E30 Zone

First, Hello from the other side of the pond. My name is Keith and I live in California. Well, i just hunted down and purchased a 6/1985 euro spec 325 yesterday and am extremely excited and pleased.

It's alpine white with a hartge trunk spoiler and wheels. BBS bodykit (front, sides, rear). Black interior. 5 speed.

What really troubles me is which engine it has in it. From being here in the states, we usually have the 325e which redlines at about 4500 and sucks for top end revs with good low end torque. Most of the vin decoders i've seen translate my vin to a 325e but my car redlines at over 6k. I also own two us spec e30's a '86 325es and a '87 325e. Both of those cars have similar engines with the distributor cap located at the end of the camshaft near the top of the engine, but the new car has the distributor cap located lower in the engine and definitely NOT at the end of the cam.

Haven't had time to get underneath and look at suspension components, but it's very tight, maybe more so than my '86 with the m-technic suspension option.

I look forward to learning a lot more about european spec cars and the advantages you folks have in the hp categories without some silly government breathing down your neck.

Will post pics real soon, and thanks in advance for the info.

Ruff

Hooray for the other side of the pond! ... well not really

Welcome, welcome and i can't wiat for some pics!

welcome, your car sounds cool, cant wait for the pics.

Hi M8,

Welcome to the Zone - you should get most of your questions answered on here !!!!

Come on wheres the piccies ?????

welcome
i would think its a m20 block by the 6 cylinder bit but the distributer on it should be at the end of the cam

maybe the 325e u mention is a carb engine explaining the crap revs and maybe they have a bigger more noticable distributer as your car must have ecu controled ignition and injection and will only have the distributer cap and rotor at the end of the cam rather than the complete distributer unit that mechnical ingnition and injection or carbs use.

pics would help most but that just my guess at your car.

Here's the pics i took this morning.






You can see here that the distributor is NOT on the end of the cam.


Wheels will need some refinishing.

never seen that before........

Love the location of extra dials!!

e-brake guages are vaccum(sp?) and water temp, although the water isn't connected or reading.

The guage on the dash works fine though.

Welcome mate

Ruffian wrote:

Where do the ignition leads go and what do they connect to on the intake side of the engine??
And whats the silver box in the bottom left of the pic?

Im wondering if it has somekind of aftermarket engine management.

It looks like the L-Jetronic engine management system.
I don't think they made a 325 with that system in the UK, they were all motronic.

So where would the leads be going to??

They are wrapping around and down to the distributor and distributor cap just to the right of the water pump. I don't have the car here now, so i can't go snap a closer pic.

The module on the passenger side is a bosch product, but i can't get the part number now.

Looks cool. Its interesting to see how much difference there is between the cars here and over there.

Is it me or is that rad bigger than normal?

Engine compartment looks a lot like my old 1985 323i which had LJetronic engine management. I thought alll UK spec 325s had Motronic 1 when they first came out but as yours is a left hooker it is probably a German spec and maybe was built a little earlier than ours. Looks like it will clean up to be a real looker - and performer too!
Welcome.

Def same 323i

looks like a early chrome bumper engine to me! Rad looks normal for that age M20. Metal airbox too

Question is someone spent alot on the and wheels. So whats been done to that engine i wonder?!

Just been run in too!

Why is the eco guage in Kilometres per litre, rather than miles per gallon?!
Seeing as the speedo is MPH. Wierd

This car seems interesting, if only it could talk......................

What exhaust is she running, looks like a single pipe exit. Should be twin pipe right through?!

I reckon the turd is a 'grey' euro 323i as all septic e30s had the sad bumpers and the metric rev counter is another clue. ALL 325s were motronic so it is NOT a 325. Easy solution to the mystery is run the vin number by your local dealer. (and hope it doesn't come back as a doom blue 4 door 316 ! )
P.S that is a big caravan Ruffian, what do you tow it with ? that looks like a big old ford next to your e30.

