another s50 the easy way round !

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yetti24
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Wed Aug 12, 2009 12:18 am

hi all well where do i start ,
thanks to lots of people on the zone who have posted things that i have used or copied , and thanks to my dad he may be old but he still knows more than me sometimes ,
well it all started when i sold my m3 evo 2 after spending 2 years restoring it , i got bored and fancied a project , i bought a 320i shell with an m3 bodykit , and bought an old sport for £650 which the guys i bought it from had cut it up to make a drag car , the reason i bought it was the engine a 3.5 alpina b7s turbo lump , anyway within a month an e30 m3 came up on ebay which i gave 3k for here is the car and the engine
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as you can see the m3 is basically a shell, got it back from silverstone after 2 trips , once with my towing frame (didnt realise the car had no driveshafts and the hubs were not on properly ) it was all over the place so i turned round after 100 yards and went home to get a trailer , got it back had a look round , a bit of rust in the scuttle nothing unusual , the poor car had been taken from germany into norway then stripped for all it was worth they had taken the engine , gearbox , diff prop , driveshafts , interior calipers , rad , fan , cluster , obc , fuel pump , and along the way just cut everything out i.e c101 , fuel pipes the lot :x
i was thinking or restoring it but it just wasnt worth it so i sold the 320i with m3 kit and started fitting the alpina lump , after about a month of trying to get the engine to sit low enough , i realised it wasnt going to work without either having a massively modified bonnet , i tried lowering the subframe but i was not happy with it
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just as luck would have it an s50 b30 lump came up on ebay , i managed to get for 2k , the bonus was it had already been fitted to an e30 but the guy had crashed the car , i believe he used the zone when he did the conversion , so i got the engine , 6 speed evo box , scorpion exhaust , rad , smashed oil cooler , pretty much all i needed , so i sold the alpina lump leaving the s50 only owing me a few hundred quid , fitting it in was the easy bit everything lined up ok ,
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then came wiring it up , i had to rewire another c101 into the e30 loom as it had been hacked off , and i pretty much ended up rewiring the s50 loom as the e30 has an oil temp gauge , and some the wiring that had been done was not that great , after a week or so of wiring out in the cold ( knocked the garage down to bulid it bigger and was winter !) got another oil cooler bought an fuel pump high pressure one from ebay , put new fuel pipes to the pump , more rewiring from the internal tank pump through the car and to the cluster as nothing worked , connected the ecus turned the key , it turned over and over but wouldnt fire , checked fuel all ok after an hour or two noticed an earth by the diagnostic plug ( i bet everyone who has done an s50 conversion has forgot to bolt it up ) connected it to the body , turned it over and she fired !!!! yes made my year that did , i did have loads more photos of the conversion but i lost a load when my laptop decided to expire :x , next was to mount the radiator and oil cooler , chopped the original piece out where bottom of the radiator is and welded a bar section in slightly higher and thinner so the oil cooler could mount directly under the rad and get decent airflow to the oil cooler and rad , then i bought a pacet 14 inch front mounted electric fan , i wired it through the original e30 m3 loom as the m3 has the electric fan wiring , just used the single speed on one relay , took the blanking cap out of the s50 rad and got a temp switch from a 7 series ,
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again trouble with electrics , no power to the fuse which powers the fan wiring had to move the wire in the fuse box to 25 i think it was , a spare ,that sorted it fan kicking in just after half way , next i moved onto renewing all the bushes 200 odd quid later the poly bushes turned up , fitted them and a set of brand new e30 m3 front struts with bilstein shocks that i bought from bmw about 10 years ago when you could actually still get bits for an e30 m3 ! , repainted the whole underneath of the car fitted the prop with new centre mount as the e30 m3 uses the older style and the prop i got with the engine had the later type , i used a 325i sport diff (untill i can get an e30 m3 one) fitted that all up and the exhaust , then had to take the manifold off for what i think was about the tenth time because it was hitting the anti roll bar , reshaped it slightly and shaved a very small bit off the anti roll bar sorted ,

