Michael.

Still like new, very minor wear, but I changed them anyway

I've finally started to move forward and get onto refitting all the cleaned parts on the car with new components / seals / gaskets. I finished painting the underside of the chassis rails the other week so it meant I could get the sump and subframe back on. New engine mounts fitted, power steering pump cleaned up, idler arm bush replaced in the process. New exhaust manifold gaskets and so forth too. More work resuming tomorrow! A bit of top end work done but more to be done. Cleaning out carbon build up inside the ports next. Wont be putting on the cam covers just yet. Front timing case installed with new gaskets. I also replaced the chain guides, oil tensioner, crank case vent valve, front crank seal and a few other bits & pieces New idler arm bush pressed in, all the cleaned up parts on this side refitted. Those steering boxes are so damn heavy, quite incredible! I managed to find the center point and also made sure the steering shaft mid point was correct. New subframe bolts, the originals were very rusty!

Probably one of the most amazing sounding production(?) cars ever made.

Lots of work but I am not really sure what the result is supposed to be. Just looks like a lot of stuck on parts that have been stuck on well. Personally I'd much rather see an OEM style V8 E30 swap, maybe with mods to make it like an M3.

Probably not a heck of a lot, maybe some back pressure differences, to be fair most of the exhaust losses would be caused by the headers, the internal diameter and some of the angles are pretty brutal but the do the job and are nice being double walled for cooler engine bay temps / metallic sound dissipation.

Cleaning up the little things today, trims around the radiator and also the air duct parts for the alternator, all this stuff was filthy and had to be thoroughly cleaned. Same goes for the front impact support absorbers, there are a couple of spots where rust was developing which will be primed and painted black.

540i E34 manual > 540i E39 manual

For the price of $2-3K for an Eisenmann exhaust box I'd rather do this because its considerably cheaper and more fun, it also preserves the stock look of the car, I want zero aftermarket parts on it. But of course it depends how it sounds, I am confident it will sound quite good, but if not back to the drawing board!

The rear coolant bridge or more commonly referred to as the 'accumulator' has 6 bolts and sure enough 5 out of 6 of them were being damaged by weeping coolant and had started rusting, this is one of the reasons I am changing every seal other than the rear main seal (for now) and headgaskets. After 27 years most of these seals / gaskets are past their used by. The valley pan was suffering from the same issue many of the 20 small bolts corroding from the gasket weeping. As you can see these are the rear bolts and onne of the gaskets that had been deteriorating around the bolt sealing areas. Not good!

Been busy tidying up the front chassis rails, they required a lot of cleaning first and removal of any trims. There was some light surface rust that bothered me so it had to be cleaned up, so far primed it and ready for the top coats. Finally finished off mods to the muffler, drilled a few more holes in the baffle plates and added some stays to reinforce one of them to avoid any vibrations. I also threw on some high temperature black paint, probably pointless but couldn't hurt. Then came time to install some packing, wrapped the perforated pipes with stainless steel wool and behind the baffle pates, then filled the voids with a few kilos of fiberglass exhaust grade filler then covered it up with some more stainless wool to keep it all in place so the top cover goes back on more easily. Now time to start tacking the cover back on, it's a bit of work but I've done a few mufflers now so know what is involved, just patience!

Awesome work!

Such an insane buy for $8800 this car has real potential!!

Got motivated to get stuck into some welding work on the spare stock rear muffler I am modifying. As previously stated plan is a 3 chamber design, 2 ends will be filled with stainless mesh and lots of fiberglass filler. The middle chamber will be an open chamber to allow the gases to flow from the inlet pipes to outlet pipes. This is a style commonly found on performance style OEM mufflers so should work nicely here. So far I've drilled about 600 perforation holes reasonably evenly through the four stock internal pipes I left after cutting out the ones I didn't need. Months ago I made up some cardboard baffle end plates and traced them onto 1mm thick stainless to cut out and weld into place. Yesterday I cut and trimmed those down to fit into the muffler. These plates will fill the large holes from the old pipes and gaps to prevent the exhaust packing flying out. Before the filler goes in a bit more welding work is required as well as a series of small holes drilled to perforate the baffle end plates. Update, perforations in the two baffle plates, probably an adequate amount. Might add a few more in the gaps. Bit too difficult to drill the lower areas recessed into the muffler body so just focusing on the top halves.

Now you can charge the Leaf remotely!

Dang, what a bargain haha