S14 into RHD 325i into LHD 316i

[Mikey_Boy]

Hi Folks,

A new thread for a new installation - tax ran out yesterday so the car has been duly SORN'd to enable the winter months to be filled with the S14 project. Of course, this conversion has been done before, but thought it might of interest to some!

To start, I thought it might be good to introduce the car and the engine.. In 2008 I bought an F plate 325 Sport from a mate who owns a garage - 2 owners, 120k on the clock and a good honest car:





The day after I bought it, I took it drifting at Oulton park...



And then over the period of a year, I turned her into this:







Upgrades include - Safety devices 6 point cage (I have a bit of cage envy now reading various threads so maybe a 'shell is the next project after this! ), Recaro buckets with Schroth 6 point harnesses, full stack dash, Z3 rack (the best upgrade I have done), Gaz coilvers, Eibach antirollbars, poly bushes everywhere, K Sport 330mm discs with 8 pot calipers, 262 dogleg box...

With all these upgrades done, I found the M20 a bit lacking despite fitting a full BTB system so have started exploring engine conversions - I looked at tuning the M20, slotting in either an M52 or S50 but there always seemed to be compromises with these in my mind. I am not dismissing these conversions at all - some I have seen are fantastic but just not for me. After a lot of head scratching, I decided that an S14 might be great idea, especially mated to the dogleg box I have and 3.64 diff, I figured this would go pretty well. So in a moment of weakness, I bought this from Theo:



Thanks again Theo!

So plan over the winter is to upgrade / refresh / tidy up and install the S14 to the 325. I got a complete kit of bits from Theo to allow the install to be straightforward, but of course it would be rude not to upgrade the odd bit here and there!

So, why an S14 over the others conversion options? For me a combination of weight, tuneability, the noise it makes plus it's an engine from the right period in time for the E30 - that's what worked for me but I was oh so close to getting an S50...

And the plan? Hopefully as follows:

Leave internals alone as much as possible (Theo sent videos of it running), upgrade big end bolts, fix oil leaks, replace oil seals, tidy up engine harness, fit Emerald ECU, lightened flywheel, baffled sump, DTM airbox and suitable exhaust to make a lovely sounding, high revving trackday weapon that can be driven to and from the track... Here's where we are at right now (note the immense amount of crap around the engine - that needs to be cleared!!)



More to come...

[GeoffBob]

Excellent choice of engine Mike, I'll be watching your work with great interest. I have to confess that I personally feel that the S14 engine is best off in a LHD body, given that the you have so much more room to for the exhaust headers with the steering rack on the correct side of the engine, not to mention the benefits to the brake system. Having said that I respect your decision to put the engine in a RHD shell and I can well believe that you have all the skills necessary to do the conversion justice. I look forward to seeing the outcome.

Oh, and Emerald ECU sounds like a smashing idea.

Regards
Geoff

[Demlotcrew]

Mike, i have as many others done this conversion with RHD shells, its very easy and extreemly rewarding! You wont regret it!



Best engine for the E30

You can hear it here:

[Mikey_Boy]

Wow....! That is a LOVELY installation! Very well done indeed - that is something to aspire to - that said, my car isn't the cleanest and wears her stretch marks with pride so hopefully the fact its a trackday machine gives me some breathing space!

Great to see that there is prior experience here - good to know for questions and issues that I will no doubt come across and the first one is for Andrew (above):

What throttle cable did you use for your conversion? I was thinking E24 525 (as per M5x conversions) but value your wisdom and experience..

Thanks also Geoff for the kind words - looking forward to getting my teeth into this one. I agree, a LHD car is a much much better proposition for this, but I have managed to get brakes that seem to feel OK on street and track with the set up I have (of course there are always improvements to be had!) and the challenge of RHD was enough to sell it to me... The emerald ECU is a no brainer given the limitations of the early Motronic stuff and now that it employs a wideband lambda (that I already have fitted) it should make a lot of sense!

Cheers,

Mike

[Demlotcrew]

Mike,

I used a new 318is M42 throttle cable and made a bracket on the inlet plenum for the cable locator to sit 20mm closer to the throttle lever. There are so many ways to skin a cat, im pretty sure there are other ways too!

Andrew

[Mikey_Boy]

Thanks Andrew - that's perfect! I had never considered the 318is throttle cable - seems an excellent solution as they are both 4 cylinder engines...

Something to consider a bit later seeing as I have been waiting 4 months for my airbox to arrive from the US... At least I have a completion date now!

