New M52 "Restomod" E30 Project - SPANNER RASH

[BenHar]

Looking good!

(It's a two door saloon, not a coupe.)

Ben

[spannerrash]

This is one of the best build threads going, informative and very well shot too.
The guy from Ukraine (the glory) could do with a video but I guess he has a few "issues" at the moment.
Thanks to both of you .

Mart.

Thanks Mart!

Ahh yeah that guy's thread is insanely detailed, I'm surprised he's still able to continue working on it given the circumstances. More power to him.

[spannerrash]

On the road by Christmas?

That would be a magical xmas gift to myself for sure... Moving under it's own power early in the new year is more likely. On the road in Spring with any luck. Then we can crack on with the refinements and cosmetics.

To be honest it would kill me to drive it on salted roads given how much work I put into the underside. Never again!

[spannerrash]

Looking good!

(It's a two door saloon, not a coupe.)

Ben

Haha cheers Ben!

[spannerrash]

Another E30 build uppdate. I got a little checklist of jobs done on the car which needed doing, some of the more fiddly stuff that you end up needing to resolve on a project like this.



The first thing I tackled with the power steering lines. If you remember back to my bending the original E30 PAS lines to work with the Z3 rack, I thought I'd nailed it, but subsequently realised that the ports on the M52 power steering pump didnt at all match the ports on the E30 lines. I thought I'd been very clever by finding an appropriate adapter to make it work, but the E30 lines were covered in surface rust and starting to be a real eyesore under the car so wanted to refinish them.

I went to try and remove the lines, at this point I entered a world of pain. Because I'd chosen to route one of then between the steering rack and the subframe, between the subframe tabs, it was really wedged in solid. A future failure point for sure, I knew I needed to reroute the line, despite it already being close to kinking.

Before I even got into that, I bumped into the worlds most irritating problem. Due to the position of the sump drain plug on my custom E34 sump, I can't get the steering rack out. I can't even get the sump plug out because its a longer screw than there is space to remove it! Luckily I wasn't filming because chaos ensued trying to get the line out. I was eventually victorious in it's extraction, but then left with no PAS lines again.

At this point I knew it was game over and I needed to source some new ones. I reached out once again to Dan at BM Conversions, and it turns out custom power steering lines are another of his specialities! He was even kind enough to do me a custom routing for mine to avoid that ridiculous sump plug. Needless to say, they're perfect, I wish I'd have pulled the trigger on those from the off, I'd have saved myself a lot of time. If you're interested in checking those out, you can see them on the BM conversions website here: https://bmconversions-uk.co.uk/product-category/e30/

I can't recommend them enough!

With that fiasco over, I managed to get a brown temp sensor fitted so I'd have a coolant temperature reading on the E30 dash despite the car being an M52. I was very lucky with this actually, as most if not all M52B28's don't have all three ports drilled and tapped on the head. Mine did, I suspect thanks to the fact this M52 was in another swapped E30 before, so it must have been done back then.

I simply harvested the brown temperature sender from the M40 engine and screwed it in, then wired it up not much messing.

The other big job I got done was the heater matrix hoses. There's not many off-the-shelf solutions for this with an M5X swapped E30. I ended up getting quite creative with that I used, one of the pipes being from the M40 thermostat housing, slightly modified. I'm pretty hopeful about that being a permanent solution, they fit surprisingly well.

[BenHar]

Great progress.

I recommend that you double up the clips on the bottom of the power steering reservoir. They always leak if you don't.

You seem to fit all the bolts dry? I would put grease on them all to make disassembly easier.

Keep up the good work!

Ben

[spannerrash]

Thanks Ben, great tip, I will look to add additional jubilee clips to prevent the leak.

I actually use a dab of copper grease on all of my fasteners, it doesn't often make the edit though!

[Flaffy1991]

Been following this on YouTube for a while now, didn’t realise you were on here though!
I appreciate the amount of info you go into while doing your videos, will definitely help out a lot of people with these projects. I was originally going to go down the M5X route with my E30 (although that plan has changed) so was starting to make a list and used several of your videos for reference. Keep it up!

[martauto]

Been following this on YouTube for a while now, didn’t realise you were on here though!
I appreciate the amount of info you go into while doing your videos, will definitely help out a lot of people with these projects. I was originally going to go down the M5X route with my E30 (although that plan has changed) so was starting to make a list and used several of your videos for reference. Keep it up!

Same here , brilliant amount of good information.

Mart.

[spannerrash]

Been following this on YouTube for a while now, didn’t realise you were on here though!
I appreciate the amount of info you go into while doing your videos, will definitely help out a lot of people with these projects. I was originally going to go down the M5X route with my E30 (although that plan has changed) so was starting to make a list and used several of your videos for reference. Keep it up!

