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As some of you may know. I owned this car about 3 years ago and selling it was my absolute biggest regret in life so I contacted the guy I sold it to and asked to buy it back and thankfully he said yes, at twice what he paid for it! I couldn't say no though as I couldn't put a price on it. So I finally have it back in my care. It isn't running at the moment as the engine loom is off but that will be sorted in due time. Also there has been quite a bit of rust developing which I intend to sort out. On the cards are the following things : * Panel and paint * Rust repairs * Interior change or retrim * Suspension rebuild * Manual Conversion - planning to convert to the later motronic engine managment too, this 3 speed automatic isn't doing anyone any favors * Lowering * Recondition exterior trims * Dry ice blast undercarriage * Some Period correct wheels * Ceramic coating of exterior I am beyond excited for this undertaking.

Spot the difference.

Yesterday I went back to the Drag strip with the intention of hitting the 10s. My car now has direct port methanol and is sitting around 600whp, I also got some 275/40/R17 Hoosiers. First few runs were OK, but my 60 foot was a bit average. Finally when I started working it out my trans decided it doesn't like this power level haha. So I managed a compromised 11.155 @ 125.6MPH You can see the issue on the 100-200 etc from dragy, transmission miss shift 3rd to 4th gear. I am going to install a sonnax zip kit and go custom tcu tune with Rod Sutphin and try again late January. VID_207160423_071904_851.mp4 VID_20241118_145206_992.mp4.mov

We love sunny days

Just ordered the 5000TL230V quickjack from Sulco. It's on special at the moment there: https://www.sulco.co.nz/5000TL230V. Still pretty expensive and the price on there doesn't include GST (so you're basically getting it at the pre discount price but without GST). They had the wall racks in stock as well so I got those with it. Looking forward to using it though. Looking for a new torque wrench. Any recommendations?

Got the rears finished up tonight and made a start on the front right corner ... the fit is absolutely bang on which I'm pretty happy about !! Nice when all of the design and validation pays off. I'll validate the front left fitment is also good then get ready to paint the front calipers yellow. First time I've actually done a side by side of the rotors ... left is the 330 size at ⌀325x25 and right is the new ⌀356x30

So I got the aluminium hats on Friday as promised about ten minutes before having to leave for a weekend away. The brackets are still hung up with UPS locally for some obscure reason, which I need to sort on Monday. The hats look really good and fit up nicely Also had time to get one of the rear corners assembled ... the brackets did not centre the caliper spot on so I have spaced it over using some washers for now. Just need to adjust the parking brake and wire up the pad wear sensor and that corner is complete (bar bleeding). Fitted up with the too short bolts temporarily while I wait for the drills to finish up the proper fasteners.

Great drivetrain but I can imagine the ‘dog taking a sh*t’ silhouette might limit the market somewhat.

Managed 11.155 @125.6MPH this time, but transmission wouldn't shift from 3rd to 4th, so could have been a 10.

For sale - BMW M60/M62 centrifugal supercharger setup. Purchased Dec 2021, but circumstances have changed and now have other priorities. Details below are from the original owner and his setup. Made 406whp on original M60B44 setup with water/methanol injection at 5psi with belt slip at 5.5k rpm. Further modifications made to setup by the original owner, but didn't go back to dyno. With other supporting mods was guesstimated to be about 450-470whp Will include the following; Powerdyne BD10 Mounting bracket Upgraded one piece billet impeller shaft Upgraded input shaft pulley Upgraded internal drive belt Drilled case for improved internal cooling Custom toothed crank pulley Custom toothed supercharger pulley 6rib crank pulley 6rib supercharger pulley 6rib upgraded smaller pulley with grip enhancer Several drive belts included Spare impeller and drive pulley bearings 1x GFB Mach2 blow off valve 1x Scarles blow off valve 1x bosch diverter valve 2x tensioners AEM pod filter Blower to Intake piping Supercharger inlet piping Several silicone hoses/bends to suit Numerous mounting bolts/washers/nuts Will require the following; Modified ASC/Cruise control intake elbow or custom connection to throttle body. Custom ECU tune - can help with a Link G4+ Xtreme tune. Some users in the USA have included a resistor inline with their MAF setup to adjust the reading on factory ECU. Lots of info online about this A couple of silicone hoses/bends to suit your application Some vacuum lines to suit your application $6,500 ono I may have forgotten some items. Reach out with any questions, happy to chat and share any info I can. Cheers Matt