Thanks again! (And please do forward me pics of the exhaust manifold when you get the chance... )

[Demlotcrew]

Mike, dont get too excited about the airbox, there are too many snide versions floating around, and there are many different configurations too, a lot of the earlier copies have alignment issues and they are not as fully developed as the ones you can buy today!

Everyone says to me I have a CF Airbox, and i always say, OK, look closely to the one fitted on my car, thats an airbox, what you have is a filter in comparison!

Also, personally i would not go aftermarket ECU, if it was my project i would only use the Bosch motronic and go with UniQ piggy back - fuel and Ignition mapping, about £600 all in, by Paul on this forum.

Probably the best solution available in terms of value for money/power and drivability/reliability. If you ditch the Motronic you will also loose years of development by BMW and their maps, cold start compensation maps, idle control, elevation maps etc etc etc.

Its a no no for me.

Andrew

[Mikey_Boy]

Ahhhh - interesting - in fairness, I have seen several different configurations for the S14 carbon airbox - various runner and plenum lengths. I have ordered mine from VAC in the US so hoping it's a goodie - the kits looks pretty complete from what I have seen thus far!

Also very valid points about the Motronic as well - back in the day I worked on Motronic 1.3 for Audi so pretty familiar with what it can and cannot do but you are right that I will potentially lose a lot with the Emerald ECU. However, the car isn't a massively serious road proposition (around 2000 miles / year) so hoping that I will be able to muddle by with the Emerald stuff and get a bit extra by pulling in a few favours from mates who still programme Motronic equipment now (one of my secret weapons!! ) - transient response is one of my (many) worries for in the future...

[Mikey_Boy]

A very quick update - after 5 months on backorder, the DTM airbox is winging its way from Uncle Sam to Blighty...



Cheers,
Mike

[e30topless]

Great thread Mike and i look forward to the updates,

I have an S14 RHD manifold here should you need to "copy" it,

[Barx325i]

They're very old pictures Mike!

[Kos]

how do you find the K sport brakes ?

[Mikey_Boy]

Hi Kos - I could open up a whole can of worms here as there are a lot of opinions about brakes that exist on this forum!

So - please do take this as another bit of information to add to your knowledge! Just so that you understand the set up - I have the K Sport 330mm brakes up front with their 8 pot calipers, standard rear brakes, braided hoses all round and a 750iL master cylinder. For what I have (weight of car, intended use etc), I think this kit is very very good - works very well on track (I have never had any fade issues, but then, some might just say that I am not trying hard enough!) and the pedal modulation feels pretty good.

My only gripe was that when the kit was fitted, I noticed that the bleed nipples leaked a bit when the brakes got very very hot- not the best all things considered, but this was cured by putting PTFE tape on them (which proably should have been done duringthe initial installation)

However, what feels good to me could be very different to what feels good to someone else! As final tweeks, I would like to uprate the pads all round and uprate the rear discs to grooved.

Would I recommend them? Absolutely. Are there other options out there that are just as good? Of course!

Hope that helps,

Mike

[ShepsEvo3]

Watching this thread with interest.

Emerald is a good ECU, I actually like how easy it is to use. But as Andrew says, you don't need to go that route, but if you do, I'd be interested in the ECU and loom If you still have it ofcourse?

Good luck with the conversion!

Paul.

[Demlotcrew]

Paul I have a good loom and three ECU's!!!!

I'm still 100% convinced that a piggy back ems is by far the best possible solution, yeah who cares if you don't have a stand alone, I couldn't give, my car has been mapped once three years ago and I've never had to touch it since, no ems can give you that exept the motronic.

Andrew

[Mikey_Boy]

Paul - it looks like Andrew is your man...

Andrew's views on Motronic are absolutely sound - it's a very good ECU and I considered going Alpha N coupled into the Motronic for quite a while.

Trouble is, having had experiences in the past with developing engines when I was an engineer, my desire to fettle is rather strong and I am used to ECU's that are truly 'open', hence my desire to use something other than Motronic.... One man's meat etc etc! it could well be my undoing, but equally, if it proves to be useful - I will be sharing on here!

[Demlotcrew]

Mikey, I have ADD and i too have the need to tinker, but with out easy access to a decent rolling road (with Environmental climate etc), you are very limited of what you can do with all that access to the ECU. I agree that the UniQ does have one downside and that its not 'Open'. But if you have the tools to map motronic and all your previous experience in engine development, i have to ask why you are looking at something like Emerald which is hardly challenging?

I remanufactured great little sync cam sensor used by some very successful race teams back in the day, fully adjustable using top of the range sensor!







