XCRN : 1995 BMW 525i

[XCRN]

About a month ago I ordered 10 LEDs for $10 and now that most of the interior is back in place I can start putting in the light fixtures with the new LEDs in. The following night I got some photos of what they looked like and they are nice. I was opposed to white since I have an issue with seeing in white light, at least in the CB7 I did, but I can see fine with these. My guess why I had an issue with white in the CB was that there was only one central dome light and this car has 3. So I guess yellow light if there is only little light that can be used and white is fine if there is plenty of it

Either way on to the photos.

This photo is from a distance.







I also did not realize there was 3 lights total for the trunk. Can you believe it 14 lights total for just the interior, just absurd.



And was able to barely fit these lights into the license plate light fixtures. Guess I have to order more LEDs for the tail lights, whoopie

[XCRN]

I got to doing an oil change and got the engine running, but not too well. It idles fine and there is not off color or excessive smoke coming out of the tail pipe.



Something tells me this is the reason.

[cb9love]

There Appears To Be Parts Missing From One Of The Plugs.

[XCRN]

There Appears To Be Parts Missing From One Of The Plugs.

I thought that too but that one is a different brand and I checked for any metal that snapped off and there is none. Also the coil pack that was connected to that plug was also a different brand from the rest.

[XCRN]

Got an update for you all that read these pages.

To start off with, I will explain the things I do not have pictures for. Since I have the spark plugs out and waiting for the new ones to come in, I did a compression test. I am somewhat optimistic but still remain cautious as to what the results mean.

1 160
2 145
3 145
4 195
5 155
6 155

The spark plug tube for number 4 was the most flooded so I would assume the oil fell in when the spark plug was removed and caused the bump in compression.

For the second bit, today I finished the last corner with the rebuilt caliper and brake lines. Me and my cousin successfully bled the rear brakes, but the fronts gave us some issues. It was like an old mans urethra, just pissing out air. We did make very slow progress, but ran out of time. So until this Saturday, I am going let gravity take the fluid throughout the system and fill up as needed and hopefully by the time we get back to bleeding most of the air should be gone.

Now for the pictures! I found some deep black E46 weather trim to match the pillars and gave the interior a thorough cleaning and got some great pictures of it so here the are.

[islandhopper]

looks damn good.

[cb9love]

What are your plans for the motor?
That interior is looking so classy.

[XCRN]

looks damn good.

Thank you, I would have to agree with you.

What are your plans for the motor?
That interior is looking so classy.

Thanks, classy is what I wanted this whole time but having power to go with it is not all that bad either. But you do bring up a good question.

Short term is making it reliable. After I make it reliable enough and swap the manual stuff over, then will be the "go-fast" stuff which will be a bit longer but still easily doable and not that expensive. After I get this engine reliable enough and the manuals swap done the plan is M3 camshafts, higher capacity injectors, and a chip to tune it for those particular items. If the engine however does not turn out to be healthy enough, I will swap it with a 2.8L M52 engine. The 2.8L engine with those items plus the intake manifold from my current engine actually get really close to North American numbers.

But very long term is a rebuilt 2.8L with all those items above plus a supercharger.

Still figuring out when to do the manual swap. Soon I will actual be able to tell the condition of the current auto better to see if I can drive it as is with new fluid. I am debating whether or not if this transmission turns out to be FUBAR if I should just sell the manual transmission I have, but not the entire swap. The transmission is easy to find since E36s come with it too, but the ZF swap parts are not so easy to come by.

[XCRN]

I got to drive around on public streets today and it worked great! Still needs some work but I am close to dailying it. So excited

[XCRN]

This morning I sold the style 5s and got the cash to get the new tires. I actually had $10 left over so, bitchen!






