Socal 325is build aiming for M-Tech 1 glory

[calvino]

Jun 4, 2023:
Dove into the timing belt and tensioner replacement with my roommate. I was also taking the opportunity to replace all of the coolant hoses, some of which were soft and sticky (from oil contamination I presume?)

Old hoses coming off


The old belt was starting to show signs of rubber aging. Glad I got to it in time! Note the rust color of the "coolant".


The thermostat revealed itself to be completely broken in the open position. Perhaps this is why the car would take forever to warm up.



Here is where the car would end up sitting for awhile as the job started to snowball.

[calvino]

Jun 7, 2023:
The next stage of the project while I had the front apart was dropping the subframe. This way I could tackle 3 big items, the massive pan leak, the non working power steering, and refreshing all of the front suspension components. I picked up the engine support bar from HF and got to work. In hindsight I probably should have just waited to replace those motor mounts.

First I got the support bar setup:



Rented the ball joint separator and got those bad boys loose.


Subframe came out with relatively little drama!



Look at all that lovely sludge!

[calvino]

Jun 8, 2023 - Jun 13, 2023.

With the subframe out of the way I was free to drop the pan. With no real service history on the motor I was curious to take a peek inside.



Got the pan all cleaned up. Found a replacement level sensor at the Sun Valley LKQ. Replaced all of the seals and cleaned up my new to me level sensor.


Traded a breakfast burrito for this windage tray on FB Marketplace, not sure who made it (Ireland Engineering?) but the fitment was so bad I didn't want to chance it. Not all of the mounting bolt holes lined up so no way I was chancing their crank fitment. Ended up selling it.




Pan is back in place with a fresh cork gasket. Sadly no windage tray.

[calvino]

Jun 10, 2023:

While the oil pan saga was going on I also enlisted the help of a friend to help me rebuild the front control arms with new bushings and ball joints.

Start


Balljoints from 1996 so must have been the second set.


Used an angle grinder to chop off the ball joints so I could press them out


Had to machine some pressing tools on the lathe to get the arm to sit right in the press. Used press to put in the new Lemforder ball joints. I used 96+ E36 M3 control arm bushings.


I had decided to do the job myself to save the money of buying new arms and to ensure I got a good brand of ball joints, but this job sucked. I accidentally pressed one of the ball joints clocked the wrong way, damaged it unpressing it and then had to buy another one and redo. If were doing the job all over again I would have just bought the damn arms.

Jun 16, 2023:

Finished out the front bushings with new upper shock mounts and dust caps.

[reelizmpro]

I don't know what they run these days (they were less than $100 each for Lemforder, IIRC) but I always just change the entire control arm for peace of mind. It's such a critical component and you don't have to wonder if an arm is bent or cracked.

[calvino]

June 10, 2023: (Part 3)

Concurrently with the oil pan and control arms was the subframe and rack work. Cleaned all the oil sludge off the subframe. Then I hunted around for a 2.7 LTL Z3 rack to replace my leaking E30 rack. Tried to find a good deal on car-part, but ended up caving got one off eBay for around $250, picked up locally at some seedy dismantler in Artesia. Nevertheless it was in good condition and did not leak. Paired it with some new E36 tie rods, and sway bar bushings. Since the Z3 rack doesn't use the overpriced lock washers that the E36 racks do I used Loctite and borrowed the tie rod end torqueing attachment from Auto Zone. I used the rack spacers from Garagistic to mount the rack and I placed them on top.



For the lines, I did some research and came across this post, big ups to raj who revealed that I could just get a new stock e30 line and swap the ends, which worked well. No bending of lines needed.



June 16, 2023:

With the Z3 rack swap I needed to shorten the steering linkage. I used Garagistic's kit and I wish they had used Zinc plated hardware for the bolts so that it doesn't rust down the line. I also took the time round off all of the edges of the universal joint yokes with a file so I didn't run into any binding issues on the car. Truthfully I'm not sure if the filing was necessary as universal joint binding is typically as result of too-large or mismatched angles but I didn't want to take my chances and have to clearance it on the car. I also ended up replacing the rubber steering giubo since mine was starting to crack. The factory ones are just a rubber piece riveted on but the BMW replacement part has metal crush sleeves pressed in so you can bolt it up, which you can see in the pic below.



June 17, 2023:

Paired up my rebuilt control arms with the subframe and, ready to go back into the car.



And, back into it's home

[calvino]

June 13, 2023: (Part 4)

With the bottom part of the engine off I took a closer look at my oil cooler lines and realized I could spin the fittings on the rubber hose. Didn't think these were supposed to be swivel joints .


