E30 Zone

hi, im Sean, thought id share a few photo's with you guys of my ongoing project, I know it wont be to everyones taste, but it is well looked after for a track car.

got so many photo's that itl take me years to upload them all so heres a short summery

so the car started life as a 320i I then swapped the engine for a 3.5 m30 alpina lump and I am now currently in the middle of an sr20 coversion, enjoy

before the m30 was removed




full weld in cage



flocked dash



gaz coilovers and top mount, camber castor adjustable



interior



before sr20 coversion at pod



start of the swap, intercooler fitted



couldnt resist trying the wheels



how it stands at present still plenty to do, but getting there slowly

Nice, got any engine bay shots??

cheers, yeah heres a few

Nice a‘a

Tidy, but why SR when you could of put a 4.0 v8 in for similar monies?

I very much see your point, I have read your thread, car is awesome!

I did consider the m60/62 but I wanted a lighter engine to make the car more agile, and also with the 4 cylinder there is plenty of space in the engine bay for when repairs are required, also with this swap all the top bell housing bolts can be accessed easily from the top making gearbox changes easy....removing the cylinder head or the whole engine is a minimum effort job with this engine.....not that im hoping to have too many issues! lol but you will well know how much of a pounding a drift car takes!

yeah, the v8's are def heavy, hope the SR is reliable, dont push it too much and should be fine tho.

yeah reliability is what the v8 defininatly has over the sr, i hope its reliable too! lol

Nice car buddy, what is the size of those wheels?

cheers pal, which wheels? xxr's are 16" 8j all round, and the bbs rm's are 15" 9j rear 8.5 fronts

very nice indeed.

Great work!

Looking forward to maybe seeing this sideways at the pod this year?

Also what are you doing with the alpina lump? is it for sale?

certainly will be at pod again this year, was there a fair bit last year, had a great time. do you go?



the alpina engine I am keeping, going to give it a fresh rebuild then it can sit until a nice shell comes along. its taken some abuse over the years and been unbelievably reliable. I know if I sold it id regret it as they are rather rare to come by

man that will sound awesome on bodies! cant beat the engines they are fantastic, even if they are slightly on the heavy side a‘a

il take a look a˜„

This is ace - I love the colour, the wheels and the engine - brill!

Where did you buy the suspension stuff?

cheers mate yeah I like the malachite green

the coilovers I bought through corby motorsport, top guys that work there, really helpful, and eibach antiroll bars from demon tweeks

very nice car and with a good turbo engine, very similar to mine but i have a vauxhall c20let engine that i'm building.

that sounds awesome, you got any pics? or a build thread, sounds like an interesting conversion

It's come a long way mate!

christ ferg it looks bloody nice in that pic! what have I done! a˜³

iv killed it, iv killed it a˜­a˜­a˜­ lol, im a sucker for a clean e30

bmwsean wrote:
the alpina engine I am keeping, going to give it a fresh rebuild then it can sit until a nice shell comes along. its taken some abuse over the years and been unbelievably reliable. I know if I sold it id regret it as they are rather rare to come by

Im in the same boat, mine went up for sale but my hearts not in it to let it go, and like you id regret it epic engines!

If you do pull it apart try and grab some pics of the chambers in head, there meant to be Hemi style,
also the pistons are custom lightweight mahle type.

very interesting! iv had the inlet manifold off before, sat side bu side with a standard m30 and they are bigger, the valves are huge in comparison too...I only took it off to see if it was a genuine alpina as I had my doubts when I bought it for the costly figure of £200!

Lucky! i got mine cheap too but not that cheap, lol

Here's a thread when i stumbled across mine, few details in there of what Alpina did to it to get the power and how to tell if its genuine.

http://www.e30zone.net/modules.php?name ... 60&start=0

It was a 320i 4 door that I had up for sale for months, no takers at 750 so it was de-morseled and you had the rest. I made a grand and the car lives on. It would have been weighed if it weren't for you

Besides its a proper build so it's better now!

thats great cheers lee, had a good look at that, i will do an engine build thread when I start stripping it down and get some photo's up.

yeah suppose it was saved from the crusher!

I would have an SR over a V8 without a doubt!

SR is lighter, has potential for far more power (cheaper power too) and a much more agile car as a result.

GB69 wrote: hope the SR is reliable, dont push it too much and should be fine tho.

I thought the SR20 was good for 350+bhp without too much bother? I'm sure I've read that 400-500bhp isn't too much of a push.

very true, tuning potential is massive, iv

hks 555 injectors
z32 airmass
gizmo boost controller
front mount intercooler
360 degree thrust bearing
stage 2a map

should see a healthy and reliable 300bhp at 1bar of boost

its getting there, still abit to do but It will be running next week, for sure! been working on all the little bits like brackets etc, pipe clipping, all the wiring looms pretty much complete