My Completed m52 conversion - Update

[Green]

May be a good idea to buy a cheap car with a few weeks T/T to act as a 'parts carrier' and a go to work machine,just in case you run into snags with the conversion.
Carefull(ish!) ebaying may even see you make a small profit when you wiegh it in!

I wouldn't be having this problem if my work horse weren't stolen last year! Although parting with a couple of hundred will be hard as I'm scraping the pennies together to get this done before the dark nights!
Just remembered as my brother in law has broke his leg and can't drive for about a year I could probs borrow his car... I'll speak with him later about that and see how he feels.

[E30BeemerLad]

It's the long flat bit at the shallow end

[ultralinear]

Good luck with this Green!

[Green]

It's the long flat bit at the shallow end

Long flat bit removed!

Good luck with this Green!

God knows I'm going to need it D:

Also been given the go ahead on borrowing my bro in law's car when it comes back from the garage so better hurry up and bring it together!

[Green]

Just called up Bmw for the throttle cable, sump gasket, 325 boot and idle hoses.

Forgot to ask about the 318i temp switch but going to check euro's first for it's price. ECP do sell the prop coupling cheaper, and it's lemforder.

I went to order the e28 m5 mounts and they was about £45 each, is that right? I checked ECP for them and apparently they sell a pair for about £29, anyone got any feedback for the quality of them?

[E30BeemerLad]

the price on the M5 rubber mounts is probably correct, they were about £60 when I did the swap 2 years ago and have probably gone up in price like everything else from BMW. Can't vouch for the quality or strength of the ECP ones.

[e30-EVN]

Can't vouch for the quality or strength of the ECP ones.

got mine from ecp and made sure the oem part number matched..... gave them friggin HELL with the m50 for 5000 miles and they have been propin up the m52 for a few months now........ they are holding up fine and they dont flex like some people have experienced!
£47 odd a pair i payed but expect a rise since then thanks to that arse hole who calls himself primeminister (david cameron)!!!!

[Green]

I've played it safe and dipped into my pockets, £90 for a pair of engine mounts Temp switch also ordered today for about £22. I forgot to pick my other bits up otherwise I'd have a load of stuff laying around ready to start plumbing the m50 inlet onto the side of it.

To be honest I'm more worried about changing the mani then swapping the engine

[E30BeemerLad]

Don't bother fitting the inlet until the engine is fitted as it's a pain in the arse to connect the heater hoses up with the inlet manifold in place.

[e30-EVN]

Don't bother fitting the inlet until the engine is fitted as it's a pain in the arse to connect the heater hoses up with the inlet manifold in place

a wise point...! and its also way easier to get the engine in in the first instant also as you can get some angle side to side if you get me..... otherwise the inlet will foul the bulkhead

[redcar]

have you decided on what manifold and exhaust system you are going to use, as well as what steering rack and steering shaft you will use?

Cheers

[Green]

Inlet will be m50 and exhaust mani will be Danthe's modified ones. Exhaust will either be a e30 325i exhaust with or without midbox or modify the 328i one to fit. I'm going to keep my manual e30 rack for now but may fit power steering next year if I feel I need it.

Removed exhaust mani today, those where perhaps the worst 24 bolts/nuts of my life! Downpipe is seized on so I'll grab the blow torch tomorrow and start removing the loom after.

[Green]

Managed to removed mani's today as I had time, got pissed off with the downpipe bolts on one of them and have had to grind through the exhaust instead

I was going to remove the loom ready to post to dan, but wanted to check the car was running all good before I did but had this problem trying to turn it over, anyone know what causes this noise trying to crank it


[youtube][/youtube]

[Green]

Had a thought, could be flat battery will jump it tomorrow

[redcar]

Hi Green, what ancilleries are you using from the e36. Did it come with coilpacks?

[Green]

I bought a whole car so yeah it's come with everything I need, definitely easiest option, as well somewhere to store the engine for a while.

[redcar]

cool, did you get the starter motor issue sorted?

[Green]

Yeah was just a flat battery, making a very scary noise so wasn't anything bad!

Meanwhile donor car is getting ready to be removed



Just awaiting on the engine crane to pop up mine to start cleaning the engine bay up and ready it for it's transplant.

[Dave_M3]

e36 6 speed box is pointless. it's expensive to buy and it will break eventually.

e36 5 speed goes in easy enough, that's what i have on mine. only issue is the diff end usually ends up being expensive.

The E36 6 speeds are fine most of the time if you get rid of that stupid clutch delay.


I've an E46 M3 6 speed going in with my M52 however... coupled with a lightweight flywheel and 3.46 40% LSD and the usual M52 mods, it should be quite entertaining and even economical if I can restrain myself to just potter about in it

[Dave_M3]

This might help you too btw

http://www.e30zone.net/modules.php?name ... =steps+328

[Green]

Cheers Dave I've read over your thread before and it was useful, it's still useful to read over again and again!

First off I noticed after cleaning my clio servo it says fit only to cars with ABS, I'm assuming I can just ignore that and assume it's a french thing?


So today focused on removing the m20, out it came



And a wash inside to get rid of the majority of oil that had pissed out in my engine time and time again




I fitted the air con fan and also made my own rad mount from the old e30 in about 5 mins which fitted just fine. I wanted to do the servo today as well but still need to get a 20mm spacer so probs will pop down to homebase/halfords tomorrow to see what I can find.

