What did you do to your other car(s) today?

[gadget73]

DId the lens thing like 2 weeks ago. The one I put in is actually in better shape than the one that got broken. The old one had some minor crazing going on.

Air compressor on the same car decided it was going to be stupid. It developed a leak that was larger than the volume of air the pump made, so instead of inflating the air springs it just deflated them until it timed out. Leak was an O ring on the vent solenoid and a slightly less than perfect seal between compressor and drier. The bigger problem was low volume. The intake "valve" had dirt under it and wasn't sealing correctly. Its basically a plastic mushroom shaped device that pushes against the metal in the head. Cleaned that out with a paper towel and gave it a quick flush with contact cleaner. Compressor sounds much better now and it seems to be working again.

[e24mpwr]

The 911 got new wheels and tires and a new steering wheel

That steering wheel is sublime...

[e24mpwr]

The journey with the E30 continues. It's been a seriously-crazy 8 months or so - I'll spare y'all the details, but one of them is a move to a new house in Raleigh, NC (I previously lived nearby in Cary).

In the midst of the chaos, I've managed to address some nagging things with the car. The refurb Z4 rack was leaking from one of the seals, so I warranty-replaced that. The billet oil pan also has a consistent drip, which turned out to be a slight gouge in the mating surface that was keeping it from sealing properly. Since it was nice and tight, I slapped 9 liters of Amsoil in the S52.  Yeah - the better part of a 2.5 gallon jug... (this is enabled by the oil pan required by the swap. Normally it's an M50 pan (which gains capacity), but the billet pan based on that design offers more clearance actually enables even more capacity.

I replaced all the lugs with new blacks ones too. The old ones were a bit battered and two wheels had slightly longer ones that were used when the car was running spacers. Then the car went to SouthEast SharkFest since my M635 decided to act up a bit...
I replaced all the lugs with new blacks ones too. The old ones were a bit battered and two wheels had slightly longer ones that were used when the car was running spacers. Yeah - the better part of a 2.5 gallon jug... (this is enabled by the oil pan required by the swap. Normally it's an M50 pan, but the billet pan that offers more clearance actually enables even more capacity. Then the car went to SouthEast SharkFest since my M635 decided to act up a bit...

On the way up, chasing my friend Greg's M635


Apparently four six-footers fit in an E30

(but not for long)

Post-SharkFest I had a couple issues where the car would stall and wouldn't restart. It turned out to be a dying in-tank fuel pump. Of all things a Chevy Vega pump could be hacked into the existing assembly and seems to be working great:


As the pandemonium settles a bit, I have a list of things to do to the car soon:

• I have a knockoff set of door seals to try out. The almost-certainly original ones are done, especially on the driver's side. I have a brand-new OE set, but I'm considering whether to save them for installation when I can figure out a paint job of some sort on the car. (no hard plan on timing yet)

• I have an OE trunk seal to install too, along with brake light gaskets which will hopefully solve some damp issues in the trunk.

• I've got a kick panel made of plastic from Race German that will replace a slightly-shabby original one - haven't opened it up yet - lol

• The interior door handle on the driver's side broke. I splurged and ordered the Leo Grande billet aluminum door handles, which might eventually wind up in the M635 if I like them and don't feel flush enough to buy them twice

• I need to adjust the cushions in the Scheel Mann seats

• ...and a bunch of other little stuff

I'm still kinda digging into the garage (and the house itself, for a variety of reasons), so this and other stuff might stretch out. I need to get a proper-sized battery for the car so I can get the battery tray in the car and a more-secured battery. I also have a Continental radio I need to install (or have it done for me).

[stuartinmn]

Took care of some overdue maintenance on my 325iX. New ball joints and an alignment cured a clunky ride and shimmy at highway speeds, a leaky camshaft seal was replaced, a new muffler to replace the old one that had a hole in it, and finally it was time for an oil change. I should be all set for winter.

