Glad you got those fuel lines sorted... 1984, that's a car fire waiting to happen with a 40 year old fuel line.
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'87 BMW E30 325is Turbo
'99 BMW E36 M3 - - - '98 BMW E36 328i -
I am not looking forward to diagnosing leaks with my install experience, but that's for later. I ended up dinging one of the lines on the 4 seasons evaporator since I didn't brace the expansion valve enough. Sigh. Now I've got both old and new evaporators at a local shop to see if the new one can be repaired, and if the old one is usable after flushing. Live and learn I guess. Interestingly enough the old evaporator fins were in much better condition vs the new evaporator fins. Though that may be because I pulled harder during the new evaporator removal in my panic.
Line was quite the trooper. I'm just finishing up my rear brakes + the evap hose cover install before I tackle engine bay fuel lines. Very surprised I did not burst into flames any time during my ownership.Last edited by raymang; 05-21-2024, 07:37 PM.Comment
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Miscellaneous Trip Prep (contd.):
While I wait for my AC line grommet to ship and AC belt to be delivered, I set about finishing the rear of the car so I could raise the front. Until then the AC parts will stay in their box (mostly).
Rear brakes & evap cover (25 May '24):
Got the rear brakes finally wrapped up with Pagid pads and Centric blanks. Local bolt supply store came through with some nice yellow zinc pieces, and they do stick out like a sore thumb but they work and I'm glad. Swapped out the driver side hardware too and adjusted the parking brakes with the star adjuster and the nuts inside the cabin in 1 fell swoop.
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Evap cover came in, though one of the studs snapped because I didn't fit the cover up properly before tightening. This is jank as all hell, but I used JB Weld to cover up the hole and fill it in. Will it hold? Idk, but I'm keeping it as a note in my Notion journal as a possible pain point. Caused by my own idiocy of course (as a lot of things are), but when I can properly strip this car and fix it I will.
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Front brakes (25 May '24):
I've always had a rattle in my front driver brake pads and thought it might be because the spring clip fell out. Confirmed it.
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Now I'm kind of in a fix here because I do want to fix the rattle, but I also don't want to throw away perfectly good pads and rotors (there's 0 lip on the rotors and the pads look to be ~75% life left). I do have a set of Bosch pads waiting, but I could also look to saving them for when the fronts actually need changing. Dunno what I'll do.
Oil leaks (25 May '24):
While getting the old compressor out I decided to peruse upstairs along the engine block. Seems the headgasket may be original, it's seeping along the middle cylinders. My oil level has remained rock steady in the time that I've owned the car, so I'll leave it as-is. When it gets worse I figure I'll swap the engine out anyways to an N52 or K24 alongside a manual swap.
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How is the AC install going? I got mine working and leak free, but I wouldn't say the temps I'm seeing are ice cold. In stop and go traffic with 95-100deg heat it's pushing air in the 60s which is acceptable, but also needs to be run on full blast to keep the cabin reasonable.
I'm curious what your results are, my hot climate isn't helping but I think the turbo being so close to my AC line is what's really causing my lackluster performance.Comment
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I've been super tardy with my updates, but the install's done. I was tracking down a leak since the AC blew cold the day I refilled the system, then started blowing warmer each day after. I chalked it up to warming temps at first, but a cooler day rolled around and the AC wasn't much cooler than ambient so I stopped using it there and then. Tracked it down to a connection at the expansion valve, re-tightened it and the system blows much better even with lost refrigerant. I haven't gotten vent temps so that's still pending. Currently i don't know how much refrigerant I'd lost in the 2 weeks from initial fill so I can't give a full review, but the initial (non-leaky) system performance seems better than what I was seeing during the first system fill. A bit peeved that the shop said they'd find the leaks if there were any and they did not check the interior, even after I'd left the whole glovebox disconnected for easier viewing.
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With this I'm still kind of paranoid my connections from the expansion valve to the evaporator are leaky, but I can't go back and recheck without evacuating the system. So fuck it, we ball. I attached the valve with the evaporator outside the car, I think I'm good.
