_ethrty-Andy_

doesnt make sence having the car RWD when two of the drive wheels will be electric before long anyway. would make for a hell of a lot of weight out the front you lot would complain about that then. Have drive a bunch of modern FWD cars in my new job, the Golf GTI i hate to admit is light years better than the rest, a phenominal car, and i can honestly say i cared not that it was FWD.

probably fixing the glow plugs will be the end of all your woes when cold. lumpy when hot is a fuelling issue of some sort most likely. Have you scanned it using an OBD1 scan tool ?

i have some experience with the TDS engine if needed. also Lance @melowpuf has even more. When his 325tds got run up the back of, i reshelled the whole lot into a 328i cabby, i did the swap. the car now lives in Tauranga, and can be seen at Hampton skid pan/drift days from time to time. when you say lumpy on idle, is this only when cold or at all times ? if just when cold it will be the glow plug relay, aparently a common failure item.

you_got_a_friend_in_me.mp3

@gjm officially a Kiwi from today! congrats to you and your family.

why cant you daily the E30 ? if it cant be dailyied (unreliable) then i retract my $12k i am now daily driving an E30 again and im loving it!! been 7 years since i last dailyed one.

i agree also

reregistering is completely different to being registered for the first time

Came across this today. https://driving.ca/bmw/auto-news/news/bmws-i2-to-be-built-on-new-platform-developed-with-daimler-report

obviously the Aston spinning constantly is all done for the camera.

yes ive always said the Z3 rack is a total have and waste of money. usually alignment shop have bar that sets the steering wheel straight, and then remove for sweep test to check the steering wheel was centered, this is the first step they do. did they do this ?? check your steering wheel is centered on the spline, there are markers on both the wheel and the end of the spline. its critical its in the right place so you dont wreck the clock spring for your airbag/horn/multifunction. if it IS centered, then sweep the wheels to each side and make sure center on the wheel is center on the rack. if not, then adjust one or two splines at the point between the rack and the column and check again. you wont be the first person to just throw a rack in and find this, the difference is most are lazy and then adjust the wheel, thats fine on a non airbag car but doesnt take much to over wind the E36 clock spring.

yep no point bothering with M20 unless its for a specific racing class, you just want to keep the car "more original", or you want the cheapest option to get the car back on the road. M30 is dinosaur tech and boat anchor. was the engine of choice for decades when M5x engines were over 2/3k, but no point doing that now. i have done a bunch of M52 swaps, its easy to do and my engine of choice. just do plenty of reading, and read through a half dozen build logs and take the average of suggestions as the fact, dont rely on any one person. Bear in mind two things, 1/ most of the logs will be in American which means they are left hand drive (important when it comes to exhaust stuff, steering, and clutch control), the pinout tables are not correct for your car, and also 2/ most of the threads if not all are outside of NZ, where rules are generally a lot laxer and do not require the certification process we have. thus you will need to think about things like drive shaft hoops and bump steer tests, possible be forced to upgrade brakes etc. worth looking through the LVVTA Threshold guide as a starting point. also i recommend swapping to stock E36 steering rack at the same time, they are cheaper now than they used to be, and cheaper than having to make up custom power steering lines to adapt the e36 pump to the inferior E30 unit. use the holden barina / opel corsa linkage youll see mentioned, e30 nuckle on top and e36 on bottom. also means you dont need to recert later down the line when you do it anyway. having said all that, if i do another swap in the future, i think i will use the M54B30.

Couldnt tell you what spec is. I dont like the new design lanugauge, but i recall saying the same about almost every new BMW in the past decade, but they have all grown on me over time. Went to an international autoshow here a month or so ago, the BMW stand was dissapointing, they are all there, but nothing there that jumped off the page as a car id like to own. The Volvo stand tho, now THATs my language! and snow almost all gone now, hence why i brought an E30 Touring here a few weeks ago for the summer ha.

awesome Jared

im on a few up here in Ontario (im in Toronoto now), bmws seemed insanely cheap before i got here, but once here i realise they are all total rust buckets thats why! by the way, if you find your self in NY or PA end of June/Early July prehaps catch up for a beer ?

yes very primative system

already seen a few of the new 3 on the roads up here in Canada. they just blend in.

@eliongater do the E28 have the copper grounding nut on the back of the cluster like E30s do ? i suspect in any case this is a sperate issue not related to the engine

there is nothing prestigeous about a 3 series or a C class these days, hardly anything you can get on those you cant get in a same size Kia or toyota.

i know you tube links aren't usually welcomed here, but will be an exception this time.

the cam may well be worn and lifters need adjusting, but it wouldnt cause performance loss to the point you are experiencing.

i wouldnt recommend using plywood unless the tiber is clearly marked as treated and has appropriate standards marks on all pieces. i learnt this the hard way when i sent a container overseas many moons ago and didnt use treated pallets. expencive mistake you only do once.

you know i would have agreed with the above. But now living up here in Canada, where E46s all have heavily rusted arches, of course no way near as many now as there would have been. do see quite a few E53s tho, more than home. you can pick up a 335i here for 3k if that. No such thing as E38s E39s here any more. of course, this is how most of the world live, a car does not need to last 20 years like we expect it to at home. anything before 2010 is an old car in the same way we would call anything from the 90s or older and old car.

makes sence, both are no way near as big as VAG group they are competing with.

Heard the news of Attas passing from another ex forum member here. RIP