325i sport sterling silver (light restoration!)

[toole325i]

Hi there everyone the time has come to get my bmw back on the road where it belongs. It has been neglected lying in my garage for the last 3years! Absoloutly shocking i know but thats all about to change its time to bring her back to life.

Overall the car is in excellent condition but i am on a mission to get this thing looking as good as i possibly can. The two sides including the bodykit, bonnet (apart from the back of it) and roof are immaculate but the rest of the car needs tidying especially the engine bay!

I am going totally standard with it by doing things like replacing the 205/50/15 tyres that are on the bbs's at the moment with the correct 205/55/15 tyres that would have been on it when it left the factory the car is also on the original suspension, i have also sold the mint stainless scorpion rear box that was on the car for a superb condition full standard exhaust system.

Anyways enough of the blethering for now and i'll get the pics up of the progress made this week when i figure out how to do it. Yes i know its a doddle but i am hopeless when it comes to doing computer related tasks, so i'll get them up tomorrow lunch time when my mate shows me what to do.

[si911t]

Sounds good- look forward to seeing some pics

[tonybtonyb]

Hi fella pic's please

[toole325i]

Yes! I managed it lol heres some pics of the engine bay as it sits right now i've stripped alot of it already. Radiator, bottles, etc. Still got to remove the airbox and other various parts for cleaning and painting.

I've done alot of work to the front panel, front bumper, front valance, rear bumper and side skirts already so i'll get pics of them up shortly, now i've figured out how to do it.

I threw in a random pic of the rear end aswell dono why but there it is minus the rear bumper and spoiler.

[toole325i]

Front bumper before repairing: It actually looks ok in the pics but there were a few marks, chips, etc that needed rectifying.







After all the repair work was carried out it was now ready for the primer stage: The front bumper had 12 coats of various primers, paints and lacquers applied to it during its life. Thats a hell of alot of material on one panel!





Now the same for the front valance:











Ready for primer:







Side skirts:







Ready for primer:



Rear bumper and toe eye covers:







Ready for primer:










I'll add the pics of everything primed tomorrow plus the work carried out to the front panel from start to finish.

[toole325i]

heres a pic of all the parts in the spray booth ready for primer:



time to prime lol. plastic primer on the left which goes on first then light grey high build primer



all primed up



next thing to get treated was the front panel which was rather rough and needed two corner sections removed and replaced with better sections from a donor panel kindly given to me by my mate.

heres the rotten corner bits that got removed:



time to cut off the good bits from the donor panel:





new bits welded in place by my good mate kyle at chizfab, his workmanship is truly top notch!







next thing to do was scotchbrite the whole panel with petrol and rub out any rust on the rest of it with the orbital sander and a 120grit disc then a 320grit disc.





now all the rubbed out rust was ready for this stuff to stop the dreaded brown stuff from returning in the future.



it goes on white and turns purple blue with it bites into the treated areas.



now thats dried its time to put some brushable seam sealer over the welds and then underseal the bits that require it.









now thats done its time to prime the whole thing and paint the back of it just now as the front of it will be getting painted at a later date.







with that out the road for the moment it was on to the back of the bonnet.

as you can see its in need of some work



i removed all the glue left by the old tatty heat insulation then scotchbrited the whole panel with petrol and rubbed out all the rust, again using 120grit and 320grit disc.



time for the rust treatment again.



after that dried it was time for primer and paint. but first i had to mask up the front of the bonnet to prevent it from getting covered in overspray.



primed then painted.





with that done i ordered brand new insulation from my local bmw dealership phoenix in kirkcaldy along with some other bits n bobs aswell as a full inspection 2 service kit minus the diff oil which i'll order later on.





been rubbing all the primed bits today. great fun! //// just about done. I'll get more pics up tomorrow of progress made today,

[bhups]

Good work mate!

[toole325i]

Good work mate!

Thanks mate. Theres still loads to do but i'm getting there lol.

[toole325i]

Quick update of further progress made today.

sideskirts, front panel, front bumper and toe eve covers. Primer all rubbed, panel wiped and ready for some sterling silver and lacquer.



Here's the results after the paint fumes were extracted.



















I'm delighted with the finish i achived today

Same treatment for the front valance and rear bumper tomorrow.

[jaymos]

I love these threads, good work fella.

[Alpina99]

That's going to be a stunning motor when it's finished,
Keep the updates coming,
This is great,

[oomz1975]

Great work, this is my favourite type of thread.
Attention to detail is spot on.

[oguz327]

Fresh Stirling mmmm

[suchy]

This is kool, mine needs all of this done (mine is also worse than yours) so a good inspiration I do love a proper full-on resto read, but know mine will never get it so this kind of resto is more real world for me. Keep the updates and pics coming

[toole325i]

Quick update of further progress made on saturday.

front valance and rear bumper, primer rubbed, panel wiped awaiting paint and lacquer.



All done

















With all these bits done now its time to start the dreaded engine bay tomorrow.

[tonybtonyb]

So far so good keep it up

[lyricalnut02]

excellent resto mate, going to be stunning when finished.

[toole325i]

Thanks for the kind comments guys i'm really enjoying doing this now its going totally according to plan.

Been a busy week so heres an update of the progress made.

First thing on the cards this week was to rectify all the rust on the engine bay/slam panel.







After a whole day of scotchbrighting with petrol, cleaning it with petrol and alot of grinding and buffing with 80grit heres what i achived.











now thats done it was time for some rust proofing again.







Now the engine bay was ready for primer it was time to move onto the sills and wheel arches

heres pics of the passenger and drivers side sills before i started









So i ground all the rust back and scotchbrighted the whole sill on both sides.









Then i applied the rust proofing then the seamsealer.
















Same drill for the wheel arches.



















