Jdesign

They are 15x7 in front and 15x7.5 in the rear. The 16" RS definitely come with a premium. But I've always like 15s on the car better. 
 
Had the car out for its first test drive and it was pissing transmission fluid. Engine and transmission had to come back out. It ended up being my fault - I put the input shaft seal cover on about 90* off which just so happened to line up the fluid return hole on the transmission to be lined up with an open hole on the cover. So it literally was pouring out. Fixed that. Drove it around this weekend some. Realized I forgot to tighten up the nut on the driveshaft where it splits. Sooooooo one more fucking time on the lift to do that, but then it should be all set!


Other notes: 
This winter I also made rear speaker boxes and front door tweeter pods and fitted in Focal component speakers in the front and rear. I installed an Infiniti Basslink Mini under the front seat. The sound system is now fantastic and sounds like what I've always been chasing. 






Interior is exceeding my expectations. I love them. The seats are so comfortable. Also finished the e-brake handle boot. 


Also able to test my H1 LED high beam kits. Since the caps on the euro smilies can't really accommodate the larger LED bulbs or the wiring, I wanted to make these since I don't have my US Ellipsoids anymore. I am not disappointed with the performances of the MLED projector and LED high beams. 



 
Made a stop at Fermentorium in Cedarburg with our youngest while the older two and my wife were at a birthday part. After Fermentorium, I used the e30 to pick them up and continue on to Sahale in Grafton. What a family car. 


 
 

I bit the bullet and had Partee Racing do the bottom end as well.  Shipped the heads back to Partee Racing for them to assemble the motor. High compression pistons, Arrow rods, all new everything.  Almost ready to throw it into the wagon!

Got spotted on the freeway. E30 - 1, G80 M3 - 0.

S54 is at 103k miles and had the bearings replaced with WPC! Everything looked pretty normal wear wise for this mileage, and crank was in great shape. 
 

Got the car out of storage two weekends ago when it was warm just to circulate the fluids and what not. Car started in half a crank, so no issues there thankfully. Also, very little fluid underneath the car for sitting in the same place for almost 6 months.
 
Really no big plans for the car this year other than some continued maintenance. I addressed a big portion of things on top and front of the motor last summer. Aiming to target the lower portion and the rear.
 
Now that I’m thinking about it, I still have this Ireland Engineering cat back I bought last summer and never had installed, so that will be a big thing I’ll look to have done. 
 
OFHG for sure, and possibly looking at having the RMS and crank seal done. Have the trans resealed, new guibo, trans mounts, slave cylinder, drive shaft CSB, etc. Starting to build out the shopping cart on FCP.
 
Hopefully just a lot more miles this year. I’ve owned this car for 4(5?) years now and I think I’ve only put on like 2-3K miles. 
 

 

Getting pretty warm out here and the snow is nearly gone! Fired up the M3 to bask in the sun and do a speaker system overhaul. The factory HK system was pretty toast and rattling like a mf so I bought a bavsound kit from @wasnt m3. Installed and sounds pretty good, can finally listen to my tswift without getting a headache

Fish tank mod 

Oh yeah, its gonna get fully detailed at my work, document/photograph everything, and submit the cost to insurance.

Yesterday morning while I was at work I received a phone call from the detective that had been working on the case and he asked me "Hey, would you like to come pick up your car?" I was pretty quick to respond with a hard yes and was on my way. The vehicle had been found by the detective via text messages from the recent "owner" of the vehicles phone, and it was hidden behind a storage unit complex here in Eau Claire. This was what it looked like when I got there:

Pretty well snowed in but from what I could tell it didn't look too rough. Unfortunately keys were nowhere to be found so I ran home and grabbed my spare set as the city called a skidsteer over to dig it out. They left about 2 feet on either side of the car by the time I got back and my cousin came by to help me dig out the rest. After another 2 hours of shoveling we were finally able to dig out a spot!

Car wouldnt start via either a jump pack or jumper cables hooked up to my truck, battery was completely froze up. Ran to the local Oreillys and picked up a new battery to just get me by. Once I threw the battery in (using the handy dandy BMW trunk toolkit lmao) and got it started a local tow company came by and couldnt sneak back there to it so we just hooked their chains right up to the hitch of my pickup and pulled it right out of its spot. Honestly it ran pretty good and seemed mostly complete aside from the fact they ripped half the speakers out and broke the speaker covers on the doors. They also did me a great pleasure of smoking cigarettes inside of it and leaving it almost completely empty on gas! How kind!

I proceeded to drive the car back to my work and got it pulled inside. Aside from the fact the brakes were trashed, the tires and everything else seemed to be mostly the way I left it which is pretty crazy. Of course theres a few new scratches and dents here and there, but nothing too crazy.

