325ix s54 E30 Swap

Billy_Bottle_Caps wrote: In reply to jakeb: Man that is really nice work.. what is your time frame? When are you hoping it get it on the road? BBC

Maybe a month.... We have a complete interior to swap on it too. Tan to black.

ssswitch wrote: How much torque can the AWD system take? I thought the viscous centre diffs were fairly weak on these. Also, this is an incredible swap. There is some serious effort and experience involved in this job.

thanks! The weakest point is the splines on the front driveshaft. I forgot to take a picture but that part actually has been upgraded. The splines only go into the tcase about 3/4" but there is enough room to go another 1" or so. So there is a guy that makes an extended spline end for the shaft. If you look at the pictures you can see where the shaft has been welded.

Here is a pic to show the difference and the new piece.

this is excellent. and I agree with the others that its something that has been talked about to death but never really tackled in the right way. very nice work. cant wait to see more!

This build is pretty epic, I'm looking forward to updates!

Not a huge update but pics are fun right?

Suspension is all back on the car now. Test fitting the wheels so we set it on the ground.

I'm happy with the fitment.

So with any swap it seems like there are some things that are road blocks...oil pans, brake booster, exhaust manifolds, and wiring/dme.

So with this one the next thing to get around is the brake booster. Fitting the stock air box first required some trimming of the heater pipes to the interior. They will need some more yet.

Plenum on..

As you can see there is NO room for a booster.

At this point we are planning to go with a booster delete and change the ratio off the brake pedal. Maybe a slightly smaller master cylinder as well to give a better pedal feel.

Looking good! I may have missed it, where'd you get the flares?

jsquared wrote: Looking good! I may have missed it, where'd you get the flares?

They're OEM ix flares.

Should keep this thread updated as the project is moving along.

This car is also getting some interior upgrades. First going from tan to black. Dyeing the carpet....1st step is to clean it a ton

Then start spraying on some dye.

fresh dash as well

Seats getting heat added.

Black vert sports

Due to the plenum we needed to remove the booster. So we are going to increased leverage from the brake pedal and also a smaller master cylinder 19mm/19mm

I started with the massive booster delete but it didn't work. So I had something similar made at the water jet...twice. Things are fitting now.

The progression...

The master is just for mock up.

Exhaust...

Once again... NICE! Does one of those mufflers have a shared chamber or does the S54 like a "true dual" exhaust setup?

Didn't know the E30ix had factory flares, that's pretty neat.

The center muffler has a shared chamber

I think this is going to be my new favorite E30

Nice work!

Relevant to my interests, why the different muffler designs in center and rear? What is that center muffler?

And, it appears you've transitioned to doing this full-time now? Based on the new shop and all the stuff going on in the background...

bmwbav wrote: Nice work! Relevant to my interests, why the different muffler designs in center and rear? What is that center muffler? And, it appears you've transitioned to doing this full-time now? Based on the new shop and all the stuff going on in the background...

Yes doing this full time now. New shop is around 5k sq ft.

The center muffler is a spintech. The idea using two different types of mufflers is each one will cancel different frequencies. At least that is what the guy that makes the spintech mufflers said. Makes sense to me.

Using two e46 heater hoses

Joining AC lines - high side

low side

installed

Stock oil cooler lines welded to AN 10 fittings.

Coming off the engine

Getting closer

Will use an e28 m5 coolant tank <img src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-kUOxpP7OVCg/VF14HEQt7RI/AAAAAAAAQSA/fG_43tpSKmM/s640/IMAGE_196.jpgp/img]

return hose https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-LlCdrVj7JJk/VF14ZVMeT8I/AAAAAAAAQTo/5EUP_PswHwg/s640/IMAGE_209.jpg" alt="" />

e46 FPR

Had the lift at the shop to change some light bulbs and snagged this shot

Engine was supposed to be running early this week but when we cranked it over there was some noise from the lower end. Come to find out that two rod bolts were just barely hitting the oil pickup tube. So entire engine, trans, front suspension, etc etc came out and the pickup was adjusted. It's all back in now and wiring can get wrapped up.

This is the ultimate e30. Far surpasses any e30 m3

The car is back to it's owner now. This will be the last post... Well might have some video to upload.

In the video posted eariler in this thread the engine sounded a bit noisy. Ended up finding 3 of the little adjustment pucks had came out of the cups. Found them sitting under the valve cover. Went through and did a full valve adjustment and it was MUCH quieter.

During valve adjustment

First time outside in a while...

The master cylinder we were using provided for a VERY hard pedal with not much travel at all. That was a porsche 944 unit which I thought was 19mm/19mm but in fact it was 23mm/19mm. Anyway we swapped to a 5/8" dual bore wilwood master and another custom bracket. Pedal feels MUCH better. You can still tell they are manual brakes but the effort isn't bad at all.

Pictures before it went back to the owner. We swapped from tan to black sport interior, aftermarket seat heaters, new dash, dyed carpet, 1 series winter mats, fixed sunroof, etc etc.

instagram fun @classicdaily

Getting ready

Due to scheduling and time constraints I trailered the car down to the customer. I like a nice road trip here and there as well.

I must say this thing is a BLAST to drive. It just goes...pulling from all 4 wheels. FUN FUN FUN

Now that's a build after my own heart, I would have used the Conti DWS intead of the Yokos though.