E30 Zone

I will start of by introducing myself.
My name is Magnus and i live in Iceland.
I always loved the E30 m3 and last summer my and my uncle decided to buy one to restore it.
Unfortunatelly due to the crisis here it was not cost effective to import one so i had to make due with what was available here.
So i bought a 1988 Europameister.

Here is how it looked when i bought it:



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This car has been severy mistreated in the past.
There has been some bodywork done on it but by what i can only call cowboys. I say this because instead of fixing the problems they just covered them up as best as their litle talent allowed them.
If you need further explanation on who and whay you should avoid when it comes to repairs please contact me. All i can say is the people who did work on this car in regards to the bodywork should close their business and buy a boat....they ll be better off fishing cause thei sucked ass in bodywork. And for sure they never loved a BMW as they should have....
Proof is one of the pictures where they covered the problem area with a pice of metal and painted over.
But enough with these morons!!!!
The car has tons of rust but we knew this (or at least most of it) when the car was bought.
At the moment the car has been completelly stripped and work on the rust has started.
It will be put on a rotiserie this weekend (rig so we can turn it upside down.
Below are some random pictures to show the terrible state the car is.
I am lucky enough to get Steini (anyone who has been in the Kruiser club will know him) work on our car.
Anyone that knows him can tell you about his work.
I would also like to thank Sveinbjorn (Alpina) and Þordur(Onno) for all their advice and help so far.
I will be replacing all panels with new one (or at least the ones that are still available from the dealer).
It will then have a complete respray in the original colour.
The only additions i will add outside will be rear Evo Sport spoiler

front Evo spoiler (Contact me if you have any of these for sale.)

and possibly change the mirros (one of the two below)


Mechanically i will be rebuilding the engine to 2.5 spec most likely with mild modifications for some extra bhp....
Gearbox and diff will be rebuild accordingly.
We have not decided on the interior but i will definetly retrim door panels and center console (original coloured leather)
Most likely i will change the seats to possibly some Recaro CS or SR similar to the origina Evo Sport seats) or maybe some Bride seats retrimmed offcourse to match.

There will be some more changes (steering wheel, gauges, etc) but nothing decided yet. I will post though as we progress.
All subframes and drivetrain parts were cleaned today to be sand blasted and powder coateded or replaced if needed.
The plan is to keep everything original with the possibility of doing an S54 swap next year. All original parts will be kept and all modifications will be done so as to be able to put it back to the original state when needed.
We have not decided on wheels yet but it will for sure be 17 inch and staggered.
In any case here are some pictures with the progress so far.
I will try and update this thread as often as possible but if you have questions or something please contact me.
Ciao for now
pics

We cleaned the garage and decided to decorate a little!!!!!!











and silly moment of the week.....

Please excuse the picture quality as i forgot my camera and took the pics with my cell.
As it stands the body has been braced and on a jig.
All rust spots have been removed from the main frame and everything cleaned.
We have mounted the front arches and currently are mounding the cabrio reinforcements. We are missing the lower passenger side piece but i will have a company mirror it and fabricate it by hand.
We just got delivery of the roof skin, rear arches, front wings and the panel where the wipers mount.
We have also drilled out the welds so we can remove the rear quarter panels and replace them.
This will be done in stages (remove one part and replace it with new) so as to minimize the possibility of distortion on the body.
All parts are OEM from the dealer.Basically all but the doors, bonnet, sunroof and boot door will be replaced with new.
Unfortunately due to the amount of panels we have to prolong the timeline this will take so we have postponed a big order from VAC that we were about to place till hopefully closer in the summer.
The plan is to get a rolling chassis from the bodyshop that we can transport to our carage and continue the assembly ourselfs.
I will try and get more pics as frequently as i can *wave*

Front new arches are now in:











Had to get one of the cabrio reinforcement made by hand as its no longer available.



Next we need to weld or the reinforcements in.


Inner side valances are also in. Had to cut the rear arches to make sure the positioning is correct.







Also the new door hinges:



Here you see the new rear arches and fenders to be mounted soon:








Some more parts have also arrived!
New roof,New front fenders, New Sideskirts:

Front is more or less done. All that remains is to weld the cabrio reinforcements but we will do this once the car is on the ground to ensure optimum alignment. Do you guys think i should do it prior to that?

The driver side is 95% done too with the rear quarter panel and arch mounted.
Now working on the passenger side removing rust spots and prepping the area.
We have decided to paint the underside too instead of recovering in the original material. We think this will look nicer and will also make it easier to spot trouble areas in the future. Keep in mind that the car will most likely never see rain again.
Also the footwell rust on both sides have been repaired. You can see on a box part of the corroded metal we have removed.
Also in the pics you can see why i had to replace the wheel arches. It was more like cheese than metal with all the rust.
Once the passenger side is complete the rear panel (where the lights mount will be going on and then the roof. I estimate 3-4 weeks by the time all this are completed.
Then we can paint and start making it into a rolling chassis so that we can move it to our garage and start re-assembly.
Hopefully once the car is done this will be the most complete renovation of an E30 M3. So far no expense has been spared and i can tell you by the time its a rolling chassis the cost will be the same as if i had bought a very low mileage SE.
I am going to South Africa for a few weeks so i wont be able to update for a while.
Hopefully if time allows it i will be getting some special parts only available there!

This is the progress so far!

Looks like you're doing a proper job there!

this is AMAZING!!!

Welcome and well done

Shows what a shiny exterior can hide...

Hey Snooka, is that your car on the sig. ?
If so what mirrors are those?


