Decided I should probably stop putting off doing a write up for my car. It’s been about 8 months since I dove into the first phase of my project, and I keep telling myself I’ll just write it later. So here we are.
My hope in writing this is to keep a log detailing everything I do to the car, not just for personal satisfaction when looking back, but also in case the info can help someone else. Never done a write up like this so hopefully it’s decent to read. Kind of torn between doing this as a scientific style write up or a narrative. Guess we’ll see where this lands.
Part Zero: My First Mistake
I got this car back in early 2021. I was a freshman in college who decided that his pockets were too heavy and that engineering courses hadn’t gotten hard enough yet.
After months of browsing the local car listings and seeing one too many rotting S chassis, I found a listing on Facebook marketplace for a 4 door late model in delphin metallic and instantly knew it was the one.
I ended up scrapping together every last cent to my name and bought the car. It was far from perfect. It had no AC, the car would shut off if I turned the blinkers on, it knocked on a cold start, and the headlights would somehow trigger the ABS. But it was mine, and I thought it was the coolest thing ever. I named it Hilde, short for Hildegarde, after looking up cool old German names (I was a bit naive at the time but looking back I could’ve picked worse).
I drove it every summer when I was back from school, wrenching and doing small fixes to keep it running. I learned the ins and outs of the ignition system, became a pro at diagnosing a gunked up idle control valve, and cleaned out my fair share of rats nests. I also ended up replacing the melted motor mounts and the exhaust (which had about an 8” long rust hole???) in my college apartment driveway.
By 2023, the engine knock got so bad that it wouldn’t go away when warmed up. On top of that, one day while parking at my apartment, I drove too far to the left, so one of my wheels was in a dip, causing the car to rest on the oil pan, giving it a decent sized crack. So I deemed it too risky to drive and decided that I would learn to rebuild an engine, but I wasn’t ready to dive in (engineering classes turned out to be pretty hard!). So I parked it up in the barn back home, and there it sat until Summer 2025.
Part One: Barn Find (Unfortunately Mine)
After moving back home from grad school, I got bored of the LinkedIn 9-5 job search, and needed to find an out. One day, I wandered out to the barn, and there it was in all of its rusty dusty glory: my beloved E30.
After giving it some gas and starting it up, it was immediately apparent why I had forgotten about this car in the first place. The engine knock was horrific. I never did figure out what the noise was, but there was only one way to find out.
I started my diagnosis by doing a compression test. The results weren’t perfect, but the difference between cylinders wasn’t enough to cause alarm, given it was a cold comp test, not warm.
I decided that pulling the motor would give me the best opportunity to determine cause of death. So I got to work labeling all the wires and hoses, drained all the fluids, and disconnected the shift linkage and guibo (about to fall apart by looking at it wrong) from the transmission.
After pulling the transmission brace, I was greeted with yet another pair of melted mounts! It’s a miracle the entire driveline hadn’t dropped out on its own accord previously.
After that, it was pretty much just carefully pulling out the motor/trans in one piece. Way easier than expected.
From there, it was smooth sailing. Take the head off, strip the block down, and discover… pretty scored up pistons and cylinder wall. We found the culprit! It was piston slap all along. Unfortunately that meant that I’d need to get some machining done, along with oversized pistons.
Yeesh…
I thought long and hard, and ended up buying all the replacement parts I’d need to rebuild the engine. Only then I realized that I’d need to ALSO pay a machine shop to work on the block and just about everything else. You know what they say, measure once cut twice. I also received some pretty gross looking “refurbished” connecting rods, which didn’t instill confidence in the direction I was taking.
So, back to the drawing board I went. Ended up getting a refund for pretty much everything! My new plan was to find a good engine to swap in, as it seemed that doing an engine swap would actually be cheaper than rebuilding my M20 (RIP).
(Way more to come, taking a break as it’s getting late)
My hope in writing this is to keep a log detailing everything I do to the car, not just for personal satisfaction when looking back, but also in case the info can help someone else. Never done a write up like this so hopefully it’s decent to read. Kind of torn between doing this as a scientific style write up or a narrative. Guess we’ll see where this lands.
Part Zero: My First Mistake
I got this car back in early 2021. I was a freshman in college who decided that his pockets were too heavy and that engineering courses hadn’t gotten hard enough yet.
After months of browsing the local car listings and seeing one too many rotting S chassis, I found a listing on Facebook marketplace for a 4 door late model in delphin metallic and instantly knew it was the one.
I ended up scrapping together every last cent to my name and bought the car. It was far from perfect. It had no AC, the car would shut off if I turned the blinkers on, it knocked on a cold start, and the headlights would somehow trigger the ABS. But it was mine, and I thought it was the coolest thing ever. I named it Hilde, short for Hildegarde, after looking up cool old German names (I was a bit naive at the time but looking back I could’ve picked worse).
I drove it every summer when I was back from school, wrenching and doing small fixes to keep it running. I learned the ins and outs of the ignition system, became a pro at diagnosing a gunked up idle control valve, and cleaned out my fair share of rats nests. I also ended up replacing the melted motor mounts and the exhaust (which had about an 8” long rust hole???) in my college apartment driveway.
By 2023, the engine knock got so bad that it wouldn’t go away when warmed up. On top of that, one day while parking at my apartment, I drove too far to the left, so one of my wheels was in a dip, causing the car to rest on the oil pan, giving it a decent sized crack. So I deemed it too risky to drive and decided that I would learn to rebuild an engine, but I wasn’t ready to dive in (engineering classes turned out to be pretty hard!). So I parked it up in the barn back home, and there it sat until Summer 2025.
Part One: Barn Find (Unfortunately Mine)
After moving back home from grad school, I got bored of the LinkedIn 9-5 job search, and needed to find an out. One day, I wandered out to the barn, and there it was in all of its rusty dusty glory: my beloved E30.
After giving it some gas and starting it up, it was immediately apparent why I had forgotten about this car in the first place. The engine knock was horrific. I never did figure out what the noise was, but there was only one way to find out.
I started my diagnosis by doing a compression test. The results weren’t perfect, but the difference between cylinders wasn’t enough to cause alarm, given it was a cold comp test, not warm.
I decided that pulling the motor would give me the best opportunity to determine cause of death. So I got to work labeling all the wires and hoses, drained all the fluids, and disconnected the shift linkage and guibo (about to fall apart by looking at it wrong) from the transmission.
After pulling the transmission brace, I was greeted with yet another pair of melted mounts! It’s a miracle the entire driveline hadn’t dropped out on its own accord previously.
After that, it was pretty much just carefully pulling out the motor/trans in one piece. Way easier than expected.
From there, it was smooth sailing. Take the head off, strip the block down, and discover… pretty scored up pistons and cylinder wall. We found the culprit! It was piston slap all along. Unfortunately that meant that I’d need to get some machining done, along with oversized pistons.
Yeesh…
I thought long and hard, and ended up buying all the replacement parts I’d need to rebuild the engine. Only then I realized that I’d need to ALSO pay a machine shop to work on the block and just about everything else. You know what they say, measure once cut twice. I also received some pretty gross looking “refurbished” connecting rods, which didn’t instill confidence in the direction I was taking.
So, back to the drawing board I went. Ended up getting a refund for pretty much everything! My new plan was to find a good engine to swap in, as it seemed that doing an engine swap would actually be cheaper than rebuilding my M20 (RIP).
(Way more to come, taking a break as it’s getting late)
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