifter linkage.




    Cluster stopped at 146k about 3k miles ago.



    I haven't been able to drive the car very much due to my busy schedule and the weather. I was able to take it out for a little bit before we brought it back and noticed the valves do tick quite a bit.



    PO cut the carpet and put a license plate under the carpet to cover up the rust hole.




    Overall it seems pretty solid. Just needs a little work to get it back up to par. My plan after I fix all the small stuff is to lower it a little and get some different wheels and turn it into a daily that still performs great on the track. This forum seems like a great community which is why I decided to join years ago! Hope to learn a lot here and meet some new people!
    Last edited by Slowgan; 01-21-2016, 07:02 PM.

    #2
    Looks like a really solid project to start on, have fun with it! Gotta say, never seen anybody cut up the carpet and make it so obvious that there's a rust spot there, usually see PO's try and make incognito. Shouldn't be too bad of a fix as long as the frame rails don't have any rust either. Nice car overall.
    The fun never ends :-?

    89 318iS
    R.I.P 89 325i coupe
    89 335iC

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      #3
      I would keep the stripes! They're cool. And it would have been smarter for the PO to hide the rust hole because then you'd have an intact carpet. Valve cover looks nice. And your hood just needs to be aligned to fix those gaps


      it's a Kenny Powers quote on wheels

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        #4
        Lol the stripe is perfectly aligned with the misaligned hood.

        Cool start man
        Originally posted by Vokuhila
        I laughed, and then I serioused

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          #5
          I did the one thing you should never do when you own an e30. Pull the carpet. At first glance my heart dropped and I thought this thing was going to be on its way to the junk yard tomorrow, but after getting rid of most of the sound deadening and the loose rust it doesn't look as bad as I thought. The frame has a little bit of surface rust, but other than that it looks fine. I have never welded before so wish me luck!


          Comment


            #6
            Ouch! Good thing you pulled the carpet, looked like at any moment you could step on the gas and the pedal would disconnect!!

            I did the same but mine was no where near as bad.
            Euro Delivery Thread///E30 Project Klaus///COTM August 2021

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              #7
              oof, I'd be afraid to jack that thing up!!!

              good luck in your project. I pulled the carpet on my e30 prior to doing any other work. Best darn thing I ever did.
              If it's got tits or tires, it's gonna cost ya!

              Comment


                #8
                I know that's waiting for me as well. Best of luck!
                AWD > RWD

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                  #9
                  Welp I pulled up the passenger side carpet because why not. The carpet wasn't soggy like the driver side so I knew it wasn't going to look as bad. I wasn't too surprised when I found this hole. Also found one in the rear passenger floor pan but I didn't take a picture of it. So much weight reduction!!

                  Last edited by Slowgan; 03-21-2016, 09:23 PM.

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                    #10
                    Originally posted by Stanley Rockafella View Post
                    oof, I'd be afraid to jack that thing up!!!

                    good luck in your project. I pulled the carpet on my e30 prior to doing any other work. Best darn thing I ever did.
                    I was scared to jack it up too but the frame seems to be strong and rust free except for one small area! The car had been in Illinois for most of its life so I guess the rust is to be expected.

                    Comment


                      #11
                      All of the rust on the floor pans have been fixed! For now. A friend and I took some pictures of the car while I had it out the other day so I thought I'd share them. The paint really cleaned up nicely!


                      I also installed an IS lip and it makes the front end look loads better!






                      I took a picture of the flex disc to remind me not to drive the car lol. I should be getting a new flex disc with a csb and dssr along with new bushings soon!

                      Comment


                        #12
                        Originally posted by Slowgan View Post
                        All of the rust on the floor pans have been fixed! For now. A friend and I took some pictures of the car while I had it out the other day so I thought I'd share them. The paint really cleaned up nicely!


                        I also installed an IS lip and it makes the front end look loads better!






                        I took a picture of the flex disc to remind me not to drive the car lol. I should be getting a new flex disc with a csb and dssr along with new bushings soon!

                        Glad its fixed!! I just bought a new flex disk, I dont even know what mine looks like but since I am changing the diff and the drive shaft I figured a new one was in order.
                        Euro Delivery Thread///E30 Project Klaus///COTM August 2021

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                          #13
                          Wowsers... You can almost "Fred Flintstone" stop by using your feet thru those holes! Lol keep us up on your welding & progress!

                          CAPP :-)

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                            #14
                            dont give up i have seen worse than that fixed good luck

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                              #15
                              Damn, sub'd to see this thing happen.
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