BMW E30 320i "not to be finished anytime soon" project

Hello everyone.

I am originally from Lithuania, but residing now in Denmark where i have my sweet little car detailing shop and well i have just recently become a BMW fan.. Big time!

Now a bit of Prologue:

So i have been searching for a bmw e30 for 2 weeks. Surprisingly it become a sort of a challenge to even buy one, as here in Denmark every1 started to sweep them like crazy. Somebody puts one for sale, you call a man in the morning and it is allready sold. And that repeated at least 10 times during 2 weeks. Crazy isn't?

So somehow a friend of mine stumbled upon a very nice e30 which was a coupe and that's how i ended up owning my first proper car (i had some old Opel astra hatch before which was horrible ). Funny thing is the advertisment was added in the "4 door" section So obviously noboy were looking for those ads who were interested in 2 doors. Lucky me

So here i am with a BMW e30, original 170k on a clock. Nice exterior (except few surface rusts here and there) with nice undercarriage, engine compartment and just a little bit of rust in the trunk.

I got the car from the guy in his 40's who obviously did not give a damn about car pretty much... We found out later that the car was running on 5 cylinders for a while, as there was a spark shortage in one of the distribution wires which go towards the spark plug (reason for not working cylinder :/). Car had multiple torn vacuum hoses which basically were worn out due to age. We cleaned the Throttle body and fixed all the vacuums and staff.

So there you go, a nicely working car with oil changed, spark plugs replaced, vacuums fixed and i am continuing to fall in love in it.

I had problems switching gears. Had guesses that it was a gearbox issue, but my friend said that it would be most probably the gear shifting rails (rubbers worn out) so off to the mechanic, and it comes out that we put a very nice used gearbox instead with long ratios. There we go do some drifting (attempts) and burning tires (comoon it's first rear wheel drive car i have ) and after a bit i can not hit into the 2nd and 3rd gears...

So new gearbox and new all rubbers and neccesary parts to fix the shifting problem.

Then i have contacted a good friend of mine who suggested to give me a special deal and make my baby a project car of ours, with a target to come close to handling and power of 911 (yes yes, i find it unbelievable, but he insists with proper fine tuning and calibration and some few more things done, it will be quite possible :) )

And then he saw the engine cylinder block after removing top and he was blown away!

He said in 30 years of experience he has never seen a more well taken care - engine (internals as he said) with respect to the years. So good news, cylinder head is not warped, nor cracked. All cylinders are allmost like brand new, all rings are fine. The problem was with the worn Camshaft which was caused as he explained by the poor oil lubrication where oil pump distributes poorly oil down to back cylinders.

He as well said that if you heat up engine for couple of minutes every time you are about to drive, if it is in a great condition and is maintained properly, you will never have a problem with gaskets as hard as you will push the car (ofc not keeping on a rev limiter for hours).

So then he says: we have to modify it a bit and put a camshaft with bigger angle and port (if i get it right) the headers (cut the corners for the better flow. right?).

So now got custom milled camshaft with 288degree angle, new valves, new stronger valve springs, new seals for the valves, new pretty much all the new top head ))) new thermostat, new water pump, gaskets, and other small bits which i am sure you all know. Aha i get to put at the same time a new "Sebring" banana manifold as well.

So he estimates 40hp increase in power at least. And i can not wait to get my hands on it as i imagine that will be quite a fun to drive especially when it will hit 4k rpms

My plans are big to what i will get my car to look like, so there is still a long way to go, but i will achieve it. I will not give away what will be done here and there, as to keep things entertaining :)))

But i can relief you and assure you that it will be a very nice eye catcher and "Wow factor" bringer with delicare elegant touches (Porsche Singer or Magnus Walkers porsches sort of - They are my biggest inspirations :) )



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So i will try to keep it updated once something changes, but it might take a while all the time as need to hold on with my works as most of you i suppose :)
 
I love old shape BMW's. So much character and charisma then BMW's of today! Keep up the work and hopefully we can see more of her! :)
 
I see there are people who think alike :) Sweeet! Ou hell yes there will be more pics coming for sure :)

Love dat beading ^,^

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Ou well and just recently had some attempts to drift, but seems like i need wider set of wheels for the back to let it slide easier :)

But instead this is what happened to the differential cogs. First time removal and close up investigation of this interesting mechanism! The inside bracket part where these small once spin was broken in half :eek:

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And something fancy what is sitting currently in my car ^.^
This is original Hella with optional cover which you see on the pic, i will post some more pics once i get my car on the ground with the look of dar brushed aluminium in spokes

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What techniques do you use to wash your car? The colour looks so vibrant for a grey.

Hello davalav :)

the color name is "Cosmo-blau" at least what it says on that label in the engine room. And i love it. It seems greish-blue in daylight and during eveninngs it starts to look like very nice grey.

