My Chrome bumpered Bronzit E30 Arches Done!!!

[Ollie_bwoii]

Richy it's lookign very nice, I wouldn't mind some larger pictures though.

[richy187]

Dunno what happened photobucket has shrunk them...

Edit: Found the resize setting, higher res pictures now uploading

[richy187]

Right then just foryou ollie...

[Ollie_bwoii]

Hmmmm, that does look really very nice.

I still really want your interior.

[richy187]

If you can find me an immaculate beige leather interior with matching door cards I will swap!!!

[Ollie_bwoii]

I do know of one.

[richy187]

Where and how much£££?

[Ollie_bwoii]

It's residing in my car.

[richy187]

Hmmm then maybe you would be interested in a swap?

Are you coming to the Toby Carvery meet next month?

[Ollie_bwoii]

I am going yes.

[richy187]

Then I will see you there and we can talk

[Ollie_bwoii]

Fair enough, I have never actually seen a beige country interior in the flesh, so I will have to have a look see.

[richy187]

I love it, it looks amazing but I would prefer leather as its more robust

Bring your spanners I can see us swapping in the car park if we both like what we see...

[Ollie_bwoii]

I'll have a think, the leather is quite good with my german shepherd.

[richy187]

Right car is now fully Polybushed on the front, and has new brake pads all round and new discs on the back. It also has the last known can of ATE super blue racing fluid in the UK pumping round its veins. That car never fails to surprise me, 180k miles in 23 years, and yet every nut/bolt came undone withe ease, its actually a pleasure to work on it

If anyone knows where I can get some more for a reasonable price and would be kind enough to let me know I would be eternally grateful

Took loads of pictures while I fitted the bushes so when I get a spare bit of time I will stick a "how to" on the wiki, It was easy once we worked it out Didn't get to use the blow torch on them though

[richy187]

Lollipop Bush wiki now completed and available here:

http://www.e30zone.net/e30zonewiki/inde ... ipopBushes

I'd appreciate any feedback, or feel free to edit if I missed anything

[richy187]

Parked my car at work on Monday, only to be told by the maintenance department they were sorry for getting my car dirty when carrying out car park repairs, only to get home and find this...









It would appear they were cutting concrete right in front of my car with a disc cutter and they just let all the shit spray all over it

[Tedswagon]

Lollipop Bush wiki now completed and available here:

http://www.e30zone.net/e30zonewiki/inde ... ipopBushes

I'd appreciate any feedback, or feel free to edit if I missed anything

I think its great when people take the time to write these. They are so useful, well done. I can never remember to get my camera ready.

My only comment is, and I could be wrong, I don't think you should use grease to get rubber bushes into position. It is slippy and will stay slippy. You do not really want the bush to move freely on the control arm.

I have always used a 50% water 50% washing up liquid. I read recently from another forum hair spray is perfect for getting rubber hoses on as it is really slippy when applied and then drys hard.

[richy187]

Sound advice Ted, I put grease on there to prevent squeaking in use not to make fitting easier, there was nothing telling me to though so I may have done it wrong. There's no chance of the control arm coming out of the bush though so I suppose it doesnt matter too much, it will just hinge a bit easier in the lollipop.

New track rod ends went on today, piece of pish to do, they came off really easy and the new E36 ones just screwed straight on too. Wasted most of the morning tightening a handrake and changing coolant on a Corrado though so didn't make it to the tracking shop in time to get it tracked up properly.

I now see why they use fancy lasers though, we lined it up roughly by eye and thought it would be fine, but it was totally undriveable even though it looked only a little out. The outside wheel would just skip while turning. not good . After the third attempt though it was possible to drive it home and it will limp to the tracking shop ok tomorrow or Monday. Its still a long way out though, the steering doesn't self centre any more and it pulls to the right a bit, you just can not do it by eye

[E30BeemerLad]

a long ball of string, go all the way around the car with it at half way up the height of each wheel, and that will serve as a good rough guide to getting it tracked straight by getting the string to touch the front & back part of each tyre. Does that make sense?

[richy187]

Yes mate I did think we were going to have to do something like that, but a bit of trial and error got us close enough for me to make the short run home

[richy187]

Having picked up a couple of bargain chrome bumbers (for£20 ) I thought I'd have a go at restoring them before they go on the car. The hangers I got for the rear are rusty as hell, so I thought I'd have a go at a bit of electrolysis to remove it. I first saw this method on Club GTi

http://www.clubgti.com/FORUM/showthread ... de+cathode

so I had a quick scavenge round and managed to come up with this:

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Its fizzing away quite nicely at the minute, but will take a couple of hours so will report back then...