I think that the speedo was mph as a conversion to import the car to the u.s. This week i'll give the engine bay a bath and get some closer pictures and jot down some p/n's

vin is WBAAB510001228226

pacerpete wrote:P.S that is a big caravan Ruffian, what do you tow it with ? that looks like a big old ford next to your e30.

The caravan is my mother and father's. That is his ford next to my e30. The car was for sale about 3 hours away from their house, and i live about another 2 hours from them. The wife and i took the kids to grandparents house to drop them off for Thanksgiving Holiday. Then we drove down to get the car.

Well, i had to come back home to work and left the wife and kids and the car at mom and dad's house. Hopefully they'll wash the new one for me while i'm gone. I needed to get it insured before i drove it the rest of the way home, so it'll be coming home with us on Friday.

Jimbob wrote:Is it me or is that rad bigger than normal?

"tropical" rad, usually found in southafrican spec and some usa cars, its a lot bigger than your regular ones we get here, all alloy very nice if you got a turbo'd e30

Just been looking at your pics again. The interior is Sport with MTech 1 wheel. There's also a few Hartge bits on there (wheels/strut brace,etc) and a few mysterious extra bits in the engine bay Wonder if you have stumbled on a rare model or its just been owned by an enthusiast in its earlier life. It'll being interesting to watch this one unfold.
Keep us posted!

It would be nice if we could all just leave a diary in the glovebox each time the car got sold so that the next owners would know all the stuff done to the car.

I just hope that i don't have any problems with the pollution control because the engine mystery. Luckily, where i live, i only need to have the test done once in the life of it's ownership. Some areas here in california have to have the tests done every two years, but i only have to do it when i register it. I know a guy....so we'll see how that goes.

I've really liked reading what you folks have had to say so far. I am leaning toward the 323i engine as the possibility. Looking at the etk, that does closely resemble my engine, but i'll know more tomorrow when i start looking at part numbers.

Ruff

Actually the euro 325i are very much same as a US version. Your's looks more like a 323i instead! I will take a pix of what a euro 325i engine compartment like for you later. Yeap...all 325i in Hong Kong are euro version. I had had couple e30 when I was back in US.

nice car... look forward to hearing more about it.

Pics after a cleaning today. 1/2 bottle of meguiars leather conditioner later...

Engine


Distributor

I haven't washed the outside, this is just for the profile.


The seat back is perfect, but the seat...well..it's gotta go.

The mtech needs a LOT of cleaning more. I imagine a toothbrush and meguiar's.

Wow! That's looking good. Another E30 back in loving hands. How does it run now?

MONSPORT42 wrote:How does it run now?

I'm pretty sure that cleaning it added at least 15rwhp.
Seriously though, this wednesday will be the day that it gets a tune up. Besides the normal click, there's not much sounding bad about it.


Thanks for the compliments!

Ruff

Know what you mean! I remember the first time I bought a sports steering wheel for my old 323i, the guy at the dealers reckoned it would add 10bhp! Mine's definitely faster when it's clean. Just to give you a bit of confidence, my one did 267,000 miles before the rust got it which shouldn't bother you in California. The engine was still going strong (although it was a 2.7 by then) and is the one I now have in my Sport..
The 323iA a couple of months before it went to the scrapyard!

Welcome

W BA AB51 0 0 0 1 228226

W COUNTRY OF ORIGIN GERMANY
BA Manufacturer = BMW
AB51 Model type
0 Manual Seat belt restraints
0 Check digit - ignore!
0 European model
1 ASSEMBLY PLANT ???
228226 unique serial number

Basiciall its a european
325e
manual
LHD
Produced June 1985

Looks like it's been played with over the years...

Thanks for the data mark. That about sums up the info i've gotten so far. The fun part is in figuring out how much tinkering has been going on. Why the distributor? Why wasn't the tach changed till after 02/86 giving only about 8 months of "e" class 325's with no fuel economy controls? Ahhh...the joys of new ownership.

Ruff

Pacerpete said

ALL 325s were motronic so it is NOT a 325

Errrr, are you sure mate? Are you talking just about US cars? Ive got a 1987 chrome 325i which has a jetronic system.