Change of plans.

Project will be going a different direction. Sold my ls1 and t56 today.

Time to dust off my electric car parts and get that project on the road again.

New wheel

Installed the sport steering wheel today. Bought it used and when I got it part of the rim was rough looking. Bit worn and sort of look like it was drug along the concrete. But a little smoothing some dye the clear polish and it is almost like new! Pictures don't really capture it.

Also started on the amplifier install. Got the first one nearly installed.

E46: Clean door panels

Before and after pictures of the door panels. Some serious elbow grease, new speaker covers and it is much better looking.

E46: speakers and obdii socket

Installed the tweeters today. Luckily the aftermarket tweeters fit into the oem tweeter housings. Transferred the oem connector and it was a bolt in place affair. Even with the factory amp the highs are better. Bass is weak. Expect the ohms differences on the speakers is not helping. Will fit an aftermarket amp to drive the aftermarket speakers.

Today we also added some additional pins to the obdii connector. This car has a 20 pin connector still which means txd (diagnostic bus) is not present at the obdii connector.  Only TXDII (for ISO OBDII protocol), power and 2 grounds were present at the connector.   So we rewired it and added not only txd but can bus and I bus. The connector is more useful now. And we no longer need the 20 pin connector.

Also reinstalled the door panels.  Will post before after pictures later.

OEM left.  Aftermarket in OEM housing right

OBDII Port.  Added 4 pins and wired up the Diagnostic bus, Can Bus and Ibus.  Now I have easy access to them.

Not Sure why but the OBDII pin part number eluded me for awhile.  It is listed on REALOEM  Not sure why I hadn't found it sooner.  So I bought a bunch from ECS tunning when I was ordering some other parts.

E46: Door speakers

Since the BMW mounting holes are nonstandard, I fabricated 6 little brackets out of some scrap to hold the speaker in. Here is a picture of one.

Home made Speaker retaining clip



Speaker held in with fabricated clips



Spliced the OEM connector into the aftermarket wiring then tie wrapped the connector to the speaker to keep it from rattling.  With the insulation back one might not notice the changes.

E46: Snow

The E46 at the moment. Not much going on. Actually I do have interior parts in the house I'm fixing up. Though waiting on parts to be delivered so i can finish. I'll post pictures of that later.

E46: New wheels

Had a warm Saturday and took the time time to clean up the car and change the wheels. It's now sitting on the wheels and tires that I had put on my e36-ls1 last fall. The rear tires went from 205mm wide to now 245mm. Car looks meaner with just that change.

E46: Black car II

Saw a deal on a 2000 323i E46. Was cheaper than my 1993 was when I bought it 7 years ago. And this one is in better condition. So I bought it. Picture of it being towed home (it was dark). And a picture of it in the garage at home. Looks like an LS1 E46 is in my future

Bye "Black car"

The end of the E36 era for me. Sold the black car. But not before removing the engine..... What will happen next?

Again. Nothing to report. Really nothing.

Well still in Sweden and the car is in America. Wish I had it here. The autoban in Germany has some unlimited sections and it would have been perfect. But I just have a rental car and it's not even a BMW. or rear wheel drive and just has 2.0L. Oh the pain. Oh well, at least a 6speed manual.

A comment was left asking if I regretted the project. You can thank that person for the last few updates. Got me thinking about this blog again. Hadn't been updating it because there wasn't much new to say. That in itself I think says something. The car has been reliable and happily did it's job and would scream away from any light or up any on ramp I asked it too.

Do I regret building it? Definately not. When I first put it together I wished I hadn't spent so much money on it though. But after 4 years of driving it my biggest regret is that I didn't spend MORE. More on the chassis. I really should have bought a nicer car to start with. Can't fix the past but for the future there's always the wife's E46, Maybe I coudl put my motor in that when I get back. :-).

Garage is finished.

We worked hard all summer to

get the garage done and in August we finally finished it. My children I think were as happy, if not happier than I was. They were very tired of evey holiday, every weekend, and near the end, every available moment during the week (I even took vacation days just to work on it).

