E30 Touring resto - Pic heavy

[Jozi]

Been browsing on here on/off for some time now, got my wheels of here last year as well so time for a into I think!

My love affair for E30 started a few years ago before going to college, however I couldn't afford to buy one until a few years ago when I was after 318iS, we have high tax rates on 325's. I eventually ended up with this


She had a bit of crash damage which got fixed over the course of 6 months or so and eventually looked a bit better:


And later with some 16x7.5 Borbet B's


I never really finished her, hence skirts not being re-fitted, instead I just enjoyed her for a good year or so. During which a few additions were made, quicker rack, m3 bushes up front, new discs and red stuff pads allround. I was going to collect some parts for a nice tidy up, doors, boot lid and sort the sill rust when Oct last year the engine started leaking and I took her of the road for a mini resto. Not much happened until Jan this year when I got given a touring shell that was better than my own. Plans were hatched after lots of browsing for idea's and a more comprehensive resto started.

Spec will more or less be as follows

Engine & Drive train
M52B28 (e36 328 engine)
E30 M3 Scorpion exhaust to e modded with Le mans tips
M50 intake manifold
Modified exhaust to clear steering rack
S52 cams got but wont be fitted until I have enough money for a remap
M42 5spd box with short shifter (unsure which one, might be changing this for a quicker one)
3.64 LSD rebuilt with 40% lock
New bearings all round

Chassis stuff
Bc Racing coilovers with front adjustable top mounts
Rear camber and toe plates
Rear beam bush void fillers
E30 M3 eccentric control arm bushes and new bushes all round
Standard brakes with EBC red stuff (carried over from the blue touring, not even a year old) callipers re-furbed again
E46 steering rack (quicker than the E30 one)

Exterior:
Metallic Blue - still undecided on exact colour, suggestions welcome
Mtec2 front and rear bumpers
Mtech2 touring spoiler
325 iX arch/fender flares and skirts
16x9 Borbet B all round with (if I can fit them) 225/40 rear and 215/40 front tires
Yellow Lamin-x film on main lights and fogs, clear indicators
De-locked (and prob remove the side repeater also)
Shadow line trim (already on the touring)

Interior
E30 Recaro Ls 4dr/touring seats (fitted before she came of the road)
370mm Tec1 steering wheel, the smaller one, also fitted quite while ago
black carpet - undecided but probably will happen
black headliner - also undecided probably will also happen
better speakers front and rear with tweeter pods for the mirror plates
leather re-upholstering - eventually as funds allow

While searching the net trying to decided on a look I found a nice black 2dr and the 4dr below with the same exterior styling I was thinking of


Some photoshopage later


On thing I'm still very much decided on is what colour to paint her, or specifically what shade of blue My blue touring above is Mauritius Bleu (likely contender for colour choice)


A few options that were tried


Calypso red (ish)


Lagoon Green


Marrakech Braun - ish,


What I tried to copy: http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-..._4305298_n.jpg

Porsche Amethyst


If anyone has any suggestions for a nice blue, I'd like to hear them. For now Mautitius blue is the likely contender (more examples: e36, e30 more. This Fiat colour and Interlagos blue look nice to

So thats my introduction and what I intend to build, I probably won't go all out low as I still want to be able to drive her and push on a bit without worrying about my sump (or sump guard) to much.

The following are copy and pasted posts from my project build over on E30owners.com which I'll copy across over the next few days starting with this:

Jan 2011:
Little bit of progress today, after a bit of messing with the engine we got it sitting like this:



Bit of messing to get it on it's mounts in the sub frame but got there in the end. Can start mocking up the manifold next time I'm home and once I get some stainless tubing.

Won't be lifting this engine out though, probably drop the whole subframe, suspension etc and lift the car over the engine.

Got this done instead of getting the new shell today, couldn't go again because they guy lending the trialer and my uncle couldnt get lights working and didnt want to take a chance

Engine's normally this black on the inside:

Exhaust ports have a nice thinck layer of black grime in them as well. Anyway of cleaning this out or what can you do about it?

Bit of work done yesterday, we got the spit rolling and the car onto it. Had a quick look around the car with the cam, don't look bad at all :dance: Now to learn to weld

2 tourings keeping each other company




It's only bent because of how we lifted the whole car with the engine hoist resting on the box section

Bit of bent metal here from when we were putting the shell on the trailer using a tractor, sill got a slight ding as well


Bit of surface rust here












Both rear pockets were full of water when we got the shell home, sorted them drilling a small hole :






Small update from last weekend, not much done because of my brother leaving for Oz.

