E30 Zone

On the hunt around a few scrap yards a few weeks ago, i came across a 320 SE 2 door in alpine white that had been broken in to was sold to the scrapper due to the age and everything else. The owner of the scrap yard said that i was the third person asking about it. The first was a garage that wanted to fix it up and the second wanted to turn it into a drift car. I said i wanted it and a day later we did a deal. Might have paid a little too much but the deal was done never the less.

The car has a 110k on the clock and MOT till August, from what i could see it need the passenger arch, passenger scuttle repair and a steering column. Any way, here are some pics:







Started to strip it down for my mate Alex to do some welding:




The passenger side was rotten, but i noticed some rust bits in the boot on the drivers side of the boot well and investigated more and this is what i found:




The inner arch had rotted away and a new one is needed!!!

Work got started yesterday:



The scuttle and the passenger srch had been previously repaired.....badly so time to sort it out.

While Alex was sorting out the arch i was taking the front wing off, which surprise surprise is rotten at bottom. Some pics of me fixing the steering column:



The donar:



Alex's welder wasnt working yesterday so we called it a day and he came back today with a different welder and we got the arch done:



The patch that needs putting in:



Alex had to go at 3 as he was watching the Manchester Sh*tty match but the arch was done and i finished off we some rust proof primer:



Will keep you posted.

You're a brave man to rescue that. Looks like quite an offputting amount of rust.

Good going but again, a brave man indeed!

How much did you part with for it?

Are you gathering a large fleet.

Those crazy welderzz

99% of folk here - me included - would have broken that up and weighed it in. Nice to see something saved .

I fragged a car earlier this year that was waaaay better condition than that!

Speedtouch wrote:You're a brave man to rescue that. Looks like quite an offputting amount of rust.

It depends on how you see as off putting or as a challenge.

Jim320i wrote:Good going but again, a brave man indeed!

How much did you part with for it?

Cheers, i paid a little over the odds and the way people are talking on here looks like i should be fragging it!!!

Rav335uk wrote:Are you gathering a large fleet.

LOL, just a little!!

DanThe wrote:Those crazy welderzz

Andyboy wrote:99% of folk here - me included - would have broken that up and weighed it in. Nice to see something saved .

For me anything can be saved but it has to be like the red one for me to frag it. If i did it as a business or to make money then i would do but to me, its the outcome of it and seeing another E30 on the road.

Duke137 wrote:I fragged a car earlier this year that was waaaay better condition than that!

Thats nice, again your choice but still not here to frag but to restore.

l16ydl wrote:

Duke137 wrote:I fragged a car earlier this year that was waaaay better condition than that!

Thats nice, again your choice but still not here to frag but to restore.

hat off to you for restoring that car and setting about it, more should be restored

Good luck, look forward to the updates.

polsta wrote:

l16ydl wrote:

Duke137 wrote:I fragged a car earlier this year that was waaaay better condition than that!

Thats nice, again your choice but still not here to frag but to restore.

hat off to you for restoring that car and setting about it, more should be restored

I take my hat off to you, you are brave!

Polsta, you can't save them all though it is with regret that the budget/time does not allow and if anybody wanted to give me over a grand for a partially stripped E30 with no tax or MOT I would have taken it but they didn't and that is what it made in frag, not including the bits I binned

"more should be restored" is such an empty statement, in this world money talks.

At the OP, how many have you got now are they all finished or partially done etc? It is great to see them saved!

polsta wrote:

l16ydl wrote:

Duke137 wrote:I fragged a car earlier this year that was waaaay better condition than that!

Thats nice, again your choice but still not here to frag but to restore.

hat off to you for restoring that car and setting about it, more should be restored

Cheers, i'm hoping it to be done for just before or after Xmas.

oomz1975 wrote:Good luck, look forward to the updates.

Cheers

Duke137 wrote:

polsta wrote:

l16ydl wrote: Thats nice, again your choice but still not here to frag but to restore.

hat off to you for restoring that car and setting about it, more should be restored

I take my hat off to you, you are brave!

Polsta, you can't save them all though it is with regret that the budget/time does not allow and if anybody wanted to give me over a grand for a partially stripped E30 with no tax or MOT I would have taken it but they didn't and that is what it made in frag, not including the bits I binned

"more should be restored" is such an empty statement, in this world money talks.

At the OP, how many have you got now are they all finished or partially done etc? It is great to see them saved!

Cheers, i know you cant save them all but some that can be saved.

LOL, i've got 4 on the go. 2 cabs and 2 saloons, the 2 cabs are no way near to being finished and the saloons are at my unit so i plan to get them done within now and New Year.