Why such a hurry? What difference does a few weeks or months make. Between the time we started the garage and August I accepted a temporary assignment with my company in Sweden. The entire family would be leaving for in August and the garage had to be done and signed off with the inspectors before we left. We got our final approval on the garage the same day our work visa's were approved for Sweden. We made it. Whew.

The car was planned as an oversized 2 car garage. But since there are no tools in it yet and it was a bit more roomy than I thought it would be all 4 cars and my tractor fit inside. Nice. They will all be out of the weather while we are out of town.

Yes we did build the garage

Going through a year of no garage was painful for me. Scraping windows again. Yuck. Then there was replacing the wheel bearings on the Landrover while it was snowing. Putting on the snow tires on a snowy gravel ground. (cars don't jack up well on gravel even when it isn't snowing.) Then there was the rear differential bushing and cooling repairs on the E46. The LS1 BMW was great. Only repair I had to do to it was the rear door latch broke and had to be replaced.

Broke ground on Weding aniversary in april. What a present. Here are a few pictures of the garage being built and the cars saying. Can't wait until it's done. In fact they didn't. Soon as there was a way to drive up in there they were parking inside.

We contracted out the concrete work and grading and escivation. We built everything else. All the wood, roof, siding etc.

No Garage

Did I mention that the new house did not have a garage. Yes it is a disaster for a per

son that loves to work on cars. This time when we bought the house the neighborhood was one of the first things we looked at. What do they say in realestate. Location location location. So true. Garages not being all that populare in this area we ended buying a house without one thinking. We can just add that on.

Here is a picture of the "Fleet" in its parking area. the maxima was sold a few days after this was taken.

Time to buy another car.

Well back 2008 I mentioned my wife wrecking her maxima. She drove the damaged car for 2 years and actually liked it was smashed. Didn't have to worry about scratching or dinging it. Well the transmission was dieing so thought we'd treat her to a non wrecked car. So started looking for another car. Was looking for a 2002 or 2003 Nissan Maxima (would make this her 3rd) but none of the ones forsale near us were what we wanted.

Then one day an add for a '99 BMW 3 series (E46) appeared and the price was very good. The car wasn't too far so we went to look at it. It wasn't what my wife wanted exactly. It was an auto and she hates autos. And it had more miles on it than the maxima we were selling. But it was in really good shape inside and out. Figured she could drive it a year or so and then I could put my V8 in it and get her something else. So we bought it.

Doesn't it look so shinny. My BMW's paint is fading pretty badly and was never that great even when I bought the car. And the interior is much nicer than my car's was. Hoping she breaks the motor soon so I can have it.

BMW isn't just for play

Decided to sell our house and move to a new neighborhood. For those of you that have done moving know it's crazy. And the way the move worked out we had to have all our stuff in limbo land for a few hours (out of our old house but couldn't move into the new house). Despite renting the biggest uhaul we could get every vehicle was needed and the BMW did it's share that day too. For some reason people get the biggest kick out of seeing the BMW with the trailer. Don't know why. It can tow like any other car. And with the V8 it sure has enough power.

Nothing to report

Car running fine. It's garage spot being used for the electric car project. Due to the snow the EV needs moved out of the garage. I hate scraping windows.

I was driving home with a passenger and it was a nice sunny day. Had the video camera with us so we took a video of driving down the curvy road near our house. Turn up the bass or you'll hardly hear the engine.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToyQmXmWe3M

Wow it's been awhile.

I had not realized it had been so long since I updated this Blog. The car just runs and runs like one would expect so there is not a lot to say. I've put on more than 10,000 miles on the car now. I don't even think about the fact I modified it when I get in and hit the key. Of course when I hit the gas pedal I tend to remember :-)

I did have a failure the other day. The brake fluid light came on. So I added brake fluid and 2 days later the light was on. I found that the low pressure line that goes from the brake resvior to the ABS was leaking at a spot where I had added a zig zag length of aluminum piping to re route it. I had used one of the spring type hose clamps which was more than enough for the job but somehow it started leaking. Decided to just take that off and put on a standard hose clamp and see if that would fix it.

