Saving an e21 320i

[4bangerfury]

Introducing a new to me 1980 320i. Don't let the pictures fool you, she looks pretty from afar. The closer you get, the more you notice is wrong. But it's a good start to a project that should be a running daily driver in a month or two.

Since I need a daily driver that gets better gas mileage than my truck, I'm going for reliability over performance at this point. That being said, I'm pretty close to saying fuck the m10 that's in it now and swap in the m42 and trans from my old car that was totaled and year and a half ago. The m10 needs a new fuel distributor among other things like new hoses. All the kinds of things that I already did to my m42. I'd consider ditching the mechanical injection and running the m10 on carbs if they weren't so expensive.

I also wouldn't mind really cleaning up the engine bay. I think the previous owner may have spray bombed the sides of the engine bay to cover some things up.

And speaking of paint, it was originally Alpinweiss. The previous owner did some rust repair and resprayed it red. I'd like to eventually return it to Alpinweiss, but making it a good daily driver is priority one. After seeing the trunk, it kinda makes me worry how good the rust repairs actually are.

Before the tow truck came:


After being dropped off at home:


More pics to follow as I start tearing into the car some more and make a list of small parts that are missing.

[Butler]

That second pic makes it look great! Nice car, it should be a nice project. Take lots of pics :)

[4bangerfury]

Some pics of what I'm working with:





Any recommendations for someone to reupholster the center section of my seats?




Definitely getting rid of the side markers when it comes time to do body work.


Ugly trunk repairs:










Lots of work ahead.

[mr ilia]

it has factory recaros, nice.

[4bangerfury]

Been awhile since I remembered to post anything. Some rain delays didn't help either. Right now, engine and trans are out, engine bay is degreased, pulling a few other parts out this week before scuffing it all up and repainting it. I'm probably going back to white after the previous owner's shitty black spray job. I'll get the motor mounts welded up either this weekend or the next. The week of the 4th will be pretty sweet for progress since the whole company was given the week off. Onto some pics.

Found some more rust to eventually fix:


Transmission was out on Saturday night:




Pulling out the engine:




Dirty engine bay:


Clean enough for now:


The motor that's going in:


Trans and clutch, the clutch was practically new when the car it came from was wrecked:


Back on the ground for the night. Holy 4x4 action:

[E30_Pare]

:( no m10 Luv. It's ok I understand :( goodluck

[Pantless Spency]

hm i need to do what you are doing haha.

[4bangerfury]

Nope, no m10 love right now. I would have loved to find a set of carbs and ditch the mechanical fuel injection, but the parts were too expensive and I already had the m42 laying around. Ordering some more por15 for the weekend as I type this. I'm turning this into more of a crusade than I should, but I won't be happy unless it's done.

[E30stan]

nice progress, the e21, being lighter then the e30 m42, will yield better mpgs, which final drive ratios are you mating the m42 to?

[4bangerfury]

For now, final drive is just going to be whatever is in there now. I think it's a 3.91. I'd love to figure out if I can get the 4.10 lsd from the 318is in it. It looks like it mounts completely different though. Doesn't mean it can't be done at some point, I have a welder and sort of know how to use it.

[4bangerfury]

Finally got to get some more work done. Got a round of parts from AutohausAZ. All m42 rebuild parts. Sent out the exhaust header to be ceramic coated. Thinking about powder coating the valve cover, timing case covers, and oil filter housing.

Should I completely rebuild the engine? I was only going to replace all the gaskets and clean everything up. Should I bite the bullet and get main/rod bearings and the hardware for them? I'm already turning this car into more of a crusade than I originally intended.

I actually have an e36 m42 motor that I was originally going to rebuild for my old 318. It's already torn completely apart, ready for all the new hardware. The shop that was going to help me overbuild it for a supercharger mag inspected the block and crank for me. He even lightly honed the cylinders to clean them up. Fuck it. I think I just decided to finish rebuilding the e36 block instead. No supercharger though. I want a simple daily driver. I can supercharge one of the e30s later on.

Onto some pics. Took out the seats and carpet, found some rust to repair:




Removing the old sound deadening sucks:


Parts!:


Inspiration to replace all the gaskets:


How do the teeth on the cam gears look?:


Problem?:


Apparently the PO's solution was JB weld:


Special tool to hold crank shaft while I jump on the of end of a breaker bar+6ft pipe to break the crank bolt loose:


How about these timing gears? The idler is pretty wobbly, so it's definitely being replaced:


Part of the timing case 95% cleaned:


Cylinder head off:


Bottom of cylinder head:


I love the way cylinders look:


Oil pan off:


Grossness behind the timing case:




Final questions:

Any brand recommendations for painting the engine block? What have you guys had great results with?

Any tricks for removing the water pump from the timing case? I think they somehow became one. The threaded ears that I thought would press pump out just snapped off.

[4bangerfury]

Slow going. Deciding to completely rebuild the engine has me thinking about bumping up the compression, and boring the cylinders a little bigger to get some extra power. Also been working on the e28 so I can get that out of the driveway.

I did get a few things though

Got a pair of these, just waiting to find a good deal on either another pair or a full set and have a matching full size spare:




The spare m42 block and crank that have already been cleaned up for a prior build. I think I'm going to build this motor instead since it was from an e36 with the 6mm valve stems and a serpentine belt instead of 3 belts:


And the header came back from being ceramic coated. Also picked up a better torque wrench. The screwdrivers are for work since I only had cheapo mini screwdrivers that were stripped or missing:

[Steven Dziedzic]

It is amazing!

[george graves]

sub'ed - totally excited to see this build!

[e30jake]

I almost did this with my 318is until I realized I needed both a daily driver AND money for school and just made it run. I still need to restart progress on my 2002 soon though. Did you just use a screwdriver to scrape off the old sound deadening? It doesn't seem to work very well for me and I've even tried it with a heat gun.