E46 330i Touring

[Hazzy 56]

Been a while since I posted anything but thought I would post some of my rough old wagon.

Bought it late 2019 and fixed it up somewhat over the first lockdown. Did a big road trip all over the south island with it in late 2020.

Then in early 2021 I moved from Auckland to Queenstown and didn't have access to a garage anymore so it hasn't been getting as much attention as it did when I was trapped at home and had nothing else to do.

It's Still running pretty well, has a couple of little things playing up but other than that it's been a good reliable daily. The ski season and access trails haven't been particularly kind to the suspension and a couple of possums have made my bumper a bit mangled (anyone got a silver m-sport one lying around...), and not to mention the various dents that came with it when I bought it. It's been a great car though has served me well over the last couple of years, three cities, and 30,000km.

I have picked up a Prado 120 to start doing the ski runs up the remarks and for the trailhead to save my poor car from some more pain. Bonus of the prado is it makes my 330i's consumption feel like a prius...

Highlight was having the Milford Road all to myself earlier this year.

I Installed an Avin Avant 4, works great and it's good having carplay. My car didn't come with the OEM radio so this has been a huge upgrade for it. Not pictured is the absolute carnage the previous owner had left when they installed their radio. 

Loaded up with all my sh*t.

Cleaned up after the big trip. Whispbars always good.

Routeburn trailhead. Another unkind and brutal road.

First snow of 2021.

Coronet Peak, my preferred mountain since its mostly sealed...

And stuck on coronet peak on the most mild of inclines. 🙃

No comment.

Bought a set of mint winter tyres for $100. Night and day difference on snow and ice. Extra sidewall helps heaps as well.

Big clean after the winter season. The 21 year old paint still has a decent bit of shine.

Made a friend.

Putting the winters back on for 2022.

Can't understate what a difference the winter tyres make down here.

 

 

Edited July 12, 2022 by Hazzy

[adro 1052]

What a workhorse you have there 😉 

I imagine the 3L would be lovely on those Central Otago roads. Have been really tempted by the AVIN 4. Did you get it direct from AVIN? 

[Eagle 1515]

Nice. First BMW ive seen in NZ running style 72's (besides mine)

[Hazzy 56]

7 hours ago, adro said:

What a workhorse you have there 😉 

I imagine the 3L would be lovely on those Central Otago roads. Have been really tempted by the AVIN 4. Did you get it direct from AVIN? 

Yeah certainly haven't given it the easiest life, was maybe a bit better fit when I was in Wellington rather than down here but I make it work.

Super glad I found a 3L one, they seem hard to get these days, it's Fantastic on the roads around here.

Just had it up coronet with the chains on tonight to get some more skiing in so the abuse continues 🙃

And yeah bought the Avin directly from them. It would've been an extremely easy install if the previous owner hadn't massacred the wiring harness for the radio on their install. Can highly recommend it though, it looks great in the dash and having carplay with navigation and all it's other features is well worth the price of admission. Certainly makes the car feel much more modern but keeps the OEM look to it. 

Edited July 13, 2022 by Hazzy

[Hazzy 56]

5 hours ago, Eagle said:

Nice. First BMW ive seen in NZ running style 72's (besides mine)

Yeah they're great right up until the you need to clean them haha.

[Vass 697]

Lovely car. Awesome to see it properly used

[Hazzy 56]

😑

 

Not a happy day up on Coronet yesterday. Some f**kwit in a Nissan backed into me and their tow bar has done that to the 330. 
To make it more fun I was actually crushed in the door itself since I was grabbing something from the front but am luckily unhurt. Wasnt super f**kin happy about the situation though. 

The door frame at the top kind of bent around my chest so now it doesn't seal properly but I have managed to bend it somewhat back into shape to try stop it from leaking in the meantime.

Now it's wait and see with the insurance, the damage is all on the one door so could be worse, hopefully it doesn't get written off. I am fairly confident that me being alive is evidence that the car is still structurally fine since they were driving pretty slow and the door mostly just bent around the towbar (and around me).

It wasn't even a tight car park I have no idea how they f**ked up this bad could of actually killed me christ.

 

It was my good door as well all the others have wellington dents...

Edited September 5, 2022 by Hazzy

[Vass 697]

Glad you're okay, hope the car is too. A silver sedan door shouldn't be too hard to find. There's one at the Christchurch Pick-A-Part that I know of. 

[Hazzy 56]

Cars now all fixed again. Not sure if they repainted or just got a used door and put that on but it is basically as good as new. I can't see any difference in the paint, the only thing is the door is not perfectly aligned but looks pretty easy to adjust the striker plate so it all lines up perfectly.