[gadget73]

The Chevy Vega had an electric in-tank fuel pump? Would have never guessed that.

[stuartinmn]

I'm surprised a Vega fuel pump is still available.

[Theotherotter]

The 911 got new wheels and tires and a new steering wheel

That steering wheel is sublime...

It's very nice! It was originally offered as an option in Corvettes in the early 80s. Finally the right combination of reach, diameter and grip size. And yet now I am tempted by a brown-with-bronze-hub Victor in the same diameter....

[gadget73]

I'm surprised a Vega fuel pump is still available.

true

for yucks I looked it up on rockauto, sure enough its got an electric in-tank. Fits a ton of things from the mid 70s through the late 80s including Ford trucks. Thats probably the real reason its available. On those I suppose its the lift pump in the tank for dual tank models.

[e24mpwr]

I'm surprised a Vega fuel pump is still available.

true

for yucks I looked it up on rockauto, sure enough its got an electric in-tank. Fits a ton of things from the mid 70s through the late 80s including Ford trucks. Thats probably the real reason its available. On those I suppose its the lift pump in the tank for dual tank models.

In my case my shop used the kit to just replace the pump in the BMW frame, but it was funny asking for a Vega fuel pump from NAPA.

[Mike W.]

I'm surprised a Vega fuel pump is still available.

I wouldn't be surprised if there were more Vega fuel pumps available then Vegas remaining.

[1st 5er]

I'm surprised a Vega fuel pump is still available.

I wouldn't be surprised if there were more Vega fuel pumps available then Vegas remaining.

[Mike W.]

I wouldn't be surprised if there were more Vega fuel pumps available then Vegas remaining.

Yeah, I mean Rockauto alone has 7 different brands. Really?

[e24mpwr]

Somewhere in the ether of the interwebs, some guy (or AI bot) is wondering why there's a jump in interest in Vega fuel pumps...

[gadget73]

If you look at the listing of what else it fits, I'd bet its more the F series trucks that explain why they are around than the Chevy Vega. As for surviving Vegas, I'm curious how many still exist with original engines vs V8 swaps. I suspect there are more V8 Vegas at this point in time.


This was a week ago, but I rebuilt the power antenna on the Continental. I had gotten it working when I bought the car and last year it started getting goofy again, not wanting to run the antenna all the way up. Cleaned it, and it worked until a few weeks ago. Gave it a complete teardown to nothing with a deep clean and lube. Found crap packed between the commutator bars which explains why the motor never ran quite right. Runs real well now.

[austin8753]

winterized the 2002 and s50 powered e30 yesterday and took them to storage.

oil service on the M3 and M5, washed both and put on the battery tender.

winter has arrived... :/

[e24mpwr]

If you look at the listing of what else it fits, I'd bet its more the F series trucks that explain why they are around than the Chevy Vega. As for surviving Vegas, I'm curious how many still exist with original engines vs V8 swaps. I suspect there are more V8 Vegas at this point in time.


This was a week ago, but I rebuilt the power antenna on the Continental. I had gotten it working when I bought the car and last year it started getting goofy again, not wanting to run the antenna all the way up. Cleaned it, and it worked until a few weeks ago. Gave it a complete teardown to nothing with a deep clean and lube. Found crap packed between the commutator bars which explains why the motor never ran quite right. Runs real well now.

Somewhere here there's a thread on S38/M88 thermostats where my shop found one that fits/works correctly (which is a trick these days... ). Anyway, I went looking for a spare, and apparently it also works on early/mid-1980's Jeeps

[Shawn D.]

A bit of Tahoe stuff:  My Installation of A Diode Dynamics SS3 LED Fog Light Kit as Driving Lights

[gadget73]

Sat down with the glow plug controller out of the Continental last night to figure out why the "Wait To Start" light didn't work. Eventually found a cracked trace on the controller board where the +12v that is fed to the glow plugs goes into the board to run the light circuit. It was two adjacent solder blobs but no connection between them. Bridged the two blobs with some extra solder and now it works.  

