My 1988 325 track build

[phenryiv1]

09.18.09:

FINALLY got the car to my house. I had it towed, because I was too lazy to re-install the exhaust in the lot at the shop and I could not work out a time with the shop owner to use the lift. I finally paid the guy $50 to drive it 20 miles and drop it off at the house. (Best $50 I spent on the car, by the way!) I should have done that a MONTH ago!

I also have a ton of parts and maintenance bits to install. I got brake pads (still need rotors), spark plugs, oil/filter, new battery (old one was toast after sitting), and a stock is spoiler (black). I also grabbed a 3-spoke leather stock wheel from a 535i. It needed a new turn signal cancel ring, but I picked that up for cheap.

I need to clean the whole car- badly!

Pics, after a quick rinse and wipe-down:









Once the car got to the house, I swapped the battery for a new one (old one was still under warranty, but was pro-rated). I got the warranty into my name and paid to upgrade to a new battery. Unfortunately, there was a brief issue with a parasitic drain on the new battery. After about a week of fighting it, I determined that it was the power antenna motor that was the source of the drain. Disconnected it…problem solved!

I began more research into my 327i build. Being that this is a SuperEta, it was a different ball of wax. Long story short, I determined the following was all that I would need for my upgrade:

• 325i 173 (or 380) ECU
• 325i inner valve springs
• 325i cam
• 325i intake manifold
• 325i throttle body
• 325i throttle position switch
• 325i intake bellows
• 325i air flow meter
• 325i 3.0 fuel pressure regulator
• 325i vacuum line from brake booster, to bellows, and to throttle body side
  

09.27.09:

Took her for a drive today in my neighborhood. I re-installed the midsection of the exhaust (took no time with a helper to align the front) and drove it in my neighborhood. This was the first time that I had actually driven it anywhere other the lot where I bought the car.

First driving impressions were good. Throttle response was pretty good and the idle smoothed out after I had driven it for a few minutes. The gauge cluster had no movement on the tach on the first startup, but after driving, it sprang to life. Weird. Not a big deal, since I am swapping in a gauge cluster from a 325i, but odd nonetheless.


09.29.09:

Already needing a timing belt, I decided that since the car won't be on the street or track until spring, I decided that might as well build this right. I have located an "i" donor car and am getting everything that I can from it to do a budget “stroker” build using the S-eta bottom end and pistons and the complete head, TB, IM, 173, cluster, alternator, radiator, etc. from the donor car. I also found a few other nice random parts on the donor (sail panel tweeters, vert FSB). I am basically taking everything forward and on top of the head. I bought some parts that I have no intention of using, and am selling them off to fund the other parts that I need to buy.

10.02.09:

Sourced the majority of my top end rebuild parts today at the junk yard. I grabbed everything from the head on up and forward:

325i 153 DME/ECU
325i head, including:
325i inner valve springs
325i cam
325i intake manifold
325i throttle body
325i throttle position switch (should be in there somewhere)
325i intake bellows
325i air flow meter
325i 3.0 fuel pressure regulator (Should be in there somewhere)
325i vacuum line from brake booster, to bellows, and to throttle body
325i Gauge Cluster
325i Alternator
325i radiator
325i airbox

A lot of other random stuff- hoses, lines, what looks like a full motronic 1.1/1.3 harness, coolant tank, plug wire set...

Like I said, I bought some parts that I have no intention of using, and am selling them off to fund the other parts that I need to buy and to offset previous costs.

Main parts:





10.10.09:

Purchased a new shifter assembly on eBay. This came from a Z3 M (don’t know which sub-model). Cheaper than just the shifter from a regular vendor, and all of the bushings are tight tight tight.



Look how dirty the interior was as I started disassembly:



That Great Neck 24V impact wrench is a great deal at Pep Boys, if you get it on sale for $59 like I did.

Swapped in a passenger sport seat to the driver's side, just for now. I also have the driver's side frame and will work on swapping the controls to the proper side, but I don't need much in the way of adjustments. I have it where I want it, which is good enough for now. I bought both sides for dirt cheap and parted out the driver’s side (due to the cracked frame) and was left with a decent seat (the ‘vert passenger Sport seat) on the driver’s side, and a profit, to boot.