Got both jacking points cut out and welded up with some fresher looking steel.
Started removing the heatshield to get a look at some rust on the floor, cut a nice hole and started welding it up then it got dark - have to finish this this weekend

Few pics of the floor








We had a look at the rear arch, prob the worst job to take car of, unsure of how to tackle it. Looks like the rust might have started eating at the outer arch




Very little work was done in February:

The hole that was made in the floor all welded up and ground smooth-ish



Introduced my front subframe to the wirewheel on the angle grinder, and evening of that and it was all bare metal. Have welded in subframe mount reinforcement plates, primed it 2x and 1 coat of hammerite smooth black. The front ARB got the same paint treatment, will add a few more coats once the body work is done and do the same with the rear beam and ARB.


This was like this when I got the shell



Rear jacking point got a coat of primer after meeting the angle grinder with wirewheel, might cut the jacking point out it tends to go a bit rotten there.


I had a picture of the drivers side rear cill, opposite as above, but I can't find it, here it is anyway with the rust cut out :



And 1 plate welded up

Ran out of light but got the plate on the inside of the arch nearly fully welded in, plug welds let go on me :
Anyone know should I have recreated the step or change of dept of the seam, only realised after having it all welded up there's a step. Will also drill the hole for the rear beam mounting once I fit the beam.

I patched up 2 other area's I'll get pics of them finish, no before pics of it though.

Thats all for now, will finish the above off tomorrow and then no more work on the car till Sat/Sun.

21/03/2011
After a week+ of doing nothing I got the 2 fuel tank mounts cut out plated up and one new and the old bracket welded back on and seamsealed. Cut 2 other holes where the rear break lines go, will have to make up a new bracket or re-use the old ones tomorrow. Then it's onto the area where the handbrake cable is welded on, nice wee hole there as well.

23/03/2011
It's been 3 weeks now since any sort of real progress here's a few pics of the last two days worth of work. Had to make 1 new bracket to hold the tank, re-used the other and also the 2 brackets for the brake lines.




Up next



24/03/2011
Started taking all the area's I touched up, removed rust or plated up back to bare metal yesterday with the intention of getting primer on it today. First up though, a few new studs.

Screws I ended up using (found them in the shed after I got back from buying some that were to small)

In the vice


Flatten tip with the grinder

Flip it over

Cut the head of

And here's a few of them

Rotten stud

Cut of and area flattened a bit with the grinder

And one of the studs welded on


Here's where I'm at now, lots of bare metal


I was going to get sanding at the engine bay and have it primered as well, thinking I'll sand all the bare matal tomorrow and get some primer on it before moving on to the engine bay.

There's a couple of tricky brackets that need to be cleaned up by hand and the bolts holding the bumper mounts on will have to be replaced one it's of the spit.

31/03/2011
I think I got all the cracked underseal removed and all the rust found, finally. Few new holes as well that I will start at this evening, the end looks to be insight! A good clean-up and a sand and I can get some primer and paint on all the area's I cleaned up.

Then engine bay... then interior... then I'm sure...

Haven't taken any pics in the last week or more, it's a bit time consuming and I'm not keen on the cam lying out all exposed.

Took a few pics:

Here's where I'm at now, lots or bare metal all with a coat of kurust on it:


Soon to be primered and painted

I decided to investigate why the seatbelt points? looked so flakey, 2mins later and not much metal left - another 2 holes :


A few attempts at making a nice piece of metal later...

Getting better at the welding as well, got a few good runs of nice weld doing them 2 patches - not quite visible in the above pic. Both patches were also plug welded to the brackets behind them. Plug welds needed a bit of grinding to get them flat, prob could have done a bit more grinding on the other welds but didnt bother as it wont be seen.

Tried my best to seal the gap between the plate and the bracket with seam sealer. Trapped moisture here was prob the cause of the rot the had developed!

2 new holes, both on the cills at a drain opening, one by the front wing the other where the petrol tank is


Will get these plated up and then prep for primer, paint and when I get it underseal.

Next up then:


Getting there, slowly

[04/04/2011[/i]
Some new parts collected at the weekend




Rubber coupling (doughnut), Propshaft Bearing, Rear Subframe, Trailing Arm bushes, ARB Bushes (front and rear), Drop links (front and rear) and Gearbox Mounts. Eccentric control arm bushes will be carried over from the blue touring (attached to newish arms). No top mounts because I'm hoping to fit coilovers at some stage and had no trouble with them (as far as I could tell).