And yes shiny on the outside does not mean good in the inside....just like pornstars.....all looks on the outside....HIV+ more on the inside! lol

MagnusKK wrote: And yes shiny on the outside does not mean good in the inside....just like pornstars.....all looks on the outside....HIV+ more on the inside! lol

You are going to fit in perfectly on this forum!

Great thread

Another one being saved. Heavy work you got there. Keep it up.

Nice work, really got a lot to do, there seems to be more rust on yours than on mine, which is a supprise, expecting a nice 5 figure bill from the garage for the rust repairs on mine.

Unless a zoner can weld to MOT standard and fancies a trip to my house for some welding work (cash paid of course along with lunch provided and plenty of tea and coffee).

MagnusKK can i move into your garage?? Im awful polite

Car looks great..... if you bought one in good nick you wouldnt off had half as much fun fixing it

Stunning work there!

m8782538 wrote:Nice work, really got a lot to do, there seems to be more rust on yours than on mine, which is a supprise, expecting a nice 5 figure bill from the garage for the rust repairs on mine.

Unless a zoner can weld to MOT standard and fancies a trip to my house for some welding work (cash paid of course along with lunch provided and plenty of tea and coffee).

I havent really checked what the cost is so far but with the price of the car, the panels i have bought and the welding etc i think i am so far close to 30K Euros.
By the time i finish i expect it to be at least double that. Then you have to add the cost of the S54 i am planning.....lol i would go on but i am getting depressed! lol

bab-91 wrote:MagnusKK can i move into your garage?? Im awful polite

Car looks great..... if you bought one in good nick you wouldnt off had half as much fun fixing it

There arent that many here and the two good ones are not for sale.
As far as i know in total including ours there are 4 or 5 here. And importing one would cost me about 30K Euros anyway and you never know what work that would need.
I figured i may as well do it once and do it properly! Time is no issue and as you said working on it is the best part!!!!

you certainly got your hands full there .

great progress ,you need a better camera though mate.

This week i managed to get the doors all apart and ready for sand blasting. Also took all brakes apart and suspension parts so they are blasted too. Started taking the engine ancilaries apart too.....here is a pic of how to start taking apart an engine that has been around the world a few times!!!!!


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Here is another pic of me having a smoke and wondering WTF have i done!!!!lol



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My friends have been trying to convince me to do a V10 conversion and although i would love to i think considering how rare Europameisters are i should keep it fairly original. At least with S54 or S50 i can do everything as plug and play so i can always go back to the original since i will rebuild the S14 and keep it!

Some trackday pics before the car was taken off the road!



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And this is close to what i hope to get it to look like when its done(notice the crap Photoshop skills???)....Except with more POWWWWAAAAAA!!!



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MagnusKK wrote:

m8782538 wrote:Nice work, really got a lot to do, there seems to be more rust on yours than on mine, which is a supprise, expecting a nice 5 figure bill from the garage for the rust repairs on mine.

Unless a zoner can weld to MOT standard and fancies a trip to my house for some welding work (cash paid of course along with lunch provided and plenty of tea and coffee).

I havent really checked what the cost is so far but with the price of the car, the panels i have bought and the welding etc i think i am so far close to 30K Euros.
By the time i finish i expect it to be at least double that. Then you have to add the cost of the S54 i am planning.....lol i would go on but i am getting depressed! lol

fantastic work going on there,
Have you used the bumper mounts to attach the body roller?

I had no idea this panel was available from the dealers if that's where you got it from ?

WOW that is one naked zimmer lol cant wait to see what she ends up like

Nice resto, Great work so far

keep those updates coming

keep up the good work.

Good luck with the rebuild fella,welcome..

AliE30 wrote:WOW that is one naked zimmer lol cant wait to see what she ends up like

Yes its a dealer piece. but only one side is available so i had the other one made by hand at a local shop.

Its part number 8 on the below :
http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts.do ... g=41&fg=10

e30topless wrote:fantastic work going on there,
Have you used the bumper mounts to attach the body roller?

I had no idea this panel was available from the dealers if that's where you got it from ?

Yes its a dealer piece. but only one side is available so i had the other one made by hand at a local shop.

Its part number 8 on the below and i installed it along pieces 9 and 18 :
http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts.do ... g=41&fg=10[/quote]

Hi all,
its been a while i posted since progress has been slow. Summertime is our busy time at work so the project has taken a back seat.
Today we started to soda blast the car. We decided to do this so that we can completely clean the underneath of all insulation material.
We managed to do quite a bit but had to stop cause one of the neighbours decided to call the police cause he got some dust on his car!!!
Instead of talking to me ( i would have paid for the cleaning cost no problem) he decided to call the police! But i guess that shows what kind of a guy he is.

Anyway as you can see from the pictures though this is giving a nice bare metal finish making the car ready to go for glass blasting before we paint it.
We are doing it like this so the car is both better rustproofed and smooth since we want the undercarriage to look just as good as the rest of the car.
Hopefully by next week we can complete this so we can take it to the glass beating!
Also as winter comes progress should be faster!!!!



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Great work man. I will be following this. Cant believe your neighbour called the police, That would pee me off

e30topless wrote:fantastic work going on there,
Have you used the bumper mounts to attach the body roller?

I had no idea this panel was available from the dealers if that's where you got it from ?

This is actually a convertible part, not an official M3 Coupe part.

and so it is Andrew, I have just seen the extra bits, this may cause issues when fitting the wings?

It shouldn't do if they are tailor fitted correctly as the convertibles have deeper sills.

Has anyone ever seen rusty 'jacking' points on a convertible?