1985 BMW 318 Stage Rally Build - 1988 Porsche 924S Street Build - Sequoia Build

Lof8 wrote: Really cool build. I've got 5 years and many K's into my e30/S50 powered track car. I couldn't bear to to subject it to rally abuse. I dream of picking up another e30 to keep basically stock and rally the crap out of. Until then, I will live that dream through you. How soon do you plan to get it on a course? Good luck with it!

thanks, I can imagine why, lol. I plan to have about $3k total into this car (including two sets of tires, and the car itself), so abusing it is considerably less of a problem, haha....

it's only for 2 or 3 years though. Once my WRX is paid off and over 100k miles, it will be old enough that I can take it out to rallycross, and it's considerably more setup in every respect. Not to mention triple the power of the e30 :)

Then I may take the e30, drop a new engine into it, and convert it into a track car. If it isn't destroyed by then of course!

Finally got the bolts in for the seat. Now that I look at them, I think I may order a larger diameter. I'm sure these are plenty strong, but they look so small, lol.

Also gotta love McMaster-Carr. They ship two little boxes of nuts and bolts in this big-ass box

In any case, the seats are mounted now and fully functional. After trying them in various positions the only issue is that they do sit a bit lower than the OEM seats. With the electric height adjustment at full "up" the driver's seat is ok (though I could go for another inch or two higher) but the passenger seat (no height adjustment) is pretty damn low. Upside to this is that there is plenty of helmet room. IDK, it's fine for now as I sort the car out but at some point I'll probably want to tweak the mount size. Maybe when I someday reupholster the seats.

how 'bout all the black duct tape. Almost blends in, lol

oh....and got three much bigger, very beat-up packages via FedEx today: front and rear suspension and brakes from a 325i (minus springs, shocks, and the front control arms - all of which I already have the stuff I want to use). I'll replace all the bushings on everything and pick up some cheap rotors and used pads, most likely. Need to do some cleaning up and repainting while I'm at it. Project for the next week or two.

so....decided not to autocross today. Why, you might ask? This is why. Shaved AD08s would not have been fun.

so did a few things in the garage. The bulk of it was disassembling, rebuilding, cleaining, and painting the front and rear 325 calipers. They look pretty now :)

Disassembled the gauge cluster to see if I could figure out why my tach isn't working. All soldered connections look fine, the board looks fine, and I tested the board batteries and they have the power I'd expect (1.5V)....so either the gauge assembly itself is bad, or I'm not getting signal from the sender. Will look into it more at some point.

While I was messing with the gauge, also jumped the test circuit to turn off the inspection warning light. Small victories.....

Got a bit bored watching my Mids getting shellacked by Notre Dame.....so back to the garage for a bit. Cleanup and somee cosmetic stuff...yay.

What condition are your small diameter front shocks in?

dealing with a power drain someplace that is causing dead batteries. I narrowed it down to 3 fuses that were drawing voltage with the car off:

Fuse #28: small draw. Unhooked the power antenna (don't need it) and cig lighter (don't need it). No more draw. Will remove all that wiring.

Fuse #27: large draw. Must be a short someplace. This fuse runs to interior lights, central locking system, on-board computer, and radio.

1. radio: unhooked it, and no significant change. The "constant power" for the radio memory has a very minor draw, so that's not the issue. Will hook it up again later. still need tunes.
2. on-board computer: this is a 318i. Pretty sure I don't actually have it, that was a 325 option I think.
3. central locking: not working anyhow, so I pulled the control box and will pull all the wiring in the future to clean things up. Don't need it, don't want it, who cares.
4. interior lights: I suspect this is where the drain was, but I'm not tracing every interior light wire in the car. Besides, I have no need for them, they're dim as hell anyhow. I'll probably run new wires on a master switch if I want them in the future. result of all that: Fust #27 is no longer drawing any current (shocker!).

2 down, 1 to go.

The one left drawing current, a large current, is #21. This fuse controls all kinds of crap....including the active check control (which my car doesn't have), service interval indicator (which I would love to eliminate), the clock, and most importantly the tachometer. My tach (and associated fuel economy gauge) haven't worked since I bought the car, so I suspect either I'm grouding out someplace causing the tach NOT to work, or the tach itself is shorting. Either way, this is going to take some investigation. I'm almost certain this is the harness that's causing my battery drain, so it's going to be the one I take apart to figure out and trace wires. With any luck, if I can find the short it will make the tach work again. That would be useful to say the least!.

wish me luck...ugh.

things I ordered today:

full set of used manual window regulators. Apparently everyone in the USA ordered their BMWs with nifty (lousy) power windows. So I found a full set in the UK for around $100 total.

and stainless braided brake lines.

things on their way:

Some Ireland Engineering rear trailing arm bushings

things that arrived:

Set of lightly used rear Bilstein HDs. No leaking, bushings look practically new, and got them for under $75 shipped for the pair.

and since the forum was down over the weekend, my little nice-weather (free) project: PROJECT DELETE CHROME WINDOW TRIM. A nice matte black now!

Now I'm wondering if I can find some coilovers that can handle both rallycross and autox duty for my e30:

I dont care what anyone says, I love the diving boards

I like them fine once they're compressed

loudes13 wrote: Now I'm wondering if I can find some coilovers that can handle both rallycross and autox duty for my e30:

I'm sure you can, if you spend enough!

btw, your car looks great.

question: how easy/quick is it to remove that front air dam? I have the basic front end, but would love that air dam if it's something I can pull off relatively quickly during rallycrosses.

excellent.....found the battery drain. It was the glovebox light/flashlight assembly someplace. Don't need either, removed, all wiring removed (I'd say at least 1/2 oz. worth, lol).

total battery draw is now only 5 milliamps now, and that is with the radio hooked up.

on to more interesting things...