And I got this delivered just before the weekend

It's a rivnut tool with some rivnuts which will be used to hold on the brackets for the fuel lines and where ever else I can find a reason to use it :p

Break & fuel lines should be here this weekend as well, my to-get list (and wallet) is getting smaller and smaller (the amount of work to-do isnt though :p)

Brake lines also got delivered, two roles of kunifer pipe.[/i]

[TheRev]

Great thread dude

Where abouts are ya located???

A set of German plates on her would help alot to the final picture

[Jozi]

06/04/2011
Had a few things to do earlier this morning but I got started on making 2 small rusty holes into two larger holes.

The infected area at the drivers side rear jacking point:



Resultant hole:


And this is near the drivers side front wheel arch, close to where the jacking pad used to live. A bit trickier to get at as there's 3 different sheets of metal all joined together and there wasnt much room for the angle grinder



And the resultant hole after showing it the angle grinder and dremmel

I've cleaned up the seam and part of the original metal and welded it back in, just 2 plates to make up for it. (Bottom of picture with the nice folds and lip)


Got a 3rd coat of paint on the front subframe and roll bar, I was nearly out of hammerite smooth black so switched over to one with a hammered finish, think it looks better.





I made up a list of things to do before I can sent it for paint:

Finish underside - Cut and patch 2 holes, prep bare metal for primer, paint and underseal
Remove rear beam - Weld on tabs and prep for primer and paint
Fuel tank - Removed from blue touring, clean up, paint and under seal
Engine bay - Fix 2+ holes, tidy up front panel, prep for primer and paint
Brake and fuel lines
Paint door shuts
Paint boot lid - Take out glass (being done tomorrow), fix rusted area's, rust proof inside and out
Doors - Plate up key hole, rust proof inside, paint around edges and back, clean and fit locks
Bonnet - sand and paint back of bonnet, cavity wax
Cavity wax everywhere - Chasis legs, Sills, roof, doors, boot lid, bonnet, subframes

The order might change but I think thats all that has to be done before I can send it of for paint

09/04/2011
Only took 2 days more than I thought it would

This hole was probably the hardest patch I had to do so far!

I cleaned up the steel from the outer sill and welded it back into place where it was. Then started making up the plate that goes from the sill lips into the car, made a balls of it so cut it all out again, making the hole bigger and started over. It now looks way better than the first attempt and as good as it was before rust got hold, if I may say so myself

The plate that cause the headache (taken from inside the car)

Outside after welding


Inside after welding

After a bit of tidying and some primer

inside the car:


This was the other hole:


Much less problems with this one:



I'm kinda proud of the above and glad I went at it a 2nd time, even if it took up a whole day. Drain holes took a few attempts to make but also worked out well.

Aside from the rear arches, engine bay and a few minor things I cant get at because of the spit thats all the holes patched up on the under side :dance:

Thats it for now then. I look to have all parts for the m52 conversion, box of bits came from bmw some time ago and a few other piece have been collected over the past few weeks.

I had a look at the manifolds today, I'll have to see can I sort them out before the shell is ready for paint.

I'm going to try and get everything sorted to the underside of the car so that when it's back from the paint shop I have as little as possible to be fitted under the car and I can get working on the inside and engine conversion.

Anyone know how to m52 viscous come of? It spins freely as it is now.

16/04/2011
Got a little bit done today.

Attacked passenger side rear inner arch with the angle grinder






New inner arch? (or cut the inner arch out of the blue touring)

Got the whole loom stripped out

Old touring where she is now

Have started painting a spare beam, need to get the halfshafts of this one and get painting them and trailing arms

Latest bit of rust, nothing to bad:

Also found a bit starting under the rubber for the loom on the firewall.

Bit low on motivation today to get anything done.

Did a 200mile round trip yest to get cavity wax on my way to picking up a sunroof panel (tiny bit of rust on 1 bracket) and dropping some parts of to Scruffy.

21/04/2011
After about a week and a half of procrastinating I finally got a little bit of work done today

Started patching the drivers side rear arch, of which I have no pics, not my best welding or attempt at a repair! I have to patches right on the lip to make up next and weld them in then tackle a bit of surface rust and eventually get rid of the under seal.

I also put a second coat of primer on the rear beam and after a good sanding with some 600grit paper I painted a 4th and final coat on the ARB and front subframe


Thats all really...

