After sealing the deal on an engine this weekend, I figured it was time to make a thread documenting my s54 swap. There is some info out there on the swap, but obviously not as much as some of the other 24V e30 swaps, so I'll update this thread with a lot of detail as I go along. I am by no means an expert on this swap, there is a lot of it that I'm not sure how I'm going to tackle and I'm sure plenty of hurdles that I haven't even considered yet, but we'll see how it goes.
I decided to pull the m30 out of the car because I'm wanting to get into some DE's and SCCA/NASA TT stuff this year. I've autocross the car a lot with the m20 and m30, but I decided I wanted something that would make more power up top.
Car before:
Where I am now. Engine bay is stripped. I removed most of the bracketry and am working on getting rid of cosmoline. Probably just going to re-spray it Alpine, not planning on shaving or wire tucking, just going to keep it clean. Just messing with the gold foil stuff, we use it on a lot of race cars at work and I think it looks cool, but it may look out of place in here:
Last night I replaced the e30 fuel pump with an e46 m3 pump. The m3 runs at 5.0bar, compared to the e30's 2.5 or 3.0 (can't remember), so you need to use the pump from the e46. You have to trim the bottom bracket on the fuel pump to run the e46 fuel sock, which is a tight fit in the tank but it all went back together fairly easily.
e46 on left
e46 installed
I was going to run the e46 m3 fuel filter, because it has a threaded outlet that holds the stock m3 fuel pressure regulator. However, I didn't realize the fuel filter was a foot long, and there isn't really a great place to put it under the e30. Now I'm thinking I'm going to just get a new e30 fuel filter and run a barb adapter fitting to adapt the e30 fuel hose to the stock e46 regulator.
Next project is the brakes, I have a Massive Booster delete and I need to find a 20.6MM, non-ABS master cylinder, so if anyone can tell me what model e30 that comes on that would be great! I'm thinking early 325e?
Also, I figured I would add a parts list, what I have now at least:
'02 Z3M Engine Harness
ZF310 trans from e36 m3
e34 m5 clutch kit
e36 m3 dual mass flywheel
trans crossmember from e36 m3
e36 m3 engine mount arms (planning on AKG 24V swap mounts)
e36 328i driveshaft
Massive booster delete
e34 m50 oil pan/dipstick/new m50 oil pump
VAC oil pan baffle for e30 swap
VAC oil filter housing adapter (for oil cooler)
s54 Z3M radiator
M50 radiator hoses
Z3M coolant pipe
e30 m3 coolant resevoir
I decided to pull the m30 out of the car because I'm wanting to get into some DE's and SCCA/NASA TT stuff this year. I've autocross the car a lot with the m20 and m30, but I decided I wanted something that would make more power up top.
Car before:
Where I am now. Engine bay is stripped. I removed most of the bracketry and am working on getting rid of cosmoline. Probably just going to re-spray it Alpine, not planning on shaving or wire tucking, just going to keep it clean. Just messing with the gold foil stuff, we use it on a lot of race cars at work and I think it looks cool, but it may look out of place in here:
Last night I replaced the e30 fuel pump with an e46 m3 pump. The m3 runs at 5.0bar, compared to the e30's 2.5 or 3.0 (can't remember), so you need to use the pump from the e46. You have to trim the bottom bracket on the fuel pump to run the e46 fuel sock, which is a tight fit in the tank but it all went back together fairly easily.
e46 on left
e46 installed
I was going to run the e46 m3 fuel filter, because it has a threaded outlet that holds the stock m3 fuel pressure regulator. However, I didn't realize the fuel filter was a foot long, and there isn't really a great place to put it under the e30. Now I'm thinking I'm going to just get a new e30 fuel filter and run a barb adapter fitting to adapt the e30 fuel hose to the stock e46 regulator.
Next project is the brakes, I have a Massive Booster delete and I need to find a 20.6MM, non-ABS master cylinder, so if anyone can tell me what model e30 that comes on that would be great! I'm thinking early 325e?
Also, I figured I would add a parts list, what I have now at least:
'02 Z3M Engine Harness
ZF310 trans from e36 m3
e34 m5 clutch kit
e36 m3 dual mass flywheel
trans crossmember from e36 m3
e36 m3 engine mount arms (planning on AKG 24V swap mounts)
e36 328i driveshaft
Massive booster delete
e34 m50 oil pan/dipstick/new m50 oil pump
VAC oil pan baffle for e30 swap
VAC oil filter housing adapter (for oil cooler)
s54 Z3M radiator
M50 radiator hoses
Z3M coolant pipe
e30 m3 coolant resevoir
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