w_elliot

It sat in a shed and the rego lapsed while he was overseas and I recomplied it when I bought it in late 2012. I'd buy it back if I hadn't just bought another one.

had a few years out of the e30 game but i want back in, if anyone has a car they want to part with flick me a message. willing to spend up to 20k for the right car, probably missed the boat on a tech 1 or 2 m325i with that budget but you never know. cheers

as the title says. im located in christchurch

no sorry, then i would be left with a v8 e30 sitting on axle stands, bit of a hard sell.

http://www.trademe.co.nz/Browse/Listing.aspx?id=891618581 ive decided its time to change up the vehicle fleet so the v8 is on the market i dont actually expect to get the listed asking price for it, people on here have a better idea of what these things normally sell for than the greater trademe community. no idea what iil replace it with yet. it's been a fun 2 and a half years of ownership and i'll definitely miss it. would like to see it go to a member on here.

replaced all the bearings and seals in the diff. surface ground one of the carrier bearing shims to get the backlash spot on. way quieter now. also made up a second diff mount bracket to beef things up a bit back there. while the driveshaft was out i had new universal joints installed, new csb and got the whole thing balanced as a unit, heaps smooth now. also replaced all four wheel bearings while the car was off the ground (got carried away as usual). the navy blue interior is now all black, and the washer tank is also finally installed. overall the never ending project is coming along pretty nicely

Wilwoods can be had pretty cheaply on trademe, I'm tossing up on a set for my e30

This explains why I haven't seen this cruising round chch in a while, looking good man

Progress.

got busy again tonight, bought a new windscreen washer pump and started making a new stainless washer fluid tank. the car has never had a washer tank installed during my ownership so it's time for a bit of luxury. not intrested in ruining the look of the engine bay with the factory beige plastic tank. to make a stainless tank you must first make a cardboard one had to stop cutting out stainless sections because the neighbours probably arent into listening to angle grinders at 9pm but it should be all cut out and glued together by this time tomorrow.

i wouldnt say theyre harsh but you do feel everything, huge improvement over the old cracked nolathane bushes they replaced. the front end feels seriously tight with brand new balljoints and struts plus the CABs. not a grub screw in sight. but the outer diameter of the aluminium part of the bushes is 0.05mm larger than the inner diameter of the steel lollipop brackets, they were fitted by heating the lollipop brackets up to around 200 degrees which causes them to expand enough for the bushes to just drop in, once things cool down the bushes wont go anywhere without the help of a big ass press. its called an interference fit. both the ali and nylon bushes also have top hats on the forward facing sides so they cant be forced out backwards, just as an added precaution.

decided it's time for an e30v8 project thread to keep everyone up to date with whats happening to the old girl. it's by no means a new build as some of you know but it's still constanty being tweaked and improved. decided to give the front suspension a birthday couple of weeks back with new balljoints, struts and offset CAB's I also made an underbody brace to tie the front crossmember back to the chassis where the lollipop bushes mount to it (idea shamelessly copied from ultra racing) and a rear strut brace. I always try to machine or fabricate parts like this myself instead of buying them, the new offset bushes are aluminium with replaceable nylon inserts. bought some cool 80s looking gauges ages ago and found the time today to make up a gauge panel and wire them up. more updates to come

first post in a long while and a bit of an e30v8 update got motivated and set the ball rolling for a wee birthday for the old lady, front control arms off to replace all the ball joints and old cracked urethane offset castor bushes, pulled the front struts out to chuck some konis or something along those lines at them. started jigging up an underbody brace to tie the front crossmember back to the castor bush housing mount points, similar to the ultra racing items. planned a bit of trick machining to convert to adjustable offset castor bushes. pulled my camber plates off, now to try and track down new bearings for them, much play! currently the car is more or less as i bought it aside from tidying up a few interior bits and pieces, destroying and subsequently replacing the w55 gearbox with a w58, ditching the power steering using a delete block i whipped up to link the inlet and outlet ports on the rack to keep sh*t out and a bit of fluid in to keep things lubricated, and replacing the rear shocks with GAZ damping adjustable numbers which seem to be doing the job project thread and pics to come.

ive got a 3/4" drive one you can borrow. i can lend you a 3/4" ratchet or a big arse power bar to drive it too. pm me if you still need one.

what sort of condition is the PFL steering rack in? manual or power? im in chch too would be keen to take a look 021776223 cheers

Sounds similar to what I went through getting mine recomplied. Old front end repairs to my car were signed off easily and only needed to be re undersealed to keep the cert engineer happy, to get the rear parcel shelf signed off repair plates had to be fabricated to replace the steel that was cut out to fit 6x9s. This was expensive but not expensive enough to write an m325 like yours. I'm guessing you have the same issue? Seems to be a common thing with e30s. In all honesty it's an easy repair that could be done by anyone with reasonable welding skills, if I had more spare time up my sleeve I wouldn't have thought twice about doing the work myself. I took the lazy/expensive option and dumped mine at a panel shop who deals with a repair certifyer regularly and told them to call me when it was certified. Pm me if you want to know anything else

Bought it a shiny new w58 gearbox to replace my w55 that I blew to pieces while being silly last weekend Stripped the w55 during the week and found more carnage than I can be bothered repairing, it's never a good sign when you drain the oil and the remains of second gear come out with it. Carnage pics to come. The 58 should be a good upgrade, not significantly stronger but taller gearing and closer ratios will suit the v8 well. Out of town again this week but a good stint next Saturday should have the car back in action. Might also score myself a new clutch this week as well. The ten million pound pressure plate isn't ideal for round town driving and I'd prefer a bit of clutch slip over an exploding gearbox any day of the week

Hey mate still got the glovebox, front ashtray and analogue dash clock? Will flick you a text

what part of nz are you in mate? if your in christchurch i can probably help you out, easy job if you have the gear. i assume your planning on getting some lower springs than your currently running? otherwise shortening the struts is a bit pointless because you'll just wind up with more spring preload and a car that isnt any lower. shortening struts is really a way of keeping springs captive not lowering ride height. like everyone else said, there are several cheap coilover options for e30s on trademe, definitely the easy way out if you want to spend the money.

if your still looking after christmas i can machine some up for you, flick us a pm if your interested

Final update, car now has a vtnz wof stuck to the windscreen, all done in time for a Wanaka mish on the 24th

update time once again, picked the car up from gordon milne paint and panel today with the all import repair cert, really do recomend these guys, gordon is great to deal with and made sure all the work was done quickly so i could get the car done within the 20 working day window before my compliance check expires. got tooted at by riley on the way home will be hitting it hard this weekend sorting out a couple of minor issues (ball joint, brake lights not working, and front indicators) and fitting the parts that kirill (nipe) has lent me (thanks heaps for making my life a whole lot easier) all going well i'll go in for a re check on monday and the car will be good to go

Gold!!

Thatd be awesome of they're still on offer, I could pick them up this weekend if that suits you?

i'm heading back to christchurch on the 26th, work calls lol i'll be back down again on the 31st to hit the turps for a couple of days though. wish i didnt agree to work through christmas and new years this year. i'm a sucker for double time. but on the upside, it just means two e30 missions instead of one