Hi all,
I will be telling you my story of my E30 and my always growing experience and adventure that it has given me over the past 6 months. I will also be using R3VLimited to update you all on the build for the future.
My name is Justin.
I hail from the Midwest (specifically Indiana).
I am a college student at Indiana University Bloomington.
I always have had a great appreciation and affection for German cars, especially vintage BMW's and Porsche's. With that said, I purchased my first ever project car on February 13th, 2015 for $1000.
She is a mostly rust free 1989 325i Coupe with the M20B25 Straight-Six. The intended purpose before I obtained the vehicle was to be a drift missile (that should have been a clear sign to stay away).
When I purchased the car, I had no knowledge of how to work on a car, no garage to house it in, and no tools. I started from scratch.
There is much more detail I could go into about how unprepared I found myself being to take on a vintage BMW project, but I will go ahead and show you what I got myself into!
As you can see, she was pretty rough and the problems were definitely not only cosmetic or able to be seen with the naked eye. It was over the next several months that I began to find issue after issue.
When I bought the car, the previous owners had said it was leaked coolant and that it overheated often. I browsed forums for weeks trying to teach myself every bit of this M20 engine so I could be best prepared to tackle these issues.
As a reminder, I purchased the car in February so it was mid-winter in Indiana and there was 9 inches of snow on the ground. Therefore it was necessary for me to keep it at a friends house in his driveway under a car cover due to me living in a dormitory on campus 15 minutes away.
The first night of having the car, I purchased my first GearWrench ratchet and socket set at Advance Auto Parts as well as some fresh NGK spark plugs. It was that night that I embarrassed myself for what would be the first time of many in front of my two enthusiast friends. I couldn't even use a ratchet correctly! Lol. I am the type to laugh it all off, so everything was just fine, but it really showed them how inexperienced I was and put obvious worry into their minds.
With that said, the car fired right up in 10 degree temperatures once the plugs were properly installed (easiest job to do on an E30).
My whole family including my girlfriend were excited to see what I had purchased, so they traveled down in the coming weeks to see the car even though all they could do was sit in it, so that was a good feeling. The sad part was, those plugs were worthless and the car wouldn't start due to the frigid temps and the fact that there were many other issues that I had not known about at the time.
Here is how she sat for about 2 months while warmer weather was on its way:
Sad times, sad times.
Months passed and warmer weather approached. Spring break came and instead of going on vacation, I decided it was best to work on my car and try to get it running.
The issue, I was told was that the car was overheating and that it needed a new radiator. I ordered a new radiator, coolant hoses, water pump, timing belt, fuel filter, and throttle body gaskets among other things to install in the car in hopes that the issues would disappear.
Everything was installed, it ran and was able to be driven around the block without any further coolant leaks. I was stoked! My friend was generous enough to have let me keep the car there so I could work on it until it was running and could be moved. So on my birthday, March 15th, I moved it to my friends apartment complex without issue.
It should be noted that I am a college student and classes are back in session so my time was severely limited until after finals at this point. I still was working on the car on weekends and late into the evenings when I could.
The next adventure began when my friend and I took it out to the Fast and Furious 7 premiere. On the way there, the E30 acted as it should and everything was fine and dandy. On the way home, we experienced roughly 9 fuel cuts that killed the engine and caused a loss of power. We discovered that the quick release I had installed on the negative terminal continued to come loose, so that explained the loss of power, but the fuel cuts after around 4k RPM's did not make sense.
In the coming days I specifically diagnosed this issue to find it could be a plethora of things as this is a common issue with E30's. I replaced the Fuel pressure regulator and throttle position sensor as I had already replaced the fuel filter earlier and the fuel pump was functioning just fine.
The intermittent fuel cut was still present and now it had a crackling noise when revved past 4k. Due to this I replaced the spark plugs, spark plug wires, distributor cap, and the distributor rotor. This ignition re-haul definitely made a difference and the car fired up and idled much healthier, but still the crackling noise persisted and now there was white smoke puffing out of the exhaust.
At this point I was at my wits end and decided something was seriously wrong. The guys before me had tried to do a head gasket job, but re-use the old head bolts, thus making the job worthless. There was talk of a warped head when I purchased the car, but do to their mistakes about why it was leaking coolant, I looked past their best judgement.
I had it towed to a local shop as the best guess was that it needed a head gasket due to the white smoke. This was right before finals week and I didn't have time to deal with the issues myself. Especially with my Summer internship I had obtained. He said it would be $600 for a head gasket replacement as it would be done on his own time and wouldn't be going through the shop, (I learned what it meant when a master mechanic and business owner says they will do it on their own time lol). The car needed a whole new head as it was in fact spider-webbed and severely warped. I ordered a fresh 885 head on eBay for $770 shipped to my door and within a few weeks the car was back in my possession.
Over the months it was in the shop and at a stand still, I had ventured off and ordered some more fun parts for the car to keep my interest in-tact. I ordered stainless long tube street and track headers and a fully stainless cat-back from Ireland Engineering.
Once the car was finished, I got these installed at a local exhaust shop as they had to be welded together with stainless piping in the middle.
(I plan to add more photos as I go of the things I am speaking of)
This is where it sits right now as I am moving back to IU on August 7th for my Sophomore year of college and will be living somewhere with a garage and space to work on my car. So everything is packaged inside of the car, including my new Corbeau Sportline RRS Reclinable seats.
Thank you for reading this, I look forward to updating you all on my build as it progresses. I have learned a lot about myself, vintage BMW's, the ever growing expense of owning a German car, and how cool it is to make something entirely your own.