Have also just forked out for new rear summer tyres since my current ones were absolutely cooked.

Now all that is left is to replace the control arms again because there is some play in the balljoints which caused it to fail it's warrant. Luckily I bought them from FCP euro so should be able to get them replaced under the lifetime guarantee which takes a bit of the sting out of it.

[Eagle 1515]

What brand control arm?

[Hazzy 56]

3 hours ago, Eagle said:

What brand control arm?

TRW, I got this set from FCP euro about 2 years ago. Im not sure if the brand is the problem or its from me driving up unsealed ski access roads (Mt Hutt, Treble Cone, Remarkables...)

 

[Eagle 1515]

Maybe both?. Id certainly put Meyle HD and Lemforder ahead of TRW for arms. Im running Meyle HD as they have replaceable ball joints.

[Hazzy 56]

13 hours ago, Eagle said:

Maybe both?. Id certainly put Meyle HD and Lemforder ahead of TRW for arms. Im running Meyle HD as they have replaceable ball joints.

Yeah probably the way to go if I was going to do it again. 

[nick496 268]

On 10/12/2022 at 1:08 PM, Hazzy said:

Cars now all fixed again. Not sure if they repainted or just got a used door and put that on but it is basically as good as new. I can't see any difference in the paint, the only thing is the door is not perfectly aligned but looks pretty easy to adjust the striker plate so it all lines up perfectly.

Would pay to double check your key works in the door if you haven't already. 
Found that one out the hard way once....

[Hazzy 56]

Finally installed fresh RTAB's on it. I was going to go with Moog camry spherical bearing but gave up on getting them in with the tool I had. Also got my control arms fixed and warrant sorted out. I love suspension work it brings great joy...

Control arms and FCAB's. The FCAB's were actually fine but since I was getting everything replaced through FCP Euro I switched them out anyway. The FCP thing did save me a little bit but the shipping definitely adds up. The exchange rate really did help me either.

The issue with the tool is that they hadn't machined the top flat so I couldn't flip it around to properly align it. After a few goes trying to get them in I decided to just stick with the OEM RTAB's with limiters since I had some lying around from ages ago. The tool worked fine for getting those back in.

Set the preload on the rubber RTAB's to the same angle that they were originally.

Haven't driven it much since then as it needs an alignment but from my drive around the block it I can tell that it is definitely feeling a lot more solid on the rear so should be good once that alignment is done. I am now going to refrain from driving on unsealed roads and use the Prado for that...

 

Edited November 25, 2022 by Hazzy

[Eagle 1515]

Yeah the spherical bearings have their disadvantages and thats one reason i stuck with M3 OE + limiters. Even replacing the rear lower outer rubber bushing with the sealed bearing the M3 uses makes sharp road transitions more pronounced.

[Hazzy 56]

Drove up to Auckland from Queenstown to put on some new bumpers/sideskirts/vents etc. The parts aren't all mint but neither was my current bumper so bit of a lateral move really. Still, looks a lot better than the stock ones mine has.

Even got the M-Sport vents so everything fits nice and flush. 

[Vass 697]

You drove all the way to Auckland for that? Gotta admire the effort 😄 Looks well good! Don't forget to trim off the bottom edge of the rego plate holder, will tidy it right up, especially on a silver car. 

Bit jelly of those vents... Mine are all shagged and held together with zip ties. Tempted to get a whole new set along with the arch liners when I've got a good few hundy burning a hole in my pocket. Bloody hard to find used Msport ones in good condition.

[Hazzy 56]

28 minutes ago, Vass said:

You drove all the way to Auckland for that? Gotta admire the effort 😄 Looks well good! Don't forget to trim off the bottom edge of the rego plate holder, will tidy it right up, especially on a silver car. 

Bit jelly of those vents... Mine are all shagged and held together with zip ties. Tempted to get a whole new set along with the arch liners when I've got a good few hundy burning a hole in my pocket. Bloody hard to find used Msport ones in good condition.

Yep haha, I've had an M-Sport parts car sitting in my dad's garage for a while so needed to get it done at some point, plus family is up here so was going to be here for Christmas anyway, then I've got some stuff to bring back so in my head totally worth it...

Was quite happy to see that the vents were in good condition. A parts car is probably the way to go for this stuff can't imagine what it would cost getting everything individually. Hopefully I can sell some of the parts from the parts car (e.g Wheels, towbar, etc) to make it a bit more cost neutral.

Next stage of the job is swapping over the gloss black window trim things and sorting out the rear bumper.

