Project Armo "330i" M-tech 1

[rzerob]

What is the name of the washer bottle kit?

[Skarpa]

Last weekend I bought the tongs for forming overlapping seams


While I was shopping, I bought a small tank for windshield washer. In a summer car there's no use for a five liter tank. I think I will place it on battery shelf or in original location. I just need to check where it fits better when the M3 plastic cover on battery shelf and the plastic cover behind the headlights are in place.




By the way, this is the official windshield washer for hobby cars in Finland because it's small, easy-to-install and cheap. It actually comes with the pump, hoses, nozzles, wiring and a switch.

The front corner is finally cleaned and painted with epoxy primer so I can move on to wheel arch job with clean conscience.


I need to roll the rear fender lips double anyway so my brother asked me why would I keep the original construction and then roll it. That was a good point. I think I will cut off the lip from the wheel well panel and bend the one on the wheel arch panel around the new edge and clamp it down with glue in between. I think it's easiest if I first bend the lip almost double before installing the panel. I made a test bend to see if I can bend the lip nicely on a table with a rubber mallet.

Seems good. I dont know how I will remove the paint under the lip though. Oh well, luckily I have two patch panels for the right side.
EDIT: This was not a good technique. Bending the lip of a separate patch panel changes the shape of the wheel arch and the panel will no longer fit the car.

[Skarpa]

Here's where we are going now:

- Motor is stock and should be In good running condition. I will replace the auxiliary belt and the tensioner pulleys and check the hoses and such. Swapping in the refurbished head with re-ground cams and doing vanos service are optional extras that I may still do at first stage.

- The suspension parts are in powder-coating and I have all the bearings, bushings etc. to rebuild the suspension. I need to service the brake calipers and I think I'll have them yellow zinc chromate plated.

- 2.65 LSD diff is supposedly in good working order but I suspect the gear ratio will be tad too long so I agreed on buying 2.93 gearset and will swap that in, replace the bearings and check the condition of the LSD unit.

- All the interior and trim is mostly ready to go in. I will dye the carpet, rear shelf, trunk liners and probably also the headliner come the summer.

- Exterior trim will need some work but I should have everything acquired.

So all in all things are looking good and if I had the body ready the car would probably be running this summer. The thing is the body is not ready. Lately I've been keeping myself busy with non-sheet metal stuff because to tell you the truth, I'd grown a little tired of body repairs. Now I think I've got my motivation back for that. Earlier I had plans of test-fitting the engine but I already know it will fit right in. People shove in M50s and M52s all the time so at this point my time is better spent on bodywork. There is still quite a bit of work left but I also have a lot of it done.

Things I've done:
- Floors and rockers are ready save for some screws and brackets for fluid lines and insulation.
- Engine compartment and nose don't have anything major left.
- Rear spring mounts and the beam between them are done.

Things to do:
- Replacing the rear wheel wells. I will replace the right wheel well completely and the outer half of the left one using factory parts.
- Replacing the rear wheel arches using patch panels
- Replacing the rear face of the car using patch panel
- Replacing the battery pocket in trunk using factory part
- Replacing the cross frame beam with diff mount and sway bar mounts (new fabrication)
- Repairing small rust holes at the bottom of left A, B and C pillars
- Replacing all the brackets at the bottom of the rear seat.

So the rear of the car looks something like this:


Before I cut off the wheel arches I wanted to check that the rear wheels and tires will fit in. I need to roll the inner lip of the fender but otherwise seems to be ok.




I started the work on the right wheel well by tearing out the old one:






I also cut off the rear end of the frame beam. It is included in the factory replacement part with the battery pocket.


The trunk floor was rusty in a few places so I fixed it.




I will use factory pieces for the wheel well and glue them together with panel adhesive. I drilled holes in the pieces and in car body for pop-rivets to hold them together while the adhesive cures.




Next i drew a line around the wheel arch and cut it off. I will make an indent in the edge, overlap the patch panel with the car side and use panel adhesive for that joint also. The two halves of the wheel well will be quite difficult to join together when in car so I riveted them together with a couple of rivets and checked whether I can get the wheel well in as a single part. No problem.


Then I cleaned the joint surface and glued the two pieces together.




I also made small reinforcement welds for the shock towers. I've been told that newer models have these as stock.


When I get the tool for forming the overlap seam on wheel arc I will prepare the wheel arc piece and then start assembling the puzzle. I regret a bit that I didn't order the complete rear quarters from dealership. It would be less work replacing and I would have very good access to everything with the rear quarter cut off. I guess I could still get them but I don't want to wait for them and I've already done most of the repairs on my quarters. Also money.

[Skarpa]

I just bought a refurbished head when I came across one for a decent price.


I was thinking of building this head complete with re-ground cams and then just swap it onto B28. Then later I can tackle the bottom end and pump up the displacement and compression. In addition to what I already have, I need the exhaust cam tray and a set of lifters.

I'm also discussing on buying a cast iron sleeved engine block to work with the M54 internals. The European M52's have aluminum block with nikasil plating but there were problems with nikasil in some countries with lower quality fuel (mainly UK). If there was damage due to nikasil erosion, BMW replaced the block with cast iron sleeved one (the Z3 block for you Americans). That's the block I want because M54 piston rings are designed to work with cast iron cylinders.

[Skarpa]

Nice updates!

That E39 airbox should look right at home once you're done it would seem, really neat idea

Could you explain the thinking behind the high swaybar mounts on the struts though? I would've thought that inverting the links' mounting orientation, together with the increas in length would result in some unfavorable suspension geometrics?...

E30 M3 as well as most of the newer BMWs, uses a sway bar mounted to the struts. There are two advantages. The movement of the strut mounting point is fairly linear during suspension stroke whereas the one in the suspension arm travels in an arc. The effect of the sway bar is more consistent and predictable when mounted on strut. The other advantage is that when the sway bar is mounted on strut, it has better leverage to control the suspension movement allowing a thinner sway bar to have more effect.

My sway bar links will likely be longer than the M3 ones because my brackets are actually welded a bit higher than in M3 and the car will be lower than a stock M3 so I need to further increase the length to keep the sway bar pointed horizontally. In theory, the longer links are a plus because the longer the links, the less their angle changes when turning the wheels -> more consistent sway bar action while cornering.