Project Lola: Schwarz 89 325is given a new life.

[HennaE30]

So there’s been a turn of events...

Last week, my girlfriends brother sent me a text regarding a parts car to fix Lola, and long story short, he offered me a deal on a Diamantschwarz 91 318is slicktop shell. Light chassis, screaming to be saved.

That night I dropped by his shop to take a look at it, and as of now the car is verbally sold.

He has do some stuff to get it back in rolling shape for me, which allows time for me to get our other parts car out of here and strip Lola.

More to come soon. Getting Lola from the body shop today.



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[TeXJ]

great update! I need to learn more about electrical troubleshooting...

[HennaE30]

Project Lola: Schwarz 89 325is given a new life.



So she went to the body shop on Monday.

In the days leading up to it going to body, I tracked down an electrical draw that bricked my optima (fortunately they replaced it for free), new alternator and disconnect the aftermarket alarm and viola, no draw.




More goodies came in the mail.







Now to strip down the rear subframe to get cleaned, have the adjuster tabs welded on, and paint. Trying to get a rolling chassis to strip for spare parts from my gf’s brother.



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[TeXJ]

Sweet!!!

[HennaE30]

August 6th is the date.

Just gotta bleed the brakes, see if I can track down the short that has killed the Optima. Got a bunch of parts on order. Not much to add, but fun stuffs below.




Also have a set of braided stainless steel brake hoses and clutch hose coming from Bimmerworld, just don’t have a pic.

All that’s left to buy suspension-wise is new control arms, shocks, springs (might be getting a set of brand new H&R Race’s and camber plates from my dad with the change to SE30), and RSMs.

Planning on rebuilding the stock rear brakes when the new subframe goes in, and I’ll eventually get an RX7 BBK for the front.

Exciting stuff.



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[HennaE30]

Well the body shop didn’t write me into his book after I called him to schedule when it would go in, so he’s another month out. Gonna shop around to see if someone else will do it. If not, a buddy of mine just happened on a complete rolling shell I might take a peek at.


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[HennaE30]

The final push to get the car ready begins today. Gonna get brakes bled and make sure everything is Gucci with the suspension, in case they have to drive it around the shop for any reason.

The thing with this car is we aren’t positive the car is fixable. I sent pictures to the body guy and he said he thinks he can fix it, but he’s yet to see the car in person. If he doesn’t feel comfortable fixing the car, then I’ll likely strip it down, and use it to rehab Henna.


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[laidback93]

Glad you saved her. I can’t wait to see how she looks when she gets out of paint and body.

My baby has been at the body shop for a month. Before that she was at the mechanics for 2 months. I miss her!


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[TeXJ]

looking good man

[HennaE30]

Well not a whole lot to talk about. But the car is supposed to go to body the week of the 9th!

I need to bleed the rear brakes before it goes to the shop, among some other little things, but she’s almost ready to be loaded on the trailer.

Turning my attention to when it gets back from the shop, I got the rear subframe out of my henna car which I’m going to rebuild to put in Lola. Only problem is the trailing arms in the 84 don’t have ABS bungs, so I’ll need to use the ones from the donor car when it gets back from the body shop.

I was also considering what a red parcel shelf and red headliner would look like with Cardinal sport seats and black cards/bench would look like.






For those wondering, the henna car is going to be rebuilt, passing that torch to my dad.

The good news is the car seems to be drivable aside from the body damage. She gets drive in an out of the shop every so often to get something in or out.






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[alistairolsen]

Nice work, looking forward to the bodywork updates.

[HennaE30]

Project Lola: Schwarz 89 325is given a new life.

Exciting update!

The car is mostly back together (just gotta bleed the brakes and put the wheel back on). I called the body shop today who had originally given me the quote on the body work to get rescheduled, and they’re booked a month out. The car is currently scheduled to get fixed the week after 4th of July, but I may ask around some more to see if I can get it done sooner.


In the mean time, I’m probably going to shop around for a set of nice cheap wheels to roll around on for now and/or buy control arms to do my suspension overhaul.

Edit: she’s back on the ground. Now to assess the fluids situation (oil, coolant, etc.) and see about getting it to run correctly.




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[jeenyus]

wtf is that in the tree?! Looks like some shady as cat... but probably a plastic bag on it's way to kill a shady cat via suffocation/choking.

[HennaE30]

So life’s been busy. Trying to buy a house, finishing school. It’s delayed the restoration a bit, but I do have some stuff to report. Onto the good stuff.

The car had a bent rear trailing arm, so I grabbed the one out of Henna for the time being (since she’s been hard parked in light of missing major body parts), and threw it in there. Still have to reassemble the parking brake system, but that shouldn’t be too hard and the car should be on the ground end of week, and lined up to go to body hopefully.

Bent



Vs

Straight



Where we stand now. Everything together and tightened to go to body, just gotta do parking brake.



Some news from today/yesterday. BimmerWorld has an “Powerflex E30 Handling Pack” that includes 80A Poly FCAB, RTAB, subframe and diff bushings, and they had a Memorial Day instant rebate based on amount spent. So we picked up one for the black car and one for Henna.



That gets here Friday. Hoping I can get this diff sold, and I can make some extra money at work to get some coils and other things ordered and get this puppy driving.






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[Zeemz]

My guess is the sunroof drain is split or disconnected, and whenever it rained, it just filled the trunk with water. Will have to investigate further when I’m off work.

Awesome job on saving this one and working on getting it back on the road.

Other spots to check for leaks... Taillight gaskets/seals and there are 3 small grommets behind the rear window C Pillar Vent trim that can fail and let water in the trunk.