E30 Project/restoration thread

[Thomas. PLease.]

I've wanted one of these forever so when one came up for sale locally advertised for not very much money I had to go and have a look. It's supposedly a one lady owner car with 71k miles on. The odo does ready 71k but also doesn't work so not sure how much to read into that, in any case the car didn't have any history. Overall for the money (£2250) it seems less rusty than I thought it would be, some rust on the arches and boot corners as well as front corner by the pedal, but doesn't seem to be anythng catastrophic just yet.

The front has dents on just about every panel at regular intervals so the supposed one lady owner can't have been too careful, or good at parking so that'll be my first area to try and address; followed shortly by the rear bodywork and boot floor. It drives pretty well though, stops, goes etc.

Photos from the ad:

When I got it back there were a few areas of immediate attention with the aim to get it through an MOT.

Indicators not working - Turned out to be the flasher relay by the indicator stalk, easy £20 fix
Tach/Odo not working - Took it apart but couldn't see anything obvious, read about batteries going on the SI board and could see mine were very low on voltage, so ordered some new batteries to attempt to install
Old alarm still wired in - Dealt with the rats nest of wires and pulled out the immobiliser/alarm and associated wiring, need to solder some connections back up but appear to have maintained all functions so far.

Which is when I found someones address book written into this:

Along with this newspaper clipping :lol:

Rear light cluster is missing an indicator lens - Ordered a second hand cluster to fit

That's when I came to the sunroof whcih has clearly been leaking and was visibly rusting on top:

So I decided to hoover up the rust and give it a light wire brushing just to remove some of the excess, and left the panel off for now. Not sure whether to repair the rusted panel or just to seal the thing up fully

Overall though it's relatively clean

And no visible rust on the scuttle:

Next steps are to make a decision on the sunroof; sort the rear lights and possible order some new front panels/bumpers to tidy all for the front end up. Longer term the idea when buying was to do an S54 swap and turn it into a full track/fast road toy. Will see how that plan develops as this seems like quite a nice car to really destroy doing that sort of thing. Otherwise just to tidy it up for the time being and get it through the MOT and go from there.

Thanks

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

I'll tell you right now that with that amount of rust around the sunroof you want to take the headliner out and inspect the roof skin on the inside, then decide if you actually want to proceed or not. It is the biggest pain in the arse to repair because the sunroof tray is bonded and welded to the roof skin, and it rusts in between the two.

You also want to check the boot pockets, the rear valance by the towing eye, front and rear of the sills, rear inner arches, front footwell corners, flitch tray corners, the lip underneath the boot seal, the scuttle corners, the stamping behind the drivers side bonnet catch, the firewall next to the heater blower motor, the battery tray, and the fuel tank lip.

Assume nothing until you've removed the headliner, carpet, and all the plastic covers, undertrays and arch liners and had a proper poke around. I bought mine years ago advertised as rust free with a years MOT, and it was rotten everywhere.

Aside from rust, they are pretty stout cars. Not a whole lot to go wrong and when things do go wrong diagnosis is fairly straightforward...

The odomoter is a common issue, one of the plastic gears strips. You can buy replacements in a little kit. The SI board battery issue is unrelated. All that does is stops the service indicator lights from working properly.

The wings are worth saving if you can, genuine ones that aren't rotten on the bottoms are getting a bit scarce.

Oh and a good friend of mine owns "F83 FGJ", it is also red...

Thanks, the odo gears seem fine when I took the cluster out. Unless I need to fully dissasemble to see? Wouldn’t the SI board battery issue stop the tach working though?

I know the front footwell corners are bad, as are the rear sills and inner arches, but they didn’t look beyond help. Battery tray looks fine, but will have to check the flitch and will take the headliner off as the next job.

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

My odo still works so I haven't had cause to delve too deeply into that particular issue. The E30Zone wiki may be of help. But don't take everything it says as gospel, there are a fair few little errors on there.

The SI board issue will not affect the odometer no. The odometer is completely mechanical. If the speedometer works, the odometer should work too.

Front footwell corners are typical because people jack the car up from there, despite the fact that the square "cups" on the footwells *look like* jacking points, they aren't. They were just to aid assembly in the factory. When people jack the car up from there it splits the seam sealer/layers of metal, and then rust ensues.

