'93 316i Touring

[stmachreth]

Had my Touring about a year, since it's been a daily from the start I haven't really had time to tear it to pieces and chase away all its skeletons, hoping for this car to be a lifer so need to make a start. Though it won't end up standard I like the standard look so don't want to go lowering it and changing the outside much at all.

Eventually I want to do an engine swap. My preference is an M42, to keep the lively front end with a useful power boost. However as time goes by I could be persuaded to wedge something bigger in there. Who knows!

While the Comfort seats are good for what they are they're not very inspiring, I found some E90 sport seats on ebay for cheap and found a couple of examples of people who have done it successfully. They don't look very conspicuous to be fair, pleased with them, just need to fabricate some simple brackets.

I've decided now to remove as much of the interior as possible, chasing rust from the inside out whilst keeping it on the road. Not ideal, but I'm trying to make the best of my situation (tiny narrow, sloping drive bolted on the side of the house, double parked cars up the street). What I wouldn't do for a 2.5 garage! Very very jealous of some of you lads' setups.

In the interest of futureproofing, I'm deleting the sunroof with a GRP panel which should be arriving from Germany any day now. The headliner is out and the cassette and sunroof panel and bits are all in pleasingly good nick so I can use the sale of those to pay for remedial work and replacing old parts.

Found some rust in the footwells so better get that seen to pretty sharpish. Dinitrol has been in use a fair bit! There's also a rear arch that's blistered and having wire brushed it with the grinder the metal looks pitted so there's probably some cutting and sticking to be done quite soon.

If anyone could tell me how to add pictures inbetween blocks of text I'd be grateful!

[BenHar]

If your sunroof tray is in good condition, why remove it?

The reason they rot out is that BMW didn't bother to rust proof them. But you can do that now that you have the headlining out.

Ben

[stmachreth]

Cheers Ben,
Now would be a good time to do that. I'd rather have rid of it to be honest. Though I have used it happily this year, a blocked drain has caused some rot in a B-pillar, which might demand that I chop the door off and get it sorted.

There are a few potential time bombs ticking away: sills, under the boot seal. The fewer future surprises the better.

Losing 20kg from the roof won't hurt either.

[stmachreth]

Hinted at it before too, Ben, but carefully removing and flogging the sunroof assembly will provide most of the funds for the next few jobs.

Don't want to cheap out completely, but definitely looking to be economical with spends.

With that in mind, picked up 8 lengths of 3mm steel sheet to start on the brackets for the new seats. The few others on the net who claim to have installed E90 seats in an E30 were vague but encouraging on how they went about it. Spotted a design on lownperformance.com ($225??!) that looks like it'll do the trick.

Quite pleased so far that I decided to buy 8x3mm thick lengths and sandwich them together rather than 4x6mm, since now I can drill different hole sizes for the bolts (mimicking lownperf's recessed design) and minimise the height increase.

This thread might well start a bit shit, but I'm hoping it'll have a happy ending!

[Be30]

Looking good!
M42 (although I haven’t technically swapped mine yet) seems like the best way to go... light, tuneable, more modern and better on fuel

[stmachreth]

Cheers,
It's so tempting to make it a priority job, but there's lots else to do before I get there. Ride and handling before power, after safety and rust, but since they seem to be getting rare I have my eye out for the other bits.

Have you got one ready to go in?

Managed to break my handbrake dash light removing the carpet (disturbed the switch attached to handbrake?), also the front window switches aren't responding either. What have I done??

[stmachreth]

Creating mockups for the seat brackets.

This is good for me because a) I can be doing something useful and interesting in the evening and b) it's a departure from my old ways of 'measure by eye, cock it up, start again'

[rix313]

Can't beat CAD (Cardboard Aided Design)

I'm a bit of a champion of the M42. I really enjoy my M42 powered cars. Sure you don't get the noise and the torque from a 2.5 but I prefer the trade off of a lighter front end and better handling.

[stmachreth]

Hehe, definitely worth it so as not to have to scrap a load of good steel!

I'm not in a great rush to find an M42, there's plenty to do before that, but owing to it getting more scarce/expensive, is the M44 a viable alternative? I know it isn't nearly as easy a swap. I imagine because of that there will be loads more of them for less money that will have done fewer miles. Any thoughts?

[martauto]

Hehe, definitely worth it so as not to have to scrap a load of good steel!

I'm not in a great rush to find an M42, there's plenty to do before that, but owing to it getting more scarce/expensive, is the M44 a viable alternative? I know it isn't nearly as easy a swap. I imagine because of that there will be loads more of them for less money that will have done fewer miles. Any thoughts?

I had an m44 in my 318ti sport compact and when I sold it with 185k on the clock, the engine, box, and diff were still spot on and very cool to drive and if I were to do a swap it would be an m42/44 all day long. So reliable too.

Mart.

[stmachreth]

Sounds great. I understand it's a bit more of a faff doing the M44, and some say it's not worth the bother. But if it's more reliable even than an M42 and I'm set on keeping a lighter engine, it probably is worth it...

[martauto]

Sounds great. I understand it's a bit more of a faff doing the M44, and some say it's not worth the bother. But if it's more reliable even than an M42 and I'm set on keeping a lighter engine, it probably is worth it...

Sorry I meant to say both are more reliable than other e30 engines. might have started something here )

Mart.

[stmachreth]

Too cold for sikaflex to go off, yet again the sunroof cassette removal job is pushed back.

So, thought I'd get rid of the towbar that's doing nothing except rotting and adding 10kg to the tail.

Taped up the wires and pulled them inside in case one day I come over all funny and get a trailer.

Tomorrow's job is to grind off this crud and replace the underseal.

Exploring under the number plate backing trim to find nuf rust. Gutted I didn't check sooner, but I suspect it's been like that since I bought the car.

[Cloggy Saint]

Have you removed the tailgate trim/seal? Almost certain to find rust there too.

[DanThe]

Before you fit that GRP sunroof panel its well worth doing some research on what happens to GRP panels after a few months of hot/cold/UV damage, just look at track/race cars, they never stay the same shape and is not something id use on a road car, carbon fibre is much better, there is a company in the US making complete working high quality panels out of carbon now. Just worth considering before you chop it all out and slap the glue on

[stmachreth]

Cloggy, yep there's some rust poking through the seams on the tailgate, just like on the door seams. I've ground out the bits that are showing with the proxxon and sprayed dinitrol in there, hopefully will penetrate and slow the decay until I get round to stripping the whole thing and doing it properly (or find a clean tailgate)

Dan, would that still be the case after the GRP is fully painted? It's had several coats of primer and topcoat and I plan to finish it off with a UV lacquer.