Eta-to-M50: Build thread

[Jand3rson]

I hate sport seats, I always have. They hit me in all the wrong spots, and they make my lower back start to hurt after about 10 minutes of being in them.

I have another set of Recaros that I'm going to have recovered as soon as I have the casn, hopefully next month.

[ak-]

the headers don't cause that much rasp...people just seem to think running no cat gives them more hp. a cat gets rid of alot of rasp. and running a good muffler or two helps.

This is my experience with 3 cars.
A cat is going to get rid of loudness and make the system quieter, but more bass enriched.

I sort of regret removing the cat in my old E30. And I say that because I wouldn't pay to put it back on, it only rasps like a spece30 car above ~4.5rpm

Let's see a video so we can help you better.

[Stephen]

I hate sport seats, I always have. They hit me in all the wrong spots, and they make my lower back start to hurt after about 10 minutes of being in them.

I have another set of Recaros that I'm going to have recovered as soon as I have the casn, hopefully next month.

freak!

did a 14 hour day in mine last month, only slight ass soreness.

[scottinAZ]

I hate sport seats, I always have. They hit me in all the wrong spots, and they make my lower back start to hurt after about 10 minutes of being in them.

I have another set of Recaros that I'm going to have recovered as soon as I have the casn, hopefully next month.

Im with you here, the sports in my cabrio kill me after about an hour. too wide an ass for too narrow a seat I guess. The comforts in my Eta were better......

[ak-]

Comforts were like summer slip 'n slide for me. Hate.
Sports hurt my back after an hour or so.

It's probably me though. I like sitting "track position" even when I daily.
Tilted seats disorient me when I drive for some reason lol.

[Jesse30]

I'm running straight pipe after the cat on my m20 (granted totally different) and its extremely manageable. It sounds like what you're looking for is a cat to replace your muffler.

Sorry to hear you're having so much trouble with the exhaust system.

[Jand3rson]

Yeah, I'll get it right one of these days! To be honest, I like the sound of it right now, it's just too damn loud. I'm working on possibly ditching those Ebay knockoff headers that are on it, and trying to get a hold of a set of S52 short headers. I might also go with the Racelands, I'd just have to change my control arm bushing lollipops to THR brackets.

I'm also probably going to ditch that first Magnaflow muffler for a universal cat, and probably keep the Dynomax at the rear, but this will all be later, probably over the winter. But nothing is for sure. Right now, I'm just enjoying driving it.

The crappy thing about having more work done on the exhaust system is I won't be able to take it back to the same shop to have it done, because they're closing (owner is starting a new career). I'll have to take it to another shop, which sucks because they won't be familiar with the work that was done before, and no one likes doing work on something that someone else did previously, especially when it was done at a competing shop instead of theirs.

[Jand3rson]

I think I now have the perfect plan for my exhaust. I have a couple of friends locally who are proficient welders/fabricators, and have done a few exhaust systems between them. So this is my plan.

I want to pull my ebay headers, and have the pipes that come under the car from off the collectors cut off probably just after the subframe, and have flanges welded to them. Then cut about an inch or so out of the length of the pipes that are cut off, weld flanges onto them, so they can bolt back up and so they don't hang so low.

The single pipes after the collectors hang lower than any other part of the exhaust, because they were meant for an E36, not an E30. I want the finished product to be like the Racelands, then I'll have them ceramic coated:



From there, I want to make a Y-pipe, that goes into a single 2.5", with a bung for the 02, so I have the sensor collecting from both header banks, not just 1. After the Y, go into a single in/out Borla XR-1, with a universal single-pipe cat either before or after it. Then out of that into a single 2.5" pipe all the way back, and into a 2.5" inlet Vibrant.

With my car up on stands, and following/matching the bends of the existing system, this whole thing could be built out of the car, made to fit perfectly, and probably be done with the hangers the exhaust shop made me, and minimal shop bends. Then it would just need to be bolted up.

[Jand3rson]

Started the first part of work for the new version of my exhaust system, I chopped the factory Y-pipe out of my E36 M3 exhaust, and cut it before it splits into 2 again. *Now we don't have to make a Y-pipe, and this one is very nice. *So this will be welded to the outlets of my headers, and a Vband flange welded onto the single out.

[N2MYE30]

One of the biggest concerns I had with my swap was the exhaust sound/volume and when I took it to the shop to get it done, I was freaking nervous! But now, its actually quieter than before with just the 14816.

Stock manis "boat anchors"> new cat> 16" resonator > magnaflow 14816



The pic makes the exhaust look like its hanging low but its the angle of the shot. Its tucked nicely.

I was too thinking about getting some ebay shortys but I dont think im going to fubar with something that works great and sounds even better.

[LJ851]

With my car up on stands, and following/matching the bends of the existing system, this whole thing could be built out of the car, made to fit perfectly, and probably be done with the hangers the exhaust shop made me, and minimal shop bends. Then it would just need to be bolted up.

Build and tack weld the new system on the car and then remove for final welding. There is no way to build up a system accurately off the car that is high and tight as possible with the best clearances.

You could open an exhaust shop after with all your rejected mufflers/resonators

[Jand3rson]

That's what we're going to do, is get everything exactly where we want it, tack it, and then do the final welding off the car.

[Jand3rson]

And a new saga begins!

So yesterday, with Andrew's help, I pulled the M50 back out of the car to take care of a number of things. First, I noticed not long after getting the car on the road that it was leaving about a 2-3" puddle of oil under it everywhere I parked it. I knew it couldn't be the oil pan or anything near it, so my mind immediately jumped to the one thing I new I forgot to change, the rear main seal. Since it was on a stand while I was doing all of the refreshing and cleaning, I neglected to ever even look at it. Then I got the flywheel, clutch and tranny on so fast, I didn't think about changing it. When we got it out yesterday and pulled off the fly, it was pretty noticeable right away.

Second, the oil pump nut. I didn't find out about this issue until after I had the motor in the car and running, so that will be fixed as well. I also forgot to change the shift knuckle on the transmission, which is likely contributing to most of the slop in my shift linkage.

Third, I want to change the coolant hose that goes from the back of the head to the heater core inlet for the proper one, I have a pretty jimmy-rigged hose on there, and was never comfortable with how it fit.

Lastly, I'm completely rebuilding the whole exhaust system, starting with having the ebay headers ceramic coated inside and out. And since I had all of these other things to take care of, pulling the motor would make the task of pulling the headers much easier, along with everything else. Pulling the motor took us all of about 3 hours, and I'd much rather pull it than do ALL of that shit on my back and over my head on the garage floor.

[shiboujin]

I love how easy the M50 is to work on in an E30 bay. It makes things 10x easier than on an M20.

Demand pix!

Also, what specifically are you changing on the shift knuckle? I find the most slop comes from the piece that mounts to the chassis behind the shifter. Solid mounting my shifter to the chassis fixed almost all of my problems.

[davem]

I love how easy the M50 is to work on in an E30 bay. It makes things 10x easier than on an M20.

Demand pix!

Also, what specifically are you changing on the shift knuckle? I find the most slop comes from the piece that mounts to the chassis behind the shifter. Solid mounting my shifter to the chassis fixed almost all of my problems.

working on an m50 is easier than an m20? can you give some examples? (honest question, i have an m20)