[richy187]

Right then this is what I started with,



I didn't clean it other than to make a contact patch for the jump lead I used to connect it to the supply (I didn't even remove the leftover paint)

This is what I ended up with:




I left it in the solution for about 2 hours, then 5 minutes with a wire brush on the end of a drill and finished. Its so easy I will be treating everything I can fit into a tub like this!!!

[Topblag]

I've got this planned for the calipers, bottom arms, gearbox and prop mounts and basically anything else that could be easily tidied.

Once they're done it'll be a coat of hammerite (silver or black) and they'll look much better.

[richy187]

I primered these as soon as i fished them out and cleaned them as the downside to this method is the part will rust again very quicly if left bare metal

[richy187]

Right, I've been and got quotes for this repair, its looking like work are hopefully going to come good and cough up, but to spray the bonnet and valance, and blend the wings I'm looking at £400 + VAT!!!!

While its in the shop, I think I'm going to get the rear arches done, they need a bit of welding, and the rear quaters would definitely benefit from a bit of attention, the best quote I've had for them is £270 for both sides. How is it cheaper for the arches which need welding, than for the bonnet and valance?!?!?

[richy187]

Bit of a thread update as its been a long time...

My employer refused to cough up for the damage they caused with the disc cutter so I have touched it up myself with a touch up kit (looks shit but I can't afford to get it done properly yet), I have however had the rear arches sorted, which I'm pleased to say look great (will put pictures up eventually). I've fitted "new" (well restored) bumpers front & back, changed a noisy external fuel pump, changed the fuel filter again due to a running issue (now resolved). Also replaced the cracked manifold with a larger bore cast "log" type. Still need to fix a perished fuel return pipe under the back seat (the one from the filler neck, not the engine) to finally rid myself of the petrol fumes in the cabin.

I'm now on the hunt for a new exhaust as mine has been bodged several times in several places, and its letting the rest of the car down, but I'm a little unsure what to do since I changed the manifold, but I have started another thread about that...

[richy187]

Right then arch Pictures as promised...









All pictures are of the prep work before primer, I have yet to take finished pictures. You can see the bodged previous repair, now thankfully done properly..

£500 worth of work and I still have rust on a front wing, tail and boot lid

And one more picture because it looked cool jacked up...


Thanks for looking

[kevo]

glad to see shes been looked after still, still look back with fond memories of her and am driving around in a touring 2.5 now with lpg on it so i can actually afford it. i'll have a dig about in my attic to see if i still have the material for the seats.
Kev

[richy187]

Much appreciated

[richy187]

Wow, I've had this car for 3 & 1/2 years now, and done so much to it, nothing major really, just fettling. The last couple of months have been a bit disastrous in terms of car ownership. I bought the mrs a Volvo V40 T4, and the head gasket went on it costing over £900 (suspected wastegate problem which still isn't fixed), and in the same month I had to renew my insurance & tax, fit a new alarm/immobiliser as the existing one was not a Thatcham approved one, and replace the fuel tank.

Also since the last update, I have replaced all rear bushes (apart from ARB) with powerflex, fitted a courtesy light delay relay, fitted a lights left on warning buzzer, fixed several fuel/vacuum leaks, replaced all the speakers with some alpine ones (that fit behind the std grilles!), replaced the heater blower motor (Twice!), fitted an air horn ( ), re-wired and re-plumbed the screenwash system, replaced exhaust....

Still to sort:
1. Rusty tailgate
2. Remove rear spoiler
3. Re-furb wheels
4. Replace cam cover (warped)
5. Fit auto dim rear view mirror
6. Re-cover drivers seat bolster
7. Replace all copper brake lines
8. Rear window heater switch mod

Stuff I would like to do given the time & money
1. Full bare metal respray including interior & engine bay (in Bronzit!)
2. M52 2.8 conversion (Still looking for someone to do it/prices)
3. Fit a decent leather sport interior (Would need to be brown/beige)
4. Fit a Wilwood 4 pot front brake kit
5. Get better headlights (NOT HID's standard look)
6. Fit a New dashboard

I don't have any recent pictures, but tbh it hasn't really changed since the last ones were posted, if there's any interest I may take some and post them up?

Thanks for looking,

Rich

[mrrodney]

like this very much , i have a 318 chromie bronzit , just put bottle tops on and stripped a doner car for its 325 lump today