Date: 21 Nov 2024 Distance: 215468 kms 1. Replaced side repeaters I noticed the amber side repeaters were significantly dulled. 22-odd years in the sunshine'll do that, particularly the UV down here. I noticed these aftermarket TYR units at a particularly reasonable circa 5 euros each during a parts order from Spareto, so dropped them into my order. They took about 12 mins all up to install. A quick wipe over with detailing mist, pop out, clean up, SRP, install.... figure out why they weren't working. Oh, bulb carrier included, though not the bulb! Uninstall, remove bulb holder, install bulb from original, re-attach, re-install, test okay. Fig 1: At the start... fig. 2: Job's a good one. Second time round, at least! Of course, after that the left-hand was swift. Not Suzuki. Quick! FIg. 3: Left Hand, dulled by years of sun Fig. 4: Removed, ready to retrieve bulb from bulb-holder FIg. 5: Left hand done, shining like a diamond in a goat's ass (as that feller from TX says). Hint: you don't need a screwdriver or spludger tool. Just push horizonally toward the rear of the car, then then gently lever out the front edge (against the clip - see Fig. 4 above). I did it without tools. To disconnect from the vehicle wiring, press the lever on the connector. To remove the bulb holder from the fitting, twist approx 30 degrees. Right then, on to the next one.

Finally sorted this out. Easy enough job but a bit of a pain in the ass without a garage/driveway. Got there in the end though and cleared the WOF so mission accomplished. Huge thanks to @Eagle for sending me that steering coupler, was a huge help.

Had our F31 for 2.5 years and 50,000km - it’s been great - 320d Msport. Only niggle is the electric steering racks have a bushing that goes causing a front rattle - easy enough fix but ours is getting done for the second time this week. Handles and rides well but the electric steering is uninspired. They look fantastic in the right spec and plenty of space for gear as well.

I will be doing it in house in a couple of months, in the process of buying and sourcing equipment to do it bro. Going to offer it as a service to client's etc

SOLD, coming back up North

Decided not to put in a rear console / back seat USB BMW port. But I did put in a universal pd / usb charger. This one has up to 65 watts for USB c and 18 watts on usb b. Handy for rear passenger for charging devices and also will charge work laptop if needed. Was going through BMW TIS wiring diagrams and this is what I’ve learnt. Terminal 30b feeds all 12 volt outlets. 30b is enabled when the car is considered occupied and will run until car is either locked or will stay active for 8 -20 mins if the car is left unlocked after parked. After that it powers down. Was thinking about this as don’t want parasitic power draw from usb charger. For the rear console charger my car didn’t have a rear 12 volt outlet. In the factory wiring the rear outlet ifs piggybacked off the front hidden 12volt outlet. However with the f30 / f80 wiring looms there is almost no provisioning of wiring for accessories that went in the cars original build sheet. I needed to run wires for this. So , got some 1.5mm2 wire left over from adding the boot 12 volt outlet. Wrapped it in Tesa tape and rather than pull console apart to route I just used curtain wire to feed it from rear of console to dashboard. I popped the rear console trim down, drilled a 30 mm hole and mounted the charger. Works well for quicker charging of phone / tablets / laptop.

Excellent, thanks for the detail - mine just arrived and I was planning on attacking it with a trim tool!

That I do, hence why this would look awesome parked next to it 😎 Na you haven't, sadly it got very rundown - parked it up at a friends place while I was busy sorting a workshop out, they made the mistake of leaving it outside with the sheep, so it needs a lot of TLC now. Have been busy moving house and sorting out life and the new shed that's a lot smaller. It's currently in dry storage and I'm talking to a friend of mine who's a panelbeater, plan is to get him to go right over the body, I'll handle the mechanical and get another guy I know (and, most importantly, trust) to try and sort the battery drain issue that's plagued it from day one. Then she'll be back. I'll be updating with progress when I get onto it, it's taken a bit of a back seat atm while getting this new place sorted out.

