** Acme [Akagi] bought a pink estate car - E30 325i project log! **

It is booked in to have a proper exhaust made. I am fitting a replacement manifold which I've refurbished (blasted and painted matte black), and then a local shop is making a dual 1.75" to 2.5" collector off of the manifold, 2.5" to the mid section, small silencer, then 2.5" to a dual 1.75" conversion to connect to the existing backbox, with new brackets and v-band clamp joins. In stainless, of course.

I hope that will be the last exhaust the car has, because it has had a few... :p

Some strongflex red polyurethane bushes are arriving tomorrow to replace the rear arm bushes and the rear beam bushes. The beam bushes have already been replaced, but the beam has to come out anyway so I figured I may as well... That way, hopefully, I won't have to take the rear beam out again either... *knock on wood*
 
jaybee said:
Only just seen this thread on here. @Acme I would say ignore the haters ^ Saw a couple of comments above. If it makes you happy mate crack on. I've been criticized for keeping my "ancient" 2007 2.5t Ford S-Max running and doing some basic upgrades. To be fair mine doesn't have much rust though. :)
Good luck.
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Thanks!

I used to let it get to me, there are plenty of arguments in this thread.

But I try to just ignore it now. (Or annoy them by acting patronising in response.) :p

S-Max with the 2.5T is an interesting car. Perhaps the ultimate sporty family hauler. Unless you want fuel economy (and some might say reliability) :D
 
Oil change time, how exciting!

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Trip to BMW to pick up some bits. Raising the bar in the car park amongst all the beaver toothed M4's and other ugly rubbish. :p

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These bolts (for the rear arms) were £10 each... :eek:

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Some strongflex red polybushes for the rear arms and the rear beam.

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We are dropping the whole rear subframe out this week / next week to de-scale and paint it (and the floorpan above it) and replace the bushes. It is looking a little worse for wear back there, and I want to knock this out before its MOT. There doesn't seem to be any excessive movement, but I'm sure the tester would at least raise an eyebrow. Would rather avoid the possible fail. :D

(also you can hopefully see why I pre-emptively got new nuts and bolts)

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Painted my replacement exhaust manifold. Looks pretty decent if I do say so myself. The one currently on the car is fine, but it is technically the wrong one. This will tidy it up a little, and avoid any future confusion when trying to buy gaskets etc.

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And went for a little drive...

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Very peaceful round here. Didn't encounter another car or person, only a couple of muntjac deer and some hares. You have to take it steady and really pay attention at dusk when the animals are moving around.

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Dup said:
Baby oil? :D
I love these, the shame is getting more and more timless since you got it. Get it tidied up, I think it's suffered enough now and so have you.
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No, 10W40. :p

Tidying up is in progress! Rear beam overhaul soon, new custom exhaust after that (deposit already been paid!), and I'm still waiting for replies from bodyshops for the big bill.
 
The friend who was going to help me sort out the rear arm bushes before the MOT had something come up, so it is going to have to wait.

I decided to just put it through an MOT and see what happens.


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Well, I wasn't expecting that...


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Hrm...




Thats better! It just needed a firm whack. :p


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Ahhhh... Honestly I think those bushes should have been at least advised, but what do I know...


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Pressure is off now!
 
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jpaul said:
I'd learned a lesson about failure on bm trailing arm bushing, the arm moved about 1/2" in board because the old rubber failed - which the bush carrier allows on both sides.
rear wheel was no longer aligned, car lost rear grip coming out of a countryside roundabout as it happened I think, ended up on a lovely grass verge;
I was surprised there was no obvious scrubbing of the tyre 100miles later.
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Thats interesting, thanks for sharing, and glad to hear your crash wasn't worse!

The alignment on the rear of the car is actually a bit out of whack, the camber on one side is 2 degrees less than the other. (the one with less camber is the "wrong" one)

But I had put it down to the rear arm being bent slightly and ignored it. Looking at the service history it has been this way since well before I owned it.

Looking at the state of those bushes, I wouldn't be shocked if they were already worn out a decade ago to be honest... :p
 
80's interior moment.

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Plus some eccentricities that make me happy. An E36 lux/M3 wood gearknob, in extremely aged/cracked condition (in-fact I had to repair it because some parts flaked off), and a custom gearstick gaiter with SPACE CORGIS on it!

Because obviously. :p

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This gearknob is actually one of the first things I bought for the car years ago, you can see it if you check the old photos in my original post! I took it off when it broke, but now its repaired and BACK BAYBEE!
 
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Went to go for a drive in the E30 today to take some photos with my new camera lens, and it wouldn't start. Cranking but no vroom!

Genuinely, THE first time EVER it has let me down in a way that means I can't actually use it, and to its credit, it happened on my driveway, after I had left it sitting for a week or three.

Anyway, I did some testing and probing around... Nothing too exciting, but have a couple of pictures:

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No spark and no fuel pump, but voltages are where they need to be, fuses and relays are good, fuel pump works when jumped.

Conclusion: 99% a crank position sensor. When that fails, the fuel and ignition circuits do not engage.

Ordered a new one, will be here when it gets here.
 
jpaul said:
good stuff -

[Interesting the fuel pump gets nobbled - I had one on it's way out, warm restart was tough, but pump remained, took ages&pb-blaster to tease it out from block,
thought the plastic would fracture & there wasn't space to drill it if needed, stupid short lead too, so was really meant to disconnect coolant hoses to route it
In retrospect the tachometer occassionally seemed to get stuck at ~2000rpm which I think was a symptom, had I known. ]
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Yeah it's not routed properly. I cut the old one and pulled it out, and kind of snaked the new one under the coolant hoses and used a few cable ties to hold it away from the belts. It's not pretty but I'll be damned if I'm going to go through bleeding the sodding cooling system again just for that. :P
 
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