Taiden wrote: If you figure out what the burning smell is, let me know. Mine has a strange smell under the hood as well.
will do. seemed to go away after a few jumps around the block though. Or maybe my nose got used to it!
Taiden wrote: If you figure out what the burning smell is, let me know. Mine has a strange smell under the hood as well.
will do. seemed to go away after a few jumps around the block though. Or maybe my nose got used to it!
did some test-driving today. Everything feels good (especially the suspension), though I am getting a bit of a rumble from somewhere in the back half of the car. With the car up in the air the only noise I hear is some light rear brake pad contact and a bit of ruble somewhere around where the driveshaft center bearing is - so that might be the issue. So hard to tell...
Some out in the sun pics..
4x4 stance yo. Hellaunflush.
grr...upon further thought and examination I'm thinking that it's my driveshaft center support bearing that is bad and causing the grinding noise I'm hearing. Dammit, I KNEW I should have replaced that thing while I had the exhaust and DS off the car.
so....back up on jackstands this week :(
as I wait for a few other parts to come in, did some fun stuff today.
First, took my daugher to her first college hoops game, where my George Mason Patriots put the smackdown on conference bitch William&Mary.
she thought it was loud..
when I got home, first put together a battery tie-down out of random stuff. It hasn't had one since I bought the car, but don't want to buy anything since the battery will go to the trunk eventually.
Pulled the back deck of the car, took out the heavy speakers in them, and recovered it in some gray outdoor/patio carpeting.
Then built my "cargo shelf" in place of the back seat, using some 1/2" MDF. Should be good for strapping down the track/rallycross tires, toolboxes, etc. I plan to put some tiedown eyes in it. Still need to figure out how to secure the rear end of it. The fronts will have some pins through the stock boltdown eyes to hold it down. Pretty pleased with the fit. Used the same gray carpet. Will do the back of the seat as well with 1/4" MDF. Probably hinge it off the bottom, so I can pull them out at the track. The intention is to make all the boltdowns for them quick-release or pins with a clevis ring. We'll see.
not sure why the photos are in such a wierd color....must have my camera on a strange setting...
templated
more or less finished
some better pics....
Again, these are made to be quickly removable at rallycrosses, but I want the car to be somewhat nice at least when I'm just cruising or something, lol.
You can see, the particle-board connectors at the bottoms of the vents were broken, so I screwed the vents in - you can't see the screws with it in the car anyhow. No idea what that black triangle thing on the deck is, but I put it back on just because it looks cool, lol
And here's a better shot of the backseat area/parcel shelf area now. I'm thinking I'm going to get some pop-up sunken tiedowns so they sit flat when not in use but can be used to strap down a cargo net or wheels when needed :)
I also plan to paint the door cards with some black vinyl paint, because I hate the tan, but I'm not spending money on new door cards for a car like this!
Tan > black! 
I'm going to find a place to reuse the word "hellaunflush".
Looks good so far!
How much does the MDF weigh? I think I might just lay the carpet down over the bare metal. My back seat seems pretty light would hate to go through the trouble of doing something like that and not getting any real weight loss out of it.
nicksta43 wrote: How much does the MDF weigh? I think I might just lay the carpet down over the bare metal. My back seat seems pretty light would hate to go through the trouble of doing something like that and not getting any real weight loss out of it.
it's not super-light, but if you see the metal below it, it's a big "U" shape - not condusive to carrying stuff. When I'm on the street, I'm not concerned with an extra 10-15lbs of MDF. I can take all these panels out in about 30 seconds once I get to the track, where the weight is an issue.
When I'm doing other things, or driving to the track, I want a flat surface to put all my stuff on, and I want a bit of sound insulation.
here's what the backseat looks like uncovered - not condusive at all to securing toolboxes/jacks/tires/etc!
Note that it's alot less flat than it looks in this picture, especially with the sound deadening out. I'ts about a 6" deep wide "U"
the garage is currently too cold to work on the car....had the doors open to let the contact cement fumes out. So I've been sitting around doing things in the house, but I keep thinking about my horribly cracked dash.