But im pretty sure you dont need this with Emerald!

Andrew

[Mikey_Boy]

That looks like a fab bit of kit!

Indeed, the Emerald ECU is pretty simple (always a relative term) but also seems to have some pretty trick features to help out with my (now very rusty) skills.

Bottom line for me was simply balancing the amount of time I have to mess with things (you could spend years fiddling with a complex EMS), versus how much time I want to spend enjoying driving the car - I enjoy both equally so figured this was a good compromise. Plus I do have to squeeze in work every now and again!

Plus, I want the ability to add new things when the time is right - like most things E30, it gets under your skin!! I already have plans for the S14's future, but all in good time... So, for now, paired injectors is the name of the game (no cam sync required) but of course that will no doubt change once I need more power!!

[Kos]

Hi Kos - I could open up a whole can of worms here as there are a lot of opinions about brakes that exist on this forum!

So - please do take this as another bit of information to add to your knowledge! Just so that you understand the set up - I have the K Sport 330mm brakes up front with their 8 pot calipers, standard rear brakes, braided hoses all round and a 750iL master cylinder. For what I have (weight of car, intended use etc), I think this kit is very very good - works very well on track (I have never had any fade issues, but then, some might just say that I am not trying hard enough!) and the pedal modulation feels pretty good.

My only gripe was that when the kit was fitted, I noticed that the bleed nipples leaked a bit when the brakes got very very hot- not the best all things considered, but this was cured by putting PTFE tape on them (which proably should have been done duringthe initial installation)

However, what feels good to me could be very different to what feels good to someone else! As final tweeks, I would like to uprate the pads all round and uprate the rear discs to grooved.

Would I recommend them? Absolutely. Are there other options out there that are just as good? Of course!

Hope that helps,

Mike

hi mike

thanks for the feed back

i've been looking at brakes for my compact (m52b28 powered) which is is going to be dedicated track car, the only part missing are some proper brakes

the options i have are e46 330i 325mm disks and source a caliper set (840i brembos bolt up) or use another caliper and make up the brackets

but K sport do have some reasonably priced kits, so i was thinking about them, so its good to have feed back from some one who uses them properly

a mate with an e39 M5 has fitted a set and he seems happy enough and he uses his car hard and has no worries with it, but that is fast road use.

so, they are on my options list for now


thanks for your thoughts

[Mikey_Boy]

A pleasure Kos! In fairness I have also heard some great things about using e46 items, but again, I could open up a whole can or worms!

Good to hear that someone else with a BMW has used K Sport and had no worries - most people who I have bumped into with the kits are mostly Scooby and Evo folks.

Another small update - the carbon airbox is in the country and HM Customs have been in touch to take some money from me that they think they deserve, which, whilst not unexpected, makes me feel a little ripped off!

Now all the goodies are coming together, I shall get some pics sorted and have a 'goodie parade' in the near future before starting in earnest...

[Mikey_Boy]

A quick update... Unfortunatley work has been keeping me occupied a bit too much of late, but I have managed to get a few things started. Firstly, the engine wiring loom is in need of a bit of a tidy up:



This doesn't show much unfortunately - what I will be doing is taking out the bits I don't need and installing new wiring to accomodate the Emerald ECU I have to install...

Inspecting the harnes revealed such nasties as this:



So I am having to go through what I am using on the loom from front to back to ensure everything is OK. Meantime I have been cracking on with getting the engine ready to lift out:



Since this pic was taken, I have got the front bumper off and found that most of the metal behind it is in pretty good shape! I need to do a bit of cutting to open out the extra aperture for some extra oil coooling but more pics coming in due course!

[ShepsEvo3]

Paul - it looks like Andrew is your man...

Andrew's views on Motronic are absolutely sound - it's a very good ECU and I considered going Alpha N coupled into the Motronic for quite a while.

Trouble is, having had experiences in the past with developing engines when I was an engineer, my desire to fettle is rather strong and I am used to ECU's that are truly 'open', hence my desire to use something other than Motronic.... One man's meat etc etc! it could well be my undoing, but equally, if it proves to be useful - I will be sharing on here!

Thanks guys..

Agree the ECU is a very good ECU and that's why I like working with it coupled with the Unichip. However, the Motronic ECU is gettin on a bit now and I have every one I work on now refurbed with all the solders reflowed and all the components tested/repaired before any mapping with the Unichip.

