Back in black BMW e30

[retrofan]

can somebody please tell me the wheels he had on in the very first picture? thnks

[dillon7]

can somebody please tell me the wheels he had on in the very first picture? thnks

15x7 kosei k1

[dillon7]

Really frustrating night but I'll post an update.

First thing was to mate the transmission to it's new spouse.



Then I installed the headers and header gaskets



I went to install the starter and it didn't fit because of this little ridge so I grinded it down until it fit.





Next I reinstalled the brake booster and the brake pedal. The second picture shows how I had to modify the brake pedal to work with the booster moved 1/2 inch.





I was finally done installing everything and moment I had been waiting for finally arrived, it was time to drop in the engine. There were three of us there to do the job so clearing the engine into the bay was a breeze. Started to line up the arms to the mounts and we noticed a big problem..







They weren't even close to fitting...

It was quite obvious that one of the motor arms was wrong even though I had been told by the guy I bought the motor from that I had "everything I needed for the swap". Well for some reason he gave me an e39 passenger motor arm instead of an e36. I have no idea why but it's now going to work and I was quite pissed when I discovered this.

Now I have to try and find an e36 passenger arm tomorrow so I can get this thing in there finally.

[dillon7]

Well, the motor is in.

The guy that sold me the motor sent me the wrong motor arm so I went and bought one from someone local. Got home put the arm on and eventually got the motor in. It was a lot harder getting it to line up than I thought.

After I got the motor in the transmission was way off no matter what I did. Twisting it 10 degrees wasn't going to help so out came the whole motor again.

Twisted the linkage by heating it up and bending it.




The shifter arm was too far to the right and I wanted it to line up to the center so I slotted the holes and got it to move where I wanted it to go.




Transmission mount mounted up from Andrew. Great product, works perfectly, I highly recommend it.




While I was waiting on my motor arm I got my driveshaft ready. New CSB and guibo.

Old guibo



New guibo



CSB





Over all it was a frustrating weekend and I'm a lot further behind than I planned. I think I ended up attempting to put the motor in and pulling it about four times. That's the way it goes working on cars I suppose.

This site made everything a little better.

[Ace of Spades]

Loving it man, love the clean vibe you are doing with the car!
epic..

[Nico]

like where this is going

[Jedi Mind Trickery]

this is cool. sub'd

[06RawRsx]

Love the detail in this build. Sucks about it taking so many tries to get the engine in. Can't wait to see more.

[Nuts]

Wow!!! Lots of work done. Super excited to see it done. Its going to be lots of fun behind the wheel :-)

[Queef|Chief]

Quality work!

[dillon7]

Loving it man, love the clean vibe you are doing with the car!
epic..

Thanks man.

like where this is going

me too

this is cool. sub'd

thanks!

Love the detail in this build. Sucks about it taking so many tries to get the engine in. Can't wait to see more.

haha live and learn. I now know all the shortcuts on how to get it in really quickly.

Wow!!! Lots of work done. Super excited to see it done. Its going to be lots of fun behind the wheel :-)

I absolutely can't wait for it to be done, it's going to be a blast.

Quality work!

Thanks man!

[dillon7]

Not much of an update. I bought the "last part" I need to complete the engine swap even though I feel like I have said that 10 times. Picked up some injectors with new seals from my friend Alex.

Also while bored at school I put together my favorite car photos from the summer in this thread. CLICK HERE

so go check it out.

I'm home from college tomorrow because this stupid car has me obsessed and makes me not care about any college weekend festivities. So yeah updates tomorrow.

pics of the injectors

[dillon7]

I had Friday night to work on the car so I tried to get it complete that night.

I didn't take many photos basically because it was just hooking things up like the power steering hoses, heater hoses, radiator and a bunch of ground wires and stuff.

I started off with wiring. I bought an adapter to make life much easier but I still had the grounds to work with and I couldn't find a lot of information but I used what I had and hopefully I hooked up all of them, if it doesn't start I think I know it will be a ground wire.

Anyways my wiring mess that I still need to clean up but it's all hooked up.




Next was the intake manifold. I got it on and it still rubbed the brake booster pretty bad so I pulled it back out and got to grinding away.

Picture before I cleaned it up




New fit




Next was the fuel rail and injectors etc. Got all that in and the fuel line hooked up.




I was so excited I was basically done. All I had left was throttle body, intake boot, maf, and the filter. Them fill her up with oil and coolant and I was good to go. I had forgotten about the throttle cable so I got that put in. Complete PITA to get that stupid clip in. I couldn't get it in but I was just ready to see if it fired up I left it alone for now. Went to put on the throttle body and of course I don't have the 4 bolts to put it on looked around to see if I could find any random ones or anything off the old engine but I couldn't.

So basically 4 bolts are keeping me from getting her started up. I was pretty bummed out but oh well it happens.

Here is a pic on how far I got. It is a total mess and I still have a ton of stuff to clean up. Once I fire her up and make sure she runs then I will clean it all.





IT WILL RUN ON THE NEXT UPDATE! so stay posted

[Jedi Mind Trickery]

So basically 4 bolts are keeping me from getting her started up..

Story of my life..

Great progress man keep it up.

[dillon7]

I know on the last update, which was a long time ago, that I promised I would have the car running. Well as you can guess, it is not, but it is really close.

I haven't had much time to work so I haven't done very much but I'll give you guys some progress.

I decided to run the e30 318i radiator to clean up the bay a little. Mocked it up and cut the radiator hoses to fit which is a PITA.



Then I went to run the wiring harness through the firewall and no matter what I did it wouldn't fit through for some reason so I got out the air tool and cut away.





Got the throttle body on.



Then I kept hooking up heater lines and vacuum lines. I got everything hooked up except for two and got totally lost. I figured out I was missing the PCV and the hoses that go from it to the intake boot. So I have to order those.

I also have a hose from the lower part of the radiator and I have no idea where it goes. I was told it goes to the spider hose but I have no openings on the spider hose for another line. So I'm still trying to figure that out.

So that's where I am at now. I have to order the parts and figure out what to do with the radiator line.

Here are the pics that make it all worth it though.







oh and here is a little tease of what is coming