AC install (25 May '24 - 8 June '24):
Removal of the AC lines and other paraphernalia in the engine bay was easy. AC Solutions' video was quite descriptive and the car also came apart easily so that was a bonus. I did note that my air vent fender liners were badly cracked, but they're NLA so I'm going to be on the lookout for a partout close to me.
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Stupid condensor fan grommets were captive so I had to slice them in half and super glue them. AC compressor came off with no issues, and I didn't break the adjustment star. Nice little spare stash for the future.
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Note to self: cut the interior insulation foam if you want to take out/insert the evaporator core without excessive fin bending.
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During the subsequent evaporator removal/install I ran into my first major issue. When installing the R134A expansion valve I did not brace the valve enough when tightening the fittings, resulting in a kink in the tubing due to being made from aluminum. Great. Had about 2 days worth of delay while I had a local shop try and repair the new evaporator for me. Bent some more fins during removal so that was nicer still. Thankfully my fine motor skills were up to par and with a thin flathead I was able to mostly straighten out the fins as best I could. Not ideal, but it would do. The shop also flushed my old evaporator core so I'll keep it as a spare.
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Having learnt my lesson, we came to reassembly. Just the reverse of disassembly right? Evaporator and expansion valve were assembled outside the car so I could get ample bracing before being put back in. I still cringed every time I heard a fin bend a little, but it's in now. Used some weatherstrip caulk to seal the cover and buttoned the interior up (mostly).
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Moved back to the engine bay, and this grommet was a massive pain in my ass due to space constraints in the interior. Still, got it in eventually. Condensor went on with no issues, and the fan still worked, good stuff.
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Compressor was in, and the lines went in with little fuss. Thankful, because I'd had enough messing about with the interior.
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With that I'd completed the install and went to get the system filled. I did have a leak that was not caught by the local shop I went to, so out came the tools and I got to fastening. due to the angle of the valve with the evaporator cover, I wasn't able to get both my adjustable wrench and regular wrench in there to tighten. So I used 2 fingers instead. Tightened the fitting a bit more and ran the AC system for a few days. No more green dye, so I'm hoping that saga is closed. Still waiting to get the system re-filled because I'm planning a trip for August and most of my money has been going there instead. Figure I'll get it refilled in the last week of June. Until then I'll hold my review on the performance of the system.
Last edited by raymang; 06-23-2024, 03:35 PM.Comment
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Fuel line replacement (22 June '24):
Finished the fuel lines in the engine bay finally. Think I've gotten all of them in the engine bay (FPR -> hardline, injector rail -> tee, tee -> cold start injector). Didn't do the fuel filter -> tee as the hoses were date marked 2016 as that was when the filter was replaced. Also couldn't do the charcoal canister lines as they had the Oetiker clamps on and I ran out of hose. So I'll leave that for another time.
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And fascinatingly enough, my hose from 1984 showed no signs of dry rot or surface cracks. Amazing, I'm keeping this as a souvenir. Maybe when I roadtrip I'll bring this along as a spare haha.
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Rear brake re-do and subsequent issues (22 June '24):
Not much to update between the completion (mostly) of the AC swap and the rear brake job (again). I thought I'd be able to handle the uncoated rotor life, and I can't. Got some Zimmermanns ordered and installed. Much better.
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I also readjusted the parking brakes, and now I've got an odd noise. Quick, rhythmic slaps. Goes up and down with speed, but at max volume the slapping cannot be heard past a certain speed. Doubly so if the windows are closed, you cannot hear it at all. Have driven the car ~100km since the noise started, but nothing out of the ordinary is present.
I'm thinking parking brake related, so I will look into disassembling the whole rear end (again sigh) and seeing what's up. I gave up after 11am since I had skipped breakfast and was getting hungry. When test driving I did pull up the parking brake by 1 click to see if the pitch changed, nothing. Though I did hear a metallic ping and stopped in the parking lane immediately. Checked the road and could not see anything that had fallen out the car. For the amount of issues I've had with adjusting parking brakes, I'm also thinking to just hit up my local Euro guy and dropping the car off with him. I fucking blow at adjusting parking brakes for some reason.
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