I'm very open minded to any solutions and recently graced Clives (Kingcruisers) 2.7ltr supercharged M20 with DTA as I felt it was the best option for him considering what had been done and the problems he had. However, the Unichip coupled with the Motronic could have handled it very well and could have also ran an extra set of injectors if needed. But weighing up costs is difficult.

The Unichip isn't open unfortunately. Stand alone ECU's are ofcourse.

Good luck with the project, I shall be watching with much interest

[e30topless]

Great thread Mike, watching with interest!

might be a little early in the build, but have you taken into account using the Z3 rack alongside the S14 manifold?

this is something i want to do but cannot find any info/pointers? obviously the manifold area is going to be very tight

[Mikey_Boy]

That's a very good point e30topless... The difference in angle of the Z3 rack compared to the E30 rack is quite significant. My first options (quite frankly) is to cheat - I have been in touch with BTB exhausts for help in this area - I had a BTB3 exhaust fitted to my M20 and it was the best exhaust I have ever had for sound, fit and finish. Now that the old exhaust is out and I can see just how tight it is, but at first glance the change in angle MAY help - we shall see...!

I am currently selling everything else I own to be able to afford it...

If that plan doesn't come off then I will have to think of something else...

Either way - I shall do my best to document it...

[e30topless]

I never thought of cheating with a BTB manifold I dread to think what the price of that may be ?

maybe Andrew (Demlot) has the answer ! I can't imagine he's using a standard rack on his car ?
this is something I have to tackle in the next few weeks.. I'm really not looking forward to it,

[rix313]

Looking forward to seeing this progress, going to be a very nice car this

[Mikey_Boy]

Another quick update - a few things are starting to come together, meaning I have been waiting for other things to arrive so whilst there was a relative lull, I thought I could mount the ECU. So, opening up a can of worms, I have one of these in my possession:



And with comms lead attached:



Which is important as this will be a permanent fixture in the car in case of problems, fault diagnosis etc etc. Important as it adds a fair bit of length to the ECU!!

Having had a look at the old ECU layout and lengths of cables, ease of access, proximity of other cables etc, I decided on an orientation that hopefully ticks all the boxes:



Mounted to the existing ECU bracket - the comms plug is at the bulkhead end and main connector in a similar orientation to the existing ECU - the new harness should reach with no problems. Here it is in the car:





Now I have to get my shizzle together and modify the harness...

Whilst under the dashboard I realised that the clutch master cylinderhas just started to leak so something else to change (but then I was always going to change the clutch slave cylinder and connecting pipe as well).

The only bits stoppng me taking the engine out are the propshaft, gear linkage and slave cylinder so hopefully Mr Engine Crane will be getting some exercise soon!

[Mikey_Boy]

OK folks, another update for you all. This build is going to turn into a bit of a saga after an (ahem!) interesting day at it today.

First of all, the old donk is out! This (and loads of related parts) are now for sale so please have a look in the relevant forum - space and cash needed!!

Donk coming out:



And donk out...



So far so good... However...

One thing I had noticed whilst cleaning up the engine is that there were a couple of oil leaks - one from the cam carrier and another from the sump. As I have a Carlos Fandango baffled sump to go on this seemed to be no biggie so the standard sump was whipped off:



So far so good... Next up was the cam carrier - this is a touch more involved as it means swinging the engine round to TDC and removing various bits including the cams to remove the cam carrier - first the dizzy drive and cover to expose the cam retaining bolts:



And the usual bits to remove the cams - remove top chain guide, remove gears etc etc:



So that you have a cam carrier ready to re-seal to the cylinder head after a good clean up:



So far so good - what bothered me was that this carrier lifted pretty much straight off, which meant there was little or no sealant between the 2 faces, hence the oil leak. No biggie - out came the cleaning tackle and once clean, a good bead of Loctite 518 duly applied...

Then, disaster!!!

Assembling the cam carrier to the head, not 1, not 2 but THREE threads pulled (the arrow shows 1 of the offending threads:



Which means that the head has to come off to get helicoils fitted... Head is now off:



And whilst the head is off, I might as well upgrade the cams and springs, renew the timing chain, oil pump, crank sprocket, big end and main bearings and generally give the engine a bit of a refresh... so much for leaving the internals alone...............!

Thankfully the bores and pistons (at least from what I have seen having removed 1 piston) are in EXCELLENT condition and don't look like they have done much work at all.

An interesting day to say the least! In a way, I am glad this showed itself now instead of when the engine was back in so a (really fecking expensive!!) blessing in disguise...

[e30topless]

Ouch that's a very expensive weekend !

