325i build from South Africa

[Blaqjew]

Hi all, this is my very long build to resurrecting my baby that I smashed.

car was originally South Africa built 325i. No engine mods. Only mods made were lowered suspension on cheap knock off springs & new free flow exhaust system.





This car was as stock standard as they come. Only had a few mods on it.
Then after a fabulous year of driving at 60-100km/h just so people can see me rolling in that beast, I smashed her in June (two months after my wedding). Yup….. Coming out of Clearwater Mall, I went nose first into a yellow bukkie.(blame it on the warn out tyres & Lord knows what else) :sadd: .




Now the planning begins. What do we do? Do we fix or do a transplant? Do we do a 2 door or a 4 door?
We decided on a 2 door, till I got home on the same day & Wife tells me she’s pregnant (there goes all my dreams of looking cool in a fake 325is)

[Blaqjew]

Then to decide on the colour. I was either gonna go to “Estoril Blue” like the new F30 3-series


or “MARAKESH Brown” like the new BMW X1. (not gonna say yet which one we went for).
.

Then continued to look for more parts as I wanted this baby to look as clean & as neat as it possibly can.
Ended up buying a 318auto with no engine nor box. Friend sold it to me for a steal. Car had everything. From good body to pretty damn good interior. Only thing, cracked dash. but my 325 still has a damn good dash in it.

the idea was to take everything from the 318 car, strip it, clean it, refurbish what might need to be refurbished box it & wait my painter to finish up the paint & body work. What I want is for this new car to be as damn clean as possible.….

[Blaqjew]

Bought a BAUR

Then I bought meself this. It was meant to be a long term project but would be my everyday drive while waiting on the new car.


It’s a 1989 318 Baur with an M30B30 Engine. Engine blew head gasket, but that’s not an issue coz now I’ve decided to take the engine from the 325 & transplant it into this baby for now since going M52B28 Multivalve on the new baby seems to be the smarter option. or perhaps fix this M30 later & BOOOOOOST it.

[Blaqjew]

I played around with the idea of leaving the M30 Engine in the Baur & only doing the Head Gasket change on it. But after a 3 days & 25 minutes, I decided to use the M20B25 in the Baur. This will be kept quite standard with nothing fancy. So, my mech got down to the E.R & did the heart transplant. Removed trani & all things nice from my 325.

This is how I got her.

& Yes, that is a Golf-1 Radiator the previous owner had in there.

Engine out.


The M30.


Naked 325i (Donor)


I was gonna be using the M30 on the new build (which had to be pushed back till the Baur was done). My reasons for this are:
1. M30 gives greater power over M20 when boosted.
2. I don’t think I will be going M50 anymore. Budget forecast seems a little gloomy.
3. Doing the swap became a lot cheaper.

The Baur now with the 325i Motor, Box & Freeflow.

[flyboyx]

awesome black jew! mazeltop!

[Blaqjew]

Things got kinda slowish. But great news is, the Almost dead Baur that I got & was now running
The car still looked a bit like sh*t but quite an improvement from how it was.
Engine & Box transplant, re-wired the car as previous owner had done an extremely poor cut & Join job.
Mechanic fitted a new Steering rack, rack ends etc. Headlights & even fixed part of the roof.

This is how I got the car. Valence is skew, headlights don't line nor work etc nor does the 3.0L engine run. Car needed loads of work mechanically & cosmetics.


Interior needed major work. Starting with the horrible back cards that were cut to fit 6x9 Speakers.


Found me a 323 Chromie that I took its door cards & will be fitting those. They quite clean, just need colour touch ups.


Here's the old Roof when I got the car. Lord knows what happened to it.


Then Got this ... Clean ROOF... :whoohoo:


Refurbished SPEEDO (no, not the swim wear) that went into the BAUR. Seeing the one in the car was misbehaving. Temp gauge not working, Speed wasn't properly calibrated & petrol gauge always on empty.


Better wheel


Then this guy arrived.

[kingston]

Nice! I look forward to more updates!!

[stonea]

Looking forward to this, always loved Baurs and I hope to do a M30 someday. On a side note I'm looking for a South African Gas Gauge/ Cluster if you could help me out!!!!