Glad your all finding this interesting.

Why not record the progress on all of them and put it on here...

Duke137 wrote:

polsta wrote:

l16ydl wrote: Thats nice, again your choice but still not here to frag but to restore.

hat off to you for restoring that car and setting about it, more should be restored

I take my hat off to you, you are brave!

Polsta, you can't save them all though it is with regret that the budget/time does not allow and if anybody wanted to give me over a grand for a partially stripped E30 with no tax or MOT I would have taken it but they didn't and that is what it made in frag, not including the bits I binned

"more should be restored" is such an empty statement, in this world money talks.

At the OP, how many have you got now are they all finished or partially done etc? It is great to see them saved!

we all know that duke, most of us will think its brave to carry all that out to a 320i se, but still, with the part selling and frag culture on here, a lot that shouldnt get broke do end up that way, the ones people buy to frag, but more so the threads where people have half decent looking cars that are or could easily be mot`d and kept on the road, that they ask "anyone want to buy it/whats it worth, or im thinking of breaking it" .. the sort of cars that could very very easily be sold for 700, driven for a few years as is leaving the slightly rusty bits, then sold for 500, driven for a year, sold for 350 and driven with 6 months mot as a cheap get you around for a bit car, before being a £200 shed mot fail that then could be broke/scrapped, sort of passed down the used car chain , where as these e30s sort of get to that stage of being the £700 car, then broke to make more money than letting it pass down the chain and driven, we know money talks and in that sense you cant kind of argue with it, but still, them cars could be driven around for a few years, but money does talk, it keeps other cars in parts and culls the shitters out there making the nicer ones and even e30s in general rarer to see with each year that passes

Weekend past and me and Alex set up the temporary workshop again. We got to work on the patch of rot under the passenger rear window:



Took a little giggling and lining up but its a good job in my opinion.:



We then moved on to the the scuttle so i had to take the windscreen out and seen this:



When we finished on this side we moved on the driver's side rear inner arch. While Alex was working on that i found this:



This side of the scuttle i thought was fine until Alex had a poke and noticed it was abit bouncy. It was silicone with a cling filmed backing. Quite artistic, yet very annoying!!!

So i took off the wing and Alex carried on with the rear arch:



In taking the wing off, the wing is goosed and so is the front scuttle. Not a biggy i said and then seen this:



Alex had a look and i said it shouldnt be a hard job, just need some sheet steel which i will have next week.

After finding all of the rust, its apparent that all the work needed is all because of previous botch repairs. Anyway, its all getting sorted so more updates next week.

Bold, brave work there.

How much does your mate charge for this kind of work? He is pretty skilled to be fair

Nice work.

Speedtouch wrote:Bold, brave work there.

Cheers, I dont see it as being brave, more adventurous.

Duke137 wrote:How much does your mate charge for this kind of work? He is pretty skilled to be fair

He normally charges people £75 a day which is not bad considering i have him here from 9 till 6. Still have to find him tho!!

redcar wrote:Nice work.

Cheers, glad your liking it!!

l16ydl wrote:

Duke137 wrote:How much does your mate charge for this kind of work? He is pretty skilled to be fair

He normally charges people £75 a day which is not bad considering i have him here from 9 till 6. Still have to find him tho!!

Interesting stuff, what is classed as achievable in a day? EG how many days have you paid him so far for upto the last batch of photos?

My friends in Bejing are confused and so am I !

Duke137 wrote:

l16ydl wrote:

Duke137 wrote:How much does your mate charge for this kind of work? He is pretty skilled to be fair

He normally charges people £75 a day which is not bad considering i have him here from 9 till 6. Still have to find him tho!!

Interesting stuff, what is classed as achievable in a day? EG how many days have you paid him so far for upto the last batch of photos?

He's done 2 and a half days work which he's got the passenger inner and outer arch completed, passenger rear window line completed, passenger side scuttle completed and the driver's side inner and outer arch cut out.

pacerpete wrote:My friends in Bejing are confused and so am I !

I dont understand this whole Chinese thing??!! I wanted to put something about this as i'm lost with it all.

l16ydl wrote:He's done 2 and a half days work which he's got the passenger inner and outer arch completed, passenger rear window line completed, passenger side scuttle completed and the driver's side inner and outer arch cut out.

That seems good value to me! No wonder you like to save these cars.

l16ydl wrote:

pacerpete wrote:My friends in Bejing are confused and so am I !