Now for the not so bitchen part. I drove around the back roads today and it shift 1-3, a bit slow but goes into those gears fine but will not go into 4th. I got a little adventurous and got the engine around 5K and sounded like pennys in a can so the VANOS unit will need to be rebuilt. And I might have a blow head gasket with coolant going into the cylinders, there was a lot of white smoke but I am reading that the octane booster can cause the white smoke sometimes so I am going to keep on testing things.

[XCRN]

So I called insurance and for bare minimum it is $20 a month! I also did other things. I took a new picture that I love, and I made my own shift boot since I had the time and materials from when I did the wrapped grab handles.

[XCRN]

Two great things to report, one is I finally got a job at a driving range, and second I successfully drove this to school today through the back roads since it is still not popping into 4th yet. So long as I stay below 55mph, it will do great. I might just start driving this more regularly since I can get to work or school using country back roads.

[XCRN]

Did the trans fluid and filter change and there was a heart breaking amount of metal on the magnet. I test drove it and went into limp mode right away but felt better, but was not able to see 4th in time. It was still shifting 1-3 before limp mode so we will see as I drive more tk get the new fluid circulating.

[XCRN]

Trans took a crap and I still have half a tank of gas that will go unused for awhile. Cost me $45 to fill it up so I tried to use as much of it as I can before it went out since it was inevitable since the trans was leaking really bad. About all I can do now is move it around the property as needed. But I did make some progress on fixing the issue. I got a package today and contained parts for the 3.23 LSD for the manual swap and some parts for the shifter rebuild.






I have to redo the paint, or instead of putting any effort into doing that just say fuck it and install it and take the auto diff and use that casing and have it powderoated then do a 3.46 LSD build to it and swap it out when it is finished.




When it came to the shifter, the bushing I thought was bad was good, and the one I thought was good is bad. So now I have to order the right bushing and I am thinking of upgrading to a Teflon bushing in place of rubber. I want that mechanical notchy feel. But see how bad the slop is. No wonder the guy who I bought the swap from said it was difficult to get into reverse.

[XCRN]

Last Memorial Day weekend, the local junkyard had a %50 off everything sale so I went to get some stuff. I wanted more but am happy with some of the stuff I got. First up I got some "Pink Top" fuel injectors that come off a 328i or M3. Pretty worthless now since I have no air adders to make them worth while, but when I get the M3 camshafts it will prevent it from starving.



The second thing I picked up was some OBD2 tubular steel headers to replace the cast iron lumps I have now.



Getting these out was a roller coaster of emotions. So when I first approached the E36 328i, I thought this would be a real simple job. How wrong I was. I start undoing the top bolts and round one off and there was too little space to do my usual methods of removing rounded bolts so I decided to remove the cylinder head. I was annoyed at this point since it was going to take more time to get it but was going real well until I got to the very last cylinder head bolt. Rounded that one off and I was furious. I was dedicated to get the headers for %50 off so I came back the next day with 2 friends and we work on taking the engine out. We got that thing out and I was thinking it would all be simple from here until the last header nut (technically a bolt since it is too rusted to be separated from the stud). That one was too rounded off to go from a 7/16" socket to hammering on a 3/8" socket which worked for a few other rounded bolts. I try what ever I can to get it off and it just gets worse and worse. I was depressed, thought there was no hope left. My last effort was using a 10mm which is bigger than a 3/8" but was desperate to try anything. But that got it, I guess it just grabbed on to what remained of the bolt. But well worth the effort for %50 off as crazy as I may seem now.

So today I picked up paint for it and made it look nice before they go back in, which I need to figure out how to block off the EGR ports, which there are block off plats that exists but I do not want to pay $30 for some sheet metal. So I am going to see if my friends have some sheet metal tools. I also need to figure out how to plug up the O2s since my car does not have the sensors on the headers.




Since I had the paint I also did a stealth bulb DIY to keep the orange from popping out of the clear light housings like in the picture below.



It is real simple. Just paint the bulbs with high temp paint and you are done. They still shine really bright through the paint and does not show any orange when the lights are off.