Yeah I could get an uncracked one, but that's not an expense I want to spend on this car at the moment. So.....I'm gonna pull the dash sometime in the next month, fill the cracks with Bondo.....and FLOCK it :D
Yeah, it might look bad, but it might look good. If it looks bad, then.....well, it currently looks terrible and that would be an upgrade. Plus flocking it DIY will cost me about 25 bucks. If it is total E36 M3, then I'll just get another dash.
Now my only decision is whether to go with black or with dark gray (which will match all my new interior panels, and not show as much dust/dirt as black).....
Needs some of these:
http://www.vinyldecals.com/automotive-decals/jdm-drift-decals/hellafunctional-vinyl-decal-sticker.html
Uncoiled wrote: Needs some of these: http://www.vinyldecals.com/automotive-decals/jdm-drift-decals/hellafunctional-vinyl-decal-sticker.html
Oh my god I need that
Are you keeping the console around the shifter?
no, center console is gone. I'm going to install some kind of cupholder, and maybe a couple auxliary gauges in a panel under the HVAC controls though. Probably just get a rubber shift boot (old school style).
Darn! haha. I have a spare one of these I made today and was going to send it to you just for laughs. If you want it anyway just let me know.
I still have a few of those Hellafunctional stickers. I made a few runs of them a while back, but demand kind of died out. If more people want some, I can get more made.
Finished a few little things tonight:
First, put the finishing touches on my ghetto-fabulous battery tie-down...
Second, since I'm not going to be using the brake pad wear sensors, but don't want the stupid red light on, I cut off the wires and sensor, grounded off the ground, and spliced the two resistance wires together to trick the car into thinking that the sensor was still installed. Small victories, lol
Also built the backing board for my backseat delete and covered it. Might I add that when recovering stuff, an electric staple gun with some 1/4" staples is about 1000x easier to use on MDF board than a manual staple gun that rarely penetrates far enough!
Now that I have the panels in, I'm pretty happy with the quick-remove setup I'll have. The only thing holding the panels in are two pins (in the seat bottom original metal "loops") and two wingnuts that will bolt through into the metal seat backing (I need to tack-weld a couple nuts on the back so I can screw them in from the front. With just these four pieces of hardware, the two board pieces are held securely (the bottom of the back piece holds the back of the bottom piece down. No rattles, no movement. Mission accomplished. I will probably also setup a hang-net for small cargo stuff on the back, and some tiedowns on the bottom piece.
In reply to irish44j:
Looks good! I may have to investigate something similar on the M3 after I pull the rear seats and install the rollbar (that I still need to order). + a billion on the electric stapler, only way to fly on a job like this.
Taiden wrote: Darn! haha. I have a spare one of these I made today and was going to send it to you just for laughs. If you want it anyway just let me know.
Your shifter's got a kilt! Well played.
Some minor stuff today. I had to take some time after work to figure out why the WRX was intermittently throwing a combo of ABS, VDC, and Hill Assist warning lights. After much research it looks to be pretty common on the 08+ models, caused by a faulty brake switch. Fiddled with the switch for a bit, didn't find anything amiss, but on two subsequent drives no lights, so who knows.....
In any case, I really don't care about ABS, VDC, and hill assist being absent anyhow, lol. Just the annoying bright warning lights :)
Back to the e30, had a couple packages waiting at home for me. The first was about 20 days coming....two new window cranks that I picked up for about $8 each (pretty cheap compared to most out there). So now I have three total!
more interesting was the packaging they came in......gotta love ebay international!
Also the new center driveshaft bearing assembly came in a day early, so of course had to install. Getting the old one off was simple with a big gear puller. I didn't notice any particular gritty-ness or grabbing...felt like a good bearning and turned smoothly. I'm hoping that under load it was no good. Otherwise this was an exercise in pointlessness.
