the Aluminum Monster. a 318 with a special 24v

[2mAn]

makes your car feel new again am I right!

absolutely, it was like there was no windshield there at all!!

The little things, man.

Amen!

New windshield is awesome. !!!!

What's are these "other things pending" you speak of?

a ton of the little things. Me and Abbi (sp?) were talking about it at the Archies gtg. So many little things to do on these older cars that when they get done its something that only the owner of the car really appreciates. Wont help me get COTM :rofl:

current small things Im working on are
-replacing the wiring adapter with a repinned C101
-318is ECU mount
-painting a bunch of shit black (shadowline, bumpers, lower trim, etc)
-polishing paint
-installing the red46 skidplate
-Installing the Ansa muffler
-welding on the late model rear apron
-15mm spacers for the rear, to replace the 10mm
-Motorsport hardware studs

That will keep me busy for a little while


For now, some pics from my drive up Angeles Crest Highway

angeles_crest3 by 2mAn

angeles_crest2 by 2mAn

angeles_crest1 by 2mAn

you can see that the lip already took a beating, stupid shredded piece of a tire on I5 I couldnt avoid. That will be fixed once I get off r3v.

[2mAn]

so another little thing Im working on :)



Not the best pic, but its an engine side C101 for an early model. Stripped the old wires out, new pins are on the way and Im going to eliminate the soldered wires and make it plug and play. It will help me clean up the engine bay. A tiny little change that only I will notice

[itskingsteelo]

I love this car, I think its mainly because it looks like a sleeper, the simplicity is amazing on it but under the hood is a diff story.

[2mAn]

I lobe this car, I think its mainly because it looks like a sleeper, the simplicity is amazing on it but under the hood is a diff story.

thanks, I definitely am trying to keep the car low key. The muffler doesnt help, but luckily thats on the list to be removed.

So I finally killed two birds with one stone. Ive always wanted to do that. Usually it takes two stones to kill one bird for me.

Anyways, Ive wanted a euro filler plate for a long time and I finally got one. Abrahams Motorsport got me one it was kind of scary how quickly it made it here. My car also had this weird secondary lock thing that I never understood its purpose. Regardless its gone now.

random_lock by 2mAn

The before
before_filler by 2mAn

and the after

after_filler by 2mAn

for now, I think there is a lot of black on the back end. I think Im going to remove the badges again, especially since I will be polishing the paint and they will be in the way. Also makes me anxious to get my Ansa muffler installed and rear valence welded on. I will have the muffler in my hands this weekend so hopefully I can find time to have the muffler welded on next week.

Soon...

[E30_Pare]

If you want a cheap paint match for alpine 1. I know there's a rustoelum white that is dam near identical. Can't remember the exact white, but its out there. Kronus probably knows.

[george graves]

Nice thread - looking forward to see what you do.

BTW - next time cut the hole with rounded corners. Mainly cause it won't look so "I installed a sub woffer in my car". Less so, but it will keep the corners from cracking as the frame gets miles on it.

[E30Runt]

Haven't checked on this thread in a while but man you are making awesome progress. Funny is my setup and car is damn near close to yours. AW '84 318/M52/OBD1/Identical Recaros. But at least yours runs! I even have it at a mechanics that let's me use his spare space. Funny is I'm reverting to Metal DB so at least that will be a little different. Still crazy coincidence.

Just been lazy to post a project thread. I'll just admire yours. Haha keep up the awesomeness.

[2mAn]

Nice thread - looking forward to see what you do.

BTW - next time cut the hole with rounded corners. Mainly cause it won't look so "I installed a sub woffer in my car". Less so, but it will keep the corners from cracking as the frame gets miles on it.

Thanks George, I only had a cut off wheel so Im not sure how I would've had the rounded corners. I cut along seams, so hopefully that helps prevent issues down the road. The vertical cuts were alongside reinforcements and the horizontals were along sheet metal that had breaks in them. We'll see what happens as time goes on...

Runt! Good to hear from ya, get it done, this setup is a blast in a lightweight body

[Farbin Kaiber]

^A holesaw on a drill, and mark centers by the 'box' you made, then drill out corners, then cut your straight lines with the cutoff wheel, but that's future reference stuff now.

[2mAn]

Ok, so no real update. Just in the middle of working on a few things. A little too much going on at once so Im trying to take a step back prioritize and then come back..

#1 Hack old muffler off, weld on late model rear valence, and then weld on Ansa Muffler
#2 Re-pin Rectangular C101 to replace X20 plug
#3 Move extra wiring through the firewall and install M42 ECU mount
#4 Enlarge holes for the red46 skiplate and install it
#5 Start gathering parts to reinforce the body

I pretty much have everything I need to take care of #1-4, but for #5 I need to buy the factory reinforcement pieces from the convertible. I found a few of the part #s, so Im just posting them here for later


4114-194-3224 Cabrio Strut tower reinforcement right
4114-194-3223 Cabrio Strut tower reinforcement left
4111-194-3116 Cabrio lower reinforcement right
4111-194-3115 Cabrio lower reinforcement left

Theres one more pair of pieces that I know I need, havent found the part #s for those yet. From what I read, the lower pieces do more than the strut tower, so I may just skip the strut tower ones and stick with the lower pieces. Not entirely sure yet, I still have a ways to go before that becomes relevant.

[Rdreas]

4114-194-3224 Cabrio Strut tower reinforcement right
4114-194-3223 Cabrio Strut tower reinforcement left
4111-194-3116 Cabrio lower reinforcement right
4111-194-3115 Cabrio lower reinforcement left

Theres one more pair of pieces that I know I need, havent found the part #s for those yet. From what I read, the lower pieces do more than the strut tower, so I may just skip the strut tower ones and stick with the lower pieces. Not entirely sure yet, I still have a ways to go before that becomes relevant.

This is sadly the first I've seen of this, I had to google those part numbers and see what it was about and now I might have to add this to my to do list. This car is looking good!
Sadly in response to your earlier question no I'm not driving my car on the daily yet or even out of the neighborhood but I'm chasing down my list of things to do. I'm loving that euro filler plate too!

[2mAn]

Had a blast yesterday!

Ireland Engineering was having an open house and the SoCal Vintage guys organized a cruise in the morning and it would end at IE. I was worried ~20 cars following each other into the mountains would be slow, but I got a nice little one on one with a younger guy in his 2002 (that sounds ) and we were flying through the mountain trying to catch up to the rest of the group. and we did. Later I had a nice group of about 8 of us who all maintained a good speed through the hills and turns. so much fun to have a group that is just attacking the canyon and everyone knows what they are doing.

Afterwards, at the IE BBQ I bought an upper strut bar and installed it today along with a tranny oil change.

Photo OP of one of our stops




Now onto todays work. The IE strut bar fit perfect, no fitment issues at all. There was one threaded mini stud on the driverside strut tower that needed to get removed and I got a little over zealous with the cutting wheel and shaved a bit of the stud off. No problem though



Also had these brackets that were welded in for the old M20 overflow that were black and needed to be cut off

BEFORE


AFTER


It was pretty messy, but cleaned it all up and snapped a new pic of the engine bay. Still cleaning it all up but here is how she looks now

[glnr13]

looking good man!

[wazzu70]

IIRC one of the lower cabrio reinforcements is no longer available. Just an FYI before you get too excited...make sure you can get the parts :)

[efficient]

I wanted to pick up a strut bar aswell at ie but forgot lol