I dont understand this whole Chinese thing??!! I wanted to put something about this as i'm lost with it all.

It just means most of these rotted cars (especially 4 doors in Pacer's eyes) are only good for recycling so the Chinese can turn the metal into cheap value toasters etc...

Hats off to you guys - good work being done there.

Makes me feel bad for fragging my 320i with no rust issues now

On that note, if you do come for the wings you are more than welcome to hack any further repair patches that you may need off my car!!

Very nice work!

Where did you get the rear outer arch from? Also was the inner just fabricated from sheet metal?

Cheers

i priced rear inner arch on tuesday and got 90 pound each from dealers

Jim78 wrote:Hats off to you guys - good work being done there.

Makes me feel bad for fragging my 320i with no rust issues now

On that note, if you do come for the wings you are more than welcome to hack any further repair patches that you may need off my car!!

I dont know why you are James, still can always put it back on the road.

I'll let you know when im up, will try and get up on sunday but will call you and arrange it with you.

Andeep wrote:Very nice work!

Where did you get the rear outer arch from? Also was the inner just fabricated from sheet metal?

Cheers

Cheers, i get the arches from Euro Car Parts at trade. Cost me £40 each side i think, there or there abouts. One of the guys on here works for Euro so get in touch with him about costs.

bigredbmw wrote:i priced rear inner arch on tuesday and got 90 pound each from dealers

The inner arches was £68 inc VAT each and then £7.50 for P+P from http://www.bmminiparts.com. The guy who runs it (Toby), he's got a E30 M3 which he's restoring.

Lloyd, it doesn't seem that you are doing any work , only taking pics

Rav335uk wrote:Lloyd, it doesn't seem that you are doing any work , only taking pics

I am doing work!! Cheeky, supervising and making brews are a very important job!!!

Nice work. where are you based?

l16ydl wrote:

Jim78 wrote:Hats off to you guys - good work being done there.

Makes me feel bad for fragging my 320i with no rust issues now

On that note, if you do come for the wings you are more than welcome to hack any further repair patches that you may need off my car!!

I dont know why you are James, still can always put it back on the road.

I'll let you know when im up, will try and get up on sunday but will call you and arrange it with you.

Andeep wrote:Very nice work!

Where did you get the rear outer arch from? Also was the inner just fabricated from sheet metal?

Cheers

Cheers, i get the arches from Euro Car Parts at trade. Cost me £40 each side i think, there or there abouts. One of the guys on here works for Euro so get in touch with him about costs.

bigredbmw wrote:i priced rear inner arch on tuesday and got 90 pound each from dealers

The inner arches was £68 inc VAT each and then £7.50 for P+P from http://www.bmminiparts.com. The guy who runs it (Toby), he's got a E30 M3 which he's restoring.

...purely financial reasons and time limits - please don't make me feel any more guilty!! Sunday should be fine btw.

James.

Good work. Go on with the cutting and welding..

paps78 wrote:Nice work. where are you based?

Cheers, based in Manchester.

Jim78 wrote:...purely financial reasons and time limits - please don't make me feel any more guilty!! Sunday should be fine btw.

James.

Fair enough, did you get my message?

G-Bear wrote:Good work. Go on with the cutting and welding..

Cheers

Update time, yesterday me and Alex said we should get quite abit done today but it was not to be. Day started off well with Alex cutting out the inner arch and getting it all lined up:



Inner arch lined up:



As i went off to get some lunch, Alex was baffled at why the outer arch wouldnt line up with the inner arch and when i got back i discovered that the outer arch i had was for a Touring, major DOH, but we left it and then moved on to the scuttle:



We left it as that so next weekend we can finish off the arch and start the driver's footwell.

As i am on role, i might as well update this one too as its close to getting finished. As i drove the car into the unit, i knocked the front end against Alex's Landrover which set the day up nicely!!



Well after that weekend, i got another arch and tried it up against the inner arch and it still wouldnt fit. It quickly dawned on us that when Alex welded the inner arch in that he might have not put it in right. So he cut out the welds and we was right, so he re-fitted it and started working on cutting the outer arch.








Once that was done, he started to work on the scuttle panel on the passenger side which turned out better than the driver's side:






When Alex was working on the driver's side rear arch, he noticed the rear lower panel where the towing eye is was rotten so we got to work on that:






Once all that was done i got work filling the the arches and scuttle so i could get them painted:







I got so far until i got distracted with other projects and it was sat outside my unit for the past 6 months until i sent it down to the paintshop. I got it back last week, still need to put it back together so will get some pics of the car with the new fresh paint.