Well I haven't posted any updates in a while because there's not much going on...electrical and cosmetic fixes on the car, nothing to post about...but today a milestone was reached when the mechanic tried to swing the key, and found that the ignition switch in this car is bad. And also the one in the donor car is bad. I'm gonna place an order for one from the dealership now and also try to find a used one to avoid a 3-4 week parts shipping holdup.
Got a working ignition switch hacked together with parts from the two cars, now it turns out the starter solenoid is no good. Dealer has none in stock, I don't see any for the 4AGE on RockAuto. You can't make this E36 M3 up.
That's a bummer. If you can, replace the solenoid on the OEM starter. It sounds like that's the direction you are headed. Aftermarket and non-OEM rebuilt starters often have a tendency to suffer from heat soak. That's a higher probability in your climate.
I found one place that has the electrical solenoid itself and a couple that might have the "gearbox" part but want me to bring in the old one to match it, the mechanic's saying the "gearbox" is looking questionable and I should ideally replace that as well.
I was wondering what might be a good approach to reducing the heat soak problem, other than relocation which requires a couple of other things to be relocated first. I already have wrapped headers so that will help some. I wonder if it would help more to insulate the starter with foam-backed aluminum tape or to stick some old computer heatsinks (or one of those "oil filter coolers") to it to help it shed heat? Guess it depends which is normally hotter, the starter motor itself or the air hitting it.
Edit:Thought I tested the solenoid but missed a little blade connector that's probably important.
I did find some remanufactured starters I can order at least. All of them are way bigger than what I have though.
OK found a used parts place that sold me a slightly different starter and swapped all the internals onto the "flange" piece from mine, hope it works. The mechanic said the pinion appeared to be seized in the disengaged position and I agree from my testing. I tried pulling on the back of it with an allen key and it wouldn't budge.
This is one of those things I like to call a "Cuban" fix - the kind of thing you'd only have to do when it's THIS hard to get parts.
GameboyRMH wrote: This is one of those things I like to call a "Cuban" fix - the kind of thing you'd only have to do when it's THIS hard to get parts.
We call this being a GRMer.
Well I wouldn't recommend swapping starter internals except as a last resort, I hope it spins the right way!
(Edit:Now that I think of it, unless this other one mounted on the trans. side, it should.)
Busy day today...starter still doesn't work, looks like the contacts in the solenoid are worn. It engages the gear but doesn't spin. I have enough spare parts now that hopefully I can get it working tomorrow.
Huh the problem must be somewhere else on the car, I just bench-tested the starter and everything works.
Edit: Here's a pic of the starter:
Just worked out the heat shield wrap size is 14.5x39cm. I'll make some from aluminum-bubblewrap sandwich (winshield sun reflector material) once the CAI partition is done.
OK so the problem of the new starter only clicking was caused by a bad battery...voltage was OK but it didn't have the CCA.
New battery going in today, and something kind of funny happened while I was trying to get a common 2.5" 2-bolt flange fabricated. A big shop that does metalwork couldn't cut me out a blank any time soon because one of their machines broke down and they were waiting for parts for it. DELAYCEPTION
OK now either the fuel level is too low or it's having fuel system problems, about to find out..
Didn't hear back from the mechanic but he left the car with the fuel door open and an injector unplugged which suggests a wiring/ECU problem.
Aw E36 M3 the hacked-on 4AF alternator will eat belts, the odds of finding a 4AGE one are slim.
With all the problems the donor car had, the guys at the shop that sold it must have been jumping for joy when they saw me bring it back from the test drive under its own power.
why will it eat belts? spacing problem?
Yep spacing problem. And I know the water pump's spacing is slightly different from stock now too, by maybe up to 1mm.
alternator too far out or in?
Dunno, but the mechanic says it's so bad that if the engine turned over it would throw or cut the belt immediately, and I'm sure he would have thought of using washers to adjust the spacing if that were possible.
but would he have thought of grinding the surface of the alternator to bring it in? ive had to do that before.
Maybe...I found a shop that might have one, gonna try them first. At this point I'm happy to exorcise anything the PO touched.
been there. repeatedly.
actually, there now with my 64.....
Got a new (not "remanufactured") alternator yesterday, but at a heavy cost...at least it came with a nice billet aluminum pulley (UPDATE: Just got word that the pulley has the wrong number of grooves, big oversight! Swapping to rusty old steel pulley).
A common 2.5" 2-bolt exhaust flange, produced by a plasma cutter:
Updated engine bay pic:
Well this new alternator's pulley has a different offset from all the others so it just can't work. Gotta try to return it to a shop with a 20% restocking fee. 
(Edit: Should be able to argue they sold me the wrong part. It has a 4PK pulley which is wrong for my engine, possibly wrong for the whole model range, and doesn't match the example pic I emailed to them)
I think I'm gonna try fixing up the old alternator, all the problems with it are mounting problems. I'd need to fill a hole that was drilled next to one of the mounting holes - this could be done with a metal rod of the right size and some JB weld. And then I'd need to get extra material welded onto one of the mounts and then get it ground flat - it's been worn slanted somehow. Maybe that could be done with JB weld as well.
Project is now dead in the water until Saturday afternoon at best
OK so I got a working alternator today by getting a shop to put a new (used) housing on it, but that's not all that's needed to get the alternator back on. It turns out the housing wasn't hacked up intentionally by the PO, there's a centering collar in the mounting bracket for the alternator that was broken, which allowed the alternator to rock back and forth which chewed up the housing. So I have to get a replacement for that fabbed up. That should be done by the end of Monday at the latest.
Other stuff that has to be done for the car to be ready for corner balance & alignment includes reinstalling the front upper strut brace and checking rear tire-to-spring-seat clearance to get an idea of how much negative camber I can run and whether I need to resort to wheel spacers. I took out the windshield wipers and windshield gutter grate today and got access to the nuts for the front strut brace. Gotta get the rest of that finished by the end of Monday at the latest to avoid more delays.
You'll need to log in to post.