Turns out when I went to take the clamp off it had cracked (see pic). Weird but made sense why it was leaking. Replaced the clamp and back in business.

It won't be long and it'll be 2 years that I'll have been driving the car with the V-8. Maybe I'll go do some burnouts to celibrate. Who knows.

Well I have been driving the car for more than a year now and it has been quite enjoyable. I still have yet to finish the A/C or cruise. I have replaced 2 tires already. Boy is it fun standing on the gas.

I've enjoyed the BMW so much that I decided my next project would use the same platform. Next project will be an electric car. Planned performance will be better than that of the BMW engined car (obviously slower than the LS1 powered car). Here's a pic of me towing the donor chassis home and a link to a post where I discuss more of my plans


http://www.diyelectriccar.com/forums/showthread.php/and-so-begins-17727.html

Suspension upgrade

Well I am not sure exactly when but some time this summer I put on a set of new M3 struts and swaybar links and a used set of M3 springs. The original struts were completely shot so it was a big improvement. The ride is just what I was looking for. firm but not harsh.

Living with the BMW

Well I've still been enjoying the BMW. I have used it for a number of runs to lowes with the trailer as I installed a trailer hitch on it some time ago. I aways get good looks when I'm towing the trailer with the BMW. I really got a look when I left a 240sx in the dust at a light with a water heater in tow on the trailer. Always good fun.

I bought a new set of front brake pads. I installed the LH ones no problem. When I went to install the RH ones I found one of the caliper mounting bolts loose. Uh...not good. I had never had that caliper off. I put in the new pads and find the bolt that was loose is totally stripped. Ugh. I'm going out of town to Charlotte tomorrow. I had planned on taking the maxima (get all the miles I can on it before I replace it). Not sure I want to leave it with the wife this way. Well I guess it's been this way for almost 2 years so I guess one more week won't hurt. I buy a caliper and caliper carrier assembly off e-bay just for the carrier. A week later its all installed.

While I was shopping for parts I ordered a set of M3 struts, strut mounts, sway bar links etc. I've got a big box of parts now. I've just got to get some time to put them on.

FIRST oil change! and Misc.

Well after the trip to the big city the car had enough miles for it's first oil change and most my previous cars were nissans or Rx-7. I remove the filter and compare to the new one my wife picked up for me. no chance these are the same. She must have gotten the v-6 one. Quick trip to the store and we are back in business.

Weather starts heating up and I've still not got a good resolution to my heating issues. Having the second fan run all the time was too noisy. I decide to wire the fans to both come on at the same time. I make the wiring change and proceed to test the set up. The primary fan doesn't come on at all. What? Some checks with the volt meter and some looking at the wiring diagram I find that when the relay trips to turn on the second fan the first fan goes off. Well that's not what I want. How'd I miss that. It's an easy change. I test again and they both come on. However I notice the main fan is spinning the wrong way. Humm... These two issues explain my heating problems. Well it should be ok now.

Oh I also found that my front fan lost a blad somewhere along the line. Very strange. I break off the blade on the opposite side to balance things out until a replacment can be obtained.

Heat issues seem to be gone now though I'd still like the fans to come on sooner (guess I should have asked for that when I had the ECU programmed).

My brother comes to visit with his Audi A6 with mods. I easily pull away from him on the on ramps even though my car is carring easily a few hundered more pounds of passengers. He says. "your car's not loud". I still don't get it.

Follow up on the maxima accident. Insurance writes it off as a total loss. I buy the car back for salvage value $264. I straighten the front sheet metal and replace the right fender. Pound out the rear quarter panel and replace a few lights. Total cost about $250 and the car is back on the road. I spend $300 on a lawyer to go to court. My wife is found "not guilty" of reckless driving. (sliding on slipery pavement in VA is reckless driving). The balance of the insurance money and the Rx-7 money can go to getting her a nicer unsmashed car.....Maybe.

LS1 BMW takes a trip to D.C.

Well sorry it's been a long time since I wrote. There hasn't been much exciting to tell. I've just been driving the car. Nearly every day. It has been super reliable. Guess I can tell you about the BMW's first big trip away from home.