26/04/2011
I did a little work on her towards the weekend, few holes on the drivers side inner arch patched up



Wasn't sure how to deal with the 2 parches along the inner lip of the arches. Will prob cut the lip of (and possibly weld it back in after), and tack the patch in behind it without having it folded up. At the top of the arch I'll prob cut the lip back leaving only a few mill of it and rolling or folding it up tight against the back of the outer lip.

I cut a hole in the drivers side rear pocket, small enough, made up my paches and started poking a little more and cutting a bigger hole. Bit of a job patching this one up, I didn't bother making a patch to do the whole lot instead I used the patches I made earlier and a new bigger one. Turned out alright I think.

First patch, only realised I forgot a little triangle after making up the patch :


Same again only tidied up a little with the angle grinder


And the other patch making up the rear valance after a bit of a tidying.



Maybe get starting on the two patches i left in the inner arch tomorrow. Lots of surface rust to the back of the rear valance thats not easy to get at cause of the spare wheel well to fix as well.

30/04/2011
Spent some time yesterday making up a patch for this:



With these two


Had to go and change the welding gas this morning, the argon co2 gas didn't weld to well. Got these two patches welded up:



A little hard to see cause the sky was so bright behind the arches.

Next up the other arch, I was dreading this one at the start and left it for last here's what it looked like before 3pm today


Angle grinder with wirewheel to find where the two parts of the wheelhousing are joined


And about and hour and a half later we got a big pile of this


Taken from here


And here's is what will go back in


I haven't inspected the outer arch yet but it looks like it might have escaped rusting. Hopefully get it in by the end of the weekend!

Dad spend awhile today splitting the cv boots so I can clean up the half shafts and give them new boots and oil before going back on the car.

26/05/2011
Well... the shell hasn't been touched since removing the inner wheel housing some 3+ weeks ago. I looked at it a few times and fixed the cover a couple times, removed the rear glass though.

I've ocasionally found some motivation and now have the following in paint or primer
Front subframe - finished
Front wishbones - in primer
Front ARB - painted but was dropped and a small patch is being re-painted as I do the following
Prop shaft - ready for paint
Rear subframe - 1 more coat of paint to do
Rear trailing arms - ready for paint
Disc backing plates - all 4 ready to be painted
CV joint - dismantled and clean as good as I could and all dust covers and hubs painted, ready for re-asembly with new boots, clips and grease
Half shafts - ready for paint
Front callipers and carriers - nearly ready for primer
Rear callipers and carriers - waiting for 1 calliper and will clean the carriers tomorrow and paint

Next I'll be sorting through the varios shadow line door trims I have and getting them painted up. I'm going to try repair one of the dodgy doors by cutting a repair section from a scrap door I have. Ive some other stuff I can't think of right now to do so everything is ready for paint and I finish of the last few remaining things on the shell. Sounds like nothing but there's shit loads of smaller jobs to do like under seal, brake/fuel lines, rust proofing the shell, painting inside and the whole engine bay....




Most of it just needs sanding down and I'll start painting them tomorrow, the disc back plates need a coat of primer to the other side which I'll get done later.

Callipers are mostly striped down, have to get some rear ones, thinking I'll try either high temp paint of calliper paint on the brakes - the hammerite didn't fair out to well with 6 months driving.

05/06/2011
The above has since all been painted and put in the storage room where it will stay until it is needed and new bushes can be put in and the lot put back together.

A bag full of parts turned up last wed, mostly clips and brackets, little things and lots of them



And this


And Ciaran (David Prentice) also sent me two of these:


All of the above has been sorted into a case with little compartments, I put the part no's in with them just incase I need to find where something goes.

Also spent some time polishing my wheels today :dance:

Did one wheel a few weeks ago





And I washed the other 3 last night, polished one and finished polishing the other 2 this afternoon.





I'm not quite happy with them : I want them shinier! But I don't think it's possible by hand polishing? All the wheels have minor imperfection but I can live with that, they were 2nd hand after all and in pretty sweet condition. One of the caps came of when I was washing it, will double sided tape it back on when the car is ready.

And the little bit of work under taken on the shell...


I was all most ready to start welding in the inner arch when I decided to cut out what started as a 1cent sized hole to the back of the arch, you can just about see it in this pic:


That little small hole got a lot bigger after looking at the seam to the underside of the cill, I'm not even finished cutting here, not yet anyway


I'm making up a piece to close of the tail end of the cill so I can drill the hole for the subframe bracket, then will cut out some more. Kinda struggling to make it the same as what it used to be and very tempted to cut from the blue shell, which isn't 100% either, it's the step that I'm struggling with


I'll get it the next time I go at it!