The reason for the depth of the clear coat is that i took my time to get this originnal painting to it's optimum result. I have sand papered so far an entire top surfacesv (to achieve that perfect smooth surface without orange peel) with 1000 ->> 2000 ->>> 3000 wet sand paper (yes i had paint measured, because due to the age it sits on it's edge of loosing clearcout :/ ) then i had the marks polished in 3 steps with hard abbrasive following middle grade and finishing with shine enhancing "Finishing" one. And off course multiple layers of carnauba Collonite wax :)

After all it is kind of a company marketing car and i like showing to my customers what their cars might look like.

Interesting you asked,, because i have a lot of people asking me if i had it repainted at some point :D Hard work pays off when you hear such words.

When it comes to washing the car i do 2 bucket technique (1 with shampoo and 1 with soap) some grit guards to keep the dirts floating in the top part of the bucket so there is minimum of risk adding of swirls during wash.
Then drying with microfiber towels and using air blower to remove remaining water from tight spots.

Unfortunatelly there are few places where rust have taken it's place and i am considering of doing complete repainting with body preparation in the same color and no fancy silly metalic thinngs. Unless i find something more interesting to go in elegant colors :)

OU AND MOST IMPORTANT NEWS :D

I have started the car today, i have not yet installed air flow meter from 2.5liter engine ( as mine is 2.0 currently, so i am giving a hard times for ECU :D by messing it's understanding what is going on with air flow) but i have throttle body assy and intake manifold from 2.5. Next week i will be puttinng all the wire harness for the ecu with newer motronic ECU for the 2.5 intake system. It will give few extra horses and well will let my friend tuner to adjust and calibrate engine again.

QUESTION: i have drained my battery today, as i had a battery indicator ON when we started the car. I have replaced with bigger amperage generator (since i have burned my original one after short circuiting the clams... yes yes i have mistaken the battery position... very lame :D ) and well battery died. What could be the problem? Could it be one of the connections to generator not beinng connected properly perhaps? I will be looking at it tomorrow but thought maybe some1 will come up with fast suggestion what to look at? :)

Thanks in advance :embarrest:
 
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Got it washed and could't resist to share it with you all :)

I got no bumpers as they won't be there at all, but with some time i will do smth interesting which will make the car look more e21 style. (as i said it is a my own kind of project, which will not going to look like no other e30 out there).

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A nice find buddy ;)

Thanks T9! I allmost lost my speech when i saw the look alikes spokes deep under the steel rims which were covering them. Now just need to get that clearance sorted out with Koni's. Ou well and will need to get them painted eventually (Hartge's) as they have seen some days.

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And next to friends e32 V12 5L Long edition executive jet liner :)))

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Well you are either giving your friends e32 plenty of room to park in or the car parking spaces in your country are massive looking at how far away from the parking line you are :blink:.......:)
 
:lol: You should see my parking given the opportunity to protect my baby, you could get a van in the space I leave between me and the other car :embarrest:

That's the right way to do it :D

And i managed to kill my new differential i think again... Well consequence is driving with half working gearbox led to it. Now i will just get a new gearbox with diff and get them properly maintainted and oiled and put alltogether at once so i can forget about it for a while >.<
 
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How are you getting on with this buddy? :)

Currently, perfecting paint by sandpapering and fixing small cosmetical rust issues around the car.

honestly not much time fixing my car, as i have to find a new used gearbox with differential for it. And before putting everything back in i will have proper maintenance of those 2. As well at the same time will going to deliver Flywheel to lighten it.

But since dont have much time so it is bit difficult to catch up with everything, but i hope in 2 months it will go out to play. And yes i will keep things updated ;)
 
Hello guys!

Does anybody know a good resource on how to choose carburetors and how to install them (what is required to install them)?

I am thinking on buying Dellorto 40mm once.

Thanks in advance :)
 
IF I were you I would go with MPI For far far better tuning But I must say that nothing stirs my blood like the sound of twin sidedraft Webbers at WOT and 7000 revs
 
IF I were you I would go with MPI For far far better tuning But I must say that nothing stirs my blood like the sound of twin sidedraft Webbers at WOT and 7000 revs

Yes i agree, but that's one of the reasons why i want carburettors. This is oldie goldie car and i don't want to make it anymore complicated! Bare pure joy of six straights!

What does WOT stand for?

And back to my question, do You perhaps know if i have to make custom connections to connect carburators to the Top Head? Or are there buy kits? I just want some links on perhaps where to buy or somebody who could make some. Or any other usefull info related with carburettors.

Tuning will be done by my engine expert as he has special equipment to adjust carburettors very precisely.
 
WOT = wide open throttle = PTTM pedal to the metal = Accelerator down as far as it can go.
 
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