Had a bit of trouble removing the fly wheel, anyone know of the easiest or best way as I also wanted to get that down to a shop for machining tomorrow.

[Dave_M3]

Good work. don't worry about the servo, it looks like it will be fine.

There's 3 or 4 different part numbers of the clio servos that all work. I'll see if I have that one written down

Should stick in an E46 rack while your at it... although that manual one looks minty now

[Green]

I'll be getting an e46 rack next year sometime if it's still going strong, I'd want to do it properly with the pipes etc and have broke the bank so far this month with everything

Managed to remove the fly wheel by wedging it with a crowbar on the ground then using a massive lever to easy it off, piece of peepee

Today I got around to fitting the clio servo, never removed one before and had no help so thought I did well.. that and it was piss easy

First I made a 20mm spacer, this was done by super gluing washers together as I couldn't get hold of a solid one.



Fitted nice and snug


Comparison in size after being fitted




Had a look at where the brown sensor will be going but bit confused as to where it's been located previously, am I correct in thinking I have to tap it into the block? And the outlet bit there has to be blocked off as well.

[E30BeemerLad]

I've not seen that way of spacing on the servo before

[DanThe]

You have got the spacers all wrong, what you need to do is extend the push rod from the servo, so the spacer needs to go inside the master cylinder.
Looks like you have a nice late head there, the brown sensor will need the thread tuning down to 12mm then you can fit it in place of the throttle heater outlet stub

[E30BeemerLad]

http://www.e30zone.net/modules.php?name ... 76#2203176

[Green]

Now I feel like a right tit, well was worth a shot anyways! Will sort that out tomorrow so that is better, now it makes sense Will be a lot easier to whip one of them up.

Well that's nice about the head, I'll be popping down to an engineering place tomorrow or monday to get the flywheel sorted, I'll get them to do the sensor at the same time.

[Green]

Correct 20mm spacer now fitted as well as 325i prop fitted, that was a pain in the ass to remove. Although in comparison the 325i prop has a bit circular thing the gearbox end which the 320i one didn't, thought it might cause some problems but assumed it can't if it was originally fitted fine on an e30.

New sachs clutch being ordered as well for £112.. only got table scraps until pay day now

[E30BeemerLad]

you can do away with the harmonic balancer at the gearbox end of the propshaft.

If you are fitting a Z3 short shifter it is best to remove the balancer as they get in the way.

[Green]

Brilliant to know, as it's fitted I'll have a look at it next time I'm under the car see what's to go about removing it.

Today we got busy again, flywheel dropped off down the shop with temp sender hopefully done for tomorrow.

Engine out



This was fouling the sump, the splash guard?


Had trouble removing dual mass flywheel


Finally sump fitted, new sachs clutch ordered ready for when flywheel's back to pop all together into the IS box



Apparently it's going to rain like a beast tomorrow so going to whip the gazebo up and hopefully finish off getting the engine into the e30. Then it will be waiting for the return of the loom and manifold from to finish it off.. seems like the hardest part is over!

The drive is in a bit of a state, bits here there and everywhere but just goes to show it's not so bad to do on your own driveway... unless you care what the neighbours think

[deanocool]

you need to remove the bracket that has the 2 holes in it for the sump to fit. it comes off quite easily

[ali50ferrari]

interesting man you doin well so far im following this will like to see the finished product!

[Green]

Cheers Ali.. just proves a complete amateur can try his hand at this engine swap malarkey!

I'm back at work today so didn't get what I wanted done cause I don't get in till 7ish and lose the light faster now

Flywheel came back today, comparison to duel mass





Weighed them both on the Wii fit, e30 flywheel coming out at about 5.5kg and the duel mass a whopping 11.5kgs

Also got my brown sensor done



Fitted perfectly m12x1.5 I think the thread was in the end.

Total cost of both down at the local place £48, bargain if you ask me!

Mounted the clutch and gearbox on this evening in the dark, took frigging ages as we couldn't see what we was doing. Tomorrow night shall be the mating with the car hopefully

[Green]

Hollllly hell what a hard days work that was.



Bloody rain made it 10x as worse I tell you, the breaking gazebo barely kept the wet out.



As you can see from that pic, the crane I had been lent was missing a wheel.. this made moving the engines about a pure mission and exhausting. Not to mention a royal PITA..!

We spent ages, must've been about 2 hours trying to get it on both mounts and up to the gearbox! It consisted of mainly raising and lowering the crane and also jacking up the gearbox from underneath the car over and over, as well as removing the mount arms and getting a bolt in at a time until we jiggled all 4 in.. was effort

The gearbox mounts that I got off ebay as a cheap alternative to e28 mounts turned out to not fit through the gearbox braket holes, which I was about to drill out then realised I'd also need new nuts for it as well.. which I couldn't be bothered and so I just used the ones from the e36 which fitted fine.


Put the m50 mani on for a mock up, couldn't resist




I've also decided to leave the viscous fan off as it's a bit tight.. unfortunately I can't get the viscous off at all so might have to leave it as it is!




All in all.. a good days work! Just need to connect the prop up and the gear linkage, and wait for my loom and mani's back from Dan then I'll be back on the road

[ali50ferrari]

So far how many days have you taken to get this far?