[Mike W.]

Sat down with the glow plug controller out of the Continental last night to figure out why the "Wait To Start" light didn't work. Eventually found a cracked trace on the controller board where the +12v that is fed to the glow plugs goes into the board to run the light circuit. It was two adjacent solder blobs but no connection between them. Bridged the two blobs with some extra solder and now it works.  

Good to see someone getting down and actually working on a PC board. Kind of a lost art.

[328dabi]

 


 


 

Latest things I’ve done to my other cars were yellow foglights for both the F30 & FC1. Also coded in rear fog light for the F30 and replaced the side view mirror glass on the FC1 with blue tinted wide angle mirrors for reduced glare and blind spots.  

[gadget73]

Sat down with the glow plug controller out of the Continental last night to figure out why the "Wait To Start" light didn't work. Eventually found a cracked trace on the controller board where the +12v that is fed to the glow plugs goes into the board to run the light circuit. It was two adjacent solder blobs but no connection between them. Bridged the two blobs with some extra solder and now it works.  

Good to see someone getting down and actually working on a PC board. Kind of a lost art.

I don't particularly enjoy PCB work. I'm more of a tube guy that does point to point stuff but considering most things made in the last 60 years use a circuit board I've given in to the necessity. Its quite a complex little box honestly, multiple timers that vary based on engine temperature, and its got self-diagnostic ability in the form of little magnetic switches that will close when the glow plugs pull current and cause the "ok to start" light to come on.  Lincoln didn't wire that one up, but BMW did. 

[Mike W.]

Gettin' ready for St Paddy's day in SD and the 600 mile drive down there. Even though I've had the E39 530i now for the better part of a year, I haven't yet attended to all it's needs. It looks good, not great, but drives oh so good. But it needs...

After working on the seat cables I thought I had the drivers good, but it still had a bit of twist to it. So I had to straighten that out. But the passenger was way out of kilter. What's worse is a shop had been in there before, apparently go it aligned but failed to shorten the housings so it got out of alignment again. Quality work. Not.

And another E39 quirk, the headlight adjusters were broken with the lights pointing pretty low, and unadjustable. That was a PITA. Fearing a divorce if I used the suggested oven baking method to soften the butyl caulk, I used a hair drier and heat gun. Got it done, but no fun. Probably going to leak like a sieve but I might use that as an excuse to just replace the plastic lenses rather than clearcoat them.

Next was new front brakes. I'm a big fan of Akebono ceramic pads. No black dust and they last forever. No biggie except those 530 brakes, same as 540, are friggin' heavy. The rotors that is. They're like 3/4 ton pickup parts. 25 pounds a rotor. As much aluminum as BMW used on that car I'm surprised they didn't use Al rotors with some sort of hard facing.

So now it's pack some stuff and off to SD!

[gadget73]

Dug into the steering column on the Mark VII.  It has this little clunk/pop thing going on if the wheel is rocked.  Doesn't seem to move or cause problems but its slightly annoying.  Reasonably sure the issue is the middle bearing in the column.  There are 3 total, the upper is right where it comes out of the tilt assembly and is easy to replace. Middle is at the bottom of the tilt assembly, and the lower is way down in the part that bolts to the dash support hanging off the firewall.  Doing the middle or the lower require pulling the column assembly out of the car to split everything apart. 

Parts are available and not absurdly priced. Seems this column and it's parts were used through 2007 on the trucks. Think I'll order it and put them in if / when I can no longer ignore it.  I'll do all 3 while its apart too. 

There is also a tiny bit of slop that I think is in the lower steering shaft. If the column is coming out, its one more bolt to extract that, so I'll look into that at the same time. Also not enough to be a problem but just enough to be mildly annoying. 

