GunMetalGrey Posted December 5, 2016 Report Share Posted December 5, 2016 Surprise! I bought another e30! This purchase was very last minute, and involved driving to Chicago to grab it. 1991 318i Sedan ~250k on chassis (ODO stopped at 230k) ~150k on motor AW2 paint with tan interior (black driver seat due to tan seat needing repair, but was included) Paint is in pretty good shape, and the body is surprisingly good. Car was in southern states most of its life according to the seller, which I can believe. Nothing else about it is really that special lol. As many of you may know my first car was a white 91 318i sedan, and I always had a thing for that car. So I decided to get another one! The plan to is get some suspension work done (original bushings) and fix a bunch of the little issues that it has. The motor was went through and has a lot of new parts, so that portion of the car should be good to go after I swap the temp sender for the ECU. I would like to get this running well and the issues fixed so that this can replace my current daily driver (2010 Mazda 3s hatch 6spd) Only one picture at this point. visian, KaiserRolls and B C 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Earl Posted December 5, 2016 Report Share Posted December 5, 2016 YES!!!!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bassboy3313 Posted December 5, 2016 Report Share Posted December 5, 2016 e30 hoarder status! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
YoungCR Posted December 5, 2016 Report Share Posted December 5, 2016 Nice score! I want my first car back too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KaiserRolls Posted December 5, 2016 Report Share Posted December 5, 2016 I want me first e30 back as well. COUGH*JAKEIHATEYOU*COUGH YoungCR and andyhundley 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
B C Posted December 5, 2016 Report Share Posted December 5, 2016 You are living some sort of dream when you can drive a fun car year round Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
m42b32 Posted December 5, 2016 Report Share Posted December 5, 2016 Awesome!! White e30's are the best e30's....not that I'm biased or anything. Looks like it will be a great DD Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
straight6pwr Posted December 5, 2016 Report Share Posted December 5, 2016 very awesome! there must be a bug going around making us all overly attracted to white late model e30s. m42b32 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyhundley Posted December 5, 2016 Report Share Posted December 5, 2016 I sometimes wish my car was alpine white (or any other color besides bronzit). Congrats on the purchase. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Boris3 Posted December 6, 2016 Report Share Posted December 6, 2016 Congrats! This sounded like a good deal in the CL ad with all the work that had been done and the price point. Hope the issue is just the temp sensor. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HipMF Posted December 6, 2016 Report Share Posted December 6, 2016 http://akroncanton.craigslist.org/pts/5904523775.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Earl Posted December 6, 2016 Report Share Posted December 6, 2016 Rod knock?... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GunMetalGrey Posted December 6, 2016 Author Report Share Posted December 6, 2016 2 hours ago, Boris3 said: Congrats! This sounded like a good deal in the CL ad with all the work that had been done and the price point. Hope the issue is just the temp sensor. There was a handful of things that were not mentioned in the ad, such as the drivers door lock being replaced with a bolt, the passenger door lower hinge being broken, and the interior passenger door handle being broken. Not deal breakers, but a bit lame to find after driving 3 hours. I ended up paying him $500 less than his asking price, so I feel like I got a decent deal! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GunMetalGrey Posted December 6, 2016 Author Report Share Posted December 6, 2016 1 hour ago, HipMF said: http://akroncanton.craigslist.org/pts/5904523775.html Ha, first you tell me to leave it, and now you send me links to things like that! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
straight6pwr Posted December 6, 2016 Report Share Posted December 6, 2016 $1,300 for an s52 with a lot of mileage and a rod knock?! KaiserRolls and GunMetalGrey 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jdesign Posted December 6, 2016 Report Share Posted December 6, 2016 Nice find. That sounds way more exciting to drive than the mazda. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
i_love_cars Posted December 6, 2016 Report Share Posted December 6, 2016 sounds like it was a legit deal. I saw the listing and secretly wished I was in the market for a streetable E30 as the history and price seemed pretty good Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KaiserRolls Posted December 6, 2016 Report Share Posted December 6, 2016 sounds like it was a legit deal. I saw the listing and secretly wished I was in the market for a streetable E30 as the history and price seemed pretty good Buy more bmws i_love_cars 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GunMetalGrey Posted December 9, 2016 Author Report Share Posted December 9, 2016 I brought this home on Saturday. List of things I have done so far. Took part of the tan sport seat apart to find out what's broken. Tried to take out the rear bumper bolts (one came out...) Yup Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GunMetalGrey Posted December 22, 2016 Author Report Share Posted December 22, 2016 Stiiiilll haven't touched this. I did notice that the PO put a "new" radiator and bleed screw in it. The radiator appears to have been from a car with some cooling system issues. The expansion tank is bulged out quite far, even with the cap off. His "new bleed screw" was some sort of torx head fastener from some interior area. No wonder it is sucking air into the cooling system. Some people I tell ya Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wasnt m3 Posted December 22, 2016 Report Share Posted December 22, 2016 It's amazing what people will do to "save" on a sub two dollar part. i_love_cars 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GunMetalGrey Posted January 9, 2017 Author Report Share Posted January 9, 2017 I finally started digging into the mechanical side of this thing since buying it. I had been working on getting things painted and just cleaned up in general on it. Did all trim in black, replaced rear bumper trim, painted the mirrors and grills black, fixed the drivers seat so I could have one interior color, and other things like that. First thing I did was evacuate the transmission of it's far too thick oil. The car didn't like shifting and I can tell why, someone used the same oil for the diff as the trans. I put the car up in the air to get started underneath it and found some stuff. The underside of this thing is staggeringly clean, and the worst areas actually show in the pictures below, which is primarily just a bit of surface rust. Someone must have decided steering couplings were dumb. The amount of road grime underneath this thing is amazing. I will probably drop 20lbs just by scraping it all off! Do these motor mounts look collapsed? Drivers side looks collapsed for sure. Someone decided to just cut the reverse switch wires and leave them dangle instead of doing anything else with them... The subframe and rear trailing arm bushings are clearly in need of replacement. The most peculiar one of them all. I wanted to check the diff to see if it was an LSD or open, and had the rear of the car in the air. I spun one wheel forward and watched to see what the other side did. It did nothing. I went to the other side and spun it and I got the same result. So either this thing has a broken open diff (seems odd) or an EXTREMELY worn out LSD. More digging on that later! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jc43089 Posted January 9, 2017 Report Share Posted January 9, 2017 Put it in gear so the driveshaft doesn't spin, then spin a wheel. Either a wheel and the driveshaft turns or if the driveshaft is held both wheels will spin. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GunMetalGrey Posted January 9, 2017 Author Report Share Posted January 9, 2017 19 minutes ago, jc43089 said: Put it in gear so the driveshaft doesn't spin, then spin a wheel. Either a wheel and the driveshaft turns or if the driveshaft is held both wheels will spin. I've never needed to do that before, and if you have a diff on the workbench it will still spin all inputs/outputs without any being held. I will for curiosity though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jdesign Posted January 9, 2017 Report Share Posted January 9, 2017 It always seems like a good weekend of fixing all the little stuff is the most rewarding. Those motor mounts are certainly shot, how are the trans mounts? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.