Awesome, really glad the vids are useful reference for you. Check out some of my E30 rust busting videos, might highlight some places to check on your own project. Just spotted your thread, looks like an interesting car!

[Flaffy1991]

Been following this on YouTube for a while now, didn’t realise you were on here though!
I appreciate the amount of info you go into while doing your videos, will definitely help out a lot of people with these projects. I was originally going to go down the M5X route with my E30 (although that plan has changed) so was starting to make a list and used several of your videos for reference. Keep it up!

Awesome, really glad the vids are useful reference for you. Check out some of my E30 rust busting videos, might highlight some places to check on your own project. Just spotted your thread, looks like an interesting car!

Funnily enough mate I watched most of them last night haha.

My car was under sealed a long time back so hoping it’s not bad….. fingers crossed.
I’ll be getting it up on the ramp soon enough and giving it a proper good go over so I’ll make sure to check the usual spots.
Already noticed the front inner arch bits, on the seam where it joins that flat panel behind the headlights, is has started to go. Hopefully that’s all I have to deal with though

[spannerrash]

Ahh yes, that's an extremely common one. Every E30 I've ever seen has that unless it's already been treated. Hopefully not too far gone on yours and you can just repair it rather than replace the whole panel.

I got away with that on mine luckily. Despite a few rust holes, my shell turned out to be pretty brilliant. Surprising as the exterior cosmetics of the car was/is a shambles haha.

[spannerrash]

I've something a little bit different to share. Not an E30 build update, but I've influenced the old man to buy his own BMW money pit.

Unfortunately, it's not an E30, but surprisingly similar to one being an E36 Compact. We're looking forward to having a bit of fun with it.



I put a bit more time in on the filming/editing of this one too, hopefully it shows.

[martauto]

What a brilliant choice
These are sooooooooooo underestimated and soooooooooooooooo cheap for what you get.
I sold my 316 of seven years and bought a 318ti sport in Agean blue ,did 35k in her and practically gave it away with 185k on.
It never let me down and was great fun to drive with an unbreakable drive train.
Looking forward to what you have in mind for it

Mart.
Why did I sell ?
330 E46 SE coupe

[spannerrash]

Wow you'll be very familiar with the 318ti then. They really are a bargain now!

This one needs plenty of love with 170k miles and in very poor shape cosmetically. It looks to have a little bit of rust to deal with too but hopefully not much.

It won't be getting what the E30 is, but hopefully we can tidy it up and add a few choice mods to make it even more fun to drive, then just enjoy it as a semi-practical car.

Hopefully my dad won't be cursing me for talking him into it...

[martauto]

Tell him to stick with it, they are as much fun as a 318is, same drive and rear suspension .
Rich will tell me different lol.
6000 6500 rpm all day long and she loved it !!!!
I only changed her because of the 330 e46.
If I had not got the Baur then this would be my car in the drive (second one lol )

Mart.

[spannerrash]

Having had an E30 318is in the past, it really does have a lot of very close similarities as far as cars go.

The 1.9 M44 4-pot is surprisingly characterful, just like the 1.8 M42 was in the E30. Wouldn't know which was which if I closed my eyes. (not advised)

Let's hope no horrors lie beneath on this one. I still so over rust-busting after doing the E30's underside, need more time to forget about how tough that was haha!

[spannerrash]

Sticking to the E30 programme, I've got another update to share, one which is hotly anticipated.

I've been promising to fit an intake manifold since the day I dropped the engine in, and that day finally came:


Even though I'm not supposed to be doing any power mods, I couldn't help but go for the obligatory M50B25 intake manifold upgrade for M52B28.

I couldn't help myself, I figured while I have the opportunity I should, and to be honest it turns out there are quite a few differences to concern yourself with in M50 manifold swapping, so I'm glad I got it over with.

I tried to make this the video I wish I'd found when researching how to do it, so explain it all as I go. There are a few ways to skin a cat, but I'm very happy with the quality of the result on this one.

There seems to be some controversy involved with the M50 intake swap these days, with a number of people decrying it and saying it ultimately leads to worse performance. But from my research, with the right map, it 100% makes more peak power, without losing much elsewhere.

It's almost a shame I'm not starting with the M52 manifold and a standard map to get a real-world comparison, but never say never, I may switch in the future in the name of curiosity.
It'd be interesting to hear anyone's personal experience on here with these intakes so feel free to share.

[spannerrash]

I’ve got a big exciting update to share on the M52 swap E30 project!

