The Ecobeamer

[hkv]

For folks that see your wheel well cover I'd strongly suggest reusing the original steel wheel well and making some filet cuts/flanges to allow it to fit the hole. Works well, and is a lot stronger than AL. Only downside is that you may need a bit of seam sealer to finish the filet gaps.

that's a clever idea to re-use material. one thing to keep in mind with that is the cuts you will need to make it fit will have gaps like you mention and therefore wont be the full strength of the full circle. not that strength really matters in that area IMO. keep in mind the wheel well is right inside both the frame rails and the crossmember the diff support mounts too. I can assure you my aluminum sheet is plenty strong in the sense it needs to be which is the strength to resist wind blowing it out from the bottom and trunk contents busting it open from the top. In fact the aluminum angle crossmember I riveted the two halves too is slightly stronger than the 1mm bmw steel and more importantly it is more rigid which is important because im mounting an exhaust hanger too it.

[hkv]

highly experienced welder, by u only use stick :D

well for me MIG is like driving an automatic; there's no skill, no honor in it.

don't be ignoring my TIG skills now though ;)

[hkv]

so one thing I discovered last night when I test fit up the brakes is that my wheel studs would not fit the holes in the rotor due to the ridge that separates the threads on the stud. what ill have to do as a solution is turn down that ridge on my lathe on the studs and that will allow the studs to thread all the way in with the rotor in place




I worked on mounting my cv axles and one of the diff side caps came off during shipping and the cv joint became disassembled so I had to spend quite a bit of time figuring out how to reassemble the cv joint but now I know the technique. I had to modify whatever you call these metal pieces, mill them and grind them to get them to be able to fit. you can see where i milled the middle section much thinner for clearance.



cv axles and suspension are installed





still need to install secondary diff mount though.

[hkv]

then installed the exhaust, everything looking good





one thing im very happy about is that I was right about why my center exit was slightly offset to the right; the midpipe was timed incorrectly. paying attention to that this time the center exit ended up perfectly center which makes me very happy I don't have to chop it up and re weld it to center it. its great.



check out how I have the muffler tucked into the bumper:

[roguetoaster]

that's a clever idea to re-use material. one thing to keep in mind with that is the cuts you will need to make it fit will have gaps like you mention and therefore wont be the full strength of the full circle. not that strength really matters in that area IMO. keep in mind the wheel well is right inside both the frame rails and the crossmember the diff support mounts too. I can assure you my aluminum sheet is plenty strong in the sense it needs to be which is the strength to resist wind blowing it out from the bottom and trunk contents busting it open from the top. In fact the aluminum angle crossmember I riveted the two halves too is slightly stronger than the 1mm bmw steel and more importantly it is more rigid which is important because im mounting an exhaust hanger too it.

Fair enough, was really only looking at it from a trunk usability standpoint, but the crossbrace is quite the improvement over a flat sheet.

[Designer2w]

Bigger brakes seem like a good idea

[moatilliatta]

When the exhaust gets hot, it’ll grow an inch or 2.

[hkv]

Bigger brakes seem like a good idea

no doubt

[hkv]

When the exhaust gets hot, it’ll grow an inch or 2.

I had not considered that at all. although I think 1-2 inches is pretty far fetched. my daily driver has a full 3" 304SS turbo-back(same exhaust pipe specs as the ecobeamer) and I don't notice it getting longer at all but I don't look for that either, ill check and see how much that grows when hot to see what to expect.

I would expect 0.1"-0.5" thermal expansion which would be fine but I might cut a little bit more clearance in the bumper just in case.

thanks for the heads up, that's definitely something to keep in mind because I only have like 0.4" clearance between the end of the muffler and the bumper

[hkv]

so it turns out my steering shaft was hitting the alternator which is kinda weird I thought it was gonna clear, but that oversight was probably a good thing because the steering rack side u joint in that steering shaft was pretty toast so I should've just decided to replace it in the first place rather than trying to use it which would have made removing it much easier. I never removed it because it was stuck pretty good. so trying to get it off with the engine and all that in there was a pain.

after trying to pull it off for a few mins I decided to take the war path and just grind it off, it fought back and dropped some hot bits of aluminum on me and burned my neck but the heat from cutting it helped get it off and it went easy after i put a cut on the other side of the clamp side to allow it to spread more.




so now I have a new steering shaft with fresh u joints and it clears the alternator good






one other fitment issue that emerged is that the drivers side steering rack mount I cant bolt it up because the oil pan is too much in the way. what I ended up doing is mount it on the forward bolt holes but in the same position by drilling and tapping bolt holes about 1" deep on the bottom and the top. works good

[hkv]

muffler exhaust hanger is all taken care of.





I modified all of my wheel studs to fit the rotors



I installed the studs and the brakes and rotors onto the rear wheel hubs. red threadlocker on the studs and medium strength threadlocker on the brake components



im almost done with the secondary diff mount as well. I had to remove the diff cover because I forgot to seal it up.

[hkv]

so I was working on the secondary diff mount and figured I should cut some more clearance in the bumper while im working back there. not really a downside to having more I figure.






secondary diff is mounted




filled tranny with synchromesh and filled the diff with synthetic 75w140. imagine frying either of those because you forgot to fill them. lots of brake fittings came in today.

[hkv]

finished with the rear end for now I move back to the front. the steering rack is all bolted up so I bolt up the coilovers and then I mount the control arms up and put my bushings in the lollipops and get everything bolted up. I heard your supposed to set the car down soon after replacing the control arms bushings so I quickly bolt up the hubs and wheels. skipping the brakes for now just so I can get the bushings settled.



the coilovers are set at a pretty good ride height but I might jack the car up another inch or so when everythings said and done. I forgot how low these cars are, this thing is as about as low as my cobra.




not the best pic but heres what the ground clearance is looking like. the oil pan seems to be the low point of the car, looks like about 2" below the subframe and a little less below the exhaust. in the future when I do other things to the car one big thing I would want to do is a less deep oil pan, something like formyhealth made when he was going for the ecoboost and while im in there do a balance shaft delete.

ground clearance as it sits right now looks something like 4", that's not that bad is it? ride height might not actually need to be jacked up any more or atleast not much.



i like how my wheels fit in the fender as it is.






anyways i will let the car sit a day or two before jacking it back up and then mounting the front brakes, fingers crossed they fit they fit the wheels but the rears fit fine so should be ok.

[formyhealth]

Looks good! Can you tell me more about those rear brakes? Sent from my SM-G973U1 using Tapatalk

[hkv]

Looks good! Can you tell me more about those rear brakes? Sent from my SM-G973U1 using Tapatalk

they are IE rear BBK, you have to bleed both sides(theres 4 bleed screws but you only do the top 2 of course) so apparently they squeeze from both sides. they are super nice IMO. everything's billet machined aluminum, and fits up right. Im super satisfied with the brake kits they are super nice. im using the front brake kit as well.

https://www.iemotorsport.com/bmw/item/e30bbkrear.html