I Sold my Rx-7 and was going to meet up with the buyer about 2 hrs away from home to exchange the car on a saturday morning. The Friday afternoon my wife totals the family car (nissan maxima). Uh.... now what do we drive. Well what do you know my hot rod's a family car too. 4 doors room for four people. That'll work. Oh wait my wife just wrecked her car. Is it such a good idea to have her driving my high HP custom car. No real choice guess I'll have to risk it.

We decide that after we hand off the rx-7 to it's new owner we'll head on over to the nations capital to visit family. The car has had some heating issues in stop and go traffic. Since we're heading to the big city I decide not to risk disaster and I wire the second electric fan to be on no stop.

The BMW makes the drive to winchester VA at the hands of my wife and Rx-7 hand off is completed. Bye Bye Rx-7 my first swap projet. You will be missed.

I'm back in the BMW driverseat and we point the car toward's D.C. A few hours later we're in the captial in crowded streets, big buildings and endless stop lights. Not what the car was built for. We make our way to the National zoo to see the Panda's and meet up with some family. All goes well.

During our stay I take my Nephew Grant, who appreciates good cars, for a ride in the BMW. Hard to find a place to show off the blazing acceleration but we hold up traffic on an on ramp long enough to flare tempers but create enough space infront of the car for a full throttle, wheel spinning run from 20 mph to freeway speeds before having to hit the brakes to keep from plowing into the slow cars in front of us as we merge on to the freeway. We visit a few sites and then sunday head on home.

All goes smooth until a Virgina police officer decides to pull us over. What the..? Wife asks why we are being stopped. I reply "I don't know" Wasn't speeding at the time (a few hours before... well that's another story). Officer comes up and starts asking about my muffler. What? He's kidding right? I was so shocked I didn't know what to say. Wasn't sure I should be mentioning that the one he's looking at is only ONE of the mufflers. There's another buried farther up stream. He seems to be clueless that the car now has a V8 though it idles the whole time we talk. I figure it's not in my best interest to mention it and just take the ticket. I figure it could only get worse. I figure he stopped me more for the look of the muffler than sound. It's not excessively loud. I've passed numerous local police and state troopers near my home with no questions asked. When I went to pick up my wife from her crashed car I drove by a sheriffs officer with his window open then got out and talked to him. But nothing can be done and I wasn't going to drive 2 hours to fight a ticket even if something could be done. I sprayed the muffer AND exhaust tip with flat black high temp paint. Been through many speed traps and followed by police since and no problems. I think the other guy had something against BMW's.

Car performed well and got 23.7 MPG for the one tank of gas that was consumed during the trip. Though the car was a bit smaller than the Maxima we all made the trip in relative comfort.

Couple more weeks of driving.

A few more weeks have went by. I've been driving the car every day now. It has done quite well. Even with me getting on the gas quite a bit it makes 18 miles to gallon on my to from work drive. A little less than my other car but much faster and bigger. The biggest complaint I had with this car is the noise. I finally took a stab at fixing the noise. I added a 3" high flow cat and a Magnaflow Straight through muffler in place of the prescilencer. It has brought the volume levels down to liveable. On the freeway I have begun to notice wind noise again. Which with the previous exhaust i couldn't hear.

In addition to the exhaust changes I finished replacing the trailing arm bushings and bearings (now both sides are done) and replaced the rear springs and shocks with M series springs and shocks. I think the next most annoying issue may be the front struts. Looks like the next project.

2nd week of Driving.

I've now completed my second week of driving the car. It's all been quite uneventful. Car starts right up and runs great. No new noises. Biggest issue this week was the heater not working. If it weren't for the heated seats I would have had to switch cars.