16/06/2011
Small update on the sill repair now that my photobucket works again.

I had made this piece up, what now seems, ages ago


At some point last week I decided the previous repair job to the cills wasn't good enough and so I cut it out again to start fresh.

I had to do 2 attempts at making this piece up. First I forgot about the step in the seam, second time I forgot about the little bit poking out with the hole in it and decided to just weld a piece on to it rather than make it a 3rd time


With that made up following the sill profile pretty closely the piece I made previously turned out not to be made to follow the cill as closely : Then this happened And a new piece was made up, I made two pieces (one for either side) after deciding I will probably do the same on the other sill once this is finished


I had to remake the stepped seam, which was something like this but slightly different


Figured the easiest way was to make the sill piece and weld on the seam that steps out, much easier said than done! Between the 1st piece above and the final repair piece it took me four and a half attempts to make it! Forth ettampt in pic:


I remade the sill piece as it wasn't matching the longer repair piece again At this point I decided to fold a piece of steel matching the bend in the sill and weld the seam to the under side of this.


With the two parts welded together the bit behind the seam (not shown in the pic) was cut away and I still have to fold the end of it to follow the line of the arch, bit it all fits and I have the same made for the far side.

With that done I started on making up the piece to fill this side of the arch


Which ended up looking like this not so long ago


I did my best to get something that resembles the rib in the panel and also need to cut out and weld in the drain piece


And this is where I am at now, 3 pieces made up to close of the cill and make it good again. All 3 pieces need some trimming before I can weld them in, I don't want to weld them in until I have the rear subframe in place so I can drill the holes for the support bracket, to do that I need to get the bushes pressed in first.

18/06/2011 - was meant to have her finished by now

Started cutting out the last jacking point yesterday afternoon, it looked a bit iffy and also lonely being the last one left on the sills


Glad I cut it away as there was rot developing on the back of the sill and floor panel. The rotten metal cut out:



Floor panel and back of the cill welded up and given a lick of paint:



And the sill all patched up and also given a lick of paint.

Them blobs aren't where I blew holes at all... I swear... :

Getting my stuff together and of to the Big meet : will come back and grind down the welds after the weekend and get back to the rear cill on both side. Feels like there's not much left to do body wise D :

19/06/2011
Got these today



Hopefully get them welded this week

21/06/2011

I got a nice delivery from DHL this morning, came wrapped up in a deck chair box

Courtesy of DanThe from here, will be another while before they are going on an engine, well cheffed with the turn around time I think it took just over a week between sending my manifold and this coming back to Ireland, top notch guy another big thumbs up from me for Dan :thumb:

I also got the struts taken apart today, offcourse the plate on the locking nut broke clean of The other one was grand and came of with a little bit of persuasion. This is the bottom sleeve of the coilovers which is pushed over a 50mm stub left on the struts and then welded.


Also courtesy of Dan, I got these void fillers ages ago. Got the bush pushed in yest at the big meet by SeanMul from E30owners. I hope to get that bolted up tomorrow and get started on filling the big gap that was left on the sill after I got carried away


25/06/2011
Got a bit done earlier, Started closing of the end of my sill.

Pic of it from the inside before welding


And the inside of the sill all welded up


Thats about it progress wise. I fitted the rear beam and lines everything up, all seems good, the panel above might need a little massaging to get it to butt up against the outer sill panel but all will be good :thumb:

13/07/2011
Small up date from the few bits done recently/few weeks ago.

I got the sills all patched up and ground the welds down a little early last week.



I spent some time trying to get the new inner arch panel in, was a pain to get in and even worse again to get it out so I could get it all prepped and good to go for welding:



Welding away when I notice flames inside the car when looking through the shock topmount hole : I had left the cover in the boot area of the touring. It's pretty highly flamable! A burnt finger, some nylon drips in the boot and project touring was saved from burning to the ground


The cover is worse than what is in this pic!


Welding the inner arch in was a pain, worst welding so far, I won't be surprised to find lots of holes after I grind the welds down a little. Not fully finished it yet and didn't get pics cause it started to rain and I tidied all up. Should see this finished tomorrow and I'll move on to the next bit of rust.

Re-did my photoshoped image, I like this better:


Some pics of the inner arch I welded up, still a bit of tidying up to do on it, the fire damage on the inside :p



Inner arch:


Outer arch needs a little tidying up before paint:


Just need to finish the end of the sill where it meets the inner arch:


Started on the other sill late Monday, pretty much the same as before only this time I got the 3 pieces made up in the space of 2 evenings! I had the last piece made up, trimmed it a little and it didn't fit anymore, was also not quite 100% so doing it over.