[austin8753]

been a few weeks since all this, but worth reporting anyway.

e39m5:
- differential pinion seal
- front/rear sway bar links/bushings
- Dinan shift kit (e60 545i)
- new single piece black leather shift boot
- new PS4 rear tires
- rear brake hoses (engine bay) + brake fluid service
- tightened rear control arm/axle bolts because some knucklehead left them barely finger loose after installing the suspension kit (prior to my ownership -___-), it sure drives a lot better now.
- had BKbimmer reinstall/weld the original mufflers in, to get rid of the dumb muffler delete

been daily driving it since my purchase in November. other than the lack of fuel economy (fully expected), i sure love the car.


---

inherited my step-uncle's '95 911 at the end of last year, so i set out to get it running again, after being off the road since 1996, due to a RH side impact at Laguna Seca. he bought it from auction, started the repairs and never finished them... 20,569 miles when crashed. now 20,608.
- fuel pump and filter
- new oil cooler lines
- oil service
- p/s service
- gearbox service
- all soft brake hoses + brake fluid service

fit and assembled the body panels on the RH side and installed all the lights. hit the key with the DME relay removed to build oil pressure. reinstalled and it fired on the first click. drove it to DMV and got it inspected and titled. great feeling.

[gadget73]

Starter solenoid on the Continental died last night. It didn't want to start when I went for lunch yesterday, but I was able to feel that the solenoid moved around when I checked the cables.  Got the screw a wee bit tighter and it was just enough to get it to light off.  I thought I'd just snug the screw down after getting back to work, and check the one on the other side which required removing the battery cable for access. At this point the entire back end of the solenoid where the cables attach broke into multiple pieces.  I managed to jam it together enough and bridge it with a screwdriver to start the engine and get me home. 

Pulled the solenoid off the original starter that came on the car and swapped it on to the starter on the car.  Much less annoying than replacing the starter, and now it works again. Now I guess I find another solenoid to throw on the old starter I replaced the brushes in so I have a complete spare starter again.  Yay for long 1/4 drive extensions and swivel sockets. 

[Vman]

Replaced all of my fuses, cleaned up the fuse terminals. Made a quick YouTube video. 


 

 

[gadget73]

changed the O rings on the rear air spring that randomly leaks down on the Mark VII.  Annoyingly it looks like I had done that previously.  I knew I'd changed them at some point but I had the wrong size O rings at one point.  Seems I put the right ones on, so I don't have high hopes this will fix it.  O rings are cheap and its an easy job though, so worth the attempt. 

Air spring looks OK and the soapy water test showed nothing.  It takes several days to leak down so wherever its leaking from, it doesn't seem to be registering.  If the O rings do no good, I'll change the solenoid itself for a brand new ne and see if that fixes it.  Annoyingly its been taking 3-6 days to sink, and sometimes its sat for weeks with no issue so this may take a while. 

[gadget73]

Didn't work.  It sank overnight, so I made something worse. I'll try the solenoid.  If that doesn't do it, basically left with the air spring itself.  Its original from 1991, so far from impossible its had enough of life. 

[gadget73]

Its the air spring.  Apparently jacking the car up and forcing the air spring to go through a complete deflate and inflate cycle made it worse.  I can actually see bubbles now.  Oh well, 34 years and 240k miles. 

[gadget73]

New air springs installed on both sides in the back.  Cost me $75 and took an hour.  Found one of the rear sway bar links had come apart too, so that got replaced.  I had previously replaced the one on the driver's side for the same reason.  Nut fell off the bottom and all the parts except for the long bolt vanished somewhere along the road.  I checked the passenger side link when I did that and it was tight and in perfect condition.  Records indicated the previous owner had replaced it not long before I got it, so I left it.  I guess the self-locking nut didn't lock itself down very well. 


Car is a little softer in the back now, which I expected. The aftermarket air spring bases have a different profile that results in a lower spring rate than the LSC springs.  OEM are not available, and the better but still not correct manufacturer is out of stock or out of production for those. 10+ years ago there was an aftermarket source that had the correct base profile, but they don't make them anymore.  Only option is the cheapie Chinese ones, so thats what it got.