I finally got a chance to really look into what was going on. I removed the heater valve which I suspected was the problem. I found it worked perfectly but noticed it only allows flow in one direction even when open. Could it be I had the in and out on the engine switched? I went in the house and found my original heater line sketches. Car matched the sketches. Looked at some information I had on the computer and Uh Oh. I had them backward.....how'd that happen. Oh well. Trouble is that the outlet from the LS1 is 5/8 dia and the return is 3/4 dia (I have it right this time. Outlet is smaller than inlet) So it wasn't just a matter of switching the lines. I had to change the connection dia of the hard lines I made. Not all too bad as I used all the same dia lines for my hard lines but just soldered on different ends depending on the dia of rubber tube that it hooked too. I removed one line and cut off the 3/4 dia end leaving just the ring on the end of the pipe making it perfect for the 5/8 dia hose. Then I heated the other pipe and removed the ring it had and soldered on a new 3/4 dia end. All and all not too bad.

I filled it with coolant and test ran it and HEAT again. Driving it this week will be much more enjoyable. For the record the right way to hook it up is: 5/8 dia line on the engine goes to the Heater valve. Mine is dual zone so it goes to the lower port which is centered. The 3/4 from the engine goes to the return line from the heater core. On mine this is the line on the passenger side.

Also this week I took the car in for it's required anual "saftey" inspection. It passed. I've also ordered a 3" high flow cat and muffler to install on the car. It is to the point where the noise is definately the biggest issue I have with the car now.

Video of an accleration test

I up loaded a little video of an accleration test. Not much but you can hear what it sounds like.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxH6SKT7IVM

 

First week of Driving

Well the car has now made a complete week of to and from work duty and weekend running around. So far that's about 200 miles. The engine has run great and strong. The tires are just about at the limit for traction just standing on the gas with the RPM's over 4,000. I've been real easy on the drive line as I haven't strengthened the diff mounts. So no clutch dumps or hard shifts. Even with being easy on it 0-60 comes in 4.5 seconds (per G-Tech).

So far the issues I've found with the swap are: The exhaust is too loud for my taste. I feel like I'm a specticle driving around and the heater doesn't work. I haven't had time to look at the heater yet. It could be the heater valve or the controler.

This saturday I finished replacing the traling arm bushings on the LH side of the car. The car feels more composed with the new bushings. I also put new parking brake shoes on the LH side.

Things on the to do list:
Put the new parking brake shoes on the RH side.
Add another muffler and perhaps a Catalyist to quiet the exhaust down some more.
More suspension upgrades (springs and dampers, Maybe sway bars too)
Reinforce the diff mounts and subframe.

Ready For the Road

This week was good for shipments. The PCM came back from its tach signal tweaking, the 3" dia exhaust pipe for finishing the exhaust showed up and the bushings and bearings for the trailing arm arrived.

Spent saturday replacing all the bearings and bushings in the RH trailing arm (installed RTAB's for an M3). Having a press does come in handy. The wheel bearing on that side was wore out. Looks to me the whole issue was because the previous owner didn't have the lock nut tight enough on the rear axle so there was no preload on the bearings. I'll replace all the bearings and bushings in the LH side next saturday. Bad news is I broke the ABS sensor off when trying to get it out. (rusted in place) and the rear emergency brake shoes were garbage.

So I have to order some more parts and take things apart again.Finished the exhaust. It turned out well except for that it is louder than I like. I drove it to church and a guy commented on it. I said "yah it's too loud" and he said "I thought it sounded great". I dont' think it is obnixious but I'm going for "sleeper" and the sound gives it away.

Lots of odds and ends to do but the car is driveable now. I think I'll drive it to work tomorrow.

FIRST DRIVE

Well it's been awhile again. Been busy. Very busy. Last saturday I spent ALL day on the car. Actually I did take a break to watch my boy's soccer game but other than that I worked on the car. I put in the radiator, driveshaft, part of the exhaust and a ton of other stuff. I ran the engine until it came up to temp and made sure the electric fan came on. The fan did come on and my daughter said the fan sounded like shaking a box of rocks. The fan blades were definately hitting something. note to self remove the fan and check it.


