Vass

So the dude manual converted it and is now parting it out less than a year later? Wonder what's happened there

Sure did, at $12k already. https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/motors/cars/bmw/m3/listing/4023486610

Think this was the thread for it. What do you do with a car that you couldn't shift for $40k? Take shittier photos of it and chuck it up for $100k. Brilliant.

Only one way to find out mate 😄 Go for gold

Impressive that they successfully went through the whole compliance process in Germany, they're supposedly notoriously difficult to please over there with any sort of vehicle modifications.

Not sure on the buzzing noise but I'd take care of the steering wheel alignment first, then see if the issue persists. You need to have the steering wheel perfectly straight, then recalibrate the steering angle sensor with INPA/PA Soft, then drive it for a while. I'm only saying that because I had exactly the same lights pop up just recently and the steering wheel misalignment was the cause of the issue. Only happened because I had the steering rack out of the car during an engine swap but in your case it sounds like there might be something bent or misaligned. Sure enough you might be right on the ABS pump being bad but even if you fix that and the steering wheel is still off center then you'll still have those lights popping up.

There's a few other culprits that can set those 3 lights off as well. Is your steering wheel pointing perfectly straight when cruising in a straight line? Mine was offset by just a fraction and those lights kept on popping up intermittently until I got the steering linkage alignment just right. Are you using just a generic scanner? I've got a few specialist softwares set up on my laptop, happy to do a scan for you, might help pinpoint the issue more accurately.

Yeah saw those two, absolute bummer. I know the previous owner of the Alpina, he's pretty bummed, was a very well taken care of car and only sold it a few months ago. Looks to have been well submerged, looks a total loss. Wonder what money the M3 might go for and what of it is salvageable. Could be a good project.

Hot damn, so glad you chucked this on here. I flicked through the channel and stumbled upon my old 325ci! So weird seeing it again, video would have been made not even 2 months after I'd sold it. Loved that thing 🤤

Yeah was a bit toasty that. Had to dry the seat out when I got home...

Those seats look comfy as. Wouldn't mind a pair in the lounge in front of the telly

Starting to think ol' Barbara has it out for me. That and a dose of me being a bit of a numpty. Had a few weird adventures lately. Both the alternator ducts were missing when I got the car so I found an upper one on one of my parts cars, ordered a new lower one and fitted them on once I got the car up and running. Fast forward about a week and found the lower one rattling around on the undertray. The fittings on it are a bit flimsy so it must have vibrated itself loose, jammed itself against the belt and chewed through it. Luckily doesn't look to have done any damage to the belts or pulleys. Last Friday was going about my business, filled the tank on my way to Supercheap to pick up some oil. Pull up to the parking lot and felt a strong whiff of petrol. Looked down to find a massive puddle of fuel spewing out from the bottom of the car. Either I didn't seat the seal properly / didn't tighten the fuel pump lock ring enough or just because I overfilled the tank but the fuel was overflowing through the seal on the pump side. Quickly got the staff to help, grabbed the spill kit to clean it up as it looked a fire hazard. Video 1 Video 2 Undid the fuel pump to find the tank up to the brim and overflowing. Luckily I was already at the store so bought a siphon and a fuel cannister and pumped a few litres out. Seated the seal properly this time and tightened down the lock ring as far as it wanted to go. Looks fine now but will take a wee while to air out the smell of fuel from the cabin. Still have a persistent rattle from the engine for the first second or two on a cold start. At that point I'd done 500km on the special 15W-40 running in oil so figured it must be time to switch to the usual Castrol Edge 5W-30. Way less metallic sludge stuck to the magnetic drain plug than after the first 100km, the oil looked nice and clear still but the fresh 5W-30 didn't fix the ticking either. Not quite sure what it might be still or whether to be too worried about it. Probably worth getting a set of new lifters at some point as the old ones did look a bit tired. After the oil change, took the car out for its first proper drive today, a small club run to Arthur's Pass. Very nice drive with some nice hilly and twisty bits. Just 8 cars in total with an E46 M3 vert, F30 335i and an X5 outside the picture. Mine was the only "project car" in the group and of course decided to be the problem child. Just before Sheffield heard a slight thump and the HVAC screen went blank. The fella behind me told me it also blew a black puff of smoke out the exhaust around the same time. Made it to the parking lot to discover the AC compressor had spat the dummy and spewed out some sort of sticky gunk all over. Out of everything under the hood, the AC was the only thing I hadn't touched so naturally it got jealous and started acting up. The compressor was due a replacement to be fair but didn't want to touch it until the engine was all sorted. Will have to expedite it a bit. Luckily had my toolbox with me (as is a must at this stage) so just took the AC belt off and carried on. Apart from that, no major dramas. The car ran really well, temperatures kept steady, pulls nice and solid, especially with the auto diff, although taking off from a stand still is still an absolute pain so will switch it out for the manual diff shortly. The alignment is all over the place but holds the road steady enough. Will leave it until I get onto the rear subframe and suspension work. Still keeping it under 4k RPM for a few thousand km's so didn't go too crazy, although did try to keep pace with the E92 M3 to enjoy those V8 noises. The drive back was a bit of a pain with no AC as the outside temperatures hit 30 degrees. Might look into getting some of those wind deflector things that fit onto the tops of the door frames as the turbulence was unbearable with the windows open. Was absolutely drenched by the time I got home. Getting back into town I nearly got T-boned by an SUV that obliviously started pulling out from a side road right into the side of me which didn't help with the sweating. Luckily managed to swerve out of the way just in time. NZ driving culture man... But yeah, a few gremlins still but not totally unexpected. Will just keep chipping away.