Also I just noticed your wings appear to be held on with 2 or 3 bolts each.

I’d taken the front wings off in that photo to have a look underneath.

Trying to decide whether to make good the current wings or order replacements and get them painted. Are pattern parts or other pressings any good? Any recommendations?

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

I guess that’s what happens when world governments are on a money printing spree!

So I had a deeper look into the passenger rear which I knew to be in dire need of work with bottom missing, its been taped up so I knew it was hiding a bit of a mess but it’s gone all the way through the seam so will need a lot of building back up, which was more than I was expecting; there’s a theme emerging here!

Other side is thankfully much less worse with just some rot in the bottom

Going to need a full rear repair panel rear and passenger side. @Acme if you know of anyone with any good repair panels or where I can get something it would be much appreciated.

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

Check out carpanels.com

Will you be welding etc yourself? That would at least save the majority of labour costs

Yeah, will all be my own work. Just keeping an eye out at the moment to try and get some repair panels to use for a reasonable price.

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

I think the mileage is bogus on that thing, it's been hovering around 70k since 2005 & once even went through an MOT at 65k but it fluctuates. In the meantime it's failed the MOT on tyres, appears to have had them changed then a few years later down to cords again.

Yeah bearing in mind the odometer isn’t working I’d taken the mileage with a pinch of salt. It’s not going to stay standard so would rather it’s a bit of a ****box than something genuinely worth keeping original.

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

Odometer failure is common and OP said he knows the odometer doesn't work.

I'd guess its probably around double what it reads (Although with an E30 mileage is the least of your worries...)

I do wish people were more proactive with fixing odometers when they break so it doesn't look like the cars have a dodgy past though.

Given how borked the MOT history already is, I'd probably just replace the whole cluster with a working one. It would be easiest

One to consider, I took the cluster apart again yesterday and the Speedo gears are all intact and seem to be working so not sure what the issue is. I’ll see if the new batteries solve the rev counter and mpg dial and go from there. Coolant and fuel both work as expected.

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

Well you were right on the SI board batteries, replaced them this morning and still no luck with either rev counter or speedo. Everything else seemed to work ok still.

On to the proper next job now, and it has somewhat escalated. Ordered a full new rear panel so now need to tidy the rear up and get to work fitting that when it arrives. Did toy with building up what was there, but with a couple of other rust spots it just seemed easier to replace. Lots of spot welds to get through and quite a bit of work will be needed to get everything sitting right but hey ho.

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

Is the speedo not working either? I thought it was just the odo.

The speedo takes its signal from the sensor on the diff. Make sure the sensor is OK and the wiring from the sensor to the cluster is OK. The odometer won't work unless the speedometer works.

No it’s both speedo/odo and rev counter. Makes sense for it to be sensor as the gears were fine in the odo itself. Will take a look at the sensor and see if I can trace the wires to get continuity.

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

If the speedometer hasn't been working for so many years, how has it been passing MOTs...

Good question...

More progress, whilst waiting for the rear section I wanted to make a start on the front footwells, in particular the drivers side which is in a fairly bad way. that meant getting the seats out and carpet out, which was a disgusting sodden mess.

Even found some more treasure! Only went out of date in 2019.

Once that was out I could get a better look. Passenger section looks ok, on the drivers side the section where the accelerator pedal attaches is pretty bad and has been patched before, it looks like they may have sealed up the drain hole which is possibly why it's now gone bad again.

Started cutting first to just trim away the rot. I've got some repair sections for this portion of the floor so should be ok to use those once ready.

Annoyingly a previous repair goes into the sill so will need to cut and replace that section too.

One other hole in the front pan which I decided to start by repairing before moving onto the bigger sections

Cut out done,

Excuse the welding.

Given its under the carpet didn't think it needed to be flush

Then primed.

Onto repairing the corner section tomorrow.

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

Looks good - so what weldng equipment had you invested in - is that a skillset you have from your job. ?

my tachometer had had reading problems because of the the camshaft sensor, I don't know if that had impacted speedo, or mileomter, had never thought about it before.

I've got a 10yr old Clarke 135te Mig welder; it's not the best with only 4 voltage settings but if everything is clean seem to usually be able to get reasonable welds. All self taught, I grew up on a farm so always been in and around machinery and my Dad was pretty handy with tools so picked up a lot from him, but taught myself to weld just by trying what worked and what didn't and doing small bits on various cars over the years. And watching lots of youtube! I'm by no means good, but I can weld a patch.