I put the car on it's own wheels. Was funny to see it down on the ground again. I wanted to take it for a drive but it was dark and I didn't have any head lights. Or a muffler. So night driving was a bad idea. However the next day I backed it out of the garage under it's own power. My wife, my 2 kids and I all went for the first ride together. With no muffler it makes quite the sound. Very strong solid sound but nonetheless loud. Still didn't keep me from flooring it a few times though. Then brought it back home and parked it. No lights, no muffler, no front bumper expired inspection sticker it was just not a good idea to drive it much. So the first trip was only 2 miles. All went well though. Only other problem found was the Tach didn't read correctly.




Tuesday I came home at lunch from work and drove it again. Couldn't resist. Wife and I went on another 2 mile run. I got on the gas even more this time. Man that was fun. However, that night i removed the PCM (engine computer) and sent it away to get the tach signal corrected. I hated pulling it out when it was running and driving but have to have the tach working right. The rest of the week I spent intalling the head lights and turnsignals, few more interior bits, Fixing the fan rub (fan blades were slightly bent and rubbing on the fan housing) and started installing the muffler.


I need some more 3" dia exhaust pipe to finish the muffler installation. Doesn't appear that anyone in town has any so I ordered some off the net. Should be here in a few days. By the end of this week I should have the PCM back and the muffler installed. We'll see how it goes.

Wow where does the time go.

Well since my last post I pulled the motor back out to finish some details. I painted all the heater lines black. They look much better. I also cut part of what would be the battery tray if this were a TI (the battery on my car is in the trunk). This gives plenty of clearance to work on the relocated heater valve if ever necessary. I also remounted the ABS again in a slightly different location getting it a little farther from the header. Let's see what else. Oh I made a heat shield for the RH motor mount. I added some heat barrier to the transmission tunnel and a number of other small items (including new set of spark plugs).

I then reloaded the engine into the car for hopefully the last time!! Whoo hoo. I bled the clutch and it releases easily. I need to clean up a few more wiring looming issues, reassemble the interior, Mount the A/C condenser and do a little suspension work. I'm thinking in a week or 2 I'll take it for a drive. It won't be done but it I feel I deserve a trip around the block. Things that will have to be done after the first drive are rear differential stiffening, New struts, Rebuild the steering rack and perhaps a new sway bar or 2.


More later.

Getting there!! Light at the end of the tunnel

Wow, a lot has happened since my last post. Due to trips and Internet problems I have gotten behind. Here is the update:
I finished my fuel lines all the way to the engine. I've attached some pictures showing the aluminum fuel line and the beading tool used to construct the lines.








The beading tool is Earl's part# 008ERL



Heater lines. I wanted to use some hard line instead of rubber line for the heater runs to keep the OD of the lines down and less worry about being close to the exhaust. I ended up going with copper pipe. To fit copper lines to the 3/4 rubber heater lines I had some standard copper fittings machined to .75 dia (thanks Lee) and then sweat soldered a ring to keep the hose from slipping off. For the 5/8 dia line a the standard 1/2" copper pipe was just right with a ring sweat soldered on it in a similar way. I'm sure there was probably a better way out there but that's what I've done. I spent about a day cutting, fitting and soldering. After all that time I have what is in the pics. Looking at it now I think it turned out but took way to long.
















I also finished the shifter close out. I want a nice fit to keep the noise and heat out of the cabin. I used the rubber boot from the f-body car. I removed the metal from around the perimiter and cut it smaller and rewelded it together. Then cut the boot down as well. Seems to work just fine.









I currently have the engine loaded into the engine bay with both headers on this time (to help set the placement of the heater lines and shifter closeout etc). I couldn't resist. I plugged in the wiring hooked up the battery and attempted to connect through the OBDII port with my laptop. Wouldn't connect. After some trouble shooting of the wiring I found it was just the software I was using was getting impatient and the autoprotocol feature wasn't working with the PCM. manually set the protocol and...Hello. hey PCM is working, engine's in.... SO I ran a quart or two through the fuel lines to flush out any dirt or metal in the section after the filter. Connected up the fuel line and....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1T4qxA7LEkI

Only ran it for a few seconds since I don't have the cooling hooked up. Oh I also finished the throttle cable.

I think the next step is to pull the motor again and finish the hold down's on the heater lines. Misc work on the ABS mount. Clean everything up and add some heat shielding.