got some front calipers from ebay £26 bargain , then got the rears from joe aversracers@hotmail.co.uk who i also got an original e30 m3 black leather interior from and is sending me an e30 m3 diff , hes got loads of stuff lying around and is reasonable on his prices
next the dreaded servo master cylinder combo !
the plenum had already been cut thank you , first i tried a mk1 polo servo with a renault clio master cylinder , that just kept the fronts locked so you couldnt turn the wheels and the rears didnt work , so joe advised me to use a plastic winged clio servo and an audi master cylinder anything from 94-99 i used one from a 96 audi a4 2.6 and it works a treat just as good as the original set up if not better ,and used a mk3 golf resovoir it fits nicely and takes the bmw cap with sensor Image
moved on to the fitting a braided clutch hose and bleeding the clutch , fitted the hose bled the clutch with an easy bleed kit using low pressure , nothing ! ,treied the old way , roped in some help to pump while i close the nipple , still nothing , took the master cylinder out and half of it was missing and lots of fluid in the bell housing , ( thought there wasnt much fluid coming through the nipple ) anyway this meant taking the gearbox off and that means taking the engine out as some off the bolts are not accessable , so i ended up dropping the whole front subframe and lifting the body up , cleaned it all up put it all back together , new master cylinder fitted bled it twice and it was fine , then the brakes started playing up when i moved back abs pump failed lucky i had spare one i got from the scrapyard , most things sorted so its off to the welders to have the new scuttle welded in thanks to cotswold bmw for that and zimmerbimmer1 , got it back after a couple of days thanks to dws in hedge end southampton , then off to the paint shop after another 2 weeks waiting for the painter to fit me in , heres a couple of pics on the way and in the paint shop
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that bonnets not going on the car by the way just thought i would see how it looks with vents it was a spare i had , i will add some more in the next couple of days (the car is finished now ) but my fingers hurt from writing , sorry about the long post still got plenty to tell though
Last edited by yetti24 on Thu Aug 13, 2009 9:34 am, edited 1 time in total.
leeparkes
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Wed Aug 12, 2009 12:36 am

Excellent write up,well worth the read!

All updates are welcome :cool:
Cypriotgeeza wrote:I done both my mates in my old 318is
felt so proud,even tried it with a E30 325i and got put in my place.. :o:
yetti24
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Wed Aug 12, 2009 8:58 am

thanks i am trying to remember everything i did over the past 8 months i will write some more tomorrow
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buster
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Wed Aug 12, 2009 9:53 am

Good write up yetti. When i changed my gearbox i managed to do it with everything in place,just used loads of long extesions over the top of the box.I also changed the slave cylinder and found it quite difficult to bleed also.
I love the m3 body shape, i just wish i could have done my conversion into one
UweM3
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Wed Aug 12, 2009 11:12 am

yetti24 wrote:thanks i am trying to remember everything i did over the past 8 months i will write some more tomorrow
I am in the process of doing same swap and it always amazes me how qick one can read through an 8 month journey in just a few lines. A write up never reflects the amount of work involved.
Well done to get it all running, hope I am there soon as well.
yetti24
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Wed Aug 12, 2009 8:13 pm

back to it
while the car was at the paint shop found a nice set of wheels on ebay , did have a set of 18 inch breyton magics to go the car , but i didnt think they looked right and they were off an e36 evo i had (didnt like that car it was a convertible not a nice drive ) but that would meant using big spacers and i found in the past it does the inside of your tyres no good , so i saw a set of 18 inch bbs originaly off an 8 series which are the right pattern and offset , they were in germany and managed to get them for £700 , they turned up nice and quickly , took them to to the wheel specialist in whitely £500 later and had wheels like new with very shiny rims , then tyres cost me £300 so the wheels set me in at £1500 , alot of money i know but i think they look right on the car , started trawling the scrapyards for more parts , interior bits and other parts , my local scrapyard who i know (dase engineering in bishops waltham ) have about 4 e30s i must have stripped them all nearly to shells and the bloke who runs the place was rubbing his hands everytime i turned up ! ( i wish i had just bought an old 2 door e30 for parts it would have been alot easier ). i also sent the rocker cover and plenum chamber off to be polished , the paint man promised me 4 weeks to the car , anyway 6 weeks later i got it back , i always find its best not to hassle painters otherwise they bodge it , i was champing at the bit by the time i got it back , here are pics of the parts i was collecting from the paint shop as he did some bits first before the main shell

