E30 Resurrection Intro

[JeLani]

Shit I remember my old intank pump looking like your old one too , I had fuel cuts and my car even shut off on me like 3 times in a night haha.


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[Jshbrwr]

E30 Resurrection Intro

Well it looks like the timing belt/water pump job will be sooner than planned. I topped up the coolant and noticed coolant leaking out the front of the belt drive near the water pump etc. So, again it will be parked for a while until I get time/$ to put toward that fix. Looks fairly simple though and I have more confidence now than I had before for sure!

Does anyone have a good link to a deal on water pump/belt/seal etc?

[Jshbrwr]

Hey folks so I'm in the middle of the water pump/timing belt job and I saw something a bit strange and wonder what it is/was. When the old water pump came off, there was a weird flaky partition inside the orafice. Here's a pic



You can see it at about the 7 o'clock position. It was honestly so brittle, I pretty much cleaned it out while I was sucking out all the nasty stuff. Did I screw up, was it some kind of barrier or journal that is critical to the cooling system? I feel like it's probably just crud built up over the years and just deposits that result from the direction of the coolant flow...just gimme your thoughts.

Also interesting to note, when I took off the timing belt tensioner, I noticed that there was no tension spring at all. Totally missing here's what it looked like before I removed it:



Anyway, surprised it never self destructed up to now. Another reason I'm glad I went ahead and took this on now instead of later!

Thanks for your suggestions etc.

[nando]

The spring isnt needed once the bolt is tightened down - its only used to set the tension.

However, you have the stamped timing gears. They are known to fail - i reccomend replacing it with the cast version. Theres also one on the intermediate shaft that should be replaced. Would be a good opportunity to replace the cam and intermediate shaft seals.

[Jshbrwr]

Well, so...

As it goes on, I'm learning a good bit about the past of this car. Evidently the timing belt had been replaced before (gawd if not it deserves a medal) and the prior mechanic decided against replacing that tensioner spring, as mine was absent.

Here's mine installed:



The timing belt job was actually pretty easy, just like I'd read. It pretty much went as well as I'd hoped. Had a few pauses to wait for parts, but overall, reassembly was not terrible. I did have to replace the tensioning arm (weird gear train bar) and nut for the power steering pump, song with some other various things. The belts gave me some fits, but I did get them on the right way and the right tension.

I did notice after filling the cooling system that one hose was leaking even before I cranked it. Turns out I had not slipped the hose all the way down onto the pump and it seeped a bit until I refit it. It was leaking just like it did before I started the job. Flashback! Whew.

Meanwhile, I took the opportunity while the front end was disassembled to take care of some interior bits. Namely the gauge cluster. There are a few items here - odo gears were probably busted, speedo is always pegged at like 120mph (see engine start vid earlier), and also the lights were super dim, just a tiny glow in the middle. So I took it out and began to remedy those. That's where simple mistakes in troubleshooting began to show. Of course without actually testing the bulbs, I just ordered all new 2w cluster bulbs, 12 of them. Upon removing and replacing, I finally got the right idea (too late) to see if I could actually test the bulbs (I'm not too comfy with my multimeter yet). I got a 9V battery and hooked the leads up and voila! All except one of them was still good [emoji52]. Good/bad news right?!

Then to the odometer. The odo gears were sure enough toast when I pulled the speedo out.

The cluster is a Motometer one, so I ordered a replacement set from garagistic. But when it came, I was so perplexed at the difference in the actual gears. No matter what, I could not get things to work. Then I saw the VDO sticker on the speedo's pcb. Argh! Evidently the speedo in the car was replaced along the way (who knows the mileage now!). So here I am with a VDO speedo in a Motometer cluster. So a quick check on eBay nets me a Motometer speedo for $32 shipped. I already have the odo gears for it, and I went ahead and got the VDO odo gears from garagistic for $17; that way I can sell this VDO speedo with at least a working odometer. I'm hoping installing the MM speedo will remedy the weird 120mph (hoping the dim lights too). I read somewhere that he actual wave form signal to the gauge differs between the MM and VDO ones. I did check the speed sensor plug back in be differential just to be safe though, and there were no frayed or broken wires and the contacts appeared good.

SO, while waiting (again) for the cluster parts, I went ahead and reassembled the front of the engine and tested her out. Cranked up great with no leaks whatsoever. I will have to test it more thoroughly (heater on, etc) when I have the cluster reinstalled. Parts should be in by next Monday. It really would be nice to have a working odometer/speedo...updates to come