Half-Life | '91 DS 318iS Slicktop | Track & Weekend Warrior

[jeenyus]

Solid update. Love this car.

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[Digitalwave]

Well, a lot has happened since the last update! Let's dive in.

First off, I finally bit the bullet and got a vehicle capable of towing and bought a trailer. I have accumulated so much stuff that I bring to the track, and with a car that may or may not have an issue when being flogged at the track, plus the lack of a/c or any basic comfort in driving the car on the street, it has sure made track weekends more enjoyable. I ended up putting on a Stealth Hitch on the X5 and I hard wired an electric brake controller and hid it on the driver's side glove box. Really happy with how it all came out. It was a bit nerve racking taking about the interior of a new car, but it was all pretty easy.












So back over to the E30. From the last update, I didn't have much left to do before starting it back up. Just had to put the intake manifold and intake tract on, and then the cooling system and the rest of the exhaust.

I had the mid-pipe ceramic coated this time as well, hoping to lower the cabin temps a little bit.






Got the manifold on there.






Then I bolted the intake up and put the cooling system in. It was time to start the car!

It fired right up but died immediately. I tried a few more times and then it was apparent the car was flooded. Using flood clear (a Megasquirt feature) and it still wouldn't start. I pulled a plug out and realized I made an incredibly stupid mistake.

Back in December, I cleaned up the intake manifold, and wrapped my injectors and the fuel rail in DEI heat wrap and heat tape. This was in an effort to reduce heat soak on my injectors. When that project was all wrapped up, I plugged up the manifold with paper towels and then it sat for over 3 months.

Fast forward to putting it back on. It was sitting on my bench with the ports facing away from me. I picked up up and swung it over to the engine bay without ever looking at it, and I totally forgot about the small wads of paper towel that were in the ports. They got sucked into the engine.

After pulling the manifold, most of the towels came out easily by turning over the engine to release the valves. The rest of the small bits I couldn't get blew out once it fired up, and sure enough it fired RIGHT up and ran great as soon as it was put back together.





I bled the coolant for a few minutes, drove it around the parking lot, and called it a night. It had gotten pretty late.






A week or so later, I had some more time to drive the car and took it out on the street for a bit. It was running a bit warmer, which I thought was odd. Took it on the highway and the temps shot up instead of going down like they usually do. I was able to limp it home without it getting TOO hot, but something was definitely wrong. I tried several times to bleed the coolant more, with the front end up in the air, etc. The coolant kept boiling over. I made a huge mess in the shop.








At this point, I was distraught. I was thinking the worse... that I had done something majorly wrong with the head gasket, that the head was cracked and pressurizing the coolant... all sorts of bad thoughts. I started pulling out the cooling system thinking the head is coming back out again, and called it a night.

The next day after thinking about it for a bit, I was wondering what the chances it could be that the new thermostat I put in there was defective. On a whim I threw the old thermostat back in, put the radiator back in, and gave it a drive the next day. Good as new. The thermostat I had put in wasn't opening, or at least not at the right temperature! That was such a huge relief.

The car was driving great, and I just had a few more things to wrap up.








With the car running great, I had to button up a few things. Had to put the hood and under tray back on, and I wanted to finish up the oil catch can setup I had been working on.

I had bought an inexpensive catch can on Amazon that I thought would work perfectly. It had 3/4" ports and some basic baffling on the cap. I planned to put it in line with the valve cover breather, and to retain the connection at the throttle body instead of capping it. It's safe and many people do this, but I wanted a vacuum to be pulled on the valve cover, so I kept it all hooked up.

As you know, the factory tube that connect the VC to the TB tapers, like, a lot. It goes from about 22mm down to about 13mm. My plan was to use a 3/4" hose from the VC to the catch can, then step down a 3/4" to a 1/2" to connect to the throttle body. After messing with it for a bit, I could not get the 3/4" hose through the intake manifold without it kinking the hose. I gave up on that idea and decided to utilize part of the factory tube, and then just use 1/2" tube for the rest. I had my local machine shop cut off the 3/4" ports and tap the cap for 3/8NPT, and then put 1/2" brass barbs on it.








I cut the TB curve out of the factory tube and used a 1/2" hose barb to join it to some 1/2" silicone vacuum line. Then I filled the rest of the can with some stainless steel scouring pads (won't rust).








My original idea for mounting the can didn't pan out. I ended up making an angled bracket to bolt it to the power steering pump mount. This ended up working well. The can is solidly mounted, and it can be dropped out easily to be emptied without having to remove anything else.