Took one look at the cost for new replacement BMW oil cooler lines and decided it was too rich for me, so I took them to Mesa Hose in Costa Mesa, where Brooks took care of me. I think they primarily deal with boat hydraulic lines but these were no sweat for them. They cut off the crimped portions, welded on some male JIC fittings and crimped up some new lines with matching female JICs. Turnaround was a day I think. I don't have a great pic of the lines but they're in the pic below. Ended up working great and cost me less than $150 to rebuild both.

[calvino]

June 16, 2023: (Part 5)

While the subframe was off, I had really good access to all of the nuts on the exhaust manifold. So it was time to clean those up and replace my sorry looking exhaust gaskets with torn and floppy heat shields.


June 18, 2023:

Also was a good time to replace all the plugs with some fresh NGKs. It's NGKs or nothing!

[calvino]

June 20, 2023:

Sent all of my injectors out for cleaning and flow testing. All of them cleaned up well except for one with a 45 degree offset spray pattern. Hmm, perhaps that was the one I dropped on the floor. Anyways I ordered rebuilt one off of RockAuto. Also replaced the FPR with new Pierburg one.
Reassembled my fuel rail.


Jun 22, 2023:

Replaced the fuel filter. Old filter was a Ford Motorcraft part ??? and it was installed with the flow direction backwards.



July 5, 2023:
It ended up pissing fuel. Learned the hard way the need for using motor oil to lube up the injector o-rings on install. Ordered a new set of o-rings from The Injector Shop, which also came with much better pintle caps than my rebuilder used (those were loose). Lubed those mfs up and reassembled a second time. Thankfully no leaks this time.

[Mike36]

[calvino]

Picking up where I left off:

Jun 26, 2023:
Day of discovery. Did some digging under the car, found the foglight wiring and it was operational. Also figured out the unmarked button by the headlight controls them. Great success!




















Jun 29, 2023:
Picked up a correct fog light for the cowcatcher:


























July 11, 2023

Decided to tear into the rear strut mounts. In the process I discovered the root cause of the rear left clunking noise over bumps!
[YOUTUBE]https://www.youtube.com/shorts/5nd82A0dgt4/YOUTUBE]

Completely separated carnage. What I don't understand is why the PO changed the struts and springs without bothering to change the rear mounts.

[calvino]

July 16, 2023:

Time to finally clean the gross carpets. I pulled the seats out to gain access. I rented the small extractor vacuum from Home Depot and used Folex with some drill brushes.

Before, note the gross stains.



Progress being made!! I pulled the seabelts out too so I could suck all of the dried sweat out of them.


YUCK


Passenger seat had some rust on the frame so I sanded that off and touched up that area. Piecing together the rust and carpet stains, my guess is this was from a soda spill.

[calvino]

July 17, 2023:

Finally figured out why car does not rev to correct redline. When I bought the car, it only revved to 5500 rpm. Car also pops if you let off the throttle around 2500 rpm. Now, I know why, it has a Super Eta DME in it .



I also picked up another cow catcher in better shape with intact factory brackets and the rest of the fog light parts I was missing.



July 18, 2023:
Roommate picked up an E46 M3 so we are now a 3 BMW household.


July 19, 2023:
I installed my fog lights and then went for a little drive and photoshoot with my roommates.

[calvino]

Jul 22, 2023:
After replacing all of the burnt out bulbs in my cluster, I realized that my ABS light has been on the whole time. Did some digging into the symptoms and I realized I should start with the ABS relay in the dash. It is internally fused and often blows during jumping the car. Sure enough mine was blown. I re-soldered it. ABS light off but now it turns on again as soon as the car moves.



Next, I dove into the sunroof. One of the parts guys I buy from was trying to tell me these are a nightmare to fix and I should just take it to Tijuana to get it fixed but I wanted to try it for myself. My sunroof will not fully open, it just makes a loud clicking noise and stalls out. First order of business was figuring out how to manually crank it open with an allen key. Then I removed the vinyl sunroof headliner.


Diagnosed! Gear was stripped. Shopped around on eBay for a used replacement and ordered one. The ones listed under E28 are cheaper than the ones listed under E30. Probably in better shape too.



Jul 23, 2023
Fixed up the vinyl sunroof headliner. Used San Pellegrino to repair this time instead of my favorite Michelob Ultra :)

[Northern]

Replaced the fuel filter. Old filter was a Ford Motorcraft part ??? and it was installed with the flow direction backwards.

Classic "WTF PO" moment.

Learned the hard way the need for using motor oil to lube up the injector o-rings on install.

I don't what the correct way is, but I always spit on them. Just seems natural really.