I had a bit of a poke around the car after realising the above piece wasnt gonna fit, something to cheer me up. Found somemore rust that needs plating up or tidying, unless I find more again the end is in sight :

Rear inner arch, looks to be only surface rust, luckily


Tailgate lock area, not sure what to do with this here:

Maybe cut out the same from the other touring?

Similar cracked paint/surface rust on both sides, stress cracks?


The seam for the boot rubber, bit scabby looking


Driver side arch under the battery tray:


Battery tray area, all looks to be surface rust with the exception of 2 holes on the bulkhead:


Bracket for fusebox, might cut out the one from the blue touring:


14/07/2011
finally got the sill closed up again Had to remake the last piece again, not perfect but close enough


I want to start buikding up the rear beam tomorrow or over the weekend and so decided to give the discs a clean up. Pity I don't have before pics of them, 6+ months of sitting up without use made them look nasty, cleaned up well though


26/07/2011
Was having a bit of a wtf am I doing all this for this week because of a little awkward to get at hole under the dash around the battery tray. I'm quite close to finishing though, a few more holes, a repair to the sunroof tray and a good amount of tidying up before she's ready for paint. :


Anyhow... I got a little more stripped of the car, not that there's much left




Had to get rid of the pedal box and heater matrix??? to get at the most awkward place to be repairing a hole :


And the same hole from inside the wheel arch


As much as I tried, I couldn't get at it enough to cut it out. To top it of I found some more rust under the battery tray inside the car, to the left of the hole above. This afternoon I went at it again and ended up cutting through the battery tray, cutting the rusted metal of it and welding part of the tray back in, with this being the result after some grinding and dremmeling


I'll have to get the welder out again and close up the few little holes you can see and then get the filler out and smooth it all of a little so it's nice again.

Tomorrow I'll finish closing up the original rusty hole with some clean metal, pics from inside the car and inside the wheel arch



11/08/2011
Thanks Retroboyo.

Little to update for this week. I made a final (I hope) to-do list last week after this one it's paint prep, it's mostly of the stuff I posted further back. Started removing all the seamsealer around the engine bay, few little surprises lurking that I have started cutting out.

I got a little distracted Tue, went shopping for nuts and bolts and got nearly everything I was looking for for under the car, subframe bolts, calliper bolts and various other nuts and bolts. I also picked up my rebuilt 3.74 lsd with 40% lock, while there I got to take a M52 moredoor for a spin after I took a Alpina C2 2.7 for a spin The Alpina drove very nice and the M52 felt noticeably quicker (4.1 diff), I can't wait to drive this touring of mine!! Also cut a frotn panel from a scrap car which I hope to fit in such away that it can be removed by undoing some bolts (and removing the rad, lights, wiring, bumpers, valance.... is there any point in it??).

I spent today and yesterday refurbing my callipers (and cleaning up the rear callipers), took some pics, but not enough, for a tutorial if anyone is interested?

Front:


Rear


Rear piston seals and bushes are new, I re-used the front ones which I rebuilt about 6-8months before I parked up the touring.

Started cleaning up the base of the front struts, managed to damage some of the powder coating so that all got rubbed down and will be primered and painted in the morning.

13/08/2011
Small up date

No going back with that




Small patch




Got the strut stubs for the coilovers painted up, was going to rebuild them with brakes, discs and new bearing only I need to order a new bearing dust cap/cover.

25/08/2011
Got the front panel all fixed up and it fit's, just need to drill holes where ever I'm putting a rivnut (there's nearly 30, lil bit over kill?).

Decided I'd try a and get the whole front of the car ready for paint, started cleaning back the underseal on any brackets and scabby looking bits. I got a bot carried away then and cleared both front wheel arches from the underseal (and waxoil??), not a nice job, some of it was quite thick and still soft. Few area's with surface rust were also uncovered before to much damage was done :dance:

Passenger side:


Driver side, only bit of welding required here, have to finish the shock tower, weld on the bracket for the ABS sensor and punch the hole for the wires


Inside engine bay where I had to weld around the brake line bracket



Got another order in from BMW, mostly covers and brackets, few nuts & bolts I couldn't get locally, pipe for plumbing, aircon vent, under bonnet insulation and some other stuff like clips


With the last few bits in I got round to rebuilding the front legs, until I hit a snag :

