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Introduction
I'm not great at maintaining build threads, but I love the idea of them. That's not the best way to start off this thread, but I thought I'd be up front. Now, welcome to my E30 build! This is my money pit, my shitbox, and my old friend, an $800 1989 325is. I bought this a long time ago, daily drove it through college, broke the oil pan, sold it to finish my E36, regretted that decision immensely because I **** E36s, and bought it back. I’ve been through a lot with this car, and always had “big plans” for it. But they always fell short. This was 100% because I was broke and in college. 100%.
How it sat when I bought it back from my friend. He lives in CO, but stored it back here in AZ in a field.
It’s been through a number of wheel and suspension setups, but the car has always looked like garbage. Like, even for an $800 car. When I bought it back, I made the decision to give this car the love it deserves. Anyone else would have (rightfully) either turned it into a gutted track car, or used it for parts. But my weakness for this 80s shitbox won out, and I'm rebuilding the car how I had pictured when I first got it.
Even after sitting for months, it started right up and I drove it home.
The plan is pretty straight forward, this car isn't going to break the mould. In fact, there really won’t be anything remarkable about this E30 at all. This is textbook E30 starter kit: 24v swap, BBS RSs, a healthy drop, and fresh paint. But I’m alright with that, this car isn’t about trying to break the internet. I just want to create a driving experience that puts a smile on my face, and a car that I’m proud to keep around.
So this is where we start. Note that every single body panel has a dent of some sort, the paint is flaking due to a bad respray in the 90s, and a lot of the “is” has been removed from this 325is. It used to be on CAtuned coilovers, and now sits on some janky H&R and Koni’s I got out of a bad trade. In short, everything needs redoing. You'll also notice the places I'm working at change, as I tend to just work where I can. A bulk of this build will be done in a driveway...
Back home. The garage is being used for storage, so I'll be rebuilding in my driveway.
There isn’t a timeline or a specific goal here. I don’t daily drive this car, so I’m never in a rush to get jobs done. I’ll just go with the flow and hope for the best.
Wheels
I started where anyone would: the wheels. It had always been a dream of mine to put the car on a set of RSs, but I never really had RS money. In fact I barely had XXR or Salad Shooter money. In a stroke of luck, I found a set of BBS RSs locally for a good deal. I scooped them up, but sat on them for a long time. I think I may have tried to sell them a few times, if I’m being honest. Eventually I was talked into building them, something that turned out to be very worthwhile.
How they sat when I got them.
Yikes.
Test fit these on my friend's E30. Weak specs.
They were worse for wear, someone poorly spray painted the faces, the lips had some nasty rash and they lacked any sort of real offset. I blew the set apart and sent the faces off to get powder coated at Element Powder here in Phoenix. Initially I really wanted to go with Rose Gold for the faces, however there were some concerns about the powder laying down clean on a RS face. I made the decision to go with a simpler “BMW Silver”. This will play well into future plans with body and paint.
BMW Silver, properly powdered.
Before and after. It is worth noting these were redrilled at some point. Such is life.
I also wasn’t happy with the spec - a rather boring 15x7 et25. I went back and forth on stepping these wheels up to a 16, but ultimately I wanted to go for a more period correct look. Again I lucked out, and sourced a set of 2” lips on the VWVortex forums. They were oxidized and peeling, but otherwise in good shape, so I had them polished locally. For those keeping track at home, the new spec is 15x8 et12.6. Not groundbreaking, but certainly a little more respectable.
Old lips, new lips.
Test fit, much better. This is before polishing.
Another look after I had the lips polished.
I also ordered new hardware from Black Forest Industries. I made the mistake of ordering chrome plated bolts instead of stainless steel. I should have spent the extra, during assembly some dirt made its way into the socket and I cracked the finish on a few of the bolts. From a learning perspective it was a good experience, but I know I’ll be going back and redoing these wheels someday. For anyone wondering, I sealed them with a GE Aluminum Sealant. No leaks, so I’m happy with it. Everything was wrapped up with some shiny new valve stems, and SpinFab hex caps.
Final assembly.
Hard to believe this is the same wheel.
When it came time to get tires, I flipped and flopped for a very long time. I will admit that I may have lost some sleep over figuring out what would work best for me. I knew I wanted a meaty, period correct tire and didn’t want to run a terribly undersized diameter. This left me with only a 225/50r15 as an option. This limited my tire options to the Kumhos I bought, and street legal race tires.
Ultimately I opted for the Kumhos for a few reasons. While I’m not totally happy with the way the tread looks or the way I’ve seen them perform, there are a few advantages. Keep in mind I want to drive this car a lot, and part of that means being ready for rain. While it was tempting to get a R888, their performance in the wet leaves a lot to be desired. These will also last a while, so I won’t have to stress putting a lot of miles on the car with them. It sucks that the weak point of my car is going to be the tires, but unfortunately that is the trade off for running this size for now.
That should do nicely.
Then came the test fit. No need for detail pictures, the long and short of it is nothing fits on the current suspension setup. The rear needs a smidge more camber, and to be lifted just a hair to clear the fender. But that’s fine, coilovers are coming. I’m glad I stuck to my guns and ran a 15 with a fat tire. I love the way it looks, and I think will match the character of the car perfectly when everything is done.
Oh my...
Period Correct.
Again, I can't believe these are the same wheels.
Engine
So here's the last bit of intro before we start getting into the car itself. The engine has been something that I couldn't quite settle on. My original plan for this car was to build a turbo M20. After pricing everything out, and looking at my goals for the car, it wasn’t worth the effort involved. A 24v swap made much more sense.
I started off with this, a M50nv. I picked it up off a guy who was t-boned and needed to part the car out. It was cheap, and the lack of Vanos was nice from a reliability standpoint. One less thing to go wrong. I pulled the head to get it cleaned up, got some ARP head studs and was about ready to put in a MLS head gasket. I sent the head off to get a valve job and be decked, and continued cleaning up the bottom end. However as I continued to sink my time into this, I realized that I would eventually become bored of the M50.
Safety third kids.
I got to this point, sent the head out to be decked and get a valve job, then changed my mind. Oops.
Enter 24v number two. I found a healthy S52 locally, and decided to pick that up. The idea is, I’ll throw a few new gaskets at it, and plop it in as is. This will put the chassis at a sweet spot for power right away, and give me loads more potential down the line. The M50 has been neatly torn down and packed away, it’ll come back as a 3.0 stroker someday. I'm also able to rob a few parts from it, such as the M50 intake, fuel rail, oil pickup, and oil pan.
Here it is in all of it's oily glory.
The plan is pretty straight forward. I will drop the S52 in with the stock G260. I suspect I'll eventually move up to a 6 speed, but for now the G260's 5th gear offers a more comfortable cruising RPM over the ZF. It will stay OBD2, there seems to be very little reason to OBD1 swap M/S52s anymore. So my next focus will be prepping the chassis.
Now I have wheels and an engine to build the car around. I know what needs to be done, and I can start focusing on the chassis. I have actually started turning wrenches on the car, I'm just behind on uploading photos. You can see some of the progress here (@benzintinte) as I go along.
"Effy" E60 BMW 530xi 6MT [N52] 
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