V6 powered E30 (Finished!)

Discuss general engine, turbo and supercharger conversions in this section

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ric325i
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Thu Sep 06, 2007 11:22 pm

that sounds great!

so quiet then GGGRARRRR GGGRRAAARRRR

goos ound effects i thought.

really nice nam
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DRIFTBOY
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Fri Sep 07, 2007 1:21 am

I'm loving this project! :cool:

I wish my neighbours had cars that sound like that, I'd rush to press the mute button on the tv remote and open the window so I could hear it better!

Please keep the great write ups and pics etc. coming!

Good work dudes! :D
Jeremy Clarkson wrote:...but it drives the front wheels. Theee wrooong wheels!
da4x4turbo wrote:I raced a vivaro on the motorway once in a 318is.... and lost!!!
x-works
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Mon Oct 01, 2007 9:56 am

Made some more progress again since last post.
First up was to get some paint on the car and after
sanding for what felt like forever it was finally time
to tape up and get some colours on. After painting
the car in primer and sanding it all again :cry: we
taped off the outside so we could first spray the interior
and engine bay white.................

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with this done we could now refit the doors and bonnet and
tape up for the stripes, starting with the red ..............

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and so on and on for the blue, purple and finally the white.................

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then the nervous wait to see if the shinny paint would reveal
any distorsions to the roof skin after welding in the sunroof
pannel.............

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thankfully there were no suprises.
So after leaving the paint to harden for a few days and making sure
all the flies that wanted to, had sufficient time to merge with the new
paint work (b**tards, i swear to god if ever anybody wants to study
wildlife just spray something and stand back and wait for it to dry,
we reckon if we sprayed a car in Africa there'd be a bloody elephant
stuck to it the next day!) Anyway wildlife aside, paint dry, time for
poly windows and door cards................

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with the pedal box and other bits and pieces now refitted to the
engine bay it was time to fill the empty hole...............

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nice what a lick of paint does isn't it...............


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with the engine refitted it was time to start refitting all the other bits
and pieces, starting with the cold start valve we had decided to move
to clean up the rocker cover. The old position had the valve on top of
the rocker cover with pipes running all around it...................

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so a bit of plumbing now allows it to reside at the rear of the
head................

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next up is to make some holders to route the H.T. leads out from
the distributor cap, one done one to go.......................

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and thats about where we are for now.
Ziggy
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Mon Oct 01, 2007 10:09 am

:cool: :cool: :cool: :cool: :cool: :cool: :cool: :cool: :cool:

That's blimmin lovely that is! :D
E30 in need of wiring loom smoke since April '11...
jkarran
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Mon Oct 01, 2007 10:32 am

That's looking awesome now it's all painted up. Is it going to be rallied or used for trackdays?
jk
E30 320i Rally Turd - Usually broken
E24 635Csi - Rotting in peace for now
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Blown R1 Striker - In progress
x-works
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Mon Oct 01, 2007 2:03 pm

Believe the owner intends to use it for both.
Geeman
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Mon Oct 01, 2007 2:14 pm

Wow.

What an amazing car.

Loved reading this thread. Proper engineering stuff gone on here. Surely worthy of a magazine story... even if it shows what CAN be done with some skills and patience.

nice one.

G.
ajm-e30
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Mon Oct 01, 2007 2:52 pm

is that an escort cossy i c in one the pics?
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x-works
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Mon Oct 01, 2007 3:09 pm

well spotted. Wrc shell converted to rwd with an N/A opel engine.
daimlerman
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Mon Oct 01, 2007 4:45 pm

Well done,can we have a Ferrari engine in a touring,next,please?
Youth is wasted on the young.
x-works
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Mon Oct 01, 2007 5:32 pm

daimlerman wrote:Well done,can we have a Ferrari engine in a touring,next,please?


bit of a shortage of Ferrari's engines in the scrapyards
around here these days, :D
x-works
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Wed Oct 31, 2007 8:54 pm

Been a while since my last confession, we managed to get a
good bit more done so deep breath and heres the results of this
months efforts.

new rad arrived, looks sweet and more to the point weighs about
half as much as the old one, can only guess at how much crap was
set inside the old one..............

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next up was to try and sort out the breather pipe that came out the top
of the rocker cover. This used to have a big ignorant looking breather
sitting on top of the rocker cover out of which ran another pipe that
recirculated the oily fumes back into the intake. We're trying to keep the
top of the engine as clean looking as possible, so we found a fitting that
could be "persuaded" (fancy word for hammered) into the rocker cover,
to which we could attach a pipe to and run it into a catch tank which we
have yet to fabricate..................

