'89 lachssilber 318i touring.. beginning build

[Das Delfin]

My car had the same three red indicator lights in the dash until I swapped in a new blower motor and resistor. I have no idea why they're related

[dinanm3atl]

Really want to do an E30 touring. Best of luck!

[Heitzke]

I have same headliner (came with less optioned e30s - as mine was originally 316i) - I cleaned it up with magic erasers and it worked pretty well.

Nice! Good to know, thanks. I'd "like" to go ahead and redo the thing, but I also really hate working on cars during the winter months.

My car had the same three red indicator lights in the dash until I swapped in a new blower motor and resistor. I have no idea why they're related

Haha that's really strange, but good to know since I have to swap in a new blower/resistor anyway.

Really want to do an E30 touring. Best of luck!

Thanks! It's been pretty fun so far

[cory58]

Heitzke - welcome! I picked up a Touring in October, and am still compiling my own to-do list. So far, there is no overlap with yours, except for the trashed headliner. Most frustrating so far are the water leaks in the wells behind the rear wheels. I also keep finding more rust, but thankfully none of it is structural.

I've found good Touring info on E30owners.com. It's UK based and has a great DIY for removing a Touring headliner.

Feel free to PM me anytime.

Cory

[roguetoaster]

Hot dang Mike, you're really moving on that little 318i!

Really glad it went to a great new caretaker! I was also looking through some old documents and found I had the import/maintenance records to send you for posterity/general interest.

[Heitzke]

Hot dang Mike, you're really moving on that little 318i!

Really glad it went to a great new caretaker! I was also looking through some old documents and found I had the import/maintenance records to send you for posterity/general interest.

Haha thanks, doin' what I can over here. Appreciate all the records/papers, it's nice to have with an interesting car.

[Heitzke]

So, we have functioning roof.



A very... ugly roof.




Ordered some 3M interior adhesive to get the sunroof cover fabric back in place, and also need to get myself a new handle

Seems to be another causality from the initial breakage. Annoying, but whatever. Also ordered some new front euro trim, rear roundel, brake position switch.

Need to go ahead and order rear trim pieces, and get some replacement belts. Also on the docket are PS lines, but I really need to knock out the blower motor first cause it's getting pretty damn cold.

[2mAn]

Love it! Keep going, Im excited to see the progress

[NufnSus]

This is what I THINK is a wireless remote system? I've found people using it on german forums, but google translate is making everything hard to follow. Halp?

Shoot me a PM if you still need some help figuring this one out

Very nice wagon you've scored there, always good seeing a tasteful E30 revival!

[roguetoaster]

How are you feeling about the M40 now that you're a couple months in?

Also, this is the touring of the trio that I miss the most now that it looks like the 324 has found a new home in CA. Maybe I'll get to see it again one day, sigh.

[Heitzke]

How are you feeling about the M40 now that you're a couple months in?

Also, this is the touring of the trio that I miss the most now that it looks like the 324 has found a new home in CA. Maybe I'll get to see it again one day, sigh.

Really not so bad. I've driven slower cars, but this is a fun slow. Think i'm going to do the timing belt (like I have a choice, ha) here in a couple weeks, and then see what happens during the AutoX season.

I've gotten really attached to the car in a short period of time. R3V meetup sometime? (I haven't been here long enough to know how/if/when these happen)

[Heitzke]

First. mother. fucking. handles.



Hangin' in front of the E30 hut. Now with TWO fogs



Looking for a little coolant drip, think it's actually the drain plug gasket. Annoying.



Also took the chance to grab some rust pics. Rust doesn't really bother me, but on a scale of 1-10, where do these fit?







The front jackpoints have a little gap, which is shitty, so they're rust compromised. May need to grind off the undercoating in places and see what things really look like in the sills :/


Thing really needs a polish too. Also check the 80's tandem in the back, it almost leads to a divorce every time it's ridden.



New Roundel on the back... cause:



Since I finished up the sunroof, took the chance to do a paint cleaning and quick single-stage polish and collinite wax to give it a fresh sealing. Tiny tiny bit of clearcoat failure on the back, so want to preserve the nice paint I can.


Here's ONE PASS on the sunroof panel on the claybar:



Second pass:



Cleaning just the roof took forever (and also killed 1.5 claybars, ha)


Edit: Actually, looking back through some of Rougetoasters photos (thanks dude) I see that the bottom of the car really wasn't too rusty before the coating was redone. I guess i'll just continue on with the previous plan of maybe repairing the front jack point area, and then pulling off the fender liners and bumpers to check for other rusty regions.

Need to go through and treat a few areas. Tiny bit of surface rust in the back right hatch compartment, little bit underneath the rear window on the hatch.

[roguetoaster]

That rust does look to be a bit of a worry as the pic appears to show metal flaking. Even so, it looks like it's still at wire wheel/rust coverter/undercoat.

As to the radiator, it's fairly uncommon to have the "drain plug" (rarely works as it gets clogged with deposits) leak. Fortunately, it's all M42 stuff, so is readily available.

For the sunroof handle be sure to get an OE one as every alternate brand I've tried has broken or had the spring fail. For instance, the spring on the one that was in the car failed the day you came to pick it up, despite being under 6 months old.

I should also let you know, as I think I forgot to tell you, the fuel pump was replaced the day the car was delivered from the port. I removed one from the race car and installed it, so it had 20 track hours on it prior to install. It's also an M42 component.

Glad the pics helped, they'll be there as long as google doesn't break photos again.

[Heitzke]

That rust does look to be a bit of a worry as the pic appears to show metal flaking. Even so, it looks like it's still at wire wheel/rust coverter/undercoat.

As to the radiator, it's fairly uncommon to have the "drain plug" (rarely works as it gets clogged with deposits) leak. Fortunately, it's all M42 stuff, so is readily available.

For the sunroof handle be sure to get an OE one as every alternate brand I've tried has broken or had the spring fail. For instance, the spring on the one that was in the car failed the day you came to pick it up, despite being under 6 months old.

I should also let you know, as I think I forgot to tell you, the fuel pump was replaced the day the car was delivered from the port. I removed one from the race car and installed it, so it had 20 track hours on it prior to install. It's also an M42 component.

Glad the pics helped, they'll be there as long as google doesn't break photos again.

Nice, all really good to know. Supposed to have some nice weather, so hopefully get a little more wrench time this weekend.

I'll have to inspect the radiator a little more. For lack of a better description the little blue 'block' on the bottom of the drain area seems to slowly collect coolant and drip. It's also conveniently the lowest part of the radiator, so I may strap a gopro under there and see where I'm pushing coolant.

It's a pita, but I think i'll just buy a new oem handle. I blew through another used factory piece in all of 10 minutes.

[roguetoaster]

I'd bet that you're getting a coolant leak from the tank gaskets. You can rebuild the radiator overflow tank, but it's a bit of a pest to do and not much less expensive compared to a new radiator assembly.