jc43089

About as often as this car get touched.

I feel you though.

Bumping this to keep the spirit alive until Earl can come give us hope. 

Nice find!  Hope you get it running without too much hassle.

Come on over to the Waupaca Airport on May 11, 2024 for some wings and wheels at this year's Badger Bimmers Spring Picnic!!!
We will have use of the hangar, and food will be available for purchase. (Or you can bring your own)
Parking will be on the grass, we'll be sure it's mowed and level before you come. Any questions, let me know!!
Hope to catch you there!!
 
https://facebook.com/events/s/badger-bimmers-spring-picnic/1507363836828817/
 

A couple of years ago, I was at a friend's party when I saw this X5d roll up. Intrigued, I found out the owner was the mother of my buddies wife.  I got to chatting and found out she bought it new, and had it meticulously serviced at a local BMW dealer. 
I asked that she was ever to sell it, to let me know.  She firmly said she doesn't plan on selling anytime soon because she loves it so much.
Well, in December she called and said she is finally getting a new vehicle in the springtime.  We worked out a deal to purchase and I brought it home a week ago.  It had a CEL for the  glow plug module when we picked it up, and knocked some money off.for us 😁
It is emissions in tact, with a recent DPF replacement.  I immediately checked the coolant temp and found it to be at 158. 🤷🏼‍♂️. You would think a dealer would check this.....  Otherwise it needed absolutely nothing.... This lady brought it to the dealer for every little thing, with over $14k in service work in the last two years, with a total of all repair receipts since new of $38,844.42! 😳
Off to Cascade German Parts and FCP Euro I went and filled up my shopping cart with a thermostat, glow plugs and module, gaskets,  swirl flap delete, coolant flange, and a pcv hose. 
I went to work this week and got it all fixed up.  I don't plan on hitting a pothole until a problem comes about since everything is new.  CBU was surprisingly not bad considering the 145k miles.    
This will become the new garage queen, with the potholed 2011 becoming the daily. 
  
Sometimes we get lucky!!

Well thank you, I love it and it couldn’t have come at a better time. Honestly it’s shocking how well you timed it because I had an EF shirt that was very similar that I’ve had since high school. I recently tossed it away because the entire print was worn off the shirt and it was tattered with holes and oil stains. Hopefully I can keep this one a decade or more, just like the last! 

131,050


Well, my time with this car has come to an end. What a wonderful car and one I’ll truly miss, but it was time. It sat nearly all summer and was just getting to be a pain to maintain on top of the truck, e30, and e91. It went to a local guy who was looking for a neat older car to learn to wrench on, so I think it’ll suit him well. It remains the quietest, most solidly built car I’ve ever owned, it was seriously a tank. Hung the tail out in the snow pretty impressively too.

Replaced the blower motor before I sold it, and sent two sets of wheels and most of my e34 spares along as well. I’m excited to have the space back, one less project, and to be able to focus more on the E91 and E30. I still have the MOMO Heritage 6’s and the m-systems, if anyone was wondering haha. MOMO’s will be listed as soon as I wash them, and the M-Systems will hopefully get their restoration completed once the e30 is back on the road. 
 
Farewell to the E34 club, it’s been a good ride!
 
 

133,400
Changed the oil in the rear differential. I used full synthetic liqui moly 75w-90 and a couple transfer pumps to get it done. 


Old oil was in quite good shape, I don’t recall seeing records of it being changed but it looks like it was. Still, the new stuff is way lighter in color and it’s good peace of mind. I only got about 3/4 of a quart out so I’ll maybe do it again in 10-20,000 miles once it’s all mixed in. 
 
I also noticed some coolant under the car the other day, so while it was on the lift I pulled the belly pan and took a peek.

It seems like there’s two leaks:
- One appeared to be a loose hose clamp on the water pump; I tightened it and will re-check in a few weeks.

- The other seems to be either a leak at the seam of the radiator on the drivers side, or the o-ring on the upper rad hose. It kinda looks like it’s spraying, but I wonder if it’s wind blowing it off of the radiator as it leaks and spreading it all over the underside. I’m going to swap the o-ring this week sometime and see if that fixes it, and if it doesn’t I’ll get a new rad. I’m considering a full aluminum replacement to bulletproof it, but we’ll see. This one should be under warranty still but if it failed this fast I’m not sure if I want to put the same thing back in. 

Broke in with a 12” blade on my M12 hackzall cutting through the passenger latch arm. Luckily Gibson’s had a good set of latches, catches and cables I scored for $20. Everything is in working order now 👍
 

Not much has been going on other than spending a lot of time detailing and it looks like I’m getting good at it.  I used Adam’s “9” year ceramic coat, I doubt it will last even half as long around here. The result is amazing, I would easily pay for this service. So easy to maintain and so hard to get dirty, looking forward to washing this tomorrow. 

First outing was a success. Everything worked like I hoped it would. A couple small things to do before the next trip, but all very minor. Girls had an absolute blast. 

Had a productive weekend despite the heat. Water Pump and Valley Pan done, new knock, crank and cam position sensors, billet throttle cable bushings, Intake w/ new PCV installed. I was going to do both the valve cover gaskets even though they didn't really need to be done but doing the right side turned out to be a bit of a nightmare. I think 4 of the studs backed out and 2 of them stripped going back in. The fun part is the studs are threaded into the CAM BEARING CAPS 🤔🙄 Not happy about that and haven't had this issue before on other M60's. I cleaned up the threads with a tap & die and hand tightened things as tight as I felt comfortable, the spec is only 10Nm and thankfully the lower back corner held tight. The center stud is barely hanging on though, Hopefully no leaks otherwise it'll be quite the job to properly fix that. Gonna leave the other side until it absolutely needs it. 

