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The parts car that never got parted: a beater 325e, that refuses to die

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  • #31
    Originally posted by Drmkiii View Post
    Subscribed, Always down for watching rust repair work!
    Thanks, it is really satisfying watching and doing rust repairs and sheet metal work in general!

    Originally posted by scweet14 View Post
    i think you need to take that v8 and drop it in this car. you are doing gods work by restoring the rust and it shows you car so why not give it a powerful heart!
    Oh, if there was any way to make this swap legal over here, I'd do it in a heartbeat. Unfortunately, these cars get a lot of attention from the law and are subjected to frequent pull overs, so wouldn't risk getting my car impounded. I'd have to make due with the good old m20 lump. Sigh

    Ok, let's give you another photo dump of an update!

    Now that the headliner was in and all the rust on the body removed, it was time to make it somewhat waterproof. First order of business is a new windshield



    Then some OEM seals for the trunk breathers/vents or whatever they are called. They relieve the cabin pressure when you slam doors/trunk and the seals are notorious for breaking with age. I did these on my m10 powered e30 a while back in this thread.



    At the same time I did these on my m10 e30, I had done the taillight seals too and swapped out its busted StarTecs, so naturally they come onto this car, with brand new seals.



    From here on, I started bolting on some stuff I had prepared previously, just to get it out of my way.

    The ABS bracket for the Mk60 ABS unit from an e46




    It positions the ABS unit nicely out of the way under the brake booster, using the mount for the stock fuel filter, which will be relocated and replaced by a smaller one, the OEMs are HUGE. Routing the hard lines was actually not that bad.



    Routed the ABS sensors, used the OEM holders and they fit surprisingly well.




    Had to buy the metal piece that covers the fuel expansion tank lines, these are usually very badly rotten. Mine was non existent, only some remnants under the plastic nuts. Painted it body color and turned out pretty nice. Also visible in the picture the overall condition of the wheel well after repairing the rust, applying seam sealer and paint + clearcoat, the shocks and springs.



    Time for the battery to sit in its permanent place and make checking electrics a bit easier.
    Out of the 3 battery trays I have, none was in good shape. One was cracked badly because of a rear end collision, the original from the car is bent and twisted due to who knows what and the 3rd one had its metal piece rusted off. That's where it is supposed to go, those small two tabs are just melted into the plastic, so once it rusts, it just falls off.



    Time to make a new one, start with a leftover piece of 2mm sheet metal



    Some drilling, welding, dressing and painting later. Added a third nut on there, because there is already a not used hole in the tray itself, so why the hell not.



    Attached it with rivets, way sturdier than OEM. How it accommodates a 75Ah battery.



    That pretty much summed up all the work underneath and in the back of the car, so time to move onto the fenders and front valance.
    I'll use that opportunity to show what method I use to make the invisible repairs.

    While watching videos about thin sheet metal welding and sheet metal shaping, I stumbled across a few very good channels and found each to serve a purpose for different situations.

    Trev's blog - amazing content, sadly not very often updated, but lots of tips on welding and metal shaping for very fine results
    Fitzee's fabrications - probably my favorite channel, shows that anything can be done with simple tools and a bit of thought. Also, the guy (Tony) always shows the easiest way to do something. Check it out, you'll love it.
    Make it Custom - a guy called Kyle Fisher building hot rods and low riders, has an amazing workshop and produces items and cars far beyond any realistic goals for a DIY guy like myself, BUT lots of good tips on welding and metal shaping as well.

    So, I've used a mix of all the tips and tricks from these guys and especially a technique shown in Fitzee's fabrications, Tony calls it "cut and butt". It utilizes a mix of overlapping and butt welding plus a specific angle of the grinding wheel. The idea is that you make your patch piece BEFORE you cut out the rust, and make it a bit bigger than you need. Then leave a small lip, about an inch or so, when you cut the rust out, so that the patch piece can lay flat onto the lip. As it overlaps the lip, tack weld the piece onto the detail every inch or so. Then, taking the cut off wheel at a 45 degree angle, cut into both the detail and the patch piece, where they meet and through your tack welds. Cut through some of the welds, 2-3 or 4 if necessary depending on how large the piece is. Cutting at an angle allows the pieces to fall back onto each other and will now stay flush, hanging onto the remaining tack welds. Correct the height of the patch if necessary, to make it flush with the detail and tack weld again. Continue cutting through the overlap tack welds and re-weld them as the panels fall onto each other flush. Remove the now cut off lip from the backside, grind off the welds and viola - seamless repair.
    It's a bit tricky, because while making the patch, you need to think about that letting it sit onto the original panel expands its dimensions a bit, so you need to correct for that in any shapes onto the panel and also kep in mind, the patch will move a bit after you cut through the lap welds.
    It takes a bit of practice, but once you get the hang of it, it makes life a LOT easier and repairs are quicker this way. Instead of trying to make a piece fit correctly on every spot, you just make it fit as you go.

