E30 Zone

Been offered the above with 87k recorded miles along with full BMW
service history.Know this is a fairly difficult question but what would you expect to pay for one of these.

One just gone on ebay with all ancilleries and guess ecu etc...with similar milage, but can still be heard running starting price Ԛ£500...the vanos alone is an expensive item, and bits like alternator, starter etc cant be cheap

I got a good 2.8 bargain the other week

It had been pressurising the coolant and losing water, no overheating probs, the dealers told him to just keep topping it up and it would be ok for the time being. Ran it like this for 3000 miles before replacing with a known good engine. Anyway I bought this lump for Ԛ£100 knowing the problems and taken into account he showed me the full dealer service history. After id got it home and on the stand noticed the block had a 99 stamp on it unlike the heads 96 (same year as car) so the nikasil issue had obviously meant this engine had a replacement block at some time, noticed a nice trail of green scale down the inlet side of the block and had my fingers crossed it would be head gasket failure.

So stripped the head from the block, took it to be pressure tested and it passed!
Also had it re-faced after the good news

Nice cheap 2.8

Nice one Dan

EWS will be your new best friend!

Simon13 wrote:EWS will be your new best friend!

hhmmm.

old m20 lump, oil leaks with 170bhp 2.7 conversion(to much Ԛ£Ã”šÃ‚£Ãƒ”šÃ‚£) or pretty m52, with around 200 odd bhp out the box.

Put a BBTB and a Manifold conversion on one and your looking at 220-230 with an induction kit. Strong engines.

jonb wrote:

Simon13 wrote:EWS will be your new best friend!

hhmmm.

old m20 lump, oil leaks with 170bhp 2.7 conversion(to much Ԛ£Ã”šÃ‚£Ãƒ”šÃ‚£) or pretty m52, with around 200 odd bhp out the box.

Exactly

EWS is a piece of cake to get around really. Can also be a benefit

I wouldn't touch an M52 that's had a block swap, although for Ԛ£100 you cannot go wrong. The problem is that the liners raise up and then sink in the block and the head gasket goes, just like yours did.......

The best ones are the original Nikasil units that were properly run in. I've seen countless examples with well over 100k and still fine and using no oil. But as an engine it's a million times better than some iron block single cam boat anchor designed when Hitler was in power.

Liners? I thought they used a different type of coating on the bores?

Hi . could some one tell me pleae how folty VANOS effect engine ,?
oil consuption encreased?
misfire?

or it's just doesn't drive at all?

and how to find out wether it's VANOS playing up at all.

thanks

Maybe an ECU fault code would pop up? Not sure

Andy, ive had a look at the ally block today and like you say its got liners.
Im now thinking along the lines of scrap the ally block and build the 2.8 crank and rods into an M50B25 non vanos iron block ive got and bolt the now refurbished non vanos head back on.
No knock sensors on the non vanos though.

What do ya reckon?