BreakMyWindow

Scrubs up well. New rear brakes and handbrake adjusted. Will order a new pair of discs and my go-to track pads for the front. Gearbox oil and some RBF and she’s ready for Hampton downs end of next month.

PM’d 🙂

No more ticky diesel like n52! After hunting around for a good exhaust cam and bearing ledge and no luck I pulled a good one out from a pickapart car. I should’ve done this the first time round i opened it up, the old cam had alot of play resting in the ledges. Happy days! Cleaned up the replacement : Doesn't look out of place… Result! IMG_4400.mov

I’m after a good one from any bmw with a 23i, 25i, 28i or 30i n52 engine.

Replacement bonnet got given the same treatment as the rest of car. Before After

Had a decent go at cutting and polishing. Lots of trial and error along the way but getting the hang of it… Test area to see how hardy the paint is. On to cutting the fr guard. Then the sides and the roof, which I never thought would come up well, lots of deep scratches. Gave it a wet sand first. After cutting the sides and roof I expected this sh*t to appear under bright lighting.. Up until now i’d been using a rotary polisher so i switched to a DA and got rid of most of it. Happy how it turned out Got the hatch and bumpers to do. Won’t bother with the bonnet until i can find a straight one with saveable black sapphire metallic paint.

No bueno. Still makes a racket so guess i’m up for a replacement long block at some stage. With the new large disa it goes really well, will see how many trackdays it lasts. Pulled the oil filter out after 100kms of driving on fresh oil and there are no shavings or metal bits. I even tried proma Mbl8 snake oil. IMG_4311.mov

Yep…. had the o2 sensor plugs plugged in the wrong way round 🙃

Chipping away at re-assembly while waiting for parts. An old coil must’ve been arc’ing on cyl 6 as the Mg has blown out turned in to dust. Had to clean alot of crap out of the spark plug well. Cleaned up the corrosion out of all 6 holes then brushed 2 coats of epoxy enamel to give it a seal. Giving some high heat jb-weld a jam on the blown out damage.. Vanos oil strainers had no sludge but a couple of small bits of swarf on them. Gave everything in the engine bay a good clean to help with future traces of oil and coolant leaks. 😄

Yup but surprisingly no groove cut in to its journals.

The major engine work is now done. 4 lifters were squishy so replaced all 12. This was a thunder c&nt to remove (blind plug for locking the flywheel at tdc. The end you pull on snapped off so I spent about 4 hours stabbing and hitting it with a punch and bfh until it slid most of the way in to the flywheel. Then use the locking mandrel with a prybar to lever it all the way through. It got stuck to the flywheel so was able to remove it via the starter motor hole. The exhaust cam bearing and ledge journals had seen better days. Got the cam polished and lightly sanded the scoring on the caps. The state they were in: After a polish and sanding followed by a quick clean up: Engine timed up and now waiting for a few little gaskets and bits to arrive for the intake manifold. The large Disa is cooked so taking a gamble with a new one from aliexpress.

Does the starter motor need to come out to easily access the hole for locking the flywheel at tdc or has someone got a trick where you can get to the hole from underneath the car?

Bit of progress, dash vents painted: Sump gasket and engine mount inserts : Not great, not terrible underneath the valve cover. 2 soft lifters on the exhaust side, have ordered 12 lifters to replace. Intake side seems ok which is good, no need to buy more tools to remove those c&nty valvetronic springs..

Got a persistent tick coming from the exhaust cam side that no amount of italian tune-upping and fresh oil (replaced sump gasket) will fix. Anyone willing to loan out their n52 timing tool kit for some beers/cash?

Good deal, is this a good drop for the 130i on the track ?

Yeah had a look. No joy.

Anyone have an old idrive screen unit they want to get rid of? Doesn’t have to be working, I only need the front part of the lcd casing in good condition, which attaches to the motor drive mechanism to resurrect my one again.

Anyone in Auckland have the N52 timing and valvetronic return spring remover tools I could borrow ?

The new bottle Castrol 10w-60 is still M car approved. Looks and smells the same too lol.

Maybe Turners, I bought it off TM from an ex Turners trader.

Bought this last Friday for a good price. Being a track addict these days I was keen to get in to something RWD. The Good… -All paint except rear bumper and hatch lid is original -New RE003’s 225/45/17 on all corners. I think the fronts should be 205/50/17 with these wheels? -BMWP 6 pot Front Callipers -Last owner had it 9 years. Presumably has had annual oil changes every 10-12k -Valve cover gasket recently done, waterpump and tstat look new. -Clutch feels bitey Not so good… -Oil pan gasket. No surprises. -Lifter tick seems persistent, even after bleeding procedure and open road driving -Usual old car wear and tear, the most annoying being the loose rearview mirror (previous installation error and loose retaining prong holding it to windshield) -Shocks feel tired -Needs new brakes all round No dme codes but I reset the adaptations and chucked some 98 in. Goes better now. Plan for now is to tidy it up, add some track focused mods and see how I go!

In terms of goodies just a ticky top end and in desperate need of a clean up and service. Has new RE003’s on it. Hopefully will visit Hampton Downs with in about a month.

Yep I bought it.

Fuel pump and filter.

Club is always a full day, national is mostly half-day, with the odd full day available. https://www.tracktime.co.nz/ also do full days on National, i'm doing the next one on Wed 4th Sep.