SteelBlue

@B C 💜

UPDATE
Some parts came in. Silicone IACV hose kit with the aluminum boost proof fitting and a non-m fuel pump sleeve.

I broke down my M54 manifold as well. Removed the fuel rail, iacv, throttle body and the IAT sensor.

 
Then I started the modifications to the fuel rail that I know need to be made to use the factory M54b30 fuel rail on the M50 manifold, which is cutting off the mounting tabs.

 
While I was waiting for the manifold I also pulled the harness off and labeled it all as well as wrote down the pin numbers and locations in preparation for re-looming as well as some modifications.

 
Here is the manifold before I cleaned it up. I definitely forgot to snap a pic after pressure washing it.

 
Here is the manifold adapter to put my b30 throttle body onto the M50 manifold.

 
Mocked it on while I'm waiting for all the gaskets and O-rings to show up.

 
Then I got on to mounting the fuel rail, gotta thank my buddy @_Wackster for the idea to mount this way rather than what comes in the standard kits.


I have some ideas on how to spice it up appearance wise if I can't make the factory manifold cover fit.
Next I plugged up the ccv holes in the head.

 
I was able to test fit the manifold and I knew that the chase bays power steering resiviour would be a problem. So I devised an idea and began with the first CAD work of the season lol.
Here is the base part of the mount, originally used the pattern of the factory mount that the chase bays unit used. Then I modified its shape from there, below is the progression.

 
Then I made the upright mount with hols that lined up with the mounting holes on the chase bays resiviour, and transfered it all to some metal.


 
Here's the plate mounted to the oil filter housing. 

 
Then I made a few final adjustments to the base plate and marked and drilled some holes for rivets.


 
The plan is to have this drawn up, cut, and bent so it is all one piece. 
But here is the final product for now.





 
With the resiviour mount done for now I moved on to stripping down the engine harness.


I did remove all the wiring for the DISA, SAI, and the evap solenoid from the sensor plugs to the connector on the DME.
Once I removed what I wanted I put it on the engine and began the slow process of routing things.
The beginning.

and the end for now. 

 
Waiting on a few things to finish up the harness along with a few other parts to finish up the manifold swap which should be here and done by next weekend. 
So that's it for now!
 
 

So it'll be your fault this year when we get 6" of snow in March.  Thanks for taking one for the team this year.

It's supposed to be like 60 next week and I am really getting the itch. But I really should wait, if it was a newer car I would feel fine, but with it being delicate 31 year old metal, I think I'm going to wait until we are for sure out of the thick of it.
Everyone at work has started to bring out their summer cars and I'm getting FOMO.

When do the cars come out of hibernation? I see rain early next week but I can imagine they will spray the roads with Salt/cheese brine/chemtrails afterwards though.
maybe not this saturday, but next? Hope so.

He works at Fitment, drives an M2.

Yup same fitment as style 5's. I think they look WAY better without centercaps (same with 16" style 5's unless you get those RS style waffles/hex nuts). I got my set for cheap at a junkyard and am planning to use them for track/auto-x wheels eventually

Mods please ban this hooligan 

Looks perfect

You chose well

I had the center waffles repainted as well to match the wheels. Purchased some eBay red BBS center badges for them as the BMW logos were pretty beat. Really liking the combination.
I also wanted to check on the car and make sure it was still there. Good news is that there wasn’t a lake of fluids underneath, just one small spot that I’m assuming is oil.
Going to charge the battery up and maybe let it run for a little bit next week when it’s warm.

I had the center waffles repainted as well to match the wheels. Purchased some eBay red BBS center badges for them as the BMW logos were pretty beat. Really liking the combination.
I also wanted to check on the car and make sure it was still there. Good news is that there wasn’t a lake of fluids underneath, just one small spot that I’m assuming is oil.
Going to charge the battery up and maybe let it run for a little bit next week when it’s warm.

I had the center waffles repainted as well to match the wheels. Purchased some eBay red BBS center badges for them as the BMW logos were pretty beat. Really liking the combination.
I also wanted to check on the car and make sure it was still there. Good news is that there wasn’t a lake of fluids underneath, just one small spot that I’m assuming is oil.
Going to charge the battery up and maybe let it run for a little bit next week when it’s warm.

Man, vintage shot right there, pre-surgery glasses and just a chin strap. 
Wild shit

