noe30's 89 325i build

[noE30]

subscribed...

Well thanks, hopefully there's some more interested updates to follow..

Anyway my wheel bearings and some misc nuts just showed up, thanks again blunt! So I'm heading to the shop to get some work done now, should be on the road by the weekend. I have tomorrow off so it's officially go time!

[noE30]

Well the car is back on the road for now anyway.. I've got an annoying rattle coming from the trans and I believe it is the throwout bearing which I replaced last fall.. The rattle goes away as soon as I depress the clutch, anyone have any ideas that could cause a throwout bearing to fail so soon?

Any way here are some current photos of the car that I snapped as I left this morning.

IMG_0161edit by m_colby, on Flickr


IMG_0160copy by m_colby, on Flickr

[noE30]

Did a little work to the e30 today, more to come in the next few days..
Currently I've got a vacuum leak because of a crack in my intake boot and some brittle vacuum lines running from the throttle body. Soon to be replaced with new parts from blunt, (ordering them tonight). I also found some oil deposits and dirt in the coolant reservoir, what is the best way to clean the reservoir/ flush the coolant system? I think I read that baking soda and distilled water will work to flush the system and a bleach solution to soak the reservoir in, do either of those sound correct?

IMG_0652 by m_colby, on Flickr


IMG_0653 by m_colby, on Flickr

Cracked boot and shitty vacuum lines.

IMG_0650 by m_colby, on Flickr

I'm hoping to get in on the fk suspension group buy and pick up some coils, my current bilstein sports are blown in the front so I'm looking forward to upgrading and replacing those.

[noE30]

Well I've done it again, and by that I mean forget to update this project thread with my progress. So here's another one to bring it up to speed with where I'm at.

Since the last update I have finally fixed my suspension so my car no longer rides like shit, and in that process I replaced my front shocks with some cheap kyb shocks, replaced the totally ruined sway bar links and installed new tie rods as the old ones were also shot.

IMG_0054 by m_colby, on Flickr


IMG_0062 by m_colby, on Flickr

And now that winter has hit us officially here in Iowa, I will be putting the e30 away in the garage for the winter and to get some work done.

The current to do/buy list for the winter/spring is:
Install GE group buy coils (along with camber plates when available)
Bilstein sports
Skid Plate
Wheels
New front seats as mine are trash
New pads/rotors/lines for the front and rear
LSD open diff FTL!
Euro Trim/Grills
Depo Smileys (probably the eurostop ones)
HIDS
New windshield
and may be some body work..

I'm really hoping to take the e30 to the Eurowerks car show next year in Minneapolis next June, so I've got plenty of time to get some work done to get the e30 show ready. Anyone who hasn't heard of eurowerks please check out http://eurowerks.org/ and make the trip to MN for the car show, especially if you're from the midwest!!


IMG_0347 by m_colby, on Flickr

[pegase747]

Nice buid ! Will you start the M50 swap this winter ?

Cheers

[noE30]

Nice buid ! Will you start the M50 swap this winter ?

Cheers

I wish, that project has pretty much fell by the way side I've actually sold off most of the swap parts that I had. I'm going to wait until I finish school/get a real job before I do a swap haha.

[noE30]

Euro plate filler install with detailed pics.

For Christmas the e30 got euro trim, euro grills, and a rear plate filler. Since I had some free time tonight I decided to install the plate filler. After reading a few threads here on r3v about how to install it, I decided to try something a little different mounting wise. Looks like most people drill a hole in the filler that is big enough to run a bolt through and then just sandwich the plate, filler, and body of the car together and put a nut on the back side. That works fine, but I was worried about the hole in the body not being water tight as I wanted to keep it oem as possible.


IMG_1359resize by m_colby, on Flickr

Here's what I came up with:
Basically what I did was drilled holes into the plate filler that were big enough that the threaded poppers could fit inside, thus allowing me to use the oem mounting screws. Everything should be water tight like oem and still allow me to securely mount the plate filler.