I brought the car to PBIR to do a shakedown at a time trial event. The car drove admirably. The biggest difference was the brake balance after moving to the E32 master cylinder. I can brake so much harder. I turned a personal best by over 1 second; a good bit on a 1:31 lap time.

For the first time, my tranmission vent tube overflowed, and I got trans fluid all over the brake booster area. It even came through the grommet by the fuse box and I got some in the foot well area. I ended up having to extend that hose by another 5 feet. I put 2 coils in the tube between the brake booster and intake manifold.






Lastly, mounted up some Hoosiers on a set of 15x8" Kosei K1's.






Then it was finally time to head over to Sebring for a 2 day NASA event! Got the car loaded up on the trailer, got all packed up, and had a great weekend there. We had a lot of rain the first day, but the second day was beautiful. I dropped over 6 seconds between day 1 and day 2. The car was just driving great. I did end up with a VERRRYYY cracked front rotor, but it lasted the rest of the weekend. The catch can setup is working well. There isn't any fluid accumulation in there yet (which I am kind of surprised by), but it's definitely catching vapors and stuff, so it will eventually fill up.

I didn't take a single picture at the track, so we'll see if I purchased the photos from the photographer that was there.

Other than that, I just need to put new rotors on the front, and I should be ready to go for the next event.

Until next time...

[AWDBOB]

Thanks for that x2! I've been looking for that exact elbow for my MAF setup and was about to give up.

[jeenyus]

Thanks man! Nothing like another 100 on the E30!

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[Digitalwave]

can you share what silicone intake boot that is?

This is the one I have: http://gecoils.com/?page_id=9

[jeenyus]

can you share what silicone intake boot that is?

[Digitalwave]

Thanks everyone!


Got some work done the other night. The headers are bolted up. Put on the timing belt and verified the timing at least 5 times. Installed the thermostat housing. Installed the intake manifold. Very thin smear of grey RTV on the thermostat housing gasket, and red RTV on the intake manifold gaskets. Probably not necessary, but I have a habit of doing this.










I started messing around with the mounting location for my new oil catch can. I think this spot is going to work well. It's out of the way, fairly hidden, and can be accessed from underneath the car easily to drain it. This catch can seems fairly nice. It's the same one that Burger Tuning sells for $150+, can be found on Amazon for about $30. It will be plumbed in-line from the valve cover breather to the throttle body.

[ArtFoodBMW]

Dude, This is seriously impressive. The attention to detail is awesome to see. I think you've just changed my mind on the direction I want to take my e30. Looking forward to more updates.

[rzerob]

Is it about time for you to update your signature?

[Digitalwave]

Thanks for the kind words guys.

I have never worked on a 325ix, but on all of the cars that have the oil filter rotated under the headers, they are a pain to do oil changes on. I like the sandwich plate for getting rid of that alone.

[jeenyus]

It's their universal 19 row kit and sandwich plate. I think I used the 3ft and 4ft braided lines, but I don't recall. Mishimoto braided oil lines are -10AN but they are sized closer to -12, so standard fittings don't work. I had to buy an extra 90* below from them directly to make it work the way I routed it. The lines go through the undertray in the stock oil cooler line location, so I didn't have to cut anything.

This seems straight forward enough. Kind of what I was thinking it was. In the 325IX this whole area is a complete clusterfuck in my opinion. Every oil change dumps oil all over the mount and it's simply just in an awful spot for changing the oil after the car is hot. This might be an option to remedy that, plus deal with an AN line oil cooler at the same time.

Thanks for always having the coolest shit on your e30. Always a great source of information and ideas.

[Danny]

Man this is a great thread. Lots of inspiration here! Keep it up dude!

[Digitalwave]

It's their universal 19 row kit and sandwich plate. I think I used the 3ft and 4ft braided lines, but I don't recall. Mishimoto braided oil lines are -10AN but they are sized closer to -12, so standard fittings don't work. I had to buy an extra 90* below from them directly to make it work the way I routed it. The lines go through the undertray in the stock oil cooler line location, so I didn't have to cut anything.

[jeenyus]

Any more information on that oil cooler setup? The Mishimoto one? I've wanted to change mine for a long while now and this is the first time I'm seeing this.

[Digitalwave]

Theoretically when the thermostat is opened this thermistor is separated from the other 2 (gauge cluster and ECU), however the reading from mine never differs more than 2* F from the ECU thermistor that Megasquirt sees. I'd imagine it's partly because of the hole in the thermostat housing that allows coolant to pass between the two passages even when the thermostat is open and blocking that port between the two. If yours are that far apart, it could be an issue with one of the thermistors, or the calibration of the thermistor in TunerStudio.