[phenryiv1]

I bought this car on 07.27.09 and have been working on it ever since. Things started out a bit slowly, and I have made a few mis-steps along the way. I will try to make this as good of a summary as possible to this point, and will move forward from there.

For the first couple of weeks, I owned the car but it remained at the shop where I bought it due to some needed repairs, and due to the fact that driving it to my house posed several problems (crappy flatspotted and dryrotted tires, busted CSB, among others).

Day 1 pics:









The purpose will be to play with as a project or track car (primarily autoX and HPDE) and to drive every now and then on the weekends. My wife may take it to work to cut miles on her Pilot.

Car has 160K on the clock and is a 5MT. It looks like a 20 year-old car, and has sat for a few months. According to realoem, the car has an LSD diff. However, according to a VIN check, open diff. After getting under the car a few days after buying it, I determined that it was a 2.93LSD (more on that later).




Positives:

• Good price, and a parts car is available. (The seller has a quasi-BMW junkyard.)
• Underside is in really good shape, from a rust perspective. Nothing but very minor surface rust and a bad spot in the battery box.
• Interior is in pretty good shape. Driver's seat has some bolster wear. Exterior trim is all black-out.
• Pioneer CD player (who really cares? But it works...)
• Engine sounds GREAT.
• Transmission shifts well.
• Seller threw in some other small stuff (E36 window switches, misc small interior trim parts, etc.)
• It has a nearly-complete tool kit, and I can grab other parts out of the yard to make it complete trunk tool kit.
• Sunroof (manual crank!!!) seems to work properly. I actually wish that it had manual windows, too. (See below.)
• Car has Hella ellipsoids, though one high-beam has a crack.

The bad:

• Exterior has some small rust bubbles but nothing that cannot be fixed easily.
• Needed new CSB.
• Also needs the usual parts/service/maintenance for a car that sat: plugs, rubber suspension bits, brakes (most likely), etc.
• Paint and interior need some elbow grease, for sure.
• Passenger window is not working, but the driver's side is.
• 2 tires were completely flat.

Along with the purchase price, I made a deal with the seller to help me do the CSB install for a reasonable price, since he has a lift and tools to make it happen, plus he has done the install in an E36 many times. In the end, I bought a new-sed DS on eBay and had the spare DS on-hand the day of the install, but my original DS was in good shape. I replaced the CSB and guibo and re-installed the original DS. This was a very easy process. The only bad thing was that Pelican did not send me "everything" related to dropping the exhaust, but no real harm done. (I had told them I needed every bolt and gasket in the complete system, and they left out 2 gaskets. Not horrible.)

As of my initial purchase, my main goals were related to safety and reliability stuff- brakes (pads, rotors, sensors, flush), hoses, timing belt, maybe front struts (the rears are fine). The plan at the time was to go ahead and lower it (though as of that time, I had no ideal what that entailed on an E30), and probably replace some rubber parts while I am at it.

The first order of business was brakes, belts, and hoses. I really needed some wheels and/or tires, just to be able to get it home safely.

In late August, I had a deal lined up for some weaves and street tires, and they arrived intact, though not really sporting the kind of tires I was going to want to take to the track. My first thought was to use the weaves and A/S tires for street use and to have dedicated track wheels, but I decided on a different route (more later). At the time, I could not see putting money into street tires to go on 'caps, but that might have been the easiest route.

In my haste to get it running/driving (and in hopes of getting it driven to my house), I bought and installed the weaves, and sold my stock 'caps to a Honda guy.



I had begun to research building a 2.7L "stroker" motor (what a mis-name that is). I prefer to call it a 327i motor...

As of August, I really wanted to start putting that together. The goal was (and remains) to drive the car in AutoX events next year, and I initially planned to do the timing belt and other associated maintenance this winter, then to possibly do the stroker next winter, but I later decided to go ahead and do the maintenance parts on the 2.7 with an "i" head as opposed to doing everything twice.

As for the bumpers swap, I planned to pull the stock DBs and at least shoot them in black to get rid of the chrome look. While I'd like to go plastic, I think that matching them to the rest of the trim will be better than nothing. In the end, i think I will run stock DBs with a nice coat of black paint...or maybe white. Who knows?

At the end of August, I also ordered all of the "stuff" needed to get the exhaust back together, and ordered new front and rear brake pads (Mintex Reds), wear sensors, and rotor retaining bolts. I had not yet selected rotors.