The hardest part I find, and most time consuming is the fabrication work to get the patch the right size/shape/orientation; the welding bit is much more straightforward once you're there if the settings are in the right ballpark.

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

Another corner today, ordered some cuts for the drivers side corner as I don’t have a break to properly bend sheet metal.

Weirdly sound deadening all came off in large pieces which I wasn’t expecting guess maybe because of the damp.

Cut out with one patch welded in with the wrong settings.

Rest of the patch welded up with the factory jacking plate underneath. I did cheat slightly with some ready made weld in panels. But that’s the first proper corner repair done, just needs a load of seam sealer now; and to do the other 3 corners

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

Finally had time to pick up the other footwell this weekend. Started out looking like this with all the rot cut out.

As you can see wasn’t just the floor pan but the rail as well. I ended up getting some cuts from a donor car as the bends weren’t the easiest to reproduce.

Rail dealt with

Once that was done I could add in the floor pan which was a pre made section I’d bought.

Excuse my scribing knife. With that in it was on to the outside of the car and closing in what was left. Ended up several panels as otherwise was very hard to cut out just to make things easier but end result is more or less there.

With that done I could finish it off and daub seam sealer everywhere.

Now the front corners are sorted I might shove a load of cavity wax in the rails just to help prevent anything further happening. The. It’s time to move on to the rear of the car which should mean I can get it back on the road once that’s done.

Just need to rebuild the entire rear and passenger rear quarter first!

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

Onto the rear today

Rear boot panel just mocked up for now but thankfully all seems to fit together fairly well with shut lines and lights. Definitely not perfect but I’m relatively happy with that for a first go. Might need a bit of filler work. Then just need to final fit the rear panel then get onto the battery boxes. I’m half tempted to delete the full battery boxes slightly and just fabricate something simple.

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

Great work!
Are you finding more or less grot than you were expecting?

Definitely more, I knew the front corners were bad but hadn’t expected the rear to be quite as bad as it was. Hopefully once this rear section is done it’s most of it covered. The passenger left arch is a bit crusty so that’s next then it’s just anything in the bonnet. At some point the engine will come out so a good opportunity to check then.

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

Looks great : Did you do much research to source pattern body pressings, are they very expensive ?

Most of what I’ve bought has been recycled from other non rusty cars. The floor pan section and the rear boot panels are the ones I’ve bought new. Both weren’t exactly cheap but probably what you’d expect for a piece of pressed metal that large.

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

Small update, just finished 5 lug swapping the front end with some e36 components and hsd coilovers as well as some new to me 8 series wheels which I’m quite pleased with although need new and bigger tyres.

Have some trailing arms to convert the rear which hopefully I’ll do at the weekend. Also have a new rear quarter panel to do on the rear. Once that’s covered I need to start paying attention to the front body/panels.

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

You can buy 5 stud hubs that go straight on the E30 front spindles now.

Pardon our interruption...

I wanted to lower the car anyway so would have had to weld the hubs to use e30 ones so kind of easier almost to change it all over to allow proper brakes.

Not sure whether those would work for the rear though if the currently is on drums brakes?

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

Finally got round to looking at the rear part of the car. Dropped the subframe which came down relatively easy given the bushes were completely destroyed.

Then attacked the rear inner sill which someone had patched previously was a bit of a mess as below, but have cut most of the bad stuff out so far. Need to cut a bit more then ultimately re do what looks like three panels which all sandwich together.

@Acme do you know if any of the inner bits can be bought new?

 

[Thomas. PLease.]

(keep seeing those elegant welding pictures when I open the thread)



Does the subframe need blasting in some way, or you will drill wire brush/roloc it -
how did you securely lower it, multiple hydraulic jacks , it pivots securely ?

Just one big Jack in the centre for the diff. It didn’t seem hugely heavy to be honest, I’m sure it is if I actually tried to lift it mind.

The whole assembly is in remarkably good condition maybe because it’s covered in a sort of greasy dirt which has stopped any moisture getting in. Barely any rust spots and what looks like the original black protective coating. So honestly I’m not sure whether I should just leave it as is and maybe touch it up in places.