    Let me try explaining with pictures
    Here's what my driver's side fender looked like at the bottom.



    Inner structural piece completely gone



    First, make the patches. Decided to go in 3 pieces, as Tony says - it will be welded anyway, why bother making a complex one piece patch when you can make multiple and save so much time, having the same result.



    Then, I remade the inner structural piece, nothing pretty, just the correct shape and placement, so the other patches can line up.
    Time for the first patch, tack welded while overlapping. The upper side is made to fit flush, because there is no space



    Cut through and rewelded on some spots



    Fully welded and dressed



    Next up - the bottom part of the fender. Not only was it rotten, but it was also dented below the body line, so the whole thing needs to be replaced, not worth trying to save any of it.
    Cut off the rust, left the fender lip on. The idea is to put in the whole big patch, then mark on the inside where the line for the lip needs to be, cut off t he fender lip with the excessive metal for the "cut and butt".



    Patch tacked on overlapping. I chose this place to splice it, because it's the only flat area on the fender, it has a crown everywhere else.



    Here's how it sits from a different angle.



    And you can see it here as a cross section, I've already started to cut through - note the fender lip getting cut off with the excessive lip left to do the "cut and butt".
    It still sits overlapped



    Cutting a bit further allows the patch to fall through and sit flush with the original detail



    Time to make the fender lip. Cut back to the line I marked while the original lip was still on there. Slapped a scrap piece of steel and welded it on, both sides



    Another view, also note the small patch connecting the first two patches. It was way simpler to make this way.



    Cut, grind, repeat



    Test fit on the car



    The gap to the door is a bit off, but you need to understand that was a very low effort for this fender, so it's good enough.
    Reason for it is that right after i made the patches, my jacket got caught on a piece of bondo hanging down from the body line in the front, and split the bondo.
    Digging revealed a super thick layer of body filler which covered an actually fairly decent accident repair with a spot welder. Not sure why they needed so much to smooth it out ...




    So, that dictated the low effort theme on the front end. The right hand fender was in much better condition rust wise, it was just the very bottom of the lip and some on the side where it meets the door and rocker.



    No pics of the process, as it was much easier.

    Onto the valance.
    The original one to the car had had way too many accidents and repairs. Crooked mounting brackets, literally torn up spots, dents, twists and you guessed it - an illegal amount of bondo.

    This is after I straightened it with a hammer




    I had another one, which was straight enough, read only one accident at the right hand side fog light area, but was cut up for a turbo project and thus missing the mounting brackets too because of the intercooler piping.



    Didn't want to fork out for a new one, so decided to use both and make one.
    Used the same technique, but sloppier



    Made the openings for the AC with some vice grips and called it a day. Looks good enough and most importantly - fits surprisingly well!



    These are now painted as of last weekend, but no pics. With the factory seam sealer applied with the correct texture, they look a lost better.
    Using this method and not trying hard saved me a lot of time, these were done in the matter of 5 evenings working on them after my job.
    And they turned out way better than expected, I'll post pics later.

    Anyway, that's pretty much it for the chassis, I still need to button up some interior stuff, route some AC lines, bleed the brakes and add an OBD2 connection port for the ABS unit.
    But after these are done, I start working on the engine.

    Can't wait!
    "You could roll an E30 in a BMW showroom today and people would think:
    Well, they finally got the 1 series right!"

    3.0 L e30 ground up build

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    • #32
      Hello Stance|Works

      A bit of an update, that should conclude the exterior work on this project, apart from sourcing a decent front bumper and installing it.
      Let's pick up where we left - fenders and valance.
      Here they are painted inside and out. I was generous with the seam sealer to prevent moisture getting in, it also has clear coat on the inside to help with that task.
      I tried my best at blending the paint on the fenders, not much experience with that, so got orange peel and some small runs, but when installed on the car none of that is noticeable, so labelled "GOOD ENOUGH"






      Once aligned and bolted down firmly, I think it will look pretty decent, way better than before for sure.
      Did the final install of the condenser and fan. Flipped a bracket, reshaped and relocated the other two and the 16 inch SPAL unit fits nicely. I'm a huge fan of these fans



      Yesterday was the day I had to address the elephant in the room. I want to have the car moved outside the shop for a month or so, a buddy will be using my spot to swap his convertible.
      So, that means no bare metal allowed. Time to do something about that driver's side fender.

      Started by sanding it down and adding some filler to see where my high spots were. Blocked the filler and applied a second layer of filler, blocked it down as well and it actually was all it needed. Some pinholes were addressed and viola, ready for primer.



