E30 Zone

Right boys n girls i have an e30 cabriolet and just bought a rear ended e36 m3 i wanna put the m3 lump in the cab but have been told that the engine is chipped to the key so that once the transfer has been done the engine wont start.. pleaaaaaaaaaaaase help me cos i dont wanna change every thing over if im gonna have to put it all back..

is this because of the imoboliser or something,

The e36 is an n reg.. a year before the evolution came out..

MANY MANY THNAKS.

I have no idea on the technical side ... but there must be something that reads the chip in the key. Can that not be transferred over with the engine ... ie when you transfer the wiring loom etc. ???

G

Some guys have done this conversion on the zone already, and i am sure they will pop in to shed some light on this. From my (humble) understanding, the e36 users coded keys , so besides swapping over the engine you will to also need to swap over the ignition as well, the engine's "PC" wont start without the correct code from the key.

Ian332 and Buster are people who will know about this issue.

I think the electronic bits you need to transfer over can be done without much hassle. As you have the complete doner car you will be fine, it's the people who buy just the lump without all the transponder etc who get stuck.

Not a problem if you have the EWS box that matches the ECU, and have a key and its transponder unit.
If you don't have the key, then a new key can be coded in by BMW dealers, but apparently you will need to have an E36 instrument cluster as well (only hooked in, not fitted in place of the E30 ones), because the BMW computer will not complete the coding sequence if it can't see an instrument cluster.
Ian332 is the acknowledged expert on this subject.

If it's a 3.0L M3, then you may be lucky. In general, it was only the Evo (95 onwards) that got the EWS immobiliser system, but it was fitted to some very late 3.0L car's as well.

If you can let me have the last 7 digit's of the M3's VIN number I should be able to tell if it's fitted or not.

Even if you do have it fitted, it's not very hard to install into the E30 and get it running.

Ian.

Hi everyone,

Many thanks for all your feedback, needless to say i am COMPLETLEY lost haha with all the transponder and everything haha got a funny feeling its gonna take longer than first thought.

Ian yes its a 3.0l motor on an n reg i belive a year before the evo came out, so i BELIVE its a 94 car.

again many thanks to everyone and once the transfer is finished and if i run into any problems i hope you all dont mind if i come crying asking for help

What's the ECU management software like on these? I know in some ECU's you can disable the immobiliser so I wonder if that's an option on these.

As engine swaps go it's not too bad but there are a million little problems that you'll need to get around.

Main ones being preventing the plenum fouling master cylinder and getting exhaust manifold modded to fit around the arb and steering column. Also finding brakes large enough so you don't splat yourself the second you take it out!

By now its basically a matter of scouring forums and picking peoples brains (such as Ian and Buster) rather than the expensive proccess of buying bits and trying stuff. Pioneers like the aforementioned sucked up these development costs for us... Cheers guys!


Good luck.

Jai

WOW i have a story for you,

well it turns out that the rear ended m3 i bought was actuly a m3 gt individual 1 of only 50 made. pretty much a standerd m3 but with evo throttle bodies on it unrestricted as standerd and a top end of 172mph..

so insted of keeping it and making my e30 the king of all e30's i thought id sell it haha (for double the price i bought it for) also sold the cab and looking to buy an already mint 325i cab..

i like my cars slightly diffrent so not sure what to do to the lump.. cosworth conversion.. or turbo conversion.. any ideas guys n girls..

i want pure filthy dirty power thTS going to be friendly yo my pocket..

If I knew of a way to get pure power on the cheap I'd be selling it on to you right now ;)
But if you want to do something a bit different you could get the engine out of a skyline or a supra and build a ricebimmer?

I DID THINK ABOUT A SKYLINE LUMP BUT WAS THEN TOLD THAT IF I WANTED TO PUT THAT LUMP INIT I WOULD HAVE TO BUY THE WHOLE CAR COS I WOULD NEED TO TRANSFER OVER THE WIREING LOOM ETC ETC..
IS THIS T R UUUUUUUUUUUUUUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE..

why not drop in an SR20DET ? at least its a familiar engine and you know what where and how to tune it

M20 can take a fair bit of boost even in std form though, and it keep the whole projetc a little simpler, always a good thing Imho

oh, and you caps lock is ON dude

ops didnt mean to shout

right this is prob gonna sound really dense..

whats a sr20det lump.. im sort of guessing its a 2.0ltr lol..

nissan 200sx lump from an S14/a 4 cyl 2 litre 16V turbo,

turbo the M20, its easier

Supra engine Not sure which one E30beemerlad can tell you more

SORRY EVERYONE think im turning E36 check this out

http://images.google.co.uk/imgres?imgur ... D%26sa%3DN

Ant wrote:nissan 200sx lump from an S14/a 4 cyl 2 litre 16V turbo,

turbo the M20, its easier

And my mate now has one for sale.... its not perfect but it runs. We took it out on wednesday to replace it last night with a completely rebuilt and reworked engine.

Let me know if your interested.