New one was a bit of a hassle to get on, not having a slide hammer (mental note....). The splined axle was long enough that I couldn't find much of anything to fit over it that was long enough to seat the new bearing. Eventually I stacked up a few of my press collars and got it done
tomorrow hopefully will get the exhaust and shields back on and be able to try it out. If I still have noise, the only thing left is the diff. So I guess I'll just have to deal with it....
got the DS and exhaust all put back together (after having to improv some exhaust hardware due to really crappy manifold studs, grr. Had to put the original ugly/rusty manifold back on until I can fix the studs on the powdercoated one).
Went for a spin and the car felt great, with a few minor exceptions: 1. need to do a better brake bleed job. Still got a bit of mush and squeak. 2. the snow tires are so soft, I can't really push the car much. I'll be ordering my Star Specs tonight for the euroweaves. I want to feel the car with good street tires :) 3. no more noise from the DS tunnel, so I guess the old CSB was indeed bad. I still am getting some light (rumble?) from the back end, but it's tough to tell if it's the diff, if a brake backing plate is slightly rubbing, if a bearing is bad, or if the snow tires are just really, really loud. I'm leaning toward the loud tires, but we'll see soon enough.
Overall, I think it's kind of funny that this car has less rattles now inside than my 3-year-old WRX does. Then again, the WRX springs are about twice the rate so the bumps and road imperfections are much more apparent. Of course, the WRX makes up for it with more than triple the horsepower, lol.
Also blacked out the rear windshield/window trim finisher, which had turned all brownish. Much cleaner now.
A couple night pics for the hell of it
A few trusims:
Due to these three facts, it is Friday night and I decided an hour ago to do a small project that I really wasn't looking forward to. Noticed while spending hours under the car that the fuel lines at the pressure regulator/carbon canister/emissions crap was all cracked and nasty. Broken fuel line is not something I want, so needed to replace this. The arrangemnt in that area is not exactly condusive to people without tiny hands, especially when all the hose clamps are oriented in directions where they're next to impossible to loosen.
But since, again, I have nothing going on on a Friday night, and the car is outside, and it's not terribly cold.....might as well :(
As expected, it was more of a hassle than it seems like it should have been. And due to the positing I had to be in, I got a nice flow of gasoline right up the sleeve of my sweatshirt tking off one of the lines.
But the new lines are in, and that's one less thing to worry about. I plan to fab up a rock shield of sorts for this area, since it looks ripe to get damaged by flying gravel or other debris.
Anyhow, new lines in...
Old line and hardware....
Got around to putting a crapload of tools away and reorganizing my drawers, since my original setup had some drawers getting too crowded with tools.
yay...now I can find things I need again...
Spent most of the afternoon washing and cleaning the cars. Why I have 4 black cars is beyond me, because they look crappy even when clean, at least in daylight, lol.
Then got the hardware I wanted to finish up my "cargo area" where the backseat used to be. About $10 worth of stuff from home depot, I think this will do the job.
Also test-painted one of the tan door panels, with some paint made for plastic/vinyl. Came out ok, but it was fairly cool outside today, and I think they paint will work better on a warm day.
And fitted my swap-meet sport trunk spoiler. I'm going to take it back off to sand/paint it, but I wanted to get it on there for the hell of it.
late-night while watching TV.....pulled the IACV and tested it...working perfectly. Resistance is correct, and it's opening and closing tight like it should.
Pulled the MAF assembly and tested the resistance as in Bentley manual. The resistance rises when opening the flap, but only about halfway and then it just stays about the same. I tested the parts-bin MAF assembly I have sitting aroudn and it does the same thing. So not entirely sure if I'm just testing wrong or if they're both bad or what. Hmm.
Also while in there noticed that the one of the two small blue wires from the alternator had broken off, and the second one (same post) was being held on by like two strands of wire. Diagram shows these as being to the ignition switch and the other one to "diagnostic," wherever that is. Anyhow, put a new fitting on and reattached, so that's good I guess, lol.
Also thinking about how on the last couple drives afterwards I've had a bit of antifreeze coming out of the overflow drain (dripping down on the front valence). I guess they didn't care about environmental stuff, lol. Thinking about installing a small overflow/expansion tank....pull one from a junkyard car of some sort. Thoughts?
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