Front leg with coil over strut:


Disc backing plate on with new bearing dust cover/cap, the old one was in bits, I roughed it up a little and gave it some primer and high temp silver paint before fitting it on with a nice smear of grease on any surfaces that touch each other (same on the backing plate and everything else fitted)


I had already cleaned the bearing stub up with some wirewool and a scotch bright pad, smear of grease and the bearing slipped on with a little pushing and for anyone doing this don't forget to show the locking ring the chissel



Front disc on, cleaned up the little alan bolt before fitting it with a good dose of copper grease on the threads


I couldn't get new bolts for the calliper carriers and no intention of paying 7.50+ for new ones, angle grinder with wirewheel and some paint


This is where I gave up for the night when I hit a snag, anyone see the problem:


26/08/2011
Not really a whole lot done today. I got both front legs pretty much rebuilt, just need bleed nipples and a bracket finishing to hold the ABS sensor to the struts, also cut bits of the backing plates so the don't foul the callipers any longer.



I did a bit of messing with the coilovers and wheel clearances, I need a small 3mm spacer for the wheels to clear the calliper. When I get the car dropped on all 4 I need to figure out do I need shorter springs or if all just about works as it looks close with the wheel and spring/locking collar.

Tomorrow back to the shell and get the rear driver side arch tidies up, or at least get started on it. Few touch ups on the front legs as well, scratched some paint of torquing down various nuts on the callipers

29/08/2011
I got a little lazy over the weekend not enough done really. Got the rear driver side arch cleaned up from seam sealer around any laps or welded area's. Have decided to stitch weld the seams in certain area's after a few people spoke to me about doing it.

Ignore the blue lines....


Dodgy bracket


Now not so dodgy, just need to weld the bracket up (make new bracket or use old one? It's pitted all round)



Not sure what to do here:


The whole area around the filler neck is pitted but only part of it has broken through after going over it with the wirewheel. I have no access what so ever to the back of it, additional bracing on the touring compared to the 2/4dr's (so I believe, never looked at it). I'm not sure if I can make up a repair piece of the same shape, cutting part of it out will also be tricky because I can't access it from within the car.

Another area I'm not sure wht to do with but only because I don't have any metal thats the same thickness as the shock tower (I think it's slightly thicker gauge steel)



What she looks like now


01/09/2011
Small update again...

Wasn't look forward to repairing this


After some poking the pitted area near the tube opening also broke and so more was cut than I initially wanted to


Not quite the same as what was there but as close as I could manage


And the hole patched, pretty badly welded tbh, not sure why...


And thats that rear arch done except for removing some underseal so I can seam weld a bit here and there

The bracket for the fuel over flow and guard took me hrs to make today : Weather was nice though :laughing:

Bracket for the ABS sensors up front, still some underseal to remove before seam welding:


Thats it for now.

11/09/2011
Quick pics of the seam welding.




I'll probably grind the ones visible from the engine bay side down fairly flat so they wont be visibly through seam sealer. The welds on the other side of the panel joints I'll just flat a little so they don't stick out to much, haven't done these yet.

17/09/2011
No progress this week with me having some work in Dublin, not planned on doing anything at all this weekend but I got bored earlier so did some more welding of seams




18/09/2011
Little bit done today





Welding on the firewall isn't so pretty, seamsealer?



And that brings us bang up to date with yesterdays update

Time for an update!

While I was away earning a few quid this little fella was watching over the shell (he had a few friends as well but none this big)



Got back home last weekend full of enthusiasm to get stuck into the shell, which in reality ended up meaning I done f-all this week :

Initially I was going to cut out the 2 rusty roof drains at the back of the sunroof frame. Having looked at it and decided it would be very hard to make sure that the welded area's are clean and painted over with and would just rust again down the line. That and the fact the sun roof tray on the blue touring was mint, couldn't see any rust on it worth mentioning with it fitted to the car.

So removing the sunroof frame began with figuring out how it's held in place, which looked to be just glue. A bit of googling and some questions later and I realised it was bonded on all a round the frame edge and the sunroof opening on the car, red in the below picture:


There are 5 spot welds to the front edge of sun roof opening where the frame is welded to the roof skin:


and 1 either side of the opening again welding the frame and roof skin:


And here they are drilled out with a spot weld drill bit




Next up there are 4 brackets welded to the frame and a seam under the roof skin, roughly in the area's highlighted red:


Bracket near the front of the panel:


And the rear of the panel:


These were carefully cut with the angle grinder and a cutting disc making sure to be careful not to let the grinder slip or cut to deep as that would mean your cutting your roof skin


Finally there's 5 spot welds either side of the frame where the B-pillar is


Drilled with a spot weld bit:


I left the drain pipes attached but cut the hose clip of them and made sure they could be easily removed.

