Family Truckster

[BOOGIEBOY]

It has been a long while since I have posted here, but some of you may remember my old E34 daily driver that was featured right here on Stanceworks and a few other places.







Priorities changed and I decided to let the E34 go in favor of something with a little more room, so after some time searching I found a very nice BMW 530xi AWD Wagon (E61). It had 130k miles and needed a few new suspension parts, but the exterior and interior were very well taken care of. This was a 61k wagon in 2006 and is fully loaded with all kinds stuff that I don't need, but after driving a 20+ year old car around for 5 years I have to admit that it is nice having a few modern amenities.








My main goal for the time being is to address the tie rods and misc other suspension parts that I can tell are worn already. But this will be my first big project since they are here already.



UPDATE



UPDATE
Scored a nice BMW roof box.




UPDATE






UpdateStill messing with the stance....

[daniel_lucian]

This is gonna be good. Sub'd.

[BOOGIEBOY]

This is gonna be good. Sub'd.

Thanks for the confidence, but I honestly don't know how crazy I will get with this wagon. Eventually this will be the wife's daily and I will get myself another project to work on. Don't get me wrong though, I do like it and intend to have a little fun with it.


I am not a professional mechanic, but I have had a few BMWs and learned enough along the way to get through most things. I can say that this wagon is entirely different animal to work on than my last car, but I am eager to learn as much as I can.


I got in on the ISC group buy and opted to go with the full kit replacing the self leveling system in the rear. The guys at ISC were very nice and the customer service that I received was very good.


So then I got to work on the front.


When I finally got the drivers down enough it revealed how bad it really was. Yikes!







Moving on I didn't run into any major issues.






New rotors and pads are in as well.



The carnage....




This was my first attempt at measuring before I set it down.


This is where that guess put it...

[Khalil]

Ralph!
Good to have you back man!
Awesome progress of far. Can't wait to see what you do with this one.

[BOOGIEBOY]

Ralph!
Good to have you back man!
Awesome progress of far. Can't wait to see what you do with this one.

Thank you sir! I never really left, just had a lot of life happen all at once, so I have not been posting.

If you have worked on cars long enough, you come to the realization that things rarely go 100% as planned. After I finished the front setup I really wanted to set the car down and turn it around, since the garage is small and has more room to work on one side than the other, but the car decides that it does not want to start. After some messing about, I have discovered that the starter is kaput.

So now before I can get the car turned around to finish the rear setup, I need to fix the starter.

I got to work on the starter....


I do not have the smallest hands and arms, so it was a little tricky for me to get in there.


You need a 3/8 adjustable head wrench and a torx bit to get at the back, I couldn't figure out any other way, its tight in there.



While I was taking the intake manifold off I broke one of the crank case oil hoses, specifically the return hose that nobody had in stock, so now I wait again.

[BOOGIEBOY]

Decided to tackle the rear where it sits, It's not leaving me much room to work with, but Im gonna give it a go.B)



Got everything apart deflated the airbags to remove them......




The airbag for the self leveling suspension mounted with a plastic plug at the bottom and two prongs at the top that just twisted into the slot at the top........












FYI: The setting on the rear springs is all the way down to its lowest and that is where the car is sitting right now, but the pictures show where the spring was before I turned them all the way down. I have to get it started so I can actually drive and get it all dialed in. I will probably run some spacers in the rear until I figure out what wheels I want.


Now I get to put everything back together, since you pretty much have to take the entire rear section of the car apart to get to the top of the struts and bags.

[BOOGIEBOY]

It's good to be low again.

[harprones]

looks nice!!!

[fuxxo]

nice, cant wait to see more!
and you sir, changed my perspective on the xdrive.. didnt know you can get this low with xdrive, from E46 times I remember guys were pretty upset when throwing in coilovers and still had rimgaps on the lowest settings.. this with some 20" will look tits!

[BOOGIEBOY]

looks nice!!!

Thank you.

nice, cant wait to see more!
and you sir, changed my perspective on the xdrive.. didnt know you can get this low with xdrive, from E46 times I remember guys were pretty upset when throwing in coilovers and still had rimgaps on the lowest settings.. this with some 20" will look tits!

Thanks. Yeah these X-Drives had very few options when it came to coilovers, but a few companies like ISC are starting to make them. They also have high offsets in the rear for no apparent reason? The wheels are from the 335i and are only 18x8.5 with an offset of 34/35ish? You can swap out the rear with all E60 M5 stuff and gain like 20mm, or at least that's what I have read. I may do it later down the road.

I already have a set of wheels in mind to be built for this car, but I am going to stick with 19s and it may be a little while before that happens. For now I am pretty happy with it. ISC did a good job with these coilovers and they also have camber plates and full ride adjustability up front.

This was my first attempt at lowering the front and it was a little too low for my liking, especially because the rear is all the way down.


I raised the front a little to even out the gap. I am a big advocate for even fender gap front to rear, otherwise you can throw off the natural lines of the car. In my opinion.

[BOOGIEBOY]

I made a nice Craigslist score for cheap! A nice BMW roof box and since I will be going on a 1700 mile round trip soon it will come in handy.


The bonus is the color is not too far off.

[BenVAG]

Car is looking good! I am going from older cars myself to an E61 myself too, its such a shame the rears max out at that height other-wise I would buy a set tomorrow...does it look as if there is a way to adapt them to go lower? Airrex are developing an Air Suspension kit currently but it looks to be a good few months away...

[lvaoshley]

nice, cant wait to see more!

[BOOGIEBOY]

Been a while since I updated this.



The Mailman brought goodies! Now if I could only find out where the other 3 wheels are?

[BOOGIEBOY]

The one that I have is a rear 19x10 and I think the fitment is right about where I wanted. I wanted to still be able to run a 275 or something close.









Finally got tracking info on the other 3 wheels, so hopefully I can have these ready to go on in the next few weeks.