BMW 530iT/5 Build

[Fuel Motorsport]

I have thought about making a thread before but due to time and lack of content i haven't gotten around to it. I have owned an e34 for over a little over 2 years now and I now have some time and money to start investing in these cars. Yes, cars (plural)

First, a little about my BMW ownership:
First car 1993 525iT
642615
This was an ohio car so the rust is real and bad. Got it for a grand though so it has been dubbed the parts getter and daily driver

6 short months later and i happened upon this
2004 330i ZHP (pretty special car. ZHPs are incredible)
642616

In may of 2018 i flew out to Oregon and picked up a 530iT
642617

and finally to complete my car collecting spree (for now) i drove out to NYC this month (12/2018) and picked up a 530i/5 for $400 (part-out coming shortly)
642618


Little story about getting the 530iT because that's part of what this is about right? The adventure, journey, and people you meet while working on these machines?

I was scrolling through bimmerforums on facebook and came across a link for a 530 for sale in Oregon (all of the good cars are on the west coast :(, i live in Cleveland, Ohio). I thought about it for a good long while and started talking to the guy. He sent me videos of the car running and driving, some pictures, we talked about the history of the car, and decided on the price all in about two days. I asked if he would hold onto it for me while i purchased a plane ticket and flew out. He agreed. After landing in Portland my mother and i (best travel partner i could ask for and a trooper for letter me store 4 cars in her driveway) had a hour ride south in a shuttle. We met the guy in a hotel parking lot, drove the car around the block, and paid him $3,250 for a BMW with 143,000 miles on the clock. Everything seemed to be fine with the car minus the typical tailgate wiring and the window guide bending. We then went to target and bought a memory foam mattress, pillows, blankets, and some snacks for the back of the wagon. We spent the night camped along the beautiful Oregon coast.
642621
The next morning we got up and drove to Boise, Idaho where i had a friend we could stay with. Problem is about 2 hours east of Portland, in the middle of nowhere, an hour in each direction to the nearest town with over 600 people in it, and my tire blows up. Now this wouldn't of been a problem because i had a spare but after one blew up i inspected the others and sure enough there was a large slit on the inside of one and the front tires were inflated to 45 pounds to hide the fact that they were warped (live and learn i guess). So, for the next 4 hours we were stranded in Arlington, Oregon (population 583) on a Sunday. I could not believe it but a lady at the gas station gave me a card for the local mechanic and after giving him a call he said he might have something that would fit my car. Problem was he was about 3 hours away. So after exploring the town (every single inch) the guy shows up and has a brand new set of copper tourings ready to be installed. The guy did not up charge me for the tires, charge me a higher rate, or even give me the hard time about it being a Sunday. Hands down the nicest and most honest mechanic I had ever met. So, after emptying all of the cash i had in my wallet to tip the guy (reminded me of Jeremy Clarkson) we were on out way to Boise, Idaho. We spent the day hanging out in Boise but the next morning we left at 5am and drove 30 hours straight (2,000 miles) stopping only for fuel and food. This is where the mattress and pillows really came into play. One of us would drive while the other slept. I ended up driving for 22 out of the 30 hours :eyecrazy

Sorry for the essay but i figured it was a good story. You don't have to read it if you don't want to. Sadly, this is all I have time for tonight. More on the build coming shortly. i currently have a 5 speed swap in the works:buttrock

[Fuel Motorsport]

642629642630642631642632642633

[Sir Montalbon]

Welcome! Cool mom and great story you'll always remember.

I drove cross country with some buddies a few years ago from Savannah to Oregon, then down to Half Moon Bay. The drive between Boise and Oregon is really beautiful, but also desolate. It was one of my favorite parts.

[moroza]

Cool story. What's up with the rear bumper? Casualty of the tire?

Hope you learned to check spare tires before driving into Desolation Country! On the other hand, a copilot was a smart move on your part. I once drove my 544iT for 33 hours straight, more or less, and alone. Towards the end I was sustaining unprintable speeds to stay awake. It worked, but my eyes got so used to the speed that whenever I slowed down, I felt disoriented, and when I stopped for fuel the ground was breathing. Back in the car winding out fourth gear, and all was right again. Glad for the notch in my belt but don't care to repeat it.