Engine bay is all back together besides the fan and intake. Just need to replace the battery and battery negative cable before startup. If all goes well and running issues solved it'll be onto swapping out the front doors and fender. 

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. 
 

 

Got the Adro side skirts up, I think it looks great, now I need to install the Adro front lip. Next up would be the side badges before I start on the Pure750 build. 

Started working on things a month ago and have slowly been plugging away. Working on chasing the not revving past 3k issue along with coolant and oil leaks. Digging into the motor has shown its Texas roots though as I'm finding lots of dry rotted stuff. Water pump had a small leak at the bottom so that lasted 30-40k. Valley pan has never been done though so going through that whole ordeal. Also found the water pump pulley was missing a chunk 
Just like every other M60 intake though I've managed to strip 2 of those shallow T30's, even on my "bench vise". There is enough clearance around the throttle body to get an angle grinder in there to square off the head just a little bit to give the vise grips a place to hold onto. All will be replaced with standard hex heads like I've done in past. Got the intake completely disassembled and power washed and I've been working on the fuel rail today. Replaced the FPR and found all the injector O-Rings are dry rotted so pulling those and working on a jerry-rigged injector cleaner/tester as I saw at least a couple nozzles looked clogged.

Had another autox event as USAIR this last weekend. New layout this time around which was interesting. 

i coned my fastest run, but still had a time on the books good enough for 1st in XSB and 3rd/132 total drivers 

 
I’ll have to change the expansion tank out to my spare new one. Same-ish issue from the lapping day persisted even with a new cap. I think the neck/threaded portion of the tank is screwed 
 

Wow I didn’t realize they were that valuable. I pulled them off. If anyone wants them make me an offer. They have a 4 wire connector. I don’t know if the motors work because I had no door card and therefore no buttons 😂  My other car is a sedan so I don’t think they would fit anyway. 

Wow I didn’t realize they were that valuable. I pulled them off. If anyone wants them make me an offer. They have a 4 wire connector. I don’t know if the motors work because I had no door card and therefore no buttons 😂  My other car is a sedan so I don’t think they would fit anyway. 

Exploring an alternative explanation first.
I had found a 50mm bolt in the paddock grass after coming in early from qualifying when the issues started. I couldn’t figure out where it came from or if it was mine. I was focused on a prior issue of rolling resistance from passenger front which was a brake pad sticking. Fixed that, drove it around the paddock and all seemed fine.
Went out for the race and as soon as I was going around 40 on the out lap the issues started again. Fought the car for about 7 laps and said this is stupid and came in. 
Watching my race video I can’t hear the noises from the rear I was hearing in the race. So not sure. Still kept looking for a diff just in case
Meanwhile I went through the car at home looking for other possible sources of the driveline vibration / noise.  Motor mounts were fine, trans mounts slightly loose, wheel bearings no play, diff noise no different than usual, driveshaft, CSB, all good.
But when turning the driveshaft I discovered I was missing a guibo bolt. Best guess is that it had come loose, got hammered a bit and had fallen out when I jacked up the front end to check the brakes. Helps to explain why the vibration seemed to come on all of sudden during qual.
 
All the other bolts were tight and guibo looked fine. Replaced the bolt and the lock nut with BMW parts and I guess we’ll see. No real place to test it except for on track in a few weeks. 🤷‍♂️
 

Chassis harness is done and 99% functioning. There are small things to correct, like fogs and low beams control wiring is wrong and I need to move some pins around in the bulkhead connectors. 
Fuel lines, flex sensor etc is done i just need to mount the fuel filter.
 
ECU is mounted and one of the bulkheads is terminated.
Will finish second bulkhead and engine harness sometime this and next week. The goal is to start the engine this month. 
 
I cleaned the motor, slapped new gaskets including a headgasket and it should be ready to go. This thing sat for 4 years behind my shed. Damn chipmunk lived in the motor and stored bunch of chipmunk food in the head port. 
 
Hopefully everything cleaned fairly ok. I will pull this motor anyway and drop some forged goodies over the winter. 
 
I welded drain plug and turbo drain  and oil pan is now ready to go.
My arp flywheel bolts from bmw m10 are a bit too short. I will need to replace with 28mm bolts.
Also the tilton hydraulic throw out is 2mm too long and I will need to swap the TO piston for the shorter one. 
 
 
 
I got the steering shaft mocked up with some woodward u-joints. Will finish it once i get the e36 column in final position.
 
I decided to not run the motor NA and go for boost. I got the intercooler setup and i have a log manifold from my friends Volvo. The cylinder spacing is spot on i just need to redrill the flange for m42 bolt pattern.  I got some green top injectors that should support 200-250whp which should be more than enough to test the chassis. 
 
I also pondered the idea of running e90 cluster in  my car. I got the arduino setup with can shield and was able to control most of the cluster. Cluster talks at 100kbs and maxxecu supports 500kbs i will need to setup arduino with dual can to translate the messages from maxx to BMW but that should not be a big issue. 
 

 
 

 
 

 
 

 
 

 
 

 
 


 

 

 
 

 
 

 
 

 
 

 
 

I finally installed my Turner diffuser, perfect for me since I can’t maintain a squat position, but I can work on a roller. The tabs were a bit tricky to remove, I eventually got them off after lifting the rear up for more clearance.  Perfect fitment and much better looking, the Adro side skirts are next. 

This aged well

Epoxy that into a shift knob lol

Upgrade on the Ranger. New downpipe from CVFab. They seem like a Ford only performance place?  Dunno I’ve never had a Ford before. Fit great, and wow is it nice working on something that isn’t rusty.