***Editors Note: Ive known and met Austin from my PNW days years ago. I also remember this car and its wonderful to see how far its come. I also didnt know the full history behind it, so its great to see how much work he's put into it. Congrats Austin, you have the March 2018 Car of the Month***
Factory options:
Color: 138 Cinnabar Red
Interior color: Originally natur vinyl, now anthracite/houndstooth with Recaro Confetti SRD seats
Engine modifications: S52, mostly stock, besides the tune and headers
Exhaust: UUC System U box
Transmission: G260/LTW flywheel/Clutch Masters stage two unit
Differential: Rebuilt 3.73 LSD, 40% lock
Suspension: AST 4100 E36 M front/E30 M rear
Wheels: E32 Staggered M-System wheels with no covers
Exterior modifications: Too many to list, but smoked Hella smileys, euro trim, iS lip that's beat to hell, shadowline trim, blah blah blah
Interior modifications: map-light mirror, Recaro SRDs, swapped over to anthracite carpet with black/anthracite Houndstooth door panels
Story behind the car: quite the story, but I'll give an abridged version. This particular car came in as a donated car at the wrecking yard I worked at when I was 14 (December 2007). It had some minor damage to the trunk lid and tail panel and my boss/friend was just going to process it. After some minor convincing, I had planned to buy it from him, but due to circumstances beyond my control, we cleaned it up as best we could and sold it.
Fast forward a couple years and I start getting into the whole forum thing. I see pics of another red sedan pop up on here, now sporting a half ass M50 swap with some goofy 5 lug parts and 18" Foose wheels...chrome. Recognized the rear end damage and knew it had to be the same car. After a while, I saw it on CL for an attractive enough price, and I had just graduated HS and had a bit of cash in my pocket, so I went and made the plunge and sold my E28 shortly there after. I spent the next couple years un-fucking everything he had done to the car. M50 ran like shit, missing three and a half throttle body bolts out of four...various oil leaks, etc, loose bolts EVERYWHERE, tons of rattles and such. Gutted the interior due to a nasty smell (someone spilled a battery in the back seat and never bothered to clean it up) and swapped over to black interior. Eventually, the 300k mile M50 got too tired for me to deal with, so I found a 130k mile S50B30 US, regasketed it and shoved it in the car. Eventually pulled that engine when it was time to assemble the silver E30 because I trusted it to be a good engine (which turned out to be a very very good idea in hindsight). Took a couple years, but eventually I put another engine in this car (OBD1 S52) and got it going again. I joke about this car not having any parts original to it anymore, but when I changed the whole rear end assembly a couple months back, that was the last of the original pieces..the subframe bushings were completely shot with over 300k on them.
Haven't really driven it much in the last four years for many different reasons, but it is still by far my favorite e30 to get in and drive. The paint and body are so meh anymore that I don't really care about scratches and dings at this point. It's the only one I don't have to worry about parking places. The great thing about red cars is they look great from far away and look *killer* in pictures. Coincidentally, it is the only car I have any real emotional attachment to...tried selling it over the years, even tried cutting it up with a sawzall, but couldn't do either. It's now my shop car of sorts (lovingly referred to as the "shop rat").
Plans for the near future are to install an Active Autowerke supercharger kit, get the front end repainted and install the M-Tech 2 kit that I've been hoarding for a couple years. Aside from that, drive the piss out of it, like I always do, and hope I don't break anything else
sittin hard by 2mAn
booty by 2mAn
interior-1 by 2mAn
interior-2 by 2mAn
recaros by 2mAn
S52-2 by 2mAn
S52-1 by 2mAn
beater by 2mAn
angles-1 by 2mAn
angles-2 by 2mAn
angles-3 by 2mAn
shiny by 2mAn
Factory options:
Color: 138 Cinnabar Red
Interior color: Originally natur vinyl, now anthracite/houndstooth with Recaro Confetti SRD seats
Engine modifications: S52, mostly stock, besides the tune and headers
Exhaust: UUC System U box
Transmission: G260/LTW flywheel/Clutch Masters stage two unit
Differential: Rebuilt 3.73 LSD, 40% lock
Suspension: AST 4100 E36 M front/E30 M rear
Wheels: E32 Staggered M-System wheels with no covers
Exterior modifications: Too many to list, but smoked Hella smileys, euro trim, iS lip that's beat to hell, shadowline trim, blah blah blah
Interior modifications: map-light mirror, Recaro SRDs, swapped over to anthracite carpet with black/anthracite Houndstooth door panels
Story behind the car: quite the story, but I'll give an abridged version. This particular car came in as a donated car at the wrecking yard I worked at when I was 14 (December 2007). It had some minor damage to the trunk lid and tail panel and my boss/friend was just going to process it. After some minor convincing, I had planned to buy it from him, but due to circumstances beyond my control, we cleaned it up as best we could and sold it.
Fast forward a couple years and I start getting into the whole forum thing. I see pics of another red sedan pop up on here, now sporting a half ass M50 swap with some goofy 5 lug parts and 18" Foose wheels...chrome. Recognized the rear end damage and knew it had to be the same car. After a while, I saw it on CL for an attractive enough price, and I had just graduated HS and had a bit of cash in my pocket, so I went and made the plunge and sold my E28 shortly there after. I spent the next couple years un-fucking everything he had done to the car. M50 ran like shit, missing three and a half throttle body bolts out of four...various oil leaks, etc, loose bolts EVERYWHERE, tons of rattles and such. Gutted the interior due to a nasty smell (someone spilled a battery in the back seat and never bothered to clean it up) and swapped over to black interior. Eventually, the 300k mile M50 got too tired for me to deal with, so I found a 130k mile S50B30 US, regasketed it and shoved it in the car. Eventually pulled that engine when it was time to assemble the silver E30 because I trusted it to be a good engine (which turned out to be a very very good idea in hindsight). Took a couple years, but eventually I put another engine in this car (OBD1 S52) and got it going again. I joke about this car not having any parts original to it anymore, but when I changed the whole rear end assembly a couple months back, that was the last of the original pieces..the subframe bushings were completely shot with over 300k on them.
Haven't really driven it much in the last four years for many different reasons, but it is still by far my favorite e30 to get in and drive. The paint and body are so meh anymore that I don't really care about scratches and dings at this point. It's the only one I don't have to worry about parking places. The great thing about red cars is they look great from far away and look *killer* in pictures. Coincidentally, it is the only car I have any real emotional attachment to...tried selling it over the years, even tried cutting it up with a sawzall, but couldn't do either. It's now my shop car of sorts (lovingly referred to as the "shop rat").
Plans for the near future are to install an Active Autowerke supercharger kit, get the front end repainted and install the M-Tech 2 kit that I've been hoarding for a couple years. Aside from that, drive the piss out of it, like I always do, and hope I don't break anything else
sittin hard by 2mAn
booty by 2mAn
interior-1 by 2mAn
interior-2 by 2mAn
recaros by 2mAn
S52-2 by 2mAn
S52-1 by 2mAn
beater by 2mAn
angles-1 by 2mAn
angles-2 by 2mAn
angles-3 by 2mAn
shiny by 2mAn
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