Next up I tried to break through as much of the sealer as I could, first at the rear of the frame using a hack saw blade:


And the sides:


Which was easier done using a steel wire:


All the way as far as where the panel was welded by the B-pillar, to break the sealer here you need to get a spatula and force it in from the sunroof opening, like so:


You want to try as much as you can to get the spatula to break the bond around the spot welds. Make sure at this point to wear gloves as the sunroof tracks are very sharp, unless you like chopping of knuckles pulling the spatula out like I did (sorry no pics).

The only thing holding the frame in place now it the 4 drain pipes and the area around the sunroof opening, best to support the frame ar the back to prevent it from falling down. ***I don't recommend removing the panel from your own car how we did as you can make a balls of the roof skin, use this method on the donor car offering it's sunroof frame up*** What we (I had to call in a 2nd pair of hands) did was heat the area with a heat gun where the roof skin and frame are bonded together, both from the sunroof opening side and from underneat where the frame is bonded to the roof skin. Take your time here to get it nice and hot! We then got a piece of timber, working from the B-pillar round the opening, and tapped (not quite battered but close) the frame down until the panel stared coming lose, stopping the odd time to heat the area some more, and worked our way round until the panel was completely lose and your left with this:


Which was in much better shape than the one in the red shell with only a little bit of rust that will need treating.

Now back to the red shell, I took a slightly more destructive approach on removing it from the car :laughing: With angle grinder I cut the frame along the edges leaving only a few cm of metal and part of it attached to the roof.


As before, 5 spot welds to the front of the opening and 1 either side



5 spot welds at the B-pillars:


4 brackets cut of:


And then with some heat carefully start breaking the bond around the frame:




And here's the reason for undertaking this unnecessary sunroof frame swap:



And the reason the roof skin starts to rot around the sunroof opening


Just as well I removed it as at some point in the future the roof skin would have started rotting because of the above. The underside looks like I might have caught it in time, although hard to tell with the sealer still stuck on




If like me the donor car serves as a storage space you can close up the sunroof opening using the old frame



Thats all for this week! I need to get some stuff for removing all the rust around the car and then clean up the frame and roof skin before painting both and re-fitting.


And thats enough procrastinating done for today, back to learning how to use revit and getting my cert

[Jozi]

Great thread dude

Where abouts are ya located???

A set of German plates on her would help alot to the final picture

I'm in Ireland but planning to look for work in Holland once I get this finished (was born over there).

My first blue touring had German style plates, they can be strict here with post 1990 plates so just kept it semi legal. The new shell is a 1990 which will also get some german style plates, might go a bit more elaborate with letter spacing and that.

[Zic]

holy mother f*cker, that is some awesome work. Good luck with it man, and now you can make the arches really slim, so you can fit a huge wheel in the back.

[Svenska94Aero]

Awesome work so far man, keep it up! Where in Ireland are you?

[Bronzit]

Damn.

[Jozi]

When replacing the inner arch I left the lip really small, I'm hoping to fold it up flat against the outer arch. Plan on doing the same with the other arch.

I'm about 5mins outside Cavan town, Dublin for 6yrs for college and work though.

[Ginge]

In for more!

Shame you cant make one in every colour you suggested, they all seem to work so well!

Ginge

[blowntwofive]

wow man wow \

[BONNARSKI]

Excellent work lad, by any chance would the spit that you used be up for sale, be doing the same restore job on my two E30's so one would be mint.

The main question i have is, how did you get good weather to do that outside in Donegal? lol

[X5X]

Nice work

[Jozi]

Excellent work lad, by any chance would the spit that you used be up for sale, be doing the same restore job on my two E30's so one would be mint.

The main question i have is, how did you get good weather to do that outside in Donegal? lol

I have her under a lean to at the back of the garage, so long it's not to cold it's grand to work on. I will probably sell the spit once finished. Are you on E30owners? your name looks familiar! If you are, xworks put a drawing up for his spit in his M3 thread which is what this was based on.

[Poppy]

x 100

[Svenska94Aero]

I'm about 5mins outside Cavan town, Dublin for 6yrs for college and work though.

Awesome, I'm here for 4 months on a study abroad program. Love it here, seems to be a decent scene.