Either way, I couldnt be happier to have the car back in my possession and overall could have been so much worse than it really was. Insurance claims will be submitted pretty soon. The odds of it being recovered at all, let alone almost complete is absolutely insane. I guess I've used up my luck for the year haha.

Appreciate all the kind words, hope everyone can look forward to updates on getting this thing sorted out and ready for the upcoming summer!

Caps are indeed purple. Had some made to match the interior. 

Near spring update. 
Interior almost done: 



New wheels on after being circle jerked by a "racing shop" that fucked up the seals multiple while mounting them. Eventually took them to Big Bear Tire in Oconomowoc to have them dismounted. I did the seals myself, and now all is good. They're awesome BTW. The guy who did the tires has an e30 touring. 
The shop's attempt at fixing damaged seals and the seal that was about ready to start leaking. 

My job at cleaning all the sealant and resealing them. Pretty damn good if I say so myself. 


After removing the transmission to replace the input shaft seal, I was having issues the starting pinion gear not engaging the ring gear. It was hitting the side of the ring gear instead of engaging it. Dropped the engine and it ended up being the metal plate must have gotten slightly bent that it wasn't allowing the starter bolts to line up with the holes in the transmission. That's all fixed. Bench tested the starter on the engine before putting it back in. 


 
Revised my retrofit adapters and now have them for Morimoto's MLED 2.0 and the Micro D2S. 



 
That's all. Hopefully getting close to this winter's projects and I can get the car out and start driving it. 

The rest is here, this is going to look much more aggressive once it’s all on

We finally got her on the road! Didn't go quite as expected though lol.
 
Can't wait for the next stage in this build...

High of 82 degrees yesterday, and it's literally F'n snowing right now. I've lived in this state my whole life, but this S still F's me up.

V2 voyage went decent, only annoying thing is having the cluster temp gauge, vdo temp gauge and a laptop reading the blue e36 temp gauge - all are slightly different lol. The laptop reading from the MS3 (blue e36 sensor) seems to be hotter than the other 2 gauges by a decent amount, kind of annoying
ive bled the thing like 2 or 3 times so I’m not too worried about it overheating, but on the laptop I’m seeing like 200-210, while the stock cluster is reading less than center and the vdo gauge is right around 190

 
need to get the fog light deletes painted yet, but I think most of the stuff is wrapped up. It’s been a year since I’ve heard this thing run, so I’m trying to get re-acclimated to “new” vs “normal” noises lol

Added some DEI heat sleeve to the fuel lines/brake line by the header, PS bled, coolant bled (had to do that a few times). Ended up changing tooth#1 angle from 327° to 324.5° BTDC, set it to fixed timing and cranking at 0° which allowed me to confirm TDC on the damper was aligned with TDC on the timing cover. 

All washed up an swapped over to the non storage wheels  

 
I did end up taking it out for a quick 3 mile blast and honestly the base map that’s provided is pretty decent. It was for s50 originally but changed all that with reqfuel settings and such to work with the s52
 
maiden voyage v2 coming soon

Catch can fittings/hose showed up yesterday so I got that installed. Hose routes with core support, we’ll see if that routing works - if not I can re route it. 
radiator mount thing shows up today (holds the rubber isolator in place) - going to install the radiator stuff after messing with some tooth #1 angles in tunerstudio to make sure commanded timing is lining up with what I’m seeing with the timing light. Hoping to maybe drive this thing around a bit Friday afternoon/this weekend 

All the MS3 stuff is good to go after some help on injector dead time voltage curves from a friend, figured I’d burn it to the ecu & then wanted to see if it would start. This was the first time I put the fuel pump relay back in
didn’t let it run too long without the radiator, just wanted to see if it would hold idle. It was in warm up enrichment so the idle was pretty high, but should be enough to verify base timing and then toss the radiator in and get everything bled. 
IMG_6467.MOV

IAT bung welded up
new AEM filter that isn’t a cone shape so it fits better

wired up the MS3 pigtails for the WBo2 signal and the IAT. Dropped the 2017 battery in the car and hooked up the MS3 to the laptop. Before turning the key I removed the fuel pump relay. Key on and we’re live 
i bought this MS3 back in like 2017, so needless to say I had to update stuff a few times ha. Firmware updates wiped some oem temp sensor calibrations so had to re-enter the coolant temp, IAT was no big deal as I’m using a GM sensor and would’ve changed it anyway.
-Calibrated TPS, changed to GM IAT, added values for stock CTS, switched to wbo2