I am tempted to take the power steering pump as well since my current one might be on the way out. Although part of me is thinking that I should just fork out for a new one rather than taking a higher milage unit from the parts car. My car has the LF-20 and pretty sure the parts car has the LF-30 which might be an upgrade.

Edited December 28, 2023 by Hazzy

[Vass 697]

Ahh nice! An Msport touring parts car is an epic find, especially in the same colour. Will need to snap one up myself if I ever see one but haven't come across any for a few years now despite constantly keeping a lookout. Never seen a touring at the local Pick-A-Part either.

Some of the touring-specific bits like the plastic boot trims, hatch surrounds and rear seats could be worth keeping as they're damn hard to come by. The shadowline trims are absolute unobtanium.

LF-20's have a tendency of shearing the shaft but LF-30's are supposedly pretty robust. I took mine apart, went to a local seal supplier, sized up all the necessary O-rings, cleaned and resealed it. Not as daunting a task as I originally thought it might be, I think there was 6-7 different O-rings in there. I still have a whole heap left over, I would have gotten several of each size and several size options for each O-ring just to be sure so should be enough for another reseal. You're welcome to grab them on your way back down if you wish. 

[Eagle 1515]

8 hours ago, Hazzy said:

Although part of me is thinking that I should just fork out for a new one rather than taking a higher mileage unit from the parts car

As above they are pretty robust and you rarely hear of them failing. As long as the power steering oil has been changed at points be they would probably go forever only needed seal replacement. Current one has done 320,000km and my old E39 had ~290,000km on it with the original pump. A new OE FZT (LUK replacement) one is around $600-700. 

[Hazzy 56]

 

4 hours ago, Vass said:

Ahh nice! An Msport touring parts car is an epic find, especially in the same colour. Will need to snap one up myself if I ever see one but haven't come across any for a few years now despite constantly keeping a lookout. Never seen a touring at the local Pick-A-Part either.

Some of the touring-specific bits like the plastic boot trims, hatch surrounds and rear seats could be worth keeping as they're damn hard to come by. The shadowline trims are absolute unobtanium.

LF-20's have a tendency of shearing the shaft but LF-30's are supposedly pretty robust. I took mine apart, went to a local seal supplier, sized up all the necessary O-rings, cleaned and resealed it. Not as daunting a task as I originally thought it might be, I think there was 6-7 different O-rings in there. I still have a whole heap left over, I would have gotten several of each size and several size options for each O-ring just to be sure so should be enough for another reseal. You're welcome to grab them on your way back down if you wish. 

As boring as silver is it definitely has it's upsides when it comes to finding parts. I found the parts car on marketplace up north and got my dad to trailer it back to his, cost me $1000 which isn't too bad considering how much all these parts would cost on their own and how hard they are to find. Gotta get to work getting all the black interior bits since I need to redo my headliner at some point. Scope creep keeps expanding...

3 hours ago, Eagle said:

As above they are pretty robust and you rarely hear of them failing. As long as the power steering oil has been changed at points be they would probably go forever only needed seal replacement. Current one has done 320,000km and my old E39 had ~290,000km on it with the original pump. A new OE FZT (LUK replacement) one is around $600-700. 

Sounds like I should take that Lf-30 since I've got it sitting in there anyway and mine really doesn't seem super healthy.

Might have to take you up on that offer for those O-rings, was looking at this kit. Let me know if you need any touring bits since I'm taking it apart anyway. 

[Vass 697]

9 hours ago, Hazzy said:

Might have to take you up on that offer for those O-rings, was looking at this kit. Let me know if you need any touring bits since I'm taking it apart anyway. 

I'll dig out what I've got left but that kit looks pretty decent as well. Not sure what that one shaped seal is, I obviously didn't replace it.

Could be keen on a few bits, thanks! I'll pm you. Cheers 

[balancerider 702]

On 12/28/2023 at 11:30 PM, Vass said:

  Don't forget to trim off the bottom edge of the rego plate holder, will tidy it right up, especially on a silver car. 

@Vass the euro plinth from the original car will fit?

@Hazzy i reckon it would look even better with the clear  (‘euro’ ) corner lights from the parts car

[Vass 697]

7 minutes ago, balancerider said:

@Vass the euro plinth from the original car will fit?

It'll fit but I don't think it'll clip in properly. I had an Msport euro plinth on another car, it also had two clips in behind the front surface that went up into the bumper. Then I had a donor car with a stock bumper euro plinth and that didn't have those extra clips, only clipped into the front and somehow it didn't go in deep enough and didn't feel securely attached. I assumed the stock and Msport plinths are different but could just have been some anecdotal.