      Masked off for epoxy primer.



      Some adjustments needed to be made, that the flat finish of the primer highlighted. Didn't bother to make it perfect, just good enough and masked it off for paint.



      45 minutes later, painted and unmasked. There is a hint of the next project I will be working on in the background.



      A side shot



      And a sharper angle from the front



      The blend is not perfect on the front of the fender, but there was too much bondo on it and didn't want to dig into that, because then I'd have to paint the whole fender and that is just something I want to avoid at all cost.
      It's better in person actually, some wet sanding and polish will make it look a bit better.

      ​​​​​​​All things considered, for a one evening job after work, the results exceeded my expectations and I'm very happy with it.
      About a week ago managed to finish up the rear shelf parcel with speakers install and some other small tasks, so I'm getting closer to engine work.
      "You could roll an E30 in a BMW showroom today and people would think:
      Well, they finally got the 1 series right!"

      3.0 L e30 ground up build

      Comment


      • #33
        that grey color is cool

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        • #34
          Thought this thread is due for an update.

          After fixing the fenders, put the car on the lift and bled the brakes.


          The car was then pushed outside and sat there for solid 6 months. I used the time to work on swapping a friend's convertible from a m40b18 to a m20b27 with a 731 head on top, then fixed the spare wheel well of anther friend's e21 and had the pleasure of finding out my e28 has had some sort of an accident in the past and someone replaced the whole rear fascia. It was done very professional in terms of metal work, but whoever had the job to seal it off and protect the welds from moisture didn't do too hot. A short screwdriver poking session revealed very unpleasant surprises. So that took months and after the e28 was finally on the road again, I could drag this tired lump out



          I have a ton of pictures of disassembling it, it was caked with oil, grime and dust and was disgusting, the head has (or had, scrapped it a while back) a huge weld from cyl 2 all the way to cyl 6. I'll spare everyone these and just start with the assembly of the engine. Specs are - unmodified m20b27 block, M52b28TU crank, m20b25 connecting rods, m54b30 pistons, ported and bench flow tested 731 type head, stock m20b25 camshaft, m20b25 intake and throttle body, early m20b27 fuel rail with m20b25 FP regulator and fuel injectors out of a twin spark Alfa Romeo.
          Bottom end parts measured for clearance, block honed and painted, all assembled together and torqued down. Found out the block plugs were rotted out almost the whole way through so changed them out.
          All aluminium pieces were vapor blasted and left bare. They look amazing in my opinion




          Torqued down the head and timed the engine, slapped the Chinesium headers on for visual gratification. Out of all 4 sets I've installed on other people's cars, my pair fit best and required minimal intervention. Very good for the price I bought them (90 euro about 5 years ago)



          Engine install was a breeze when you have everything ready




          Some assembly was requied, about halfway through



          Made a gauge pod out of the central vents. The red one was just a mockup piece to have everything ready. After the install was complete, the vents remained functional and the close off valve thingy still works.



          Sent it out for an exhaust job, which consist of an X pipe after the headers, a stock e46 m54 front muffler and then a stock m20b25 rear muffler.
          First day of driving it, that was around the end of Nov 2022, passed tech inspection:





          Overall, I am super happy with how this car turned out. Already made some long trips, the sound deadening is really effective and makes for a more comfortable drive. Suspension is firm and responsive, but not bone shattering, can't go wrong with Bilstein and H&R, the poly bushings stiffen it up but not render the car unpleasant for daily duties.
          The engine pulls strong all the way through the range, maybe chokes down a bit at the top of the rpms, but has a ton of torque right from idle. Haven't dyno tuned it yet, but a similar build showed 170 whp and 250 Nm at the wheels, so mine should be in the same ballpark.
          It currently has a whiny 3.64 LSD , the gear ratio matches the engine very well, so I intend to ignore the noise and just drive it as is.

          Things left to do:
          - replace electric fan. It caught on a rivet for a bracket and shattered off 6 out of 10 blades ...
          - figure out LPG system install (cheap fuel, very common around here and the car used to have an outdated one)
          - go through the pile of spare seat parts and assemble a pair of sport seats for the car
          - figure out a way to install a modern AC compressor instead of the locked up original one.

          Compared to what has been done so far, minor tasks.
          The car has now covered approximately 4000 kilometers, is due for the second oil change, after which I will take it to the dyno and see what it does.

          I left the 316 badge that came on the replacement trunk lid, because I wasn't too keen on prying it off and leaving a huge spot of failed clear coat. It's sometimes funny to see people's reactions to what this 316 can do

          Last edited by gnmzl; 03-08-2023, 02:40 AM.
          "You could roll an E30 in a BMW showroom today and people would think:
          Well, they finally got the 1 series right!"

          3.0 L e30 ground up build

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