I was going to continue on, but the battery voltage was dropping fairly fast, so I wanted to get a few cranks in to get some oil moved around. It quickly dropped to around 7 volts and wouldn’t really take a charge. Bought a new agm battery a day later, have that on the tender for now. Pulled the oil filter cap off and it was full of oil, will probably do some more priming before putting the fuel pump relay back in. Can probably remove the stock O2 relay now too  
next up is to jump into the reqfuel & injector settings as I’m running some EV14 380cc (36lb) injectors - when I bought them 3 years ago 380cc was the smallest they offered, now they offer 315cc (30lb)
after that’s adjusted can probably attempt a first start. Once it’s idling I can then verify/set base timing. Bought a LS(?) plug wire to use as an extension to go from coil pack to spark plug so I can grab cyl1 signal. 
 
assuming that goes smoothly I can drop the radiator in and get PS/coolant bled and go for a first drive 

Road noise is for sure better in all areas, obviously it’s not silent but it’s a cheap and easy way to convert your car into a 7 series

Well according to some of you guys, I definitely have an addiction then lol. I ran out of room at my house so I brought my F80 to my parents house. And I have two 135i's that don't run, and one 335i that barely limps along. The F80 and my other E90 are my only working BMWs 😆
I'm glad I have a good support system here though, fellow BMW owners who can relate and encourage me to keep being irresponsible.
Anyways, I got a DME, CAS, JBE and key from a part out to get this 135i back together. I also pulled the cluster and powered it up externally to see if it really had 11k miles, then tried firing the old girl up after sitting for years.
Couldn't get her to kick over on her own, but she did after I dumped a little fuel down the intake. If anyone has ideas on what I could do to get this thing to fire up under it's own power, please let me know.

So as far the head I decided on leaving it fairly stock. As for right now I don't have plans of revving past 7k so it should be safe just running the stock valve train. The head I'm using was originally from a M50 vanos. The only difference between the head from a s52 and a M50 non vanos were the springs and retainers. I kept the springs matched with the cams I was running which was from the s52 so I needed to swap those over. I went ahead and installed all new valve stem seals at the same time.

Made myself a little tool for spring removal and installation. Not quite as nice as some of the ones you can buy out there but it did the job well.


Once that was complete I began reinstalling the intake and exhaust studs. For the exhaust side I reused the N54 studs from the previous motor for ease of installation. After inspecting all the holes I noticed one of them was missing half the threads in it, wonderful. So out came the Heli-coil kit.

Springs and new valve stem seals were in. Studs were all installed. Time to go on the motor.

For the head gasket I went with a stock thickness 87 mm Athena cut ring headgasket. I tapped in some new dowels and then test fitted the gasket first to make sure everything cleared and all the cut rings fitted properly.

Everything checked out good on the HG so before installing the head I popped it back off and ran a small bead of the right stuff gasket maker around the entire timing cover area. Most say it is only necessary to dab a little where the cover meets with the block but I feared since there was only M6 bolts compressing the head down in this area there was still a chance it could possibly still leak. I should also note that before installing the head I made sure all the pistons were all shifted to as close to the center of the bore as I could to avoid any valves coming into contact when the cams are installed.

Once the head was on I threaded in the rest of the arp studs using the moly lube provided and torqued them in three equal steps to 75 ft lbs.

Trays and lifters were about ready to go in and then I noticed this in some of the bores on the exhaust tray .

Some light scoring in these areas is typically normal but this was far beyond that which pretty much made them scrap metal now. Unfortunately the cam trays that I got with the M52 were different. One of them was for a M52 but the other was from a M50 non vanos head so that wasn't gonna work out either. Thankfully after some research I found that M52 and S52's actually use identical cam trays so I took a trip out to the local junk yard and luckily found an untouched M52 from a 98 528i with trays and caps that ended up being in great shape!

Since they were pretty heavily varnished I dropped them off at a local machine shop to run through a hot tank.
With those back and cleaned up I went through my two sets of lifters from the M52 and S52. The lifters from the S52 worked well for me in the last motor but they were also pretty scored up similar to the cam trays they were in and I was unsure about the ones from the M52 and how many miles were on them. So, instead of trying to clean those up and risking some of them still causing issues I resorted to just purchasing all new ones.

Sprayed all the new lifters down with some break cleaner and compressed air to remove the protective oil that they came covered in.

Before Sliding them in to the trays I dunked each lifter in some break in oil and compressed the inner piston a few times with my fingers tell the piston felt a little softer to compress. This was done to prime them with a little oil so they weren't dry on first start. After rubbing a little assembly oil in each bore of the trays I popped them all in.

