E30 '90 325is

Tom, it looks like you might be using some EZ Turn on those fuel lines? I've grown to really like this stuff.

Jay, it's not totally clean yet but it's almost there. I do one complete chassis cleaning when I buy a car but it'll never look like that again. I've got to figure out something for the rear seat floorboards. The fuel leaking out of the tank for so long has turned the undercoating into a mess of sticky tar. ANYTHING it touches make either a permanent stain or a birthmark that lasts for weeks.

I've also been working on repairing the broken pieces of bumper trim. I can't in good conscience spend $100 on a single piece of trim for this car. So, I've been trying different plastic epoxy products. I'm also going to turn my US trim into Euro trim once I can get my bumper bolts out and pull the bumpers. Does anyone have a good recommendation for a vinyl/plastic paint product to coat this trim and the side trim with? Something that would match the factory shadow-line trim on the windows maybe? Not too flat, not too shiny, and CHEAP, you know what I'm saying.

This first go around I tried JB Weld Plasti-Weld. Worked pretty well, was a bit thin but I made dams out of tape and kept it where I wanted it. I was able to sand it after it set up. Wasn't completely hard until about 5 days later or so. Dries clear.

My neighbor is a body shop manager and I asked him about repairing this piece and his response was that I should just replace it. That's just not my way.

This is how I spread it across the back. I just held it together with blue tape on the front. Looks like other products want you to use some mesh to reinforce the repair but this piece is pretty damn strong. I'll be using mesh on the side marker holes when I go after those.

I hit a couple low spots on the front and then sanded them down. I may use something to fill the cracks flush once I try a couple more products, maybe something that dries black.

VWguyBruce wrote: Tom, it looks like you might be using some EZ Turn on those fuel lines? I've grown to really like this stuff.

No, just blue RTV. I didn't know about that stuff.

Finally finished this project after 9 years of troubleshooting. I goofed with this thing on and off for forever. Was just a cold solder joint on the DB 47 connector. I was being too light with the solder because I didn't want globs all over the back of the board. We joke all the time at work that "the bigger the glob, the better the job" but the guys will sure give you E36 M3 if you solder job looks like crap.

MS1 v2.2, not sure if this car will use it or if I'll pony up for the PnP kit from DIYautotune.

Love seeing the progress on this car! Nice having AC in the garage?

Honestly, the AC unit is too small for 10' ceilings. It helps about 10-12 degrees with the ceiling fans going. Believe me, I'll take what I can get with Texas being in the low 100's this week. Ill be shopping for what larger capacity remote unit when. I get things cleaned up around here.

JAW 1.03 assembled and ready to test. Bosch 17014 and matching female connector on order. Hopefully, we can get this thing working reliably.

Making progress, haven't given up. Working on bumper/side trim. I believe we have the car legally within Challenge budget. More on that to follow.

I wish we could find some stinkin' wheels for a decent price!!! Anyone have some 15x7 in an E30 fitment or close enough for spacers???

Got this stuff the other day.

Got wheels. Will need rings and spacers but hey, my Hoosiers fit.

78mm studs were on clearance at Motorsport Hardware the other day. Got tuner nuts for my DD setup and fancy extended nuts for autox/track.

Looking like some solid progress, good work!

Trying on for size. Spacers ordered.

Tossing around the idea of using these iX flares that I got with the car. I'll have to reshape them where they connected to the side skirts but I'm getting pretty good with Plasti-Weld. Tires will poke a little more with the spacers.

Started detailing the front end and underhood the other night. Thankfully, there's plenty of time before the Challenge.

Zero manifold studs were injured in the removal of the crusty manifolds.

It's awesome that "remove the manifold" is the first step to detailing the engine bay. Good work!

The manifolds looked bad enough to catch your attention any time you looked under the hood. The factory exhaust gaskets have built in heat shields to keep from melting the plug wires and they were all torn up too.

AC is out now too since the lines to the condenser were super rusty. I'm trying to eliminate any painful eye catchers. Needed to get done eventually.

Getting there. Baby steps are killing me. Worst time ever to be a "detail" oriented, OCD medicated, procrastinator.

This look bad to you guys?

I've thrown in the towel for $2015. Parts won't be here in time and I picked too many scabs at the last minute that needed too much attention. Good news is I found a lot of secrets the car was hiding and we'll have everything we need for next year.

See you guys at the Challenge!

So, 9 months later the cleanup continues. It's progressing slowly since every time I clean/detail/defunk something, the parts around pretty part become visually offensive. Since I only want to do this once, the "while I'm in there" syndrome has taken over. Treating rust, holes, questionable hoses, wiring details, broken clips, brackets, hose routing are taking some time. I'll try get ya'll caught up if anyone is still interested.

Cooling system was to remain as is but after the sludge discovery I had to clean that out. Clogged heater bypass recall thing. Took it back to pre-recall. Much cleaner hose set up. All the stop leak after it dried. Hoping radiator doesn't leak but I'm sure it will after the system is flushed. Detailed it anyway. The silver parts under the hood I'm using silver BBQ grill paint topped by a Duplicolor lacquer clearcoat. Cheapest solution that got me 90% of the factory-ish finish. I have yet to find a cheap way to duplicate Cad Plating so some of those Cad parts under the hood are now silver. I'm sure it will be a deduction on the concourse score Any black plastic under the hood is getting a light coat of SEM Trim Paint. VERY nice finish and seems to be pretty tough. I can wipe down and it doesnt come off at all.

Before:

After:

I decided the swollen, torn, cut, leaking coolant hoses should be changed. Turned into a water pump(was leaking), timing belt, pulley change.

