After owning this car for over a year (!!) I'm finally spending some time on the refresh I was looking forward to. This is our second E30, but our first convertible. We just made a move to San Diego from Chicago, so a convertible seemed like the right move ;)
This is a photo from the original sale listing:
We purchased the car from Dale, who happens to run www.unofficialbmw.com. Instead of shipping the car to Chicago, I had it sent to my Dad in dry, salt free Arizona. He took care of it until we made our move to San Diego about 4 months ago.
The car is is generally great mechanical condition. I had trouble passing emissions here in California, but it was just due to some to a cracked intake boot and rotted ICV tubing. Once replaced, we passed without issue.
I'm aiming to get this car back to stock form, looking as fresh as I'm able to afford. Starting from the beginning, my todo list looks like this:
The past week I've really had a chance to clean the car and do some the of disassembly so I can address a bunch of these items in the next month or so. Here are some photos of the progress so far:
In the garage on 14" basketweaves. You can see the pin stripe cracking:
Faded/pitted rear bumper trim:
Faded hood roundel (must be a knock off because it's pretty new):
Door & fender trim removed. You can see a black outline where the trim was, this shadow will get cleaned up. I had good success with a magic eraser. But it'll also get polished with the rest of the car. I'll be doing my best to erase any marks like this so there's a nice contrast between any body paint & trim pieces:
Almost perfect:
Removing the pin stripes with a heat gun and a plastic scraper:
There was lots of adhesive residue left behind:
I tried removing the residue with a few different methods:
1. GooGone -- not strong enough
2. 3M Adhesive Remover -- much better than GooGone, but still too slow of a process and it made me nervous using this on the paint.
3. Orbital polisher -- this totally did the job. But I didn't feel like gumming up multiple pads.
4. The winner? A flat utility razor with LOTS of lubrication (I used some no-rise car wash product). The razor let me scrape off the adhesive. It still took a long time, but I've removed nearly all the adhesive. The rest will be removed when I polish the paint.
Moldy vapor barriers:
Removing chrome trim:
Removing bumpers so I can spray the black trim later:
One question I have: I want to replace the window seal outlined here in red:
But I don't have a clue how to pop out that small corner window. Has anyone dealt with this before?
I'll post some updates as I make progress. For now it's just been lots of exterior cleanup and prep. This is the first time we have an E30 as an "extra" car, which means I can really geek out on getting it into great shape since we don't depend on it for getting around. I'm definitely a newbie, but excited to learn.
This is a photo from the original sale listing:
We purchased the car from Dale, who happens to run www.unofficialbmw.com. Instead of shipping the car to Chicago, I had it sent to my Dad in dry, salt free Arizona. He took care of it until we made our move to San Diego about 4 months ago.
The car is is generally great mechanical condition. I had trouble passing emissions here in California, but it was just due to some to a cracked intake boot and rotted ICV tubing. Once replaced, we passed without issue.
I'm aiming to get this car back to stock form, looking as fresh as I'm able to afford. Starting from the beginning, my todo list looks like this:
- replace wheels with stock basketweaves (done, the replica Alpinas were sold)
- replace aftermarket radio with stock (radio has been purchased)
- replace cracked leather (I've got 4 samples, just waiting to decide which matches the original color best)
- clean/dye carpet
- fix driver side door window rattle (I think I've got a fix for this -- I'll share the trick once I've confirmed it worked)
- polish chrome
- paint/freshen door, fender & bumper trim
- polish paint, it's quite oxidized
- remove pin stripes
- remove alarm (it's got a mind of its own)
- lubricate power windows
- replace door vapor barrier (mold is present)
- replace 13 button OBC, the screen is bleeding
- fix jumper coolant temperature gauge
- replace fog light lenses (cracked)
- clean throttle body & ICV (done, idles much better now)
- lube lock cylinders (really hard to turn, worried I'm going to snap a key)
- replace "corner" window seals in both driver & passenger doors
- clean/lube door/window seals (I've got some squeaks)
- adjust convertible top cover, it doesn't close flush on the driver's side
- Garagistic X-Brace (going to pick this up next week)
- Hunt for any rust (though the car seems very clean)
The past week I've really had a chance to clean the car and do some the of disassembly so I can address a bunch of these items in the next month or so. Here are some photos of the progress so far:
In the garage on 14" basketweaves. You can see the pin stripe cracking:
Faded/pitted rear bumper trim:
Faded hood roundel (must be a knock off because it's pretty new):
Door & fender trim removed. You can see a black outline where the trim was, this shadow will get cleaned up. I had good success with a magic eraser. But it'll also get polished with the rest of the car. I'll be doing my best to erase any marks like this so there's a nice contrast between any body paint & trim pieces:
Almost perfect:
Removing the pin stripes with a heat gun and a plastic scraper:
There was lots of adhesive residue left behind:
I tried removing the residue with a few different methods:
1. GooGone -- not strong enough
2. 3M Adhesive Remover -- much better than GooGone, but still too slow of a process and it made me nervous using this on the paint.
3. Orbital polisher -- this totally did the job. But I didn't feel like gumming up multiple pads.
4. The winner? A flat utility razor with LOTS of lubrication (I used some no-rise car wash product). The razor let me scrape off the adhesive. It still took a long time, but I've removed nearly all the adhesive. The rest will be removed when I polish the paint.
Moldy vapor barriers:
Removing chrome trim:
Removing bumpers so I can spray the black trim later:
One question I have: I want to replace the window seal outlined here in red:
But I don't have a clue how to pop out that small corner window. Has anyone dealt with this before?
I'll post some updates as I make progress. For now it's just been lots of exterior cleanup and prep. This is the first time we have an E30 as an "extra" car, which means I can really geek out on getting it into great shape since we don't depend on it for getting around. I'm definitely a newbie, but excited to learn.
Comment