3MPowered's Euro S50 E30

[2mAn]

love that mk1!! theres some 14" panasports FS in the PNW forum that would look tits on it. I have a 1.6L thats bored out and has a big valve carb head on it that Im waiting for the right project to insert it into. Im trying to get that sucker to rev. has a ton of lightweight internal rotating parts. just waiting...

[3MPowered]

Thanks for the kind words guys!

Nice build. What are the specs on the wheels and what spacers? I have a BBK too, and want to go back to a weave wheel but want to limit how much spacer I use.

They're actually 15x8 ET11 BBS RMs, too small for the BBK that I've got. Depending on the BBK you've got, you may find yourself in the same situation if you're looking for a 15" wheel.

What muffler & tips are those? They look neat!

They're Vibrant exhaust tips but I had to cut them up before welding them to the muffler canister. It looks decent for a first attempt but one day I'll redo the muffler.

excellent build! I remember drooling over your e36m3 a while back when I was e36 obsessed on bimmerforums. Sorry to see it got wrecked, but I am very glad to see its essence has been preserved in the e30!

Thanks man, I still love E36s but for slightly different reasons. I'd like to say the E30 drives similarly to the M3 but it's a much more feral experience than the E36 was. It might be down more to how I've setup the car though.

[3MPowered]

Went to the local track recently and had a go at the E30. I put it through its paces (at least as hard as I dared) and it didn't skip a beat.





I had multiple comments from other track members on how good the car sounded, so the exhaust is doing its job, albeit at about 1" off the ground.

I also took it down Chuckanut during a trip to pick up a decent set of wheels for the Rabbit:



I also did up a quick video for the hell of it:

https://youtu.be/5NnRk2qZIwY

[bangn]

really love everything about this build, that colour is beautiful. One of those signature BMW colours.

[2mAn]

We need a clip at WOT with the exhaust cut out open

[Sh3rpak!ng]

We need a clip at WOT with the exhaust cut out open

Agreed.

That lopey idle is lovely.

Sent from my SM-G920T using Tapatalk

[3MPowered]

Hahah, I wish I still had the cut out valve on the mid pipe. I took it off because the car was so loud without it, I would have rarely used it. Plus, I think it would have been better to have one bypass valve on each pipe so a much more even sound (a single valve sounds pretty crap).

[allmotorguy]

Awesome car mate! What's new here? There is no new updates for quite long time. Did you attend more trackdays this time? All the best to you!

[3MPowered]

Update: September 29th, 2016

Mileage: I forget...

Yes, I've let this journal fall by the wayside. Here's to fixing that:

The E30 had a small electrical fire sometime around mid-summer. Long story short, the O2 pre-heating circuit experienced a fault that caused a portion of the wiring loom to go up in smoke, melting all adjacent wires in the wiring harness and causing all kinds of nasty smells. The closest approximation I have for an explanation is that, because my exhaust hangs so low, the O2 sensors have been scraping the ground over bumps, causing the wires to eventually be exposed and short-out. Blame it on my novice exhaust design, I guess.

So, with the girlfriend in town from school for the summer, time to work on the E30 was somewhere between scant and nil. Once she left, however, it was all of 2 weekends before I'd repaired the damage to the harness and fixed the myriad electrical gremlins that had surfaced. I did make a poor judgement call in taking the E30 to the annual picnic (because I so desperately wanted to squeeze in at least one road trip this summer). Well, imagine my embarrassment when I pulled up to the show with a wildly bouncing idle and an uber-rich smelling exhaust. Live and yearn.

In any case, it's been roughly 3 months since I've driven the car, and I'm itching to put some miles beneath the still fresh semi-slicks, so I'm going to hit the road right now.

I'll part with a few pictures taken before the car sat idle for 2 months:







The Bunny also gets special mention here, because a 40 year old car should not be as good a daily as this car has proven to be. I've since source some coilovers and a fresh set of E21 basket weaves for it, and the positive attention it receives went up four fold. Not shown is the OEM small duckbill front lip that I also installed. It'll be a sad day when I sell it:

[allmotorguy]

Awesome jobs done like always mate!
Any new updates here? :)

[goarmy]

If I were to place the oil cooler where you placed it would I have room for a after market e30 condenser and pusher fan?

[allmotorguy]

wow. nothing new here.
How does it even possible? ;) Mate, we wanna see some updates. :)

[3MPowered]

Update: September 6th, 2019

Hello everyone, I guess it’s been a while but I didn’t want to leave this thread hanging so I thought I’d post a quick update.

There have been a lot of changes in my automotive life since my last post - something I can expand on later.

The E30 has been running extremely well and serves as my primary mode of transport during the summer months.

I have ave since revised the exhaust system to a single 3” pipe, dual resonators, a cat and a quieter muffler, which makes for a more pleasurable long distance companion.

The car also also now sits on 16” Compomotive wheels which have allowed me to finally run my 6 piston BBK, to which I have also added a Porsche 944 brake booster. The assisted braking combined with the larger front brakes have transformed the driving experience! It’s a little tougher to heel and toe, but the car now stops at a rate that can trouble the sticky Dunlops.

Ill see about getting some some more recent photos up, but for those who are interested my Instagram is @lettuceprey4u

Below is a video of the car from Roads Untraveled (@roadsuntravelled) who also did a video of my Rabbit before I sold it.

https://youtu.be/c4bk-X00PDU

Until next time!

[2mAn]

Awesome video PM sent!