I didn't snap any pics of the next part but the install of the trays and cams went smoothly. I dropped some assembly lube on all of the lifter tops as well as on the cam caps and bearing locations on the trays.
I then began installing all the upper timing components. When I was torquing down the four bolts that held the upper timing chain guide into place I was finishing up torquing down the last bolt on the back side to 10 NM when I felt that wonderful feeling of it come back lose again when I was just about torqued. Backed the bolt back out of the hole with broken pieces of threads attached to it. Out came the Heli-coil kit, again.

Covered and taped off all areas of the motor leaving only the hole exposed. While drilling and tapping the hole I had help with holding a vacuum right next to the hole to suck up any metal shavings.

New insert was installed and I got back to installing the timing components. This time everything was torqued down to the proper spec with no issue.

When installing the front cam sprockets a new upper timing chain was used. With everything timed correctly I got the vanos unit installed with a fresh oem gasket. Once that was all completed and all bolts were torqued down to spec I spun the motor around 720 degrees to make sure everything spun smoothly and nothing was interfering with each other.
Onto installing the valve cover and getting this thing closed up.

After the timing was complete I did start installing a lot of the outer parts and accessories as well.

Two things I added from the old setup included an upgrade to my crankcase breathing setup. The single oem port I was using on the old setup I felt was just not gonna be adequate enough so I purchased the catch can kit offered by SLG. The kit is pretty slick and comes with all the drill bits and taps needed for modifying the cover and plugging the factory hole as well as all the necessary AN fittings to install for the new catch can lines.
The other addition was the ignition coils. On the old setup I ran the original 20 year old obd1 coil packs. For the most part they worked just fine but they started showing their age when during an auto-x event they got heat soaked and caused the engine to misfire. Of course I didn't wanna run into that issue again so I either had to get a new set of oem ones or try something else. New set of coils would set me back close to $600 so I looked around to see what else was out there. Well sure enough I noticed quite a few other boosted e36 guys running coils out of a b58. I then came across a company called Tunertech that actually designed a full swap kit with custom brackets to fit the coils in the e36 valve covers and the necessary pigtails to splice into the harness to run em. The main advantages of running these coils were that they produce stronger spark energy over stock, allow you to run a looser spark plug gap resulting in smoother idle and the cost of the coils come in at around half the cost of the stock ones. Because of these advantages I figured it was worth the try. One other thing I really liked was the fact that these brackets position the coils away from the down pipe so I don't have to worry about any wires burning over time.

 
Up next:
Clean and prepare clutch, flywheel, and trans
Wiring for ignition coils
Re fabrication to the down pipe for new turbo

Poked around a bit on Sunday, everything is hooked up in the engine bay now(other than radiator), just need to have the IAT bung welded up to the intake tube
Here’s a better pic of the duct routing for the intake 
TBD if it will help or not, they’re fairly tight bends - eventually will add a ‘heat shield’ of sorts along the drivers side frame rail to block what heat I can coming off the rad
Added oil & PS fluid, brake fluid level is good, getting closer to hitting the key & finding out if I screwed anything up

It’s the quick jack 5000TL (110v) So far have had evo x, nb miata & e30 up on it. Nb miata is about the smallest wheelbase I think you could fit with it.
Works well with the e30, I’m lifting off the subframe pinch weld connector area (added “race German” extended plates) & pinch weld under the front of the door.


Once you figure out which liftblocks/orientation works best for the car, setup is a breeze.

They are a little on the cumbersome side for maneuverability, the wheels they have on them are hilariously small - but I really didn’t have the room for a 2 post lift.
these store nicely against my wall on the hooks when not in use. 


super easy setup, bleeding them was kind of annoying as the ATF went everywhere. I opted to use Teflon tape instead of the “updated” pneumatic sealant they provide. (They used to all ship with Teflon tape, but apparently people couldn’t figure out how to tape things and sent it into the pump) 
Here are the 2 locking positions when using the tall blocks
Lowest lock


highest lock

 
these pics are only using the “tall” set of lift blocks, they include both a short/tall set that do have the ability to be stacked together, I don’t do that though 
Because of how they lift, the car will move about 12” front to rear, just something to keep in mind if you don’t have much room in front of/behind the car 
what’s nice is if you plan on the car being up for a while (lol) you can lower the jacks onto the locks and disconnect all the lines 
I waited for a while for these to go on sale and due to some Home Depot shipping mess ups, ended up getting these for like $1200. 
overall I really like them, changing wheels/tires/oil changes/bleeding brakes is all super easy
 

Little update, I am sure I missed a ton of updates in between this. 
Scored some new seats for the ZHP! Have debated for a long time which route I wanted to go, on either m3 seats, or Recaro Sportsters, but I finally settled on just finding a really nice OEM set to match what came in the car. I felt that this fit the "build" a lot better. 
So here are some MINT electric/heated seats I got out of a 15k mile e46.