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next up was the ht lead holders. We'd started to make one of these
in the last update but neither of us were mad gone on it, so as luck would
have it we spotted some nice aluminium strips in the local hard ware store
that looked as if they'd suit the leads size perfect...............

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next up was to build a cold air feed duct which would replace one
of the e30's inner headlights. Not sure if this makes a blind bit of
difference to engine performance, but what it does do is lets more of
the induction noise out and thats worth any amount of effort in our
book. So, one rather large exhaust trumpet................

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2 alum disc's cut to slide over it.....................

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attach disc's to each other......................

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spray them black and attach them to the trumpet................

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remove headlight and replace with object................

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next up the suspension kit had arrived from ze fatherland..............

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brakes are staying standard all around for the mo, so all the original
running gear striped out and anything that was going back on got
striped, cleaned, overhauled and painted...................

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reassembled with mintex pads, new wheels bearings, wishbones,
and m3 poly bushes. Still waiting on the braided brake pipes...............

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rear suspension was along the same lines. Top shock mounts well
well past their sell by date, with the centers having burst out of them so
new mounts..................

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rear axle out and polybush everything that looks like it moves...........

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and bang it all back in with the new adjustable coils and shocks...........

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next up was the little heat shields which protect the rubber engine
mounts from the heat of the exhaust, a manifold each side would require
a heat shield each side....................

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the next thing we wanted to do was to wrap the manifolds to try
and keep the under bonnet temps down a bit so, 12 meters of fiber glass
wrap, 20 feet of lacing wire, 2 itchy and shredded hands and a bucket full
of patience.....................

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it was actually unfortunate that we used up all our patience wrapping
the manifolds as we could have done with some more to cope with
the discovery that was made upon refitting the manifolds.
You might remember from earlier that the distance between the steering
coloum and the exhaust manifold was similar to the distance between a
snakes balls and the ground ie. tight. So it probably should have come
as no surprise that with the wrapping on the manifold this had now
become an interference fit.................

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no matter how gifted you are at drifting a car and steering from the
rear, I've yet to meet someone who can do it without the use of the
steering wheel, so it was clear something was going to have to be sorted.
With hands still recovering from wrapping the manifolds the idea of
stripping it all off and altering the manifold was discounted very quickly.
Only one other option then really, move the bloody steering coloum.
With the coloum out we could see how much room there was to work
with.....................

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you can see from above the size of the hole that the coloum protrudes
through the bulkhead from the white paint. The plan was to remake this
to move the coloum a half inch to the left in the picture, which we
calculated (guessed) would give us back good clearance at the manifold.
Strip the bracket from the coloum................

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copy and make a new plate, and bolt it up to the bulkhead.............

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mark the shape of the bulkhead hole on the far side of the
plate...........

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very carefully mark where the tubing is going to weld to the new
plate, taking great care not to make a carbon copy of the plate you are throwing away, :mad: .....................

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weld it all up, reassemble it and refit it and say a little prayer that
you haven't f**ked it up...................

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in the voice of the great man himself, C. Montgomery Burns

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next up was the black art of wiring up a car and the voodo thats
required to keep the smoke from escaping from inside the wires.
Main engine loom was laid in and just needed securing
and p cliping where possible................

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there wasn't a great deal of slack left on the engine management
loom when it reappeared inside the cabin, so the 2 ecu's were going to
have to be mounted close by. First small one was straight forward
enough..................

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the second larger one was going to take a bit more creativity. So a
bracket was fabricated..................

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painted black and some foam tape applied to the inside ..............

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a few rivet nuts fitted to the bulkhead................

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and bang it up....................

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next up was to fit the extra sensors the new dash display would
need. First up was the coolant temp. sensor. A quick study of the
thermostat housing showed up 3 sensors of which only 2 were going to
be used the 3rd one on the right was for the original temp gauge on the
old dash................

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So just a simple job on removing one sensor and replacing it with
the other, untill we hit a small snag...........

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the original was an m18 thread the new one an m10, we briefly
toyed with the idea of a couple of hundred wraps of thread tape 8O
before going searching for an adapter. We managed to find a fitting
with the correct outside thread but the inside was still a little to big at
11mm to take a taping out to m10. So we done more digging an got
a heli-coil to get the inside diameter down to m10..............