Now thats done i'm going to move onto the bootlid and scuttle panel tomorrow before more priming and painting.

[Simon13]

epic. serious graft into it. You can't beat a sterling sport.

[toole325i]

Got lots more done today so heres a round up of whats been happening down at toole design HQ!

First thing for today was to repair the nasty bits on the bootlid.





Rubbed all the bad bits out and applied some rust proofing.







Time to mask it up for primer and paint.









Then i undersealed the sills and rear panel.







Now it was all masked and sealed it was time for kyle at chizfab to work his magic again.

First thing to get some new metal was a rather nasty bit on the engine bay.



Kyle cut out the rot replicated the section needing replaced then welded it in. Mint!!





While he was doing that i had some time to tidy up some of the bits to go back in the engine bay after it was painted.















With the engine bay section done kyle was ready to move onto the scuttle panel.

It doesnt look to bad in this pic but it was!



We proceeded to dig out alot of fibre glass from a previous repair. there was alot of it but we got it all out eventually.



Now we had good metal to weld on kyle proceeded to work his magic.













With the new section welded in place and buffed down all it needed now was a light skim of filler.



With all the prep work complete on the car its time to prime and paint all the parts shown tomorrow.

[suchy]

Coming along nicely I see...

[toole325i]

What a day! i'm knackered, had to go in at 6:30am today so i could get all this done before kyle could get a shot of the booth tonight to paint his drift car. Anyways heres what went down today.

First of all i finished the rest of the masking from yesterday





The engine bay took flippin ages!!!!!!!







I then etch primed all the bare metal.







Then i seam sealed the bracket kyle welded in the bay and some other bits.





Now thats done it was time to shoot some 2pack primer.











Once the primer was rock hard it was ready to be flattened using 320grit discs then 500grit discs then all panel wiped and painted.

[tonybtonyb]

A work of art fella!

[toole325i]

A work of art fella!

Thanks very much mate. I actually didn't expect this resto to go as well as its going. Cant wait to get stuck into that engine bay next week

[RustyRuss]

Stunning Stunning car mate, love the thread, no doubt see you about ... Pheonix is my local too!

[toole325i]

Stunning Stunning car mate, love the thread, no doubt see you about ... Pheonix is my local too!

Thanks very much mate. Decent! yea there pretty fond of me now seeing as i've spent a flippin fortune in there parts department in the last few weeks. lol

[RustyRuss]

Haha yeah i can well imagine mate, they will be smiling as soon as they see you pull up! All worth it though mate as at the end of the day you have an absolute stunner there Look forward to seeing it in the flesh!!

[toole325i]

Quick update of todays progress

Airbox and other bits before and after.



















Got loads more done to the rest of the engine bay today so i'll get some more pix up of it when its all done.

[mrjonchandler]

How do you get the plastic parts looking so good?
Where are you based, the level of work looks amazing, nice one.
Jon

[leeparkes]

Cool thread, subscribed.

Sterling sport FTW

[toole325i]

How do you get the plastic parts looking so good?
Where are you based, the level of work looks amazing, nice one.
Jon

I scotchbrite them with petrol to get all the crap off them then give them a light haze coat of matt black aerosol.

I'm based in lochgelly fife just outside edinburgh.

Thanks for the comments mate

[mrjonchandler]

How do you get the plastic parts looking so good?
Where are you based, the level of work looks amazing, nice one.
Jon

I scotchbrite them with petrol to get all the crap off them then give them a light haze coat of matt black aerosol.

I'm based in lochgelly fife just outside edinburgh.

Thanks for the comments mate

What is scotchbrite? The airbox and metal parts come up like new! Any particular brand of aerosol?
Would be keen to do this to my engine.
Jon

[toole325i]

How do you get the plastic parts looking so good?
Where are you based, the level of work looks amazing, nice one.
Jon

I scotchbrite them with petrol to get all the crap off them then give them a light haze coat of matt black aerosol.

I'm based in lochgelly fife just outside edinburgh.

Thanks for the comments mate

What is scotchbrite? The airbox and metal parts come up like new! Any particular brand of aerosol?
Would be keen to do this to my engine.
Jon

Its like a brilo pad mate, you can pick them up at your local halfords in the paint and car bodywork section. Im just using halfords own brand matt black its great stuff but the key to success is light haze coats, put it on to thick and it'll just flake off.

Yeah, go for it! Its time consuming but so worth it my engine bays nearly done now so i'll get some new pics up of it tomorrow.

[mrjonchandler]

I scotchbrite them with petrol to get all the crap off them then give them a light haze coat of matt black aerosol.

I'm based in lochgelly fife just outside edinburgh.

Thanks for the comments mate

What is scotchbrite? The airbox and metal parts come up like new! Any particular brand of aerosol?
Would be keen to do this to my engine.
Jon

Its like a brilo pad mate, you can pick them up at your local halfords in the paint and car bodywork section. Im just using halfords own brand matt black its great stuff but the key to success is light haze coats, put it on to thick and it'll just flake off.

Yeah, go for it! Its time consuming but so worth it my engine bays nearly done now so i'll get some new pics up of it tomorrow.

Brilliant, will check it out. Thanks for the advice.
Jon

[toole325i]

What is scotchbrite? The airbox and metal parts come up like new! Any particular brand of aerosol?
Would be keen to do this to my engine.
Jon

Its like a brilo pad mate, you can pick them up at your local halfords in the paint and car bodywork section. Im just using halfords own brand matt black its great stuff but the key to success is light haze coats, put it on to thick and it'll just flake off.

Yeah, go for it! Its time consuming but so worth it my engine bays nearly done now so i'll get some new pics up of it tomorrow.

Brilliant, will check it out. Thanks for the advice.
Jon

Your welcome mate.