Don't think it'd crank at all if it was the EWS, the starter needs a signal from the EWS to power up, don't think it does anything else. Must be something simple like a loose connection/dodgy fuse or such.

Hmm... https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/motors/cars/bmw/listing/3987284341?utm_source=tmm-savedsearch&utm_medium=email&bof=92CaS1YU

"40k 6 months ago sounds very unrealistic..." Epic copium. Of course you didn't pay that. You got had. Do your research.

Now with a fresh WoF. Flew through, only comments being the tread on the front tires getting close to borderline and probably needing an alignment, both issues soon to be addressed. The guys were impressed with the amount of work done and how clean everything was. Always nice to hear.

Fair enough. Haven't really heard of clusters failing being a common occurrence on E46's. Still, swapping a cluster over is quite an involved mission to get right, having to code several modules for the correct VIN and mileage and such. Next to that, undoing the 4 screws and swapping over the small backing panel from the supposedly bricked manual cluster to make it look legit is piss easy. If that is indeed what happened, pretty lazy to go through all the effort and not put a small finishing touch on it.

Quite a few bangers out in force at Skope. Here's a couple more.

Had a big scare on Friday morning. Was going about my business, got to a couple of km's from home and the car just died at an intersection. It would then start up, idle for just a second and die again. Video Got a mate to tow me home, fearing the worst. First time the tow hook's come out in my 4 years of BMW ownership. Feel like I've done pretty well. Only code I pulled was 44 Activation, Solenoid Valve, Tank Ventilation, which I didn't feel would be enough to stall the engine altogether but went ahead and switched out the EVAP valve, as well as the fuel pump, both of which had come from the 330i donor car, dated 2001. I put back the EVAP valve and fuel pump original to the car, dated 2003 and looks like the issue's gone away. So far so good anyway. Have now put roughly 200km on the the clock since the engine rebuild, looks like most of the niggly issues have been ironed out, bar one. When slowly coasting up to an intersection in 1st gear and not adding any throttle, when I press down the clutch, there's a weird rattle/thump coming somewhere from the drivetrain, seemingly from the rear. Video Only seems to happen when depressing clutch in 1st gear with no throttle input. Doesn't seem to happen at higher revs when accelerating to switch into second so a bit of a weird one. I suspect it could be the diff or the driveshaft. Not particularly enjoying the 3.38 ratio altogether, 1st gear seems very short for regular driving so could be a contributing factor. Was going to tidy up the factory manual 5-speed 2.93 diff and drop it in along with the refurbished subframe after I've gotten reinforcement plates welded in but might do it on its own before doing the whole refurb to eliminate the diff as the culprit. With the car up and running otherwise, I ticked off a few secondary little missions. Chucked on the front Whiteline strut brace I'd ordered a while ago. Quite well priced and contrary to the product photos, the bar itself is black so fits in pretty well with the rest of the engine bay. Really like the minimal design and lack of any sort of logos or writing, keeps it nice and clean. Also went ahead and switched out the cluster strip / automatic screen block out plate I'd received from some fellas over on the e46fanatics forum. Didn't notice it previously but looks like the US-version has BRAKE and ABS written out in words instead of using symbols. Funny little detail but not too bothered about it. The cluster will have to come out again at some point. Seems like when I was switching out the main big backing plate I slightly misaligned the tachometer needle. Was getting a bit concerned as the idle revs looked to be sitting at just 500 RPM. Hooked up the scanner and they're actually at a healthy 700 RPM so will need to bump the needle up a bit. Just clearing out the garage of all the accumulated spare parts / clutter and will jump onto refurbing the rear subframe and brake calipers.

😍

What's wrong with the photos? Looks quite well presented to me

Fair enough. I might be wrong, but my money would still be on the gearbox being swapped rather than just the cluster for some weird reason. The cluster is usually a dead giveaway of a manual swap that's almost always overlooked. VIN decoders are notoriously unreliable when it comes to transmission type. Some would no doubt also classify an SMG as being manual. Which it technically is. But really isn't.

Looks a great car and I'm sure you've done a great job on the interior, but I don't really understand the justification of a higher asking price because "the restoration of another car went over budget". Like I get you wanting to recoup some losses but those are two completely unrelated things. Top marks on the well crafted listing, you've definitely put in way more effort than the previous mob and what you've done has definitely added value but not $20k's worth. Good luck with the sale regardless. Also, and I don't know if it's news to you or not, but it's not a factory manual.

We need National to come in and privatise the roads. That'll fix it. And give the top 1% some tax breaks whilst they're at it.

Recently discovered Just Rolled In. Incredible levels of stupidity makes for highly entertaining watching. Also, the amount of cars with bullet holes is utterly terrifying. 'Murica! Also, far from an unknown creator, Adam LZ and his accompanying channels, Drift HQ and PSI, have been a good watch, especially of late. He found his first ever car from 10 years ago, an auto 325i abandoned in a swamp, bought it back, cleaned it up and swapped in a turbocharged S54. Good bit of fabricating there.