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got the plenum and the rocker cover back and started to fit it all on
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replaced all the brake flexi hoses with braided ones , moved the clutch reservoir next to power steering reservoir , bolts nicely on the same mount with a small mod , just to say i decided to use the original e30 m3 expansion bottle and run the pipe around the back of of the head , i am glad i did this as you will see a later mod i have done involving a carbon plenum , had to move the oil cooler forward as the pipes were rubbing the power steering pulley , i also cut the rubber tube down that comes out of the plenum to the maf so the k and n filter fits better , got the guys i know round to fit the front and rear windscreen in , went to bmw to get the trim that goes around the rear wiindscreen and to see about windsreen rubbers, guess what discontinued , so the guys used a ford sieera rubber for the front and ford fiesta for the rear , not ideal i know but looks spot on , started fitting all the panels back on , doors , bumpers wings so on , then i thought i would tackle the central locking ,electric windows ,and electric sunroof , this must have a very low spec m3 when it was bought from new , no electrics at all and no central locking the only thing it had was electric mirrors , oh well i thought it shouldnt be to bad to do , how wrong i was :-x had a week off work so thought i would get loads done as the other half was working , 4 days of working from 730am to midnight on it the electrics all worked , had to use looms from a rhd 320i and convert them to work the mirrors on the right side , trying to wire it all in and get everything working correctly was an absolute nightmare and the hardest part of the project :eek: , with that solved fitted the wheels , evo 2 front spoiler and air ducts , dyed the carpets black to match the seats , re fitted the dash and cluster , then the heater panel , seats and centre counsols ,
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then had to replace the steering column , been damaged by the previous butchers , i dont know why though , started tidying the wiring up copied busters and used the 4 cylinder cover by the bulk head , works a treat that mod , used an undertray from a 318i touring as it covers the front of the sump adding a little bit of protection from speed bumps , i have got a nice sheet of alloy and some metal which i will make a decent sump guard out of at some point ,
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then fitted the ecu and vanos control unit into the glovebox , i used the original cover from an e30 but just it down so both ecus go in and are covered by it
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fitted all the lights everything working apart from the reverse lights , thanks to ian for helping me sort that problem , ordered and fitted under dash trim and cover , got them from bmw as lhd bits are hard to get hold of over here , changed the dials over for some horrible white ones to pass the mot (mine was in kmh ) and had to also fit side repeaters for the mot which meant cutting holes in the wings and more wiring , i measured about 10 times when cutting the wings , its one of those jobs if you dont it means new wings :( , anyway all looks good ,
yetti24
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Wed Aug 12, 2009 9:09 pm

put some 40mm springs in to make the car sit a bit lower
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then thought i would take it for a little spin to see how everything is
a couple of niggles , the plenum chamber touches the brake servo under load and going round bends :x , and a knocking coming from the back by the diff , this turned out to be the balancing plate on the propshaft touching the bottom of the fuel tank ( definatly needs sorting or i will have a fireball on my hands ) a bit of adjustment and it was sorted , couldnt do anything with the plenum , went for its mot the next day , failed on n/s handbrake not working ( my fault didnt even adjust the shoes when i fitted them ) ! , front wheels just touching the caliper springs , how i didnt notice that i do not know , and a small hole by the fuel pump , got it home sorted the handbrake and the spacers for the front wheels ( what was i saying about the wheels going straight on without spacers !) only used 3mm spacers so thats ok , typical the mot man is away on holiday for a week , got the welding booked in as i cant weld very well , so got to thinking about the plenum as i had nothing else to do , hey presto looking on ebay again ! and there was someone selling a carbon fibre plenum for an s50 , no pictures and not much of desciption , sod it i thought i would take a chance , i saw buster had a go with one , so i thought i would have a go , 2 days and £300 later a big box turned up , when i looked inside i thought bargain , got the plenum 2 alloy tubes with a maf fitted in one , spare k and n filter , silicone hoses on the trumpets and throttle cable positioner mounted on the top of the plenum
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spent a whole day fitting it but it wasnt to bad in the end, first thing was to modify the trumpets , i used original s50 plastic trumpets and cut them right down , then cut the silicone hoses right down and had to angle cut them so the plenum would sit level , screwed all that up with jubilee clips , had to move the dip stick so it sits by the power steering reservoir, made a little plate to hold it steady from the lower mounts of the original plenum , there is no room to fit the maf , so i tried to fit that just inside the carbon plenum that did not work , the car didnt seem to want to run properly , so i shortened the maf slightly , cut a hole in the plastic headlamp panel , so it will get cold air straight from the front of the car , and mounted a k and n panel filter just behind the headlights as so not to suck up any dust or water ,had to change the throttle cable positioner as the e36 s50 one sat in the wrong place , it was ok with 325i throttle cable i had , but i changed that for an e30 m3 one as its shorter and fits better, lovely it clears the brake servo ( no more knocking ) and it sounds lovely when you rev it hard , i am not 100 percent happy with the trumpets , i think i will look to get some made up out of alloy but it runs nice

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thats pretty much it for the moment went back in for its mot today 12/08/2009 and it passed so went straight to dvla with all my paperwork to get it re registered didnt have any proper foreign documents fot the car just a letter from bmw to say when it was built , and all dvla want to do is a quick 15min check just to check the chassis and engine number , bonus :D
so got that next wednesday and they said i should have the docs back with a uk reg the following monday , here are some pictures i took today , gotta get some some original mirrors !