Been putting the engine loom back on the e23 as I took it off to have it checked prior to selling it 3 and a bit years ago. Now she won't fire up. I'm thinking one of the relays have gone bad or I put a connector on wrong. I cannot find any wiring diagrams for this car. It cranks but has no spark and no voltage to the crank and reference sensors. May be ECU related so I will pull the ECU apart tomorrow and have a look. The wiring is in a pretty poor state of affairs. I am looking to maybe make up a whole loom or just convert the old motronic stuff to the facelift motronic stuff.

Snapped some shots with my mate/client's tech 1 the other morning. Couldn't help it. The lighting was amazing. Yes the Alpine white Tech 1 is on airlift performance suspension.

@charles28 you owe us a 10 second car

yeahhh buddy!!!

That's exactly what I did with mine. From memory these don't fit the karb box. Pretty sure I ordered those as well and ended up having to use the karb supplied bolts. I put a small rubber washer under the head of the bolt so it didn't damage the finish of the airbox. The downside to the CSL dipstick tube is that you have to remove the unfiltered section of the airbox just to check the oil level. You can very easily bend the stock dipstick tube to the side and it's way more functional, that's what I ended up option for.

Some of the bits of hardware I was waiting on for the airbox install arrived today. 07119905016 - original silver bolts that hold the two pieces of the airbox together. The black ones that come with the Karbonius look great, but I'm wanting to replicate the original CSL look with the silver hardware. 07119901780 - original bolts that attach the snorkel to the airbox. The Haimus Racing snorkel comes with silver through-bolts and nuts, plus insertable collars to go in the 3D-printed mounting holes. I'm not sure whether the Haimus Racing airbox doesn't have threaded mounts on the airbox, but anyway the Karbonius does. I did a quick test fit and confirmed that using the Haimus collars with the OE bolts works. 07119902626 - original bolts for the MAP sensor to secondary air rail. As George Hill noted some time ago these are too short to fit on my MAP sensor adapter, but with them in hand I was able to confirm that these are DIN7984 spec bolts, and have ordered some M6x18mm DIN7984 bolts which will fit perfectly. Only item (I think) I'm waiting on now is the CSL dipstick tube. I realised I have a bit of a problem when I went downstairs to find something and couldn't even remember what's in all of the boxes of parts on my shelves. Need the Christmas break to come round so that I can get some of this stuff installed!

Lovely! Timeless. If only it were manual. GLWS

*many* might be pushing it @elias. There’s hundreds of thousands of the N57 out there between 3-4-5-6-7 series and X3-4-5-6. The timing chain is a bit of a weakness on the n47 but less so on n57, just a pain if it does need doing as it’s on the back of the engine against the bulkhead. Bearing failure if it happens is usually fatal to the engine due to the aluminium block and the hardness of the bearings ruins the crankshaft. IMO the N57 is one of the most reliable BMW engines though.

YES

Sounds like the 6cyl diesel would be the one to get. We have a 530d F10 and it’s been great; i’d take it over any of the F10 petrols. Go test drive an F31 330/335d .

Hi Sammo Thanks for the very nice pictures. I love the camping one and the old & new style one too How tall are you (do I fit in the 320, 189 cm tall?) and apart from this steering trouble, how do you find the power of your car. The weight power ratio (I'm an original motorcycle driver, where it is less than 1 kg for 1 HP, that is fast acceleration). The W/P ratio for your car is 8kg/HP. With my present car (530i) it is 6.4 kg/HP And I'm wondering with the 328i (there it is around 5.8) do you know how did they got another 74 HP out of the same engine volume and is that engine or it's accessories vulnerable to break down easily. Cheers Willem

Sweet. Will be needing mine done

Those engines have plenty of plastics fittings\hoses etc which leak, so probably best to get it pressure tested before doing a full change\flush. Top it up with water if its low. Penrite stuff is usually the best bet

Mate brought one of these. Best part of $240k . Remember getting a drive. These hide their weight and amazingly quick. 550 plus hp for that price ! GLWS.