After the letdown of not getting the E30 running in the last video where I slapped on the M50 manifold, the old man and I dove into figuring out why it was being so stubborn.

The first issue causing the fuel pump not to run was obvious, there was no bloody relay in. I felt a bit silly about that, but as always with these things, that was just the tip of the iceberg. A couple of times we were at a total loss and nearly gave up.



Spoiler alert! You’ll have to watch through the vid to see the trials and tribulations, but here’s a quick summary of how it went down:
- No Fuel Pump Relay preventing any pumping (doh!)
- Still no pressure at the rail, so we checked the Fuel Pump itself and confirmed it worked
- We then messed with the Fuel Pressure Regulator, turns out I’d got the wrong end of the stick on how it works, so put the lines on the wrong way – schoolboy error
- Once that was rectified, we then discovered we also had issues with the Unloader Relay and DME Relay
- After sorting those we were spurred on as the engine would fire, although it still wouldn’t stay running so we then worked through all the wires and sensors to see if we messed something up earlier in the project.

Turns out we had made an inexplicable mistake with the Starter Solenoid Wiring. We’d somehow hooked up one of the 12v battery power wires to the top terminal on the starter motor solenoid. I’ve no idea why other than it looked natural in that spot.

This is why the engine kicked into life when I cranked the key, but it wouldn't keep going after I let go. Can you believe it?

It was very frustrating at the time, but what a relief to have solved it. The best news is that my M52B28 engine seems to purr like a champ despite all those years of being snoozed. The sweet sound of victory!

[BenHar]

Brilliant, well done.

And thanks for the name drop!

Ben

[spannerrash]

Brilliant, well done.

And thanks for the name drop!

Ben

Cheers Ben, and haha glad you appreciated it! Can't promise I can stick religiously to the correct terminology though...

[Scottlaw]

Really enjoying the series. Was considering doing the same swap into my e30, however, given the expertise and work involved it’s not something I will tackle myself!

[spannerrash]

Thanks Scott, really glad you're enjoying the vids. If you follow along maybe I've made the process more possible for you?
The bad news though is it still won't be quick or cheap to do. :') I think it will all be worth it in the end though!

[reggid]

Hi i have a question about the rear brake hoses, the videos says that they are front lines, are they exactly the same length as stock front lines?
i tried installing on a similar kit using e36m3 rear calipers and the longer hose rubs on the CV joint housing

[spannerrash]

Hi mate, these are the exact lines I used for the rear with my 5-lug swap, and it seemed to fit great for me:
E30 Inner rear brake lines: https://ebay.us/qEnkSk
E30 front brake lines (used as outer rears): https://ebay.us/p5oE51

Hope that helps!

[reggid]

Hi mate, these are the exact lines I used for the rear with my 5-lug swap, and it seemed to fit great for me:
E30 Inner rear brake lines: https://ebay.us/qEnkSk
E30 front brake lines (used as outer rears): https://ebay.us/p5oE51

Hope that helps!

Thanks, i have decided to try get some custom hoses made locally with a 90 degree end swivel fitting as i tried multiple lengths and no bueno and not being local it would be a couple weeks as a minimum to arrive and perhaps not guaranteed to work on mine with slightly different caliper and bracket. Perhaps there is a sweet spot for length but ill bite the bullet and just get a hose with an elbow.

I am onto the e90 booster swap now while i wait for the hoses

[spannerrash]

No worries, sounds like you've come up with a good solution. Hope the brake booster swap vid helps you out too.

[reggid]

No worries, sounds like you've come up with a good solution. Hope the brake booster swap vid helps you out too.

yes, i got some nice lines made up and issue solved. As always though have other issues with one of the tube nuts on the other side being seized on and now rounded over no amount of heat and penetrant helped so looks like i need to cut it off and need to make a new hardline on the trailing arm. One step forward 2 steps back.
Why do they make tube nuts with the hex length so short. the flare wrenches are like 8mm thick but the hex part of the nut is like 5mm long that makes 60% more torque capability is left on the table and for a few cents of material. When i get around to redoing all the lines i am going to try and find some wider tube nuts so you can some purchase.

yes i have seen your video ion the booster it was very helpful thanks, as most others do not go into much details and are LHD , i have an M20 car and want to get rid of the factory 11" booster and use the smaller OD booster for clearance with an ITB kit and making a nice carbon airbox andthe realestate should be nice. Plus with a bigger cam the vacuum will be less so the double diaphragm should help. I also have a new ATE small 9.5" booster from a Porsche perhaps that is more plug and play as a backup.