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DanThe
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Wed Aug 12, 2009 9:27 pm

Looks very nice 8)

Hope you managed to squeeze a decent air filter in there though! :D
UweM3
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Wed Aug 12, 2009 9:40 pm

looking good! I just can't fall in love with a polished rocker cover, sorry.
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Wed Aug 12, 2009 9:42 pm

Nice project, its polished up great!!!

:cool:
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You should never underestimate the predictability of stupidity

M42 Supercharged 285bhp + M3 6speed box
yetti24
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Wed Aug 12, 2009 9:56 pm

i know the polished rocker cover isnt for everyone but i quite like it , but it means more work keeping it clean
yetti24
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Wed Aug 12, 2009 10:01 pm

i am going to take all the seats out tomorrow and clean dye them they are a bit tired, plus the whole car needs a good valet and the paint is still a bit orange peely in places so got a friend coming round whos a valeter to give it a good going over , then hope to get it out to a few meets once its registered
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buster
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Thu Aug 13, 2009 9:39 am

it looks like you've got the same plenum as the one i bought.
Just an idea , take the maf sensor out of the body and drill a hole in the plenum right near where the opening is.It'll need a re-map but should work and will shorten the whole assembley.
How does it run ? I noticed the standard trumpets are different lengths (no sure if they are on the 3ltr ) and angled differently inside ,where as the carbon one isn't it has no bellmouths inside at all.Im concerned this will cause horsepower loss hence why i took it off.
Any thoughts guys?
yetti24
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Thu Aug 13, 2009 9:54 am

just got another maf through the post so i am going to mount it in a very short piece of alloy tube shortening the assembley so i can get a cone filter on there , on the carbon plenum i have the trumpets seem smaller than the standard s50 ones , the trumpets on the 3ltr are slightly different lengths , i had to make the silicone hose trumpets slightly different lengths as well, the trouble with fitting the plenum on my car is thats as long as i can have the trumpets without moving the brake servo , the car runs fine and doesnt seem any less powerful than with standard plenum , but when its registered i will be able to take it for a decent run and find out properly , the other idea i am playing with is moving the abs unit and using the 90 degree ally tube to angle down where the abs unit currently sits
rix313
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Thu Aug 13, 2009 11:08 am

:clap: Fantastic
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eraserr
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Thu Aug 13, 2009 12:28 pm

Congratulations on a really nice build. Can you please tell me what size of wheels and tires are those? Thanks.
yetti24
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Thu Aug 13, 2009 12:46 pm

hi the wheels are 8x18 fronts and 9x18 rears , they came on some 8 series and 5series , i think they were an optional extra at the time but someone else might be able to confirm this , i think still have the name of the guy in germany who i got them off he seems to source lots of bits i.e wheels and other parts for e30 m3s and other bmws , some stuff is cheap from him some is not
yetti24
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Sat Aug 22, 2009 7:58 pm

just to update , passed the dvla inspection . they only wanted to check the chassis and engine number , not bad considering i did not have any registration docs from abroad just a few papers and just a letter from bmw stating when the car was manufactured , and got the registration number and tax disc just 3 days later , very quick for the dvla i thought , all the seats dyed and looking better , just glad i can actually drive it legally now !
Eddie25
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Sat Aug 22, 2009 8:10 pm

:eek: Epic!

Fantastic job.
yetti24
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Sat Aug 22, 2009 9:19 pm

took it for a bit of run this evening , ticking noise coming from one the ecus in the glovebox , will need more investigation , and a not so good whine coming from gearbox when the car warmed up a bit , i changed the gearbox oil before i ran it and used castrol atf fluid , was this right ? what do other people use ? any ideas on the ticking from one of the ecus anyone ?apart from that the car feels good , nice and tight on the road
yetti24
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Sat Aug 22, 2009 9:29 pm

also the rev counter goes a bit haywire , it goes well over the 8000 mark and bounces back to nothing and all over the shop when its in the high rev range ( do i need to change the white chip ) or could it be something electrical ? any help is very welcome
Jon_Bmw
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Sun Aug 23, 2009 12:41 pm

Looks a great project. Yeah the wheels are called style 5s by BMW on their parts catalogue. The nice 9J ones are found on the 8 series and possibly an option on the 5 series, although I did think they only got the option of 8J ones.

