Panici's '87 325is E30 - Boosted In Bronze

[mmoyer11]

Congrats on getting out for a couple drives…it’s so reinvigorating. Car looks great…engine bay envy is real!!!

[Panici]

Congrats on getting out for a couple drives…it’s so reinvigorating. Car looks great…engine bay envy is real!!!

Thank you!
Things were going smoothly until Sunday.
Rinsed and foam cannoned the car off to get the majority of the dust off.

Decided to go another 5 clicks on the manual boost controller. Car feels great and pulls hard!
Still needs some fuel pulled up top with readings of ~10.5:1 but rather rich then lean when breaking new ground.


I was on the highway and thought I smelt fuel. My sense of smell isn't that great, but I got off at the next exit.
As I'm at the traffic light, guy next to me yells out "do you smell fuel?!". I said yes I think so and immediately shut off the car.
They stopped and helped me push the car off the road.

Popped the hood and engine bay was soaked in fuel. After I bumped the prime cycle to find where the leak was, we saw the fuel rail had been unseated from the top of Injector #5.
Shop towels in hand I tried to soak up as much of the gas as possible. It was literally pooled at the firewall. Also had my Element fire extinguisher in case things lit up.
Thank God I didn't have to use it. 😰

As luck would have it, the allen wrench in the E30 tool kit was the exact size for the bolts on the Rally Road fuel rail.

It looks like it's possible that the bolts which connect the fuel rail to the mounting blocks are too long. I had to back them out (shown in below photos) to get the fuel rail seated fully on the injectors and bolted to the intake manifold. Was able to drive the car home.

I did change the fitting on the front end of the fuel rail earlier this year. I gave the fuel rail the wiggle test and it was rock solid both before and after, so I didn't look with a flashlight to see how it was seated on the injectors.
It's possible that the solid feeling was from the bolts fouling on the intake runners rather then applying pressure down onto the injectors.

The extra ~ 2lbs of boost would equate to another 2lbs of fuel pressure, but I can't see that making the difference.


Anyways, I rinsed as much of the engine bay as I could when I got home. Paint looks okay, but who knows if the clear is damaged being soaked in gas. It certainly can't be good for it.

The gas stripped the oils right out of the plastic intake manifold and coil cover and turned them brown/grey. Still have a little Lexol Vinylex left over after it was discontinued so I put a couple coats of that on. Will try more cleaning and conditioning with some other products to see if I can bring it back to presentable. It looks much worse in person, the photos don't show the damage well.

Brand new fuse box cover cracked and broke the mounting tabs right off after reacting with the gas. It kept the fuel out of the fuses though.

Need to inspect the underbody and specifically the chase bays brake line as it runs along the front swaybar to get to the passenger side. That area was likely soaked in fuel.



All said and done I got very lucky that there wasn't an engine bay fire. And that the engine didn't lean out under boost.
Any other damage is light compared to what fire would have caused.

Didn't even have to get a tow truck home. Which is one flaw on the cowcatcher airdam (it blocks the factory front tow hooks)