Very unoriginal 1984 318i... M30 + Boost!

[keyland]

Car looks good. What differential are you running?

Thanks! It looks better in photos or from a distance. Up close is a lot of swirl marks and sap stains in the clear coat. I'm looking at doing a vinyl wrap or learning to paint over the next few months.

Differential is a 3.73 LSD but I might go taller when I do the turbo over the winter.

[efficient]

Car looks good. What differential are you running?

[keyland]

Thanks, I think the early tail lights with the plastic bumpers is the ideal combo.

As far as the M30 swap, hard to say if it was worth it or not. Definitely not the performance increase I had expected. It wasn't too much money, probably $1500 total after buying the donor car, e28 trans, and misc parts. Wiring wise, it couldn't have been easier. 100% plug and play, except the tach signal.

In hindsight, I would probably choose to freshen up the M20 and go FI on that instead but I don't hate the M30 :)

[CubbyChowder]

Looks great! Can't wait to do plastics on my '87. So overall would you say the M30 was worth the time and money?

[keyland]

Installed the DIYPNP and wideband today, scaled up the M20 tune and added some fuel in a few places.

Did figure out why I was so underwhelmed with the M30's performance. The throttle body linkage was jacked up so it only opened halfway even with the pedal on the floor. Much more snappy now! :D

Just did a little cleaning and went for a drive. Hate black car maintenance, but when it's looking good, it looks /good/ especially for an '84.

[keyland]

Hey dudes,

Usually don't post around forums too much but I've got some spare time so here's a thread to document some of the recent/future projects going on. This is just a fun car for me to play around in, learn how to weld, dump money into, you know the drill.

I usually run through cars pretty often, but I'm quite attached to this car for sentimental reasons. The muffler has been on 4 different exhausts and I will keep using it until it falls apart.

The car's been through a few versions...
1984 318i -> 325i running gear/brakes -> 528e block + 885 heads -> Late model bumpers -> DIYPNP + headers -> M30B35 swap -> ???

I'll start this with the most recent project, the M30 swap. I chose the M30 because of the simplicity of the swap and the fact that it was contemporary to the M20 and I liked keeping things in the same generation. I completed the swap in about 7 evenings.


I was planning to pull the engine and do a refresh on it, but happened upon an E34 535i with a blown automatic and an unfortunate paint job. The engine seemed unmolested except for a cone filter and it ran pretty good so I decided to take a gamble.

I brought the dirtymax and towed it home for the princely sum of $600. Yes, that is house paint.


Here's the original color/engine... Original everything. Some signs of repairs, but even the radiator was original. I guess if my car was 'gletscherblau metallic' I would have painted it too.


It's a shame too, because the interior is mint and there's not a dent on the whole car. Anyway, engine comes out:


Decided to do the head gasket and everything else so I started stripping the dirty sucker down.


Once I got in there, I found a fairly new looking Elring head gasket already in place so I decided to let it be. The oil pan came out where I found a bunch of plastic shrapnel everywhere. Discovered a shattered timing chain guide which I replaced, then I flushed all the little chunks out of the oil pump screen and vacuumed out the pan baffles.

Double checked the spraybar up top and put it back together with all new gaskets and new front/rear mains. Fast forward a couple evenings of work:


I went with garagistic mounts of course, along with some AKG poly bushings for engine and transmission. The radiator, transmission and flywheel came out of an E28 535is. Here's the newly machined flywheel:


Bye bye M20!


Hello M30!


I was so surprised it actually fit in there. I normally keep things pretty toned down, but I thought the valve cover could use just a bit of flare ;)


I already had an eta driveshaft with the big guibo, so everything bolted right up in that department.


For cooling, I went with the E28 radiator, welded a couple little brackets to hold the bottom and then used E28/E34 hoses for cooling. I had to go score a late model expansion tank which I didn't have a bracket for on my car. Luckily there was a bracket on the driver's side that had a couple holes in the right places, so I put a couple captive nuts on the tank and attached it that way.

After everything was all wired up and all plumbed in, it was time for a test drive!


I drove it around without a hood and with the DME zip tied there for a couple days until I trusted it. Then I finished wrapping the loom, putting the wiring through the firewall, and reinstalling the hood.

Unfortunately, no photos yet of the finished wiring harness. I used the engine loom as-is from the E34. Since I already had the motronic 1.1 in the car, the C101 was plug and play. Since I've got an early chassis, my battery is still up front. I simply extended the +12v wires from the E34 relays to there. Also I had to splice the C104 connector on so my tach would work.

Since it was only one day between driving it with the M20 and driving with the M30 I could compare directly. First impressions: Screw these solid engine/trans mounts. They'll be gone ASAP. Also, the M30 feels slower than my old engine, so that's something I need to check on :( I didn't think the MS/headers/AFM delete would have made that much of a difference on the M20.

So what's next?
Scale up the MS tune to work with the M30 and get that installed.
I've also decided on a turbo setup but like a dumbass, I didn't tap the oil pan when I had the chance :(