The Red Rocket - E30 318is "Sabine"

[Greasy63]

Dude the m44 is so cute in there, they always look so small compared to the 6. I like the direction you're going. I think you'll be fine with 15s. I mean you can't go wrong with BBS right?? Gold centers would be perfect IMO. I love red & gold wheels.

[GJA003]

Dude the m44 is so cute in there, they always look so small compared to the 6. I like the direction you're going. I think you'll be fine with 15s. I mean you can't go wrong with BBS right?? Gold centers would be perfect IMO. I love red & gold wheels.

It's a M42 ! Haha practically the same thing.
Thanks man, motivates me to get more done !
Yeah they'll fit, but I did want it for track use so will see what clearance is like. They may need a 4-5mm spacer all four courners other wise it'll be close to the coilovers. Needs to be the right shade I was actually thinking maybe a Bronzitbeige Metallic....

[Amgcdi]

Looks great man.

[GJA003]

So not much of an Update.
But still waiting on Lips to arrive, been a delay as they've spent a lot of time in Germany and the tracking is yet to say they've cleared customs
I thought it'd be the faster option but next time I might stay local. Learning curve.

Anyway I still have a bit to do before they arrive so I go stuck into the bolts. Having a tumbler makes life so much easier. The results speak for them self.

So I've notice the Tumbler is quite cheap in construction and that, it vibrates its ground wire and screws loose. I almost sent it back but opened it up soldered it up and loctite all the screws and its fixed.

I'm thinking gold/bronze centres at this stage just waiting to get a colour code for the gold I quite like.

[Mehowski]

This is a thorough build man, I can tell you love what you do

Makes me realise how little I care about my car haha, got a poster on my wall of an E30 - one day I shall pick one up!

[GJA003]

This is a thorough build man, I can tell you love what you do

Makes me realise how little I care about my car haha, got a poster on my wall of an E30 - one day I shall pick one up!

Thanks man, keeps me motivated hearing that.
I do love what i do, but need a work space for it.

[GJA003]

update

So a few things have been going on. I have to hand the Garage back in two weeks and with it being winter its been hard to get things done. I really don't enjoy not being able to have my own dedicated garage for projects. I didn't get stuck into it as much as i wanted as i knew i wouldn't be able to hand it back in time. I've been looking for some where to rent but nothings out there.

Update with the ITB's.

I just wasn't happy with the quality of the kit and how things went well more like slapped together. Being fussy here but from working on Race cars daily i cant handle it. I'd rather do it a quality way that will give me the piece of mind it wont catch fire and last! So i need to sort out a bunch of hoses, make some new fuel hard lines and i want to change/make my own hose block as i didnt like the one provided. The heater core pipes hit on the airbox so ill find a solution to that and will be up and running again.

So in the mean time, i bought some 15" cheap 5 Spoke wheels with some Semi slicks for future track days. I'm still building the BBS's but these were cheap and had decent tyres. I also picked up a Velo Race seat which ill be fitting with a matching steering wheel shortly. Just need to order some brackets for the seat, a hub adapter and ill get it all in there.

So back on the ground she goes and since its not running rolled back outside so i can do some other jobs while i have a garage.



I really want to pull the engine on her soon as it needs a lot of seals. But if it comes out it really needs a rebuild and well i just dont have the time and money at the moment. So i think ill get it running and the Aircon shop to degas it so i can at least inspect and reseal it.

BBS WHEELS UPDATE

After a lengthy wait they are here. Well in Sydney anyway.



Ray from Raw works has been nothing but helpful and finally they are on the way over to Melbourne. So i went with 2" and 2.5" lips will see how it all looks but hopefully its not overly fitted. As i wanted to run some decent meaty track tyres on them.





I've been spending some time after work at the workshop trying to sandblast the centers. But the hex's were in a shocking state so i started with those.





They had quite a few layers of paint on them but cleaned up really well. I then moved on to the waffles but forgot to grab a photo. So the centers are the last thing left to do.

I decided with the bolts to Acid bath them for a good 7 days too clean all loctite off and baked on dust hopefully check them in a couple days and can get back to polishing them up.

Thats about it from me. Plenty to do but as always not enough time and need to find my self a work space.

[Gamerx]

Love it.

[speed.freak]

Depending on where you are in the south-east Melbourne suburbs, there's a place in Moorabbin that rents out garage bays, they only seem to advertise on gumtree. No hoists or anything, but it's a dedicated space where you can rip your car apart and not worry about packing up everything each day..

Car is looking mint BTW! So glad that Euro's are becoming more common in Australia.

[GJA003]

Updates

Progress as always is slow with working full time and not having Garage access.
But i have made some progress in the time since it's been parked up.

I bought a set of E34 Style 5's (16X7 +20) which i plan to become daily wheels with adapters in the near future.



Took them into work stripped the tyres, washed them and hide them under the house for now. They are in decent shape but, ill probably give them some touch up paint.

The next little job was after sourcing a M44 fuel Rail it had some tabs that weren't needed and the stainless look didn't suit. So i shaved them down and gave it some paint. It's something no one will care to notice but i want my bay to look some what as clean as possible.



Next up was sourcing a suitable cheap baffled oil catch tank. I bought something i thought would work well where i wanted to place it but it didn't work out. So straight after it arriving i cut it down around 40mm and relocated it to where the Charcoal canister lived. It still didn't quite clear so i then decided to swap it under the master cylinder where the fuel filter lived. This will hide it in case Police go searching and painted it mat black so it should stay hopefully pretty hidden.



Next up was replacing all the shitty fittings the ITB kit came with. The routing and the fittings provided are far from ideal. So i splashed out and bought some speedflow bits. I wanted to tap & thread the manifold anyway as i didn't like the quality of the provided ones. This so make routing it all much much easier and cleaner. I won't have time to do a ICV/Vacuum Block but at a later date ill make something better again.



Now onto the BBS's !!! Well my first tumbler died, so it took around a month to source a replacement. That sucked but when it arrived it was back into polishing. I had acid bathed and wire wheeled all the bolts so i could get the best result possible and .... Well the pictures do the talking.





300 Nut and bolts later and im quite pleased with it all !! Need to polish the barrels to a mirror shine now and a spare 1" lip for the space saver. I leaning towards GK1 gold as i cant really find any other BBS gold colour code yet.

[Jonnymooshoo]

Love the build progress! I'm thinking of putting in the RHD ITB kit in my 318is but my car is left hand drive. Do you think I'll run into those same issues? I'm also running a condor motorsports engine riser kit so I'm wondering if that will throw the geometry off a bit and maybe the ITB Fitment will be an issue. I'll be having my local shop put it in so I'm not sure if it will become a bigger job than advertised

[GJA003]

Love the build progress! I'm thinking of putting in the RHD ITB kit in my 318is but my car is left hand drive. Do you think I'll run into those same issues? I'm also running a condor motorsports engine riser kit so I'm wondering if that will throw the geometry off a bit and maybe the ITB Fitment will be an issue. I'll be having my local shop put it in so I'm not sure if it will become a bigger job than advertised

Thanks man, haven't worked on it for a little while now. Just need motivation haha.
I think with a riser kit you'll have better booster clearance but you could run into a issue with bonnet clearance potentially. I don't really see anything being much else of a problem for you.

[Jorgen]

Original BBS bolts? I peeled off the clear coat, hand polished them and after 1 month the bolts started to rust, because if I remember correctly they aren't stainless steel. Have you had any problems with them before?

[Mike36]

In for updates.

[kevvy_dawg]

Sub'd.. Love the journey