Possibly? Send me the part number  Ben plz

So after 2.5 years with an S4 pissing me off constantly due to half-baked features, I am back in a BMW. Picked up a 2021 X5 40i fully loaded with the exception of no traffic jam assist package because we have no real daily rush hour commute to deal with. The car had to be ordered to spec because people usually make poor decisions when they order these things, so nationwide dealer search showed literally nothing that matched exactly what I wanted. Crazy fast turnaround time since X5s are being built in North Carolina now and not shipping over on a boat, so it took about 3 weeks from the time of order until pickup at Umansky. 
Initially I went to IA since they were close, just to test drive and figured deals would be competitive regardless of what dealer I talked to because we're talking about a new car which levels the playing field quite a bit compared to the used market. This was just as big of a mistake as any one of you reading this would expect. Total horseshit. The sales guy we talked to was 3 months into the job, younger guy, unfortunately did not know about the bad reputation that IA has. I sent my spec to them, came in to chat, and they basically just offered me the current BMW incentives of $3500 total. So the car was 79k sticker, minus 3500 leaving it at around 75.5 for the raw purchase price. I looked at TrueCar and found most people around me are paying 74k for a similarly spec'd example. I talked to the sales guy and explained several things which I thought were well-reasoned arguments to lower the price. The first being that the going market rate is 74k, not 75.5. Also, they tell me they can't keep X3 or X5 on the lots and most of their sales are order/pickup. I said ok but you have 3 X5s on the lot right now as we speak, plus an X5 50i in the showroom, plus 2 of 2 allocations waiting to go into production this week that are not yet spoken for. That's 6 X5s that you don't have sold. Who is to say that your 2 allocations get built and don't also sit on the lot? You have an opportunity to lock up a sale right now for one of those if you would just be realistic about price. Plus I'm giving the dealership the financing kickback. So the sales kid goes back to the manager and as you would expect, the manager wouldn't budget at all because he's a piece of shit. Refused to even bother to negotiate in good faith.
So I called Umansky and immediately they got me a quote for 73,600 on the same car. I mentioned it to IA just to let the sales guy know that I wasn't wrong or blowing smoke up his ass when I said the car would be had for closer to 74k, and he was asking if he could talk to his manager about this offer from Umansky and try to earn my business. I said no, now you get to the learn why it sucks to be a sales guy with a shitty manager, because I already gave that jagoff a chance to negotiate in good faith and I presented fair reasoning in regards to your volume-based business. There is no more opportunity. I'm just going to buy the car from Umansky because they didn't try to jerk me around. 
So anyways, onto the X5 itself. The G05 generation is an insane jump up from the prior gen, and very much needed for BMW since they were starting to fall behind in the mid-size SUV race. The G05 really steps it up and puts it back on top as the overall best choice. I watched a ton of reviews and cross shopped it a bit and while the XC90 offers more luxury, the performance driving dynamics are not there compared to the X5, and the Mercedes GLE doesn't have the driving dynamics that the X5 has, nor the quality of infotainment. This thing feels really good and offers enough customizability in the transmissions, steering, suspension, and engine that it's fun for me to drive as well as the wife. The tech works way better than my Audi. Gesture controls and voice activation are spot on, the fit and finish and upgraded leather are supple, the massaging seats are way above what I got with the audi, comfort access actually works unlike my S4 which 60% of the time it didn't, the kick-trunk feature actually works here...and the list goes on.
In general a huge reason I went with the X5 is because BMW is still using a lot of obvious tactile response buttons that have satisfying clicks, not everything is behind a touch screen. I have a huge problem with how so many cars these days are trying to behave like a smartphone - I don't want to scroll screens and try to tap shit while I'm driving. BMW is still doing a good job of keeping real buttons in the mix for core functionality inside the cabin. The wireless carplay is really good, doesn't cut out like other cars I have heard of that drop connection. I had to order it with M-sport because obviously I had to order it with M sport... and I am very happy that there isn't any M badging on the exterior of the car. I added the "M" brakes which is separate from the M-sport package, and that's the only place you see any M logo badging on the car. I appreciate it because it's not trying to appear to be something it's not. I did get the 21" wheels which unfortunately come with summer tires only, 275 front, 315 rear, so the last week or so has not been driven at all. But with the air ride option, M sport, extended shadowline and the right wheels, it looks really good with the factory drop on air. 
I do intend to keep this car for a long time so I bought it instead of leased, and I paid $5800 for the extended BMW warranty which is 7 years or 100k miles. I thought that was interesting when you look at the cost of the car, and says a bit about how much they expect to go wrong. If you wait like 2 years into ownership and try to get the warranty, BMW will charge you almost 10k for it, and I did some rough math in my head and if you figure most people driving 10-12k miles a year, at time of purchase the 7 year/100k warranty makes sense to be cheaper, but add 2 years of time and you're still on the 100k mile limit, but now you have 9 years total ownership into the car with warranty coverage instead of 7. They are definitely banking on shit breaking after 7 years or roughly 70-75k miles, and none of it will be cheap to fix.
Overall I'm as happy as I can be I guess for what a modern BMW is these days. I do feel like the X5 is still pretty good in terms of balancing luxury with driving dynamics. Steering is appropro weighted in sport, and the car feels relatively precise even on air suspension. The B58 speaks for itself and the zf8 tuning is as good as it gets in an automatic transmission. Again, much better than my Audi, which thankfully will be leaving the stable in June.





 
Lowered in Sport mode:

 
 
 

Those
and the snail too.

lolol
i dont have video editing abilities so e30 text version:
show e30 dashboard, insert key, start car, pan up to check control, push button, no lights, happy crying people, pan down to cluster, no lights, more crying.

Fishing lures must be right up your alley 

Started making an airbox, ended up going down a rabbit hole, will update more later once parts arrive. 
I believe I'm going for the highest power NA S52

Ahhh man an excuse to go beat on the car... I hate those! 

Note my overzealous let-off that had me pointing toward another car in oncoming traffic, and the other side being a ditch lol
I hope @B C appreciates the audio, the timing was unintentional.

The highway was actually dry enough to let 3rd gear stretch its legs, I always debate going back to a 3.73 in this car, but the 3.25 feels like it takes great advantage of the torque on hand. 
 

Found some nice contrast 

E46 has to be one of the best BMW interiors. Looks amazing with the mods you've done.
 
I'm definitely getting coco mats for the E30

I've said this before, but the amber turn signals look so right on this car.