Lof8 wrote: Really cool build. I've got 5 years and many K's into my e30/S50 powered track car. I couldn't bear to to subject it to rally abuse. I dream of picking up another e30 to keep basically stock and rally the crap out of. Until then, I will live that dream through you. How soon do you plan to get it on a course? Good luck with it!

Pictures and build details in a new thread or ban. It's a simple choice, up to you really

lookie lookie what is no longer in the car....

that's right, 27 lbs of crap I don't need. The entire power lock and power window system, including all the wiring, motors, controllers, etc.

I'd say that these stupid systems that only work half the time anyhow make up like 50% of the wiring in the whole damn car, haha...

Are you throwing out the window motors?

I have a feeling that I'm going to be bumming lots of parts off of you. ;)

no, I put the entire window/lock system up for sale on revlimited for $150 shipped OBO (including wiring, switches, actuators, pigtails, etc), but I have no idea if that is a fair price or not.

Let me know what you need and whatever you think is a fair price and I'll almost certainly take whatever offer you make

I just need two window regulators, and if the whole lot is good I think you should sell them as a lot.

If you end up parting it out we can chat then.

I doubt I can or will sell the whole lot. Just posting it up in case....

will shoot you an email...

Adrian_Thompson wrote: Pictures and build details in a new thread or ban. It's a simple choice, up to you really

http://www.r3vlimited.com/board/showthread.php?t=161970

some stuff came in last night:

In the blue package, direct from the UK, full 4-door set of manual window tracks/regulators. Was very happy to install these. Now I just need some handles - right now I'm using a vise-grip wrench to open and close the windows. The regulators are in good shape and I only paid about $100 shipped for them (got a discount for buying all four), so that was good. They operate smoothly.

In the other box are some new (secondhand, so cheaper than new) Ireland Engineering rear trailing arm bushings, since the rubber ones are shot. I was just going to use OEM rubber ones, but these actually ended up being cheaper, so figured I'd go with them.

Spent today cleaning up various messes I've made in the car, raking some leaves, and cleaning/prepping/painting the metal of the trasmission tunnel. I won't be putting back the OEM center console pieces, so might as well make it look nice underneath.

I plan on rigging up a cupholder using the "L" bracket that used to hold the back of the shifter console down. Gotta have a cupholder!

Also pulled out the mess of stuff around the shifter and the tattered rubber boot. I'll just get a new rubber boot and attach it directly to the metal. It'll look like a semi trucker shifter I think, lol. Won't do anything until I can score up a Z3 shifter though. I cannot deal with the semi-trucker length throw of this stock one!

Also managed to get the old rubber bushings out of the trailing arms. After snapping a large bolt used as a home press, I decided to just burn it out. Took about an hour to do both of them and they came out cleanly. Cleaned up the arms and will put in the poly bushings this weekend.

The rear suspension will be done next weekend. I'm waiting on new CV boots and new brake lines at the moment, so will just do all of it at once. I have the arms, hubs, calipers, etc all set now, so it shouldn't be TOO hard I hope.

One thing I still need to find is the ebrake cable for a disc brake car. It's different from the one for my original drums, so will be keeping my eye open for those.

cleaned up

a few minor things during halftime

1. got some FREE 325i front rotors from a RevLimited member. Almost full runout, just some surface rust. Cleaned up decent with some scotchbrite pads and paint...

1. made up a quick template for what will eventually be a parcel shelf where the backseat used to be. The bare chassis under the seat is curved and not good for putting "stuff" in. When I go to events I'll want to put alot of crap there, so need a level surface with some tie-downs. This is the start of it. More once I start building it.

1. Trunk full of stuff I need to install once a few last parts come in!

I know I've been bugging you for every part under the sun, so here's another one for you to ponder.

My 318i has cruise control but no clutch switch or bracket. Strange, I know. So right now I have the wire 'jumped'. Cruise works but I can't toss it into gear without first tapping the brake. I'd rather it was a brainless operation.

Would you happen to have these two pieces sitting around?

Taiden wrote: I know I've been bugging you for every part under the sun, so here's another one for you to ponder. My 318i has cruise control but no clutch switch or bracket. Strange, I know. So right now I have the wire 'jumped'. Cruise works but I can't toss it into gear without first tapping the brake. I'd rather it was a brainless operation. Would you happen to have these two pieces sitting around?

got a picture of what they look like?

It's been a busy week at work so not much has gotten done. Plus I'm still waiting on a few parts to come in before I can do the full 325 suspension/brake swap.

In the meantime, I managed to find a perfect-condition VDO gauge cluster (harder to find for the old 4-cyl cars!) from a Rev member who gave me a great deal on it ($60 shipped). My cluster tach and temp gauges weren't working, and everything on the new one works. Also he had just replaced the memory/circuit board batteries, so that saves me the trouble...Also the odometer works, which seems to be pretty rare on e30s!

new on top, old motometer gauges bottom. The VDOs just look nicer too, especially the warning lights, for some reason...

got a few things in - rear brake rotors (just got some cheap new ones, tired of looking for used ones!), and some CV axle boots so I can replace them while I have the rear end apart - the current ones aren't split, but they're pretty crappy-looking. Also new nuts/clips for the hub nuts, to be on the safe side.

Also started cleaning up the first of the four 15" mesh wheels. Two hours with various scotchbrite pads and other improvised cleaning tools. All those damn little spokes, so gotta go in with one finger at a time and be creative to get to some of the spots. It's about 75% done, then I'll prime and paint it up to see how it turns out before doing the rest. These will be my street wheels so they might as well look decent. Probably will be in gunmetal or dark grey, haven't decided for sure yet.

20 and 21

I'll dig around and see if I see them anywhere. Not sure if my car actually had CC installed, or if the p/o just was rounding up parts to install it.