[Mikey_Boy]

Hi Folks - things are still moving, but given that I am saving up for parts and also tidying up the engine bay a touch and that thing called Christmas is just around the corner, updates have been a bit slower - with luck I shall have something to report over the hols and more pics to post!

In the meantime - Merry Christmas one and all!!

[Mikey_Boy]

Time for an update... After the surprise of the engine being not quite as sound as I first thought, I figured it might be best to do something that won't cost money! So the front end has been stripped a little more:



And the sound deadening taken out of the transmission tunnel to save the odd Kilo:



My ABS has never been great - given that this is primarily a trackday car (albeit driven to and from the circuit) and now that I have some bigger discs at the front and a different master cylinder (750il) I thought getting rid of the ABS might be a good idea:

Having removed the ABS pump cover:



You can unplug the wiring at the pump:



And trace that back to the ABS ECU under the left hand side of the dash:



(There are some other wiring nasties under there that I am going to address separately...!) To remove the wiring there are some connectors to the main power board, an Earth strap to remove and the wires over to the ABS light which is all easy to remove... Not so easy are the speed sensors for the rear brakes that go up the left hand side of the car. As I (may) need a spare speed signal for my Stack speedo that's not liking the current diff input, I have kept these cables by snipping the loom in case I need a good signal from the rear wheels. After all the removal you should have a pile of wires looking like this:



And a hole in the main grommet that looks like this:



(Which is far easier to get at with the servo removed...!) I took the servo out with the aim of changing it for a Clio servo and to check for corrosion around the fusebox area - thankfully none to be seen!

However, I did notice that the main grommet wasn't seating properly so have fixed that and bunged up the hole shown above with the ABS 'sub grommet' filled with some silicone:



Having weighed up the options, and the Clio servo I had bought, I decided to stick with the E30 servo despite it being a big old unit because the pedal feel I have with that coupled with the bigger discs and master cylinder is pretty good, plus I am not space restricted like with an M5x/S5x conversion - better the devil you know and all that! So, a bit of a tidy up for the servo:



And all Barry'd up and ready to go back in:



I will tackle the ABS pump removal once I can borrow a flaring tool and another pair of hands! But, the braking circuit looks easy to adapt by joining various (existing) pipes...

[Mikey_Boy]

And now moving back onto the engine - once the head was off, I realised that it had been skimmed to death as well, so I have sourced another head (which I managed to find for £300, not too bad in the bank emptying world of S14s!) so endeavouring to make a good head from the 2 that I have...

In for a penny etc with the engine, I have swallowed a brave pill and decided a full strip and rebuild are on the cards... Cue some standard engine stripdown pics:

Front cover off:



Bottom end nearly out:



Bare block from bottom:



Bare block from top:



Crank out:



Some good news is that the bores look sound and are standard size.. Also good news is that inspecting and measuring up the crank shows that the mains and big ends are also standard size and in excellent shape so a big relief there...

One thing that didn't look so good though was the crank damper:



Which came off far too easily (so clearly not done up to the spec of 440Nm!) and looked like it had fretted around quite a bit:


And taken quite a chomp out of the woodruff key:



Not happy about this as I am fitting an Emerald ECU (and the signal for the enigne speed comes from the crank) so bit the bullet (the first of several!!) and bought a new crank damper from BMW, which looks like this:



And of course a new woodruff key!

To distract me a little further I have fitted the crank trigger wheel to the crank damper:



And the result looks like this:



I also figured that after 20+ years of being shaken about, a new damper would be a wise investment especially given the reputation for harsh secondary harmonics that S14s have - I also spent a LOT of time getting dampers right during my Cosworth days so didn't want to take the chance.

For now, I have a bare block waiting for parts to be fitted and a healthy sense of denial about upcoming credit card bills!!

More updates to come when I can afford them!

[Jhonno]

Either new higher comp pistons with bigger valve reliefs or get the valve pockets machined deeper!

[Demlotcrew]

Or a really tight gear shift!

[Mikey_Boy]

Yes indeed! I have been pondering this as I managed to blag a set of brand new standard slugs for the rebuild. Also, I am running the small port head (so a few flow limitations) and even more limited funds given the rebuild so the plan is as follows:

- Use standard slugs and CR with 276 Inlet and standard exhaust cam, EVO 3 springs
- Get adjustable gears for timing in properly
- Rely on Carbon airbox and decent exhaust (50mm primaries) for a bit more poke

Hopefully that should keep things interesting for now and when I eventually take down another bank I will look at doing a full on 2.5...