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glen.riley.1990

E36 M3 - Brutus

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Ok! i had a thread up a while ago in the general forum about re-shelling vs restoring an M3, and well the consensus was restore so here it is; introducing brutus, my 1994 NZ new e36 m3 coupe. he is a dark individual, black on black to be exact. a few photos will follow but first the story of brutus....

i picked up the above car in pretty average condition thinking i was getting the deal of the century, all things considered now its probably going to cost me just as much as buying an m3 i good nick to start with by the time i get this one to the level of tidiness i intend. there were a few things i didn't see when looking at it first time round, lust must have taken over! but hey at 23 i was the owner of an M3! bucket list item achieved!

1st order of business - out with the black oil, in with 6l for 300km for a flush, then the full castrol edge - TWS 10-60 treatment, 3000 ks later its still amber! i also treated decidedly scungy intake filter to a K&N panel filter in the stock box and 6 new OEM spark plugs.

when i first got it the head lining resembles a curtain more than the roof of a car, so first duty was to whip the head lining out. boom done, fabric and rotting foam striped off. i wanted the A and c pillars to match so out they came and got the same treatment. there was a wee pause in progress here in terms of the roof lining and the next problem reared its head.

Enter the sunroof, well exit the sunroof... there was a knocking noise coming from the sunroof when the car un-weighted, and it was not tilting properly, the shuttle was not behaving 100% either but the roof portion was O.K. . until it too stuck in the open position on a drizzly day. great... out came the sunroof casset. picked up on a few broken clips in here so ordered a few from the us of a. jimmied the roof into the close position and re-installed it waiting for the bits to arrive. goodies in the mail! back in biz! or not... turns out one more clip was broken having removed the roof again causing the shuttle not to function. i have tilt now though! another order for the last clip and a tarp over the car.

a few more goodies made it over with this order, a new rattle clip for the front right brake caliper that had been driving me nuts and a set of brass caliper bushings to replace the shot flexi and cracked stock ones.

time to have the roof lining re-done, well thought having a matching parcel shelf would look better than the faded one in there, so out it came. there was absolutely nothing wrong with the adhesive on the parcel shelf! i must have removed about 3 layers of knuckle skin stripping the fabric off this one! Onehunga marine and auto upholstery did re-cover of these bits in an Audi RS4 esq material. black textured, and once re-installed looks really good. the finish of the job around the edges was not perfect which i was not too happy about originally, but is 100% now the head lining has been installed.

next embarasing issue. the drivers door had been increasingly hard to open, until it would no longer open from the outside. slighly less than dignified effort to get into the car in westfeild carpark ended up with a passenger side entry... que replacing the drivers door handle mechanism. brand new rubbers and surrounds for both doors handles here!

now the bit that had been really aggravating me. body work.... new guards, drivers door, nose cone, belly pan/under tray, wheel arch liners and radiator shrouding later the front was looking a little more like and m3 and a little less like a prats yard special! although i could not sort the light alignment out for a free beer... disassembly found 1 of the lenses not installed correctly, reassemble and we have aligned lights! PHEW. - i am still after an m3 oil cooler duct though...

a few cosmetic bits here and there, LED parking lights, LED interior light conversion, ZHP shift knob and (pick-a-part score of the month) some blau-punked 6*9 including adaptors for the parcel shelf and an M-spec 3 steering wheel (this one currently residing in my 328I though) pretty much brings it up to date!

And because every one loves pictures;

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I also have an ehaust clip ill try upload, it has a schnitzer exhaust on it and really sings when you open it up!

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Oh and the major... funny clicking on and off accleration turned out to be a busted front cross member, a few members on here (M3an, Jayden and Reid) gave me a hand to sort this one...

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So glad you went down this road instead of re shelling.

Love those seats and black on black is wicked.

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Agreed, looks pretty good from here. Glad to see another 3.0 getting the care they deserve.

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Looking and sounding good. Will how to catch up sometime. Maybe when speedway starts again as we follow it a fair bit.

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ok its been a while, but after some faffing about, some holiday and some purchasing of the appropriate tools i have done the Guibo! old one came out looking a bit average with a few cracks but not totally rooted. jeez there is a lot of stuff you need to pull off the get it out!

I would defiantly be keen Rob, when is the speed way season ? excuse my ignorance!

Cheers Glen

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should get the e36's together for a photoshoot sometime :) or come along to the next months meet. there are sure to be a fair number of e36's

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Dave, it was not too bad, i just though i could get away with pulling the drive shaft back to get the guibo out. as it turns out the spigot on the gearbox is too long which means you have to drop the exhaust, heat shield and drive shaft center bearing to drop the driveshaft far enough to disengage the spigot. Knowing this i would say i could do it in a couple of hours by my self now. i also found it helpful to support the 'box on a jack and remove the 'box cross member to get decent access the the guibo bolts.

The LEDs i used were just jay car jobs. They are very white and Quite bright so i have turned them around so the LEDs are not facing directly out of the light otherwise they are almost blinding. At night though when you unlock the car i think it looks great, very crisp light and almost erie as you walk up to the car. On the whole im glad i did it, in fact i have done my 328i as well... ill get a photo tonight if you like ?

Kyu, yes i would be more than keen for a photo shoot! i'll actually be up in auckland next weekend for the ECC dyno meet in the M3. but an E36 meet up / photo shoot would be cool!

cheers

Glen

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Hi Glen

Did i read somewhere you are in Rotovegas? If so we are going through to the bmw club day this Sunday. Be great to both you and the m3.

Cheers

Rob

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Hi Rob

I've sent you a PM, I'm actually up in Auckland this weekend but if i get the chance ill be coming back down as early as i can on Sunday.

Dave; yeah the jaycar LEDs weren't cheap, but i was in there over a weekend and needed something to do! i've seen a couple of electronic like stores in Auckland selling LEDs for quite a bit cheaper too. not totally sure on the quality though.

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Well its been on the dyno!

160 wKw and 534Nm at the wheels in 4th gear which corrects to 137 Nm ( divide by diff ratio and gear ratio) - this seems wrong if factory torque is 320nm at the flywheel?

Apparently the dyno was reading 6% low so im allowed to say 170Kw but ill take that with a grain of salt. I was stoked with the result anyway, nice smooth power delivery, a very flat torque curve and a good looking AFR! And it was the most powerful 3.0 on the day by half a Kw

Excuse the lack of side skirts, trust me i got my fair share of stick for that one already.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ly9fFo3U0Ew

Ill post up a copy of the Dyno sheet when its emailed to me, or if i find where i've hidden the original

Sorry Rob i didnt make it out of auckland till sunday night, i hope the BMW club day went well for you!

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keen to see the dyno sheet and see how similar it was to mine. My 3.0 made 179kw but was on a hub dyno.

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Yeah, this is mine. Done just after i rebuilt the vanos, K&N panel filter, and had the cats removed from exhaust but otherwise stock.

Dyno_zps9ca57bca.jpeg

Your plot looks pretty nice IMO, smooth and linear

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