A few M50/52 swap questions

[N00b]

1. What choices of gearbox do I have without major surgery, ie do any fit straight onto the 50/52 and line up properly?
2. Is the engine loom for the 50/52 the same regardless of the car it's fitted to? Is something like a 728i engine loom the same as a 328i for example?
3. Are the cams in an "automatic" engine the same profile as those in a "manual" engine?

[E30BeemerLad]

The 4 pot E30 gearboxes bolt straight up if you use a M20 flywheel & clutch. These gearboxes sit at the right angle so you don't need to faff about altering the angle of the geaarstick. You can use a 325i propshaft and then have the choice of E30 LSD's.

If you use the gearbox from the 24v car, these fit no probs, but then you have to mess about and get the right ratio diff to allow for the different final drive ratio on the 24v gearboxes compared to E30 ones.

Not sure how much the looms differ as I bottled messing with electrics and bought an exchange plug & play loom from DanThe.

No difference in cams

[N00b]

Not sure how much the looms differ as I bottled messing with electrics and bought an exchange plug & play loom from DanThe.

TBH I think I'd go this way too.
How does it work? Do you send him your existing e30 loom to be altered or does he work his voodoo on the loom that comes with the M52?

[nickso]

send him an m52 loom and some moolah and he returns the same loom all sorted.

[N00b]

send him an m52 loom and some moolah and he returns the same loom all sorted.

Ah bugger.
I was hoping you'd say he alters the e30 loom.
This means that A) I need to find an engine complete with loom and B) I need to find out if, say, the 728 engine loom is the same as the 528 loom.

[E30BeemerLad]

Generally Dan has some looms in stock and will modify you one on an exchange basis, but he will need a M50/52 loom from you in return.

Best to PM DanThe and he'll tell you straight or if it even makes a difference.

If you are getting an engine from a 7 series, I would guess it has EWS, so you need to make sure you get the key, the receiver ring that sits around the ignition barrel, plus the bit of loom and boxes of tricks, otherwise you'll be going nowhere.

This is the gubbins I removed from my 328 auto breaker (including main ECU)

[N00b]

^
I thought I'd find an engine thats had an easier life by looking for one from a 7 series.
Looks like the 5 or 3 series would be a better (read less complicated) choice.

[E30BeemerLad]

The best bet is buying a complete car, in that sense, a reasonably specc'd E36 probably has more money in it for breaking.

My donor cost me £500 and I was lucky enough for it to have a steel linered block which was replaced by BMW in 1999, so the bottom end has only done 70k. Selling the leather and other trinkets from the breaker resulted in the engine costing me about £150. I already had the E34 sump etc and a M50 inlet manifold from my M50 engine which I was messing about to start with.

That now lives on in 3ltr guise in Dezzy's hands

[N00b]

^
Is it common to find an engine that didn't have the liners done?
How would I be able to check (without pulling the head off)

[E30BeemerLad]

It's probably 50/50 odds whether you'll get a steel liner example. Late engines came like this, earlier ones (mine was a 1995 car) had them done under warranty if the Nikasil problem came up. There are plenty of earlier ones still smoking about without issues.

To be honest, if the engine has done 100k and is running as it should, i would not worry. 5 years ago, yes it would have been a major concern, but not now. a compression test could be done if you were really concerned.

Engines which have had the steel linered block fitted have a little metal tag fixed to the block on the passenger side right at the back above the starter motor area, can be difficult to see with the engine in-situ

[N00b]

Late engines came like this, earlier ones (mine was a 1995 car) had them done under warranty if the Nikasil problem came up

Ahhh, this is news.
I thought they were ALL recalled and changed. That's why I assumed it'd be rare to find one that hadn't had the work done. So I'm assuming you're saying that BMW only replaced the liners on cars that had developed problems?

[DanThe]

No idea on the 7 series looms but the E39 looms are useless, benefit of an E38 engine is the sump fits. The loom to use is the E36 one

[N00b]

No idea on the 7 series looms but the E39 looms are useless, benefit of an E38 engine is the sump fits. The loom to use is the E36 one

Basically it's looking like the cheapest and easiest way to do this is to buy a complete 328i?

[E30BeemerLad]

Late engines came like this, earlier ones (mine was a 1995 car) had them done under warranty if the Nikasil problem came up

Ahhh, this is news.
I thought they were ALL recalled and changed. That's why I assumed it'd be rare to find one that hadn't had the work done. So I'm assuming you're saying that BMW only replaced the liners on cars that had developed problems?

Yep, only cars where the owner took it back to BMW got fettled, many were out of warranty, but were still sorted as goodwill.

Symptoms were rough tickover, poor economy and oil consumption due to the bore wear.

They simply supplied a complete bottom end/ short engine I believe. My head is stamped 1995 and my block 1999. Fortunately got the paperwork from the donor too confirming when it was done etc and the mileage.

That's why I said don't worry if it is an original nikasil block engine which is behaving fine, if it was going to shat itself prematurely, it would have done it by now.

[N00b]

if it was going to shat itself prematurely, it would have done it by now.

I think that's a very good way of looking at it.