- Justin Cummings
I will be telling you my story of my E30 and my always growing experience and adventure that it has given me over the past 6 months. I will also be using R3VLimited to update you all on the build for the future.
My name is Justin.
I hail from the Midwest (specifically Indiana).
I am a college student at Indiana University Bloomington.
I always have had a great appreciation and affection for German cars, especially vintage BMW's and Porsche's. With that said, I purchased my first ever project car on February 13th, 2015 for $1000.
She is a mostly rust free 1989 325i Coupe with the M20B25 Straight-Six. The intended purpose before I obtained the vehicle was to be a drift missile (that should have been a clear sign to stay away).
When I purchased the car, I had no knowledge of how to work on a car, no garage to house it in, and no tools. I started from scratch.
There is much more detail I could go into about how unprepared I found myself being to take on a vintage BMW project, but I will go ahead and show you what I got myself into!
As you can see, she was pretty rough and the problems were definitely not only cosmetic or able to be seen with the naked eye. It was over the next several months that I began to find issue after issue.
When I bought the car, the previous owners had said it was leaked coolant and that it overheated often. I browsed forums for weeks trying to teach myself every bit of this M20 engine so I could be best prepared to tackle these issues.
As a reminder, I purchased the car in February so it was mid-winter in Indiana and there was 9 inches of snow on the ground. Therefore it was necessary for me to keep it at a friends house in his driveway under a car cover due to me living in a dormitory on campus 15 minutes away.
The first night of having the car, I purchased my first GearWrench ratchet and socket set at Advance Auto Parts as well as some fresh NGK spark plugs. It was that night that I embarrassed myself for what would be the first time of many in front of my two enthusiast friends. I couldn't even use a ratchet correctly! Lol. I am the type to laugh it all off, so everything was just fine, but it really showed them how inexperienced I was and put obvious worry into their minds.
With that said, the car fired right up in 10 degree temperatures once the plugs were properly installed (easiest job to do on an E30).
My whole family including my girlfriend were excited to see what I had purchased, so they traveled down in the coming weeks to see the car even though all they could do was sit in it, so that was a good feeling. The sad part was, those plugs were worthless and the car wouldn't start due to the frigid temps and the fact that there were many other issues that I had not known about at the time.
Here is how she sat for about 2 months while warmer weather was on its way:
Sad times, sad times.
Months passed and warmer weather approached. Spring break came and instead of going on vacation, I decided it was best to work on my car and try to get it running.
The issue, I was told was that the car was overheating and that it needed a new radiator. I ordered a new radiator, coolant hoses, water pump, timing belt, fuel filter, and throttle body gaskets among other things to install in the car in hopes that the issues would disappear.
Everything was installed, it ran and was able to be driven around the block without any further coolant leaks. I was stoked! My friend was generous enough to have let me keep the car there so I could work on it until it was running and could be moved. So on my birthday, March 15th, I moved it to my friends apartment complex without issue.
It should be noted that I am a college student and classes are back in session so my time was severely limited until after finals at this point. I still was working on the car on weekends and late into the evenings when I could.
The next adventure began when my friend and I took it out to the Fast and Furious 7 premiere. On the way there, the E30 acted as it should and everything was fine and dandy. On the way home, we experienced roughly 9 fuel cuts that killed the engine and caused a loss of power. We discovered that the quick release I had installed on the negative terminal continued to come loose, so that explained the loss of power, but the fuel cuts after around 4k RPM's did not make sense.
In the coming days I specifically diagnosed this issue to find it could be a plethora of things as this is a common issue with E30's. I replaced the Fuel pressure regulator and throttle position sensor as I had already replaced the fuel filter earlier and the fuel pump was functioning just fine.
The intermittent fuel cut was still present and now it had a crackling noise when revved past 4k. Due to this I replaced the spark plugs, spark plug wires, distributor cap, and the distributor rotor. This ignition re-haul definitely made a difference and the car fired up and idled much healthier, but still the crackling noise persisted and now there was white smoke puffing out of the exhaust.
At this point I was at my wits end and decided something was seriously wrong. The guys before me had tried to do a head gasket job, but re-use the old head bolts, thus making the job worthless. There was talk of a warped head when I purchased the car, but do to their mistakes about why it was leaking coolant, I looked past their best judgement.
I had it towed to a local shop as the best guess was that it needed a head gasket due to the white smoke. This was right before finals week and I didn't have time to deal with the issues myself. Especially with my Summer internship I had obtained. He said it would be $600 for a head gasket replacement as it would be done on his own time and wouldn't be going through the shop, (I learned what it meant when a master mechanic and business owner says they will do it on their own time lol). The car needed a whole new head as it was in fact spider-webbed and severely warped. I ordered a fresh 885 head on eBay for $770 shipped to my door and within a few weeks the car was back in my possession.
Over the months it was in the shop and at a stand still, I had ventured off and ordered some more fun parts for the car to keep my interest in-tact. I ordered stainless long tube street and track headers and a fully stainless cat-back from Ireland Engineering.
Once the car was finished, I got these installed at a local exhaust shop as they had to be welded together with stainless piping in the middle.
(I plan to add more photos as I go of the things I am speaking of)
This is where it sits right now as I am moving back to IU on August 7th for my Sophomore year of college and will be living somewhere with a garage and space to work on my car. So everything is packaged inside of the car, including my new Corbeau Sportline RRS Reclinable seats.
Thank you for reading this, I look forward to updating you all on my build as it progresses. I have learned a lot about myself, vintage BMW's, the ever growing expense of owning a German car, and how cool it is to make something entirely your own.
- Justin Cummings
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