I went for the Toolshed own branded 1/2" and will be getting the 1/4" this week. Not flashy but the selling points for me were: Nice Nm only scale Legible 0-9 units around the twist barrel Comes calibrated, with certificate https://www.thetoolshed.co.nz/product/15319-toolshed-torque-wrench-1-2in-dr-30-210-nm <--- Pretty sure i didn't pay $219, would have gotten on a special 👍

Who do you get to do the dry ice blast?

@BMTHUG your old one?

Nice E28 at Mitre 10, forget how small they are compared to modern 5 series barges.

No mention of the pinned up headliner in the ad description either @Vass. - speculative pricing still clearly on display

Ohlins Road and Track kit for an F20. Ohlins make this for a JDM BMW specialist company called 3D Design. It is top quality suspension, on par with the best from Bilstien etc. It is in excellent condition, no leaks and everything moves smootly. I bought it for my 130i but realised it was for an F20 not an E87. Those that drove my old E46, which had 3D Design suspension, will know how good it is. $600. Plus courier.

I so wish I could buy this https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/motors/cars/bmw/other/listing/5006551772

Interestingly, almost all of the 840 manual parts are still available to buy brand new for not crazy money. And although uncommon and not cheap, the V8 bellhousing 420G gearbox is still pretty attainable unlike the V12 bellhousing gearbox. I may have priced up all the parts to convert an 840 earlier this year when I was considering the project. 4.6is swap + 6 speed 840 would be wicked.

Coming from there, that is definitely the winter beater 🤣

Date: 11 Nov 2024 Distance: N/A kms 1. Parts gathered.... Diff, and Front ARB Great news. The parts car produced a decent diff. Jon @ Begley Motor Worx has now degreased, prepped, painted the replacement 3.46, new seals all round incl BMW sealant on the cover. Ready to go with Penrite Synthetic. Fig. 1 what a diff'rence a day makes 24mm front ARB sourced from Hell BM (Thanks Ray!). I'll strip, prep, paint when it arrives. It's 5 years since we did the rocker cover gasket, so I've sourced a replacement (Elring) with bolt seals, and new BMW washers. Fifteen of the buggers! BMW part number 11127838077 (for ref). Nearly ready to sort it out. 2. Next items list: Replace right rear tyre (or both rears) - it's at 2.9mm Fit Replacement diff (e46 medium case) 3.46 (including the two small bushes, input and output seals, fill and drain bungs, oil, rear cover sealant) Replace the Power Steering fluid reservoir Top-end oil leak - replace valve cover gasket. Prep and install replacement 24mm front ARB New sunroof seal (Part ready to fit) Install that Msport steering wheel with the stereo integration, have sourced a post-Takata recall airbag from the parts wagon. Clean and rust paint the surface rust on rear subframe Then in near future I'll get into the stereo as per this thread... Next year: could be time for Lesjofors MSport springs, and either Sachs Msport shocks or Konis. Jeez, next April we'll have had this car 13 years. What would an Olaf update be without a musical reference? Let's take a trip back to 70's disco-pop with Esther Phillips 😄

BMTHUG's old e28 535i parked outside Waiuku College this morning. Sorry, no pic. Unmistakable with those rims and I'm fairly certain it still doesn't have the front bumper on. I regret not grabbing that when the previous owner put it up for a quick sale.

What did you find in the interior with the blacklight 🤔

Family roadie to the BoP. Couple of days in the bush and driving around a mates farm, perfect.

Update: I love this car.

Quickjack doesnt take up that much space, you can even buy hangers to hang the frames standing up against a wall now. I have my pump and hoses coiled up on an old rolling seat that tucks away under my work bench when not in use. Ill use my jack and stands if i only need one end of the car lifted, IF the jacking points are easily accessible. Anything where i need the car clear off the ground, particularly if you need it level (like gearbox oil changes), or if the jacking points sucks to access (low car life usually) ill use my quickjacks. I've had all sorts on mine. Everything from my Classic Mini, to my Leaf on the weekend. I rate them highly for garages that dont have the space for a proper lift.

Right, so you’re telling us to gatecrash funerals and politely enquire about the plans for the deceased’s tools 😆

Another for cleaning and conditoning leather is shaving foam that contains lanolin. Work a treat on motorcycle leathers that were subjected to 9000 km of adventure riding in South America. Lady that made motorcycle leathers put me on to it.