Where abouts in Soton are you? I'd love to come and see it one day/have a pax ride in it. :)
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Sun Aug 23, 2009 4:02 pm

All I can say is Wow. This need's to go into zone gold I think.
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Sun Aug 23, 2009 8:30 pm

Zone gold! :D
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Thu Sep 24, 2009 9:29 pm

8O
yetti24
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Thu Sep 24, 2009 11:18 pm

just to update on things , got hold of a 5 speed gearbox as the bearings are shot in my 6 speed , also had to buy an e36 328i propshaft as the 6 speed box is longer , also a gear linkage as my 6 speed linkage was shortened ,
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put it all together went to drive it and the clutch pedal went to the floor , where i had put the master cylinder back in the plunger missed the actuater plate , so took it out lined it up and the clutch worked :D , no wines or rattles from the gearbox ,
also replaced the 325i sport diff with an e30 m3 unit , now the car does not rev at at 4000rpm at 65 mph on the motorway :D
took it to my friends work to wet and dry the paint work and polish it to give it a better finish

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also i have been playing around with my carbon plenum , tried mounting the maf at the bottom of the plenum where the air comes in , but the car will not run like this , so i have reverted to original alloy plenum until i can move my abs unit to give enough room for me to use an alloy tube to go through where the abs unit sits and mount the air filter behind the n/s brake duct
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it all seems pretty good , a bit of a wine coming from my power steering when the car gets warm , not sure if its the rack or the pump , also the car seemed to be getting rather warm , after a long journey the temp would not get below 3/4 , with the elec fan running , this is a good tip for anyone , make sure the fan you fit is blowing air through the radiator and not sucking , reversed the wires to make the fan spin the other way ( sorted ) , just the intermittent running problem now to sort ( i have writtern a seperate post so more people might see it and help )
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taper
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Thu Oct 01, 2009 11:18 pm

I have a trouble with the swaybar.

When the car is unload the swaybar hits the exhaust.


Exists any solutions for this incovenient?
MrBenn
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Fri Oct 02, 2009 9:11 pm

Very nicely done!!

I'm about to start an almost identical project, got an shell and a load of bits, hope to get cracking on it very soon, this has given me a bit of a kick up the arse!

I bet your chuffed to bits! I can't wait to feel that power!
UweM3
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Fri Oct 02, 2009 9:32 pm

taper wrote:I have a trouble with the swaybar.

When the car is unload the swaybar hits the exhaust.


Exists any solutions for this incovenient?
a) change exhaust
b) relocate swybar

take your pick
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taper
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Sun Oct 04, 2009 7:54 pm

What exhaust is plug and play?
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Sun Oct 04, 2009 8:02 pm

taper wrote:I have a trouble with the swaybar.

When the car is unload the swaybar hits the exhaust.


Exists any solutions for this incovenient?
My S50 manifold does this. I have lowered the ARB bush mounting points slightly and have also bashed in the manifold slightly.

At normal ride height it is OK, but when jacked up the bar slightly touches the manifold. As I have no plans of jacking it up often, I don't let this bother me :)
UweM3
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Sun Oct 04, 2009 11:11 pm

taper wrote:What exhaust is plug and play?
I try again.

MODIFY manifold or MODIFY swybar/mounting points.
There is no plug and play solution. You are fitting an engine in a shell it doesn't belong to. There will be some obstacles to overcome. Not all is plug and play.
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Mon Oct 05, 2009 12:05 am

taper wrote:What exhaust is plug and play?
BTB make modified S50 manifold which clears the Anti roll/sway bar in its standard location.

It also alows you to use an E36 steering rack in RHD cars.

Its not cheap at £1200 though!
http://www.bmrperformance.co.uk

BMW and MINI specialist - Gatwick
UweM3
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Mon Oct 05, 2009 7:01 am

bss325i wrote:
taper wrote:What exhaust is plug and play?
BTB make modified S50 manifold which clears the Anti roll/sway bar in its standard location.

It also alows you to use an E36 steering rack in RHD cars.

Its not cheap at £1200 though!
correct, the BTB is plug'n'play but more interessting for the RHD drive E30's.
For just clearing the ARB I wouldn't spend £1200.
yetti24
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Mon Oct 05, 2009 3:43 pm

i used the s50 original manifold , but it does need modding on the pipe nearest the bulkhead otherwise it will hit the bulkhead and will not clear the anti roll bar giving vibration through the body , that is the cheapest way , like uwem3 i would not spend 1200 on a manifold seeing that only one pipe of the manifold needs to be modified
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