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oil temp sender proved to be just as straight forward ie. pain in the
arse. We had overlooked (forgotten) in the inital building and painting
of the sump that a threaded boss would be required in the side of it. But
luckly we did remember it before we had fitted the engine back in for
the final time. Still meant removing the sump, drilling the hole and
welding the nut on before repainting the whole thing again and making a
new gasket. Still it would have been a bit worse I suppose if wee had to
pull the whole engine out again to do this, be greatfull for small mercies
and all that. (greatfull my arse, I hate making cork gaskets, twice)

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next up was the fuse board. Usually this would be in a panel where
the heater controls used to be, but in this car the heater was being kept
so we had to find some where else for them. We decided upon a position
where the centre console used to be as it would also help secure the
bottom of the dash...............

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fuse holder blocks from the motor factor, relay holders from a nissan
in the scrap yard......................

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forgot to take a picture of it fitted it would appear, but you can see
it in the bottom right of the next pic, will look better when its finished and
covered (i hope)
next up was the indicator stalk. For a while now we've being using
a ford escort stalk :eek: in most of our builds simply because they're so
compact. They house the wiper controls, lights, indicators, and hazard
switch and relay all in the one stalk which cuts down on the amount of
different places you have to run wires to. First up was to remove the
old ignition barrel from the bm steering coloum, and then start fitting
the escort stalk in it's place. Then fabricate a clamp...............

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weld an m6 nut to the top of the clamp...................

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bolt stalk to clamp.................

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fit object to coloum..............

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with most of the major electrical items now fitted we could start
measuring up and laying in the new looms which is where we are at the moment ..................

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On the bright side though we have reached the stage where the
amount of things left to be done now fits on a couple of fools cap pages

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the end is nigh! :D[/img]
Last edited by x-works on Wed Oct 31, 2007 10:58 pm, edited 6 times in total.
DRIFTBOY
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Wed Oct 31, 2007 9:32 pm

That looks stunning!

This car just gets better and better, I love it!!! :D :cool:
Last edited by DRIFTBOY on Wed Oct 31, 2007 11:58 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Jeremy Clarkson wrote:...but it drives the front wheels. Theee wrooong wheels!
da4x4turbo wrote:I raced a vivaro on the motorway once in a 318is.... and lost!!!
gareth
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Wed Oct 31, 2007 11:14 pm

looking good and an excellent write up.

i can't wait to see the finished beastie :cool:
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Taz
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Thu Nov 01, 2007 1:27 am

excellent project! :cool:

keep up the cool work
Jhonno
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Thu Nov 01, 2007 1:59 am

i wanna hear it.. alfa v6's make a purdy noise :cool:
Got cable ties? Get diffin..

Arch roller for hire.

www.zeroexhausts.co.uk

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Toby_Unna
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Thu Nov 01, 2007 10:14 am

Jhonno wrote:i wanna hear it.. alfa v6's make a purdy noise :cool:
read the rest of the thread then and you can :mad:

looking brilliant!
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bobafett
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Thu Nov 01, 2007 10:23 am

My boss has just caught me reading this again ! What a great write up mate carry on and keep us informed !
What ?! Drive straight officer......It's an E30 !
It's the Ultimate Drifting Machine.
Andy325i
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Thu Nov 01, 2007 10:34 am

Awesome project and top work. Keep it up :cool:

Andy
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ric325i
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Thu Nov 01, 2007 11:39 am

sweet thread and i like how you cleared the exhaust manifold by shifting the steering coloum :D
humm.
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x-works
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Sat Dec 15, 2007 7:55 pm

Bump for a new page.
x-works
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Sat Dec 15, 2007 7:56 pm

and again
x-works
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Sat Dec 15, 2007 7:56 pm

3rd time lucky
x-works
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Sat Dec 15, 2007 7:57 pm

christ there must be an easier way of doing this
x-works
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Sat Dec 15, 2007 7:57 pm

:mad:
x-works
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Sat Dec 15, 2007 7:58 pm

:banghead:
x-works
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Sat Dec 15, 2007 8:00 pm

:cens:
x-works
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Sat Dec 15, 2007 8:02 pm

All well I tried, apologies to anyone on dial up if this page takes
an eternity to load up.
Been a while since the last update as we've been a little busy
and as it happen we got quite a bit done, worst part of it is theres
so many pic's here its hard to remember what order it was done in
so here goes.
One of the things that was needed doing, was the dash, or to
flock it to be precise. This can be seen on quite a few race and rally
cars and I suppose the main idea behind it is to stop the sun reflecting
up off the dash board onto the windscreen and dazzeling the driver.
We done it cause it looks sweet.

first up strip the dash.....................

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with the dash out and empty we could pull the demister vents...........