Anyway enough derailing your thread

[spannerrash]

Ahh yes, I've had many a frustration with brake line nuts, they are pretty much designed to spoil your day.

I find heating up the thing it's screwed into (usually caliper) can help a lot as it increases in size slightly, then carefully spraying some penetrating oil on the nut itself to cool it - shrinking it slightly. Then give it some grief with a brake line spanner. That gives it the best chance it can have I find and I've had a few victories with it.

Whenever I reinstall them I make sure to add copper grease to the threads, to save myself from future battles.

Regarding the brake booster, lots of people use the Porsche booster successfully so I suppose you can take your pick. I was very happy with how my E90 booster came together though.

[reggid]

Ahh yes, I've had many a frustration with brake line nuts, they are pretty much designed to spoil your day.

I find heating up the thing it's screwed into (usually caliper) can help a lot as it increases in size slightly, then carefully spraying some penetrating oil on the nut itself to cool it - shrinking it slightly. Then give it some grief with a brake line spanner. That gives it the best chance it can have I find and I've had a few victories with it.

Whenever I reinstall them I make sure to add copper grease to the threads, to save myself from future battles.

Regarding the brake booster, lots of people use the Porsche booster successfully so I suppose you can take your pick. I was very happy with how my E90 booster came together though.

i was worried about too much heat because of the braided line i was originally planning to reuse so was conservative. In the end had another go and got it off with vicegrips and filed into into something resembling a hex. i also use antiseize and nipped it up so hopefully it doesn't leak.

i am favouring the e90 booster myself as it does look like the clevis length is basically the same within a mm or so . I am looking to do a remote mount reservoir to maximise room just waiting for those fittings to go into the grommet to arrive.

i have an ABS car so will try and bend the hard lines from ABS pump to MC otherwise just make a new lines

[reggid]

so it turns out the pin positions on mine are a couple mm out which is enough to permanently activate the brake light switch as it works out to be magnified at the pedal due to the pedal ratio, is the switch adjustable? know the early style are but mine is the boxy plastic looking one 1989 car

Edit: according to bentley it is non ajustable. looks like ill have to lop the e90 clevis off to make it adjustable / threaded

[flybynite]

so it turns out the pin positions on mine are a couple mm out which is enough to permanently activate the brake light switch as it works out to be magnified at the pedal due to the pedal ratio, is the switch adjustable? know the early style are but mine is the boxy plastic looking one 1989 car
Edit: according to bentley it is non ajustable. looks like ill have to lop the e90 clevis off to make it adjustable / threaded

I have not got round to it yet but when I do I was going to round the hex off enough to get a die on it and use the die to wind a thread on it to put the e30 clevis on. Not sure if it is long enough though.

Didn't someone make an adjustable bar to go across the car with a turnbuckle in the middle for length?

Might be looking at other options by then though

[reggid]

so it turns out the pin positions on mine are a couple mm out which is enough to permanently activate the brake light switch as it works out to be magnified at the pedal due to the pedal ratio, is the switch adjustable? know the early style are but mine is the boxy plastic looking one 1989 car
Edit: according to bentley it is non ajustable. looks like ill have to lop the e90 clevis off to make it adjustable / threaded

I have not got round to it yet but when I do I was going to round the hex off enough to get a die on it and use the die to wind a thread on it to put the e30 clevis on. Not sure if it is long enough though.

Didn't someone make an adjustable bar to go across the car with a turnbuckle in the middle for length?

Might be looking at other options by then though

I’m going to cut Clovis off thread the 12mm bar that remains with m12 die and rethread the e30 Clovis to m12. It’s not long enough but with a short stud and a coupling nut and shortening the clevia and shaft it will work out. There is a longer clevis from e24/e28 but hard to find as NLA

[spannerrash]

I'm pretty sure I reset the brake light switch on an E30 at some point in the past. Setting it goes something like this - you have to push the switch centre back into the body of the switch and it sets itself when you put the switch back into place.

In other words, take the switch off, reset it. Then put the switch back on and it sets itself.

[fixedwheelnut]

so it turns out the pin positions on mine are a couple mm out which is enough to permanently activate the brake light switch as it works out to be magnified at the pedal due to the pedal ratio, is the switch adjustable? know the early style are but mine is the boxy plastic looking one 1989 car

Edit: according to bentley it is non ajustable. looks like ill have to lop the e90 clevis off to make it adjustable / threaded

I cut down an E28 clevis which is longer to give me an equivalent length to an E30 servo, it welds in just right to the E90 clevis, just cut it back enough for the hole to clear





There is a bit of adjustment on the rod that crosses behind the heater box from the pedal to the servo linkage.