Something had been rubbing on this pulley for awhile. Could've cut myself worse than I did had I not been paying attention. Was really freakin' sharp!

I didn't take as many before pics as I should've, as parts were removed, something always popped up I didn't plan for.

Before, frame rail probably needed some thinned down Rustoleum Rusty Metal Primer applied but sometimes I want the job to be DONE and later regret my impatiencewhatthe:: : Always making more work for myself. SEM High-Build Primer likes a clean surface. I didn't wipe down the frame rail after I hit it with Permatex Rust Converter. So, had to repeat sand, prime, paint process. After the second paint job and rust hole repair:

You can still see some of the wrinkling under the paint but I was going to have to sand way more than I wanted to after the mistake and well, it's under the hood after all...

This pic of the driver's side shows what Rustoleum Rust Reformer looks like after it's applied, dusty/powdery look and feel. Parts store didn't have the Permatex Rust Neutralizer I preferred one late night, so I bought a can of this. It only seems to seal the rust in, no conversion of any kind and it make a HUGE mess, overspray city!! Time will tell if it's any better than my other method. It took the Krylon Rust Tough Enamel just fine. After paint: Turned out pretty good for what I'm trying to achieve with rattle cans.

After, AFTER paint, had to pull the brake booster since it looked like a bag of butt. You can also see some grind marks on the fender, I removed the airbag system and their associated bracketry. Replacement parts are getting rare and I don't necessarily trust a 25 year old airbag to work anyway. Wish I would've prepped those marks better but hey, maybe my kid will restore this thing long after I'm gone.

Wiring tape had seen better days and I unwrapped a big part of the main harness to remove the brake pad wear sensors from the system. It looked like the stateside dealership installed the system and they had wrapped the wiring with vinyl electrical tape. That adhesive sucked to deal with but it's going back together now. The brake pad light is almost always on no matter how hard you try to make the factory system function. BMW gave it a nice try for 1989. I used 3M Friction Tape, easy to use, looks factory.

Naturally, I ran out of tape and the 2 other products I bought to try didn't look right under the hood.

I also wanted to mention Adam's Polishes VRT product. I love this stuff! Nice smell, easy to use and it's water based. I've been using it on the under hood rubber that I'm not replacing. I clean the offending rubber/vinyl bit with VRT on a green scotchbrite pad, keeping it WET, then wipe it down with a shop towel. Then I reapply with a shop towel to give it a nice finish, not too shiny or greasy. Holding up well. My $.02

This is all out of order but you guys will get the idea. You can tell where my OCD took control.

Best "before" shots I got.

Once I took the intake manifold off to clean it, this is what I saw. Couldn't have that. Spent too much time in this area but it did allow me to find several issues that I was able to remedy.

Broken starter mount and wrong hardware. Drives me nuts when you can't take the 5 minutes to put the hardware right. Not that it wasn't functional, just flips the switch on my OCD machine.

After the first cleaning...

Decided to paint the block:

You can see this is prior to me deciding to do the water pump and timing belt. Block paint made bits on the front of the motor look even MORE grimy.

The intake was covered in cosmoline and grunge. I didn't have it in me at this point to actually clean it myself. Called local powder coat guy and he had a batch of semi-gloss black parts getting ready for coating. BEST $70 I spent on this project. Would've taken me a week!

Manifold going on, more parts were painted, motor mount arm. Charcoal cannister in the bottom right of the pic, broke one of the fittings off I had tried to repair with JB Weld. It failed of course.

Charcoal cannister used is $100, new was even more money that I wasn't willing to spend. I decided to try and "braze" it with plain old solder and a plumbers soldering iron. Works for my application. Starting to look better...

After the throttle body was taken apart and cleaned. It has since been removed AGAIN as the linkage assembly started to rust without the factory coating. This is the slipperiest slope I've even been down. I mean, I've been prepping and painting HARDWARE because it detracts from the cleanliness of the engine bay. This will most certainly get me zero points in my Challenge score as the motor is largely stock but it'll be CLEAN dammit!

This gets us, more or less, up to date. Moving forward, Challenge entry has been transferred to this year. I'm committed.

In reply to VWguyBruce :

I'm getting my E30 research on, and found this thread.  Any updates?

Man! I am ALL over the updates here!

Car wasn't put back together until last fall, October of 2018?  No remember.  Have daily driven it the last couple months as the majority of my fleet was been broken down.  The rough and tumble condition of Dallas roads did not keep me down, oil pan remained intact, almost no new rattles, zero break downs. Reliable as a MoFo.

Officially entered Challenge. Car will be there but not in its most competitive configuration. Suspension, steering, wheels and tires. Paint. If I end up with more time, who knows... I hope to have $700 left for next year for forced induction, standalone, nitrous, big brakes, etc.  It may become necessary to DE-eVOlve some of the parts it currently wears.  I have everything I need at my disposal but the time, oh, the time.  I refuse to ever bring another untested car back to the Challenge or to spend my entire weekend working on a broke @$$ car.  I get out ONCE a year, once, I don't want to waste it.

Later,

Bruce

don't waste time or money on big brakes.  if you can lock your tires and don't set your brakes ablaze with a stop from high speed, your brakes are big enough.  more nitrous, that's the ticket.

AngryCorvair said:

don't waste time or money on big brakes.  if you can lock your tires and don't set your brakes ablaze with a stop from high speed, your brakes are big enough.  more nitrous, that's the ticket.

 

e30s don't need big brakes unless you're running S5x power at least. We have no brake issues on stock brakes in either stage rally or in road racing. Just get good pads (Hawk HP+ seem to be good for street+motorsports), and you'll be fine. Heck, we use the cheapest RockAuto rotors and still have no issues.