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we've tried the spray on stuff before and ended up getting more on
ourselves than the dash, one change of wind and you end up with stuble
like Desperate Dan, so we now stick to using material instead.
The material we use is foam backed and polyester so it has a bit of
stretch to it which helps covering the bends.

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however we make things a little easier for ourselves by filling
in some of the unneeded dents and dips in the dash. A few cardboard
templates....................

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transfered to aluminium, bonded in and the whole dash sanded
down and washed with thinners to help the glue stick................

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cut some rough lengths of material...........

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and lay them up with the aid of a few thumbs tacks to trim the
material to its final shape (fancy thumbs tack are essential, results
can't be guaranteed with standard dull tacks)................

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now the tricky part, after carefull practice we've found that if
you aim the nozzle of the spray glue canister very, very carefull at a
small area of the piece you are trying to glue it will only cover
everything in a fifteen foot squared area. After cleaning up the glue
explosion it looked like this.............

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then carefully pull the material back over the dash, and position
it perfectly without sticking yourself to it in the nano second it takes to
go off...............

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first one we ever did ended up with a suspicious bump in the
middle of it that looked exactly like a soon to be missing vise grips.
With the top side done it's fliped over and the vents pieces are glued
down before the demister vents are refitted................

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leaving the finished article looking like this...............

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with the dash finished and refitted we could now make and run the
various looms that had to finish around the dash. One of these was going
to be the main cable from the battery. The battery was to be mounted in
the center of where the rear seats used to be. You can buy all sorts of
fancy and expensive lightweight fiberglass and carbon fiber battery boxes
these days, this particular one is extremely robust and cost effective and
is refered to by specialists as "a hardware store plastic bucket"..............

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covered in white decal and bolted securely into its final resting
place................

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the tail light and fuel pump wiring were finished the far side of
the rear bulkhead.................

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so they could now be coupled to the main battery cable and ran
to the dash.................

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with all wires now present and identified :mad: at the dash it was
time to finish off the panels they were to plug in to.............

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first of which was the dash gauge panel...............

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stick some clocks and warning lights in the front.................

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and stick some wires on the back part...............

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fuse board proved a little busier...............

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any finally the switch panel.............

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which when refitted looks like this..................

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fuse board needs some covers made up to go around the sides........

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although the 3 l.e.d. lights look like shift lights they are in fact
indicator, alternator and oil warning lights................

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a little aluminium checker plate provided the pedals and floor
plate............

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after which there was a delivery of some large boxes.........

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containing wheels, or 12 of them to be precise...............

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which were followed a few days later by some Pirelli slicks........

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so after fitting the wheels and setting the ride heights and corner
weights, the engine bay was then completed by bolting everything
into its final resting place and securing anything that looked like it
could make a lunge for the open timing belt....................

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then it was time for our favorite job, to see who could trap
the most air bubbles under a decal..................

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and thats pretty much about it, we've trailered it up the country
to the other garage at the moment where it wait's for some final parts to
arrive before it can be brought out and given it's final test drive.
Hopefully this will be before the new year. We'll get some footage to put
up on youtube for the last post.
At least it won't be lonely parked up for the next fortnight .........

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lance1a
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Sun Dec 16, 2007 9:59 pm

Man that is so freakin' cool! I had been toying with the idea of fitting my 2.0GTV motor (ex 1978 GTV) but couldn't get my head to even contemplate the complexity of such a swap, so to do the V6 you have my utmost admiration!
Although, I do have a rather nice all-alloy twincam coffee table though! :D
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Jon_Bmw
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Sun Dec 16, 2007 10:08 pm

This is properly heroic. I absolutly love this car. Wrong in so many ways, but just so right at the same time! 8)
DRIFTBOY
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Sun Dec 16, 2007 10:09 pm

This car should be a 'car of the month' very soon in my opinion! 8)

This just gets better and better! :D
Jeremy Clarkson wrote:...but it drives the front wheels. Theee wrooong wheels!
da4x4turbo wrote:I raced a vivaro on the motorway once in a 318is.... and lost!!!
maxfield
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Sun Dec 16, 2007 10:12 pm

Awesome!

:cool: :cool: :cool: :cool: :cool: :cool: :cool: :cool:
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Theo
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Sun Dec 16, 2007 10:12 pm

Stunning, truly amazing work - I love it.

Where did you get the decals from?
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Pad
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Sun Dec 16, 2007 10:35 pm

that is absolutely top class. Hugely impressed, well done....
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Sun Dec 16, 2007 11:30 pm

wow. thats al i can really say 8O 8)
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