So after owning an e36 328, and an mx5 I missed e30s enough to get back into them. I didn't care what i got but it had to be manual.
About 3 months ago i found a lovely white sedan 1200kms away for $4000. Flew down the weekend after finding it and drove it home.
Travelled the 1200kms home without a hiccup. Found that those aftermarket headlights are absolutely terrible and the morning after getting home i re wired in the stock smileys. also found that the m40 wouldn't rev past 5k rpm so it was definitely on its death bed.
The plan was always to swap an engine into the car and after my ownership of a 318is I couldn't get the thought of having another m42 powered e30 out of my head so decided that was the route to go. Also happens to be a fair bit cheaper than most other swaps. I kept my eye out for something and ended up buying a complete package (motor, box, loom, ecu, driveshaft and exhaust) out from a rusty car for 1400.
Cleared my schedule for a weekend and me and a mate got to work.
Managed to pull the old motor out and get the new one in with 90% of the work done in one day. Next morning we got up and worked on getting the ignition stuff in, the rear section of exhaust on and generally doing the little things we forgot.
Turned the key.
No start.
Car would crank forever if i let but not even a hint of fuel or spark. Started diagnosing and checking things for a good 6 hours. Eventually i exhausted all my options and me and my mate sat around and watched some racing.
We then went out to his E30 to try and fix a no start problem and I realized that i had a grounding cable on the positive terminal! Changed that over and the thing splutters into life.
To cut a long story short, I drove the car for 2 days without a problem. I then turned the heater on and 5 minutes later noticed the motor getting a little bit hot. nothing was making it cooler so I pulled over and looked into an empty overflow tank. tried filling it and found a large stream of water coming from the rear of the head. Limped it to my mates house, pulled the intake off and found this.
motor must have sat long enough for the coolant to do some damage. I've managed to do some dodgy repairs by shoving a tight rubber hose into it and that seems to hold. I'll try and find a better permanent solution soon.
My current problem is now the car still overheats. I'm 99% sure its the thermostat as it doesn't open as far as ones I've tested in the past. I'll go get one during the week from the stealer and see how it goes.
While I fix the car I'll be using this little rocket to get around
bought it the day after the car overheated as a very rushed purchase but I'm very glad i did. I've never had 2 vehicles and so all my repairs have been rushed or hard to do right. This will hopefully make my life a lot easier and less stressful as I don't need to have the car back on the road so quickly after doing work.
Current plan of attack is
Fix cooling issues
Mess under intake, heater bypass and mustang injectors
Coil on plug
Exhaust
Have a few other little things that need doing that I'll slowly take care of and document. Trying to do every bit of maintenance possible and everything right the first time.
Anyway thanks for looking and does anyone have any idea what to replace this with?
About 3 months ago i found a lovely white sedan 1200kms away for $4000. Flew down the weekend after finding it and drove it home.
Travelled the 1200kms home without a hiccup. Found that those aftermarket headlights are absolutely terrible and the morning after getting home i re wired in the stock smileys. also found that the m40 wouldn't rev past 5k rpm so it was definitely on its death bed.
The plan was always to swap an engine into the car and after my ownership of a 318is I couldn't get the thought of having another m42 powered e30 out of my head so decided that was the route to go. Also happens to be a fair bit cheaper than most other swaps. I kept my eye out for something and ended up buying a complete package (motor, box, loom, ecu, driveshaft and exhaust) out from a rusty car for 1400.
Cleared my schedule for a weekend and me and a mate got to work.
Managed to pull the old motor out and get the new one in with 90% of the work done in one day. Next morning we got up and worked on getting the ignition stuff in, the rear section of exhaust on and generally doing the little things we forgot.
Turned the key.
No start.
Car would crank forever if i let but not even a hint of fuel or spark. Started diagnosing and checking things for a good 6 hours. Eventually i exhausted all my options and me and my mate sat around and watched some racing.
We then went out to his E30 to try and fix a no start problem and I realized that i had a grounding cable on the positive terminal! Changed that over and the thing splutters into life.
To cut a long story short, I drove the car for 2 days without a problem. I then turned the heater on and 5 minutes later noticed the motor getting a little bit hot. nothing was making it cooler so I pulled over and looked into an empty overflow tank. tried filling it and found a large stream of water coming from the rear of the head. Limped it to my mates house, pulled the intake off and found this.
motor must have sat long enough for the coolant to do some damage. I've managed to do some dodgy repairs by shoving a tight rubber hose into it and that seems to hold. I'll try and find a better permanent solution soon.
My current problem is now the car still overheats. I'm 99% sure its the thermostat as it doesn't open as far as ones I've tested in the past. I'll go get one during the week from the stealer and see how it goes.
While I fix the car I'll be using this little rocket to get around
bought it the day after the car overheated as a very rushed purchase but I'm very glad i did. I've never had 2 vehicles and so all my repairs have been rushed or hard to do right. This will hopefully make my life a lot easier and less stressful as I don't need to have the car back on the road so quickly after doing work.
Current plan of attack is
Fix cooling issues
Mess under intake, heater bypass and mustang injectors
Coil on plug
Exhaust
Have a few other little things that need doing that I'll slowly take care of and document. Trying to do every bit of maintenance possible and everything right the first time.
Anyway thanks for looking and does anyone have any idea what to replace this with?
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