IMG_1329resize by m_colby, on Flickr


IMG_1328resize by m_colby, on Flickr


IMG_1330resize by m_colby, on Flickr


IMG_1332resize by m_colby, on Flickr


IMG_1334resize by m_colby, on Flickr
I will probably find some kind of plate frame that will cover up those bottom holes in the plate, just to clean it up a bit.

Here's the rest of the e30's Christmas present yet to be installed, maybe later this week.

IMG_1339 by m_colby, on Flickr

Cleaned up and stored away for the winter.

IMG_1351 by m_colby, on Flickr

[dmjensen]

awesome build, and iowa needs to figure out how to not use salt during the winter.
maybe sand. or heated cement lol.

[noE30]

awesome build, and iowa needs to figure out how to not use salt during the winter.
maybe sand. or heated cement lol.

You got that right! All this salt and rust shit needs to end, its so depressing not being able to find clean rust free cars around here, especially e30s.

[Podge]

Nice work mate this being done right!

[noE30]

^thanks man!

So this winter I came up with a list of projects to get done on the car starting with a m42 rad swap. After tearing my engine bay apart to clean it up /swap radiator, I decided to tuck the driver side wires along the fender. That wire tuck project soon turned into full on dash removal and wiring work. Haha ive got quite a mess going in my garage right now but its all for a good cause. Ill post some pics later and include some more info.

The current to do list for the winter/spring/early summer:
Minor wire tuck
Flocked dash
'M42 radiator
Repainted valve cover and intake manifold
New pan gasket
Shimmed motor mounts for future lowness/ skid plate
GE coils (on the way)
Bilstein IX shocks
Wheels (trying to buy some 3pc epsilon wheels currently)
Adapters for wheels
Fender roll/paint work
New windshield
New seats (im thinking corbeau gts, they look nice in e30s)
Install euro trim/grills/plate filler
New headlights (probably the smoked smileys in the retail classifieds)
3.73 lsd :) 4.19 open ftl

Should be a whole new car next summer!

[noE30]

Official update time!

So right now, my car is in pieces basically.
Engine is partially torn apart for an intake manifold/valve cover repaint (chipping off), m42 radiator (thanks blunt), wire tuck, possible ac delete (ive got a one inch hole in my condenser somehow and the aux fan wiring is messed up thanks to the PO, and probably do some shaving of some brackets as well.

Dash is out so that I can correct some wiring messes (after market alarm thanks to PO etc) and so that I can flock it. Hopefully it turns out like this :


Here's some pics showing my mess of an e30:

IMG_0147 by m_colby, on Flickr


IMG_0002 by m_colby, on Flickr


IMG_0148 by m_colby, on Flickr
new m42 radiator^


IMG_0149 by m_colby, on Flickr
notice the nice fan damage on the old radiator^


IMG_0001 by m_colby, on Flickr
How did you get out? Picture makes the dash look nicer than it is, it has probably 6 decent sized cracks in it.


IMG_0004 by m_colby, on Flickr
mmm spaghetti wiring :curse:

Oh yeah! How can I forget about the best news of all?
I just paid for these last night, should be here this week or the next!

IMG00138-20110719-1807 by m_colby, on Flickr
Epsilon Mesh, 16x7 front 16x8 rear, Porsche 944 fitment, and all for $600 shipped. Also I think I may have scored a deal on some adapters locally, fingers crossed.

[noE30]

I just added up all my receipts from the last ~3.5 years of ownership and I've spent around $4,800 on maintenance/replacement/ and some upgraded parts. I figured that was a worthy enough tidbit of info to add to the thread. Oh yeah I'm picking up my wheels tomorrow morning as well, I'll edit this post with some pics!

[noE30]

New wheels showed up today and I might be buying some adapters here locally.
16x7 front and 16x8 rear.


Epsilon by m_colby, on Flickr


Epsilon 2 by m_colby, on Flickr

[dmjensen]

sweet wheels, cant wait to see the fitment with midwestize adapters