Project Izzy: The AWD Money Pit

[arthb7]

Nice thread! What kind of a lift is that in your garage?

[stonea]

I love this car! Great work done, I'm really impressed with how you went from never working on a car to doing tons of work I yet to do and I have been working on my dads 88 diamantshwartz IX almost all my life!

Thanks!!! I'm lucky enough to have my dad and my uncle help me along the way. Theres no way I could have done it with out them.

Nice thread! What kind of a lift is that in your garage?

I'm like 99% sure its Atlas other than that I'm not sure. Its technically my dads garage, I just get to use his toys.

[stonea]

Well its been slow the past couple of weeks, but I finally got enough done for a small update. First off I got a new battery and that seemed to have fixed my charging issue. Secondly I decided to finally fix my brake duct and temp sensor, and also decided to get a few goodies too.



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I hated how my roof looked, so I did what what college student with no money would do, I bougt a couple of cans of plastidip I decided to redo the roof.





While welding some of the rust this past summer I had a little accident and caught the trunk liner on fire and when I released the fire extinguisher.....well.... I kind of screwed up my amp. So I got a new one, and also reinstalled my roof rack. I scored some skis for $4 too!!!!! Then I finally got around to installing my smoked turn signals and my german grill badge.






I stole the rear parcel shelf off the 318is parts car and recovered it with some black fabric, it didn't turn out as well as I hoped, but I think it looks better than the old crappy one.

[stonea]

Not really an update, but today happens to be Izzy's 27th birthday!!!!

[glucklich21]

Put your wipers in the proper position sir!

[stonea]

Put your wipers in the proper position sir!

lol, I've spent the past 4 days trying to figure out what you meant. Anyways thanks for the pic, I've always wondered how they were suppose to be mounted.

Anyways I've been thinking about the engine swap more and more and I think I've gathered most of what I need to know. First of all I'm going to use my M52tub25 out of my old Z3. It only has 27,000 original miles and has an aluminum block which is half the reason I'm using it. The other half is that I already have it, lol.

So as for the engine, I'm keeping it mostly stock but I am putting a M54b25 intake on with an adapter for the m52tu throttle body and use the e34 throttle cable like any other swap. The reason I'm not going for the 3.0 intake is because I'm really trying to replicate the power of my current Z3, but just in a AWD platform. I'm also probably gonna fix the nut on the oil sump sprocket, and maybe the "overheating" issue on the M54s. I'll probably throw on a cold air intake, and I'm planning on using M52 OBDII headers. Then use Adrew325is's engine harness adapter to solve the wiring headache.

As for the rest of the tiny stuff I'm just gonna go a head and use a z3 radiator and electric fan, and I'm gonna relocate the brake booster over "X" amount of inches and create an adapter from the brake pedal to master cylinder.

I'm gonna go the fraken pan route and I have a couple of people in mind that could do it for me. Although I'm running into the oil capacity problem. The m20 uses 4.5 liters while the M52tu holds just over 6.5 liters. My roommate says I shouldn't worry about it, but I can't help but not believe him. For the motor arms I'm just using the stock 325ix arms and drill out the holes. The rest of the drivetrain stock minus lengthen driveshaft splines. I would like to some how get a 6 speed in there by building a custom Transfer Case/Transmission cross brace, but this swap is already more expensive than I'd like it to be.

Anyways thats just some late night thoughts that have been running through my head.

[AWDBOB]

Talk to jakeb about the Frankenpan. What is the weight difference between the two motors?

[stonea]

Talk to jakeb about the Frankenpan. What is the weight difference between the two motors?

He's one of the two that I'm gonna contact. I wanna talk to moonlight motor works first. They're located in PA and have apparently done a 325ix swap before. As for the weight differences.... I cant seem to find solid numbers, but its looks like the m52tu is about 50 pounds lighter.

[AWDBOB]

He's one of the two that I'm gonna contact. I wanna talk to moonlight motor works first. They're located in PA and have apparently done a 325ix swap before. As for the weight differences.... I cant seem to find solid numbers, but its looks like the m52tu is about 50 pounds lighter.

Moonlit is like 20 minutes from my house. I didn't know they've done an iX swap. I may have to drive down and pick their brain....never been there.

[audiquattrot]

If one of u guys do drive down....give moonlite motorworks an earfull from me. I've been trying to get a response from them for months on replacement screws for a front driveshaft spacer I bought from them a couple yrs ago. No response to my emails or phone calls. Been told many times I will get a response back nothing

One of my bolts/nut fell out on the nj turnpike over the summer.

http://www.moonlitemotorwerks.com/driveshaft

[stonea]

Moonlit is like 20 minutes from my house. I didn't know they've done an iX swap. I may have to drive down and pick their brain....never been there.

I don't remember where I saw it (Perhaps Bimmerforums.com) but I remember hearing their name dropped in my early years of 325ix engine swap research.

Here is a video of the car they did.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sz35Gad_Ejo

[stonea]

If one of u guys do drive down....give moonlite motorworks an earfull from me. I've been trying to get a response from them for months on replacement screws for a front driveshaft spacer I bought from them a couple yrs ago. No response to my emails or phone calls. Been told many times I will get a response back nothing

One of my bolts/nut fell out on the nj turnpike over the summer.
http://www.moonlitemotorwerks.com/driveshaft

If I get in touch with them I'll bring it up. I remember I sent them an email a while ago about an oil pan and never got a response from them, but I barley knew what I was talking about so I just forgot about it. I wonder if not getting a response is a common thing from them......

[jt223539]

I swear I have seen this car around my GF's house in Ghent.

Nice to see another e30 owner in tidewater area.

[stonea]

I swear I have seen this car around my GF's house in Ghent.

Nice to see another e30 owner in tidewater area.

It could have been me, but there is another black e30 that I've seen around in the Ghent area. I actually meet the guy and his girlfriend at a hardware store. They seemed to be pretty cool, and definite e30 lovers.

[jt223539]

I have seen a couple other nice ones in the area. However I am sure I have seen yours as you have a very inconspicuous license plate, haha.