[Fuel Motorsport]

Cool story. What's up with the rear bumper? Casualty of the tire?

Hope you learned to check spare tires before driving into Desolation Country! On the other hand, a copilot was a smart move on your part. I once drove my 544iT for 33 hours straight, more or less, and alone. Towards the end I was sustaining unprintable speeds to stay awake. It worked, but my eyes got so used to the speed that whenever I slowed down, I felt disoriented, and when I stopped for fuel the ground was breathing. Back in the car winding out fourth gear, and all was right again. Glad for the notch in my belt but don't care to repeat it.

Car was perfect before the tire exploded. The tire exploded and the tire flapped around and killed the bumper, the side of the car, and the bumper support. I had to take the bumper off because the metal inside of the bumper was dislodged after everything and i had to pop it back inhttps://i.imgur.com/HzzNFKW.jpg
A paint correction is in order now

That is crazy though. I couldn't imagine driving for that long alone. Why did you have to drive for 33 hours straight?

[Fuel Motorsport]

Welcome! Cool mom and great story you'll always remember.

I drove cross country with some buddies a few years ago from Savannah to Oregon, then down to Half Moon Bay. The drive between Boise and Oregon is really beautiful, but also desolate. It was one of my favorite parts.

The drive was fantastic and gorgeous until salt lake city. After salt lake it is all the same until Chicago. i really don't know why the speed limit is only 75. in texas the speed limit was 85. that was incredible. That had to be such a great drive. What was the reason for your drive? I am dying to do it again but stop more this time

Also, i saw that you did a 540i/6 swap into your wagon. do you have any suggestions on clutch and fly wheels?

[Sir Montalbon]

We made the drive to move a buddy from GA to San Francisco. We did Savannah to Denver in 2 days, then spent 8 days heading northwest to Oregon, then south to California, camping at national parks along the way. The Midwest was part of the drive was brutally boring. Kansas was the worst. We stopped in this tiny town on the interstate called Colby ("Oasis on the Plains") and it was another universe. Every place we went into (nothing fancy, a gas station, Arby's, and the visitors center), the mouth breathing locals stared slack jaw at us like we were from another planet. We still crack jokes about Colby, lol...

As for my swap, I went all OEM. I got lucky with my flywheel. I wanted to resurface the OEM donor and wasn't having any luck finding a shop that would take it on since it is dual mass. I posted on the GA sub forum and a guy I never met who works two buildings away from me offered to give it a go on his lathe at home. I gave it to him in the parking lot at work and he brought it back the next day in perfect refurbished condition. That was a cool experience. As for clutch, I went with an OEM Sachs 265mm.

[ihm96]

Awesome. Funny you're in Cleveland cause I picked my 530i this february right outside Cleveland. If you put an exhaust on the M60 they sound godly


I have thought about making a thread before but due to time and lack of content i haven't gotten around to it. I have owned an e34 for over a little over 2 years now and I now have some time and money to start investing in these cars. Yes, cars (plural)

First, a little about my BMW ownership:
First car 1993 525iT
642615
This was an ohio car so the rust is real and bad. Got it for a grand though so it has been dubbed the parts getter and daily driver

6 short months later and i happened upon this
2004 330i ZHP (pretty special car. ZHPs are incredible)
642616

In may of 2018 i flew out to Oregon and picked up a 530iT
642617

and finally to complete my car collecting spree (for now) i drove out to NYC this month (12/2018) and picked up a 530i/5 for $400 (part-out coming shortly)
642618


Little story about getting the 530iT because that's part of what this is about right? The adventure, journey, and people you meet while working on these machines?

I was scrolling through bimmerforums on facebook and came across a link for a 530 for sale in Oregon (all of the good cars are on the west coast :(, i live in Cleveland, Ohio). I thought about it for a good long while and started talking to the guy. He sent me videos of the car running and driving, some pictures, we talked about the history of the car, and decided on the price all in about two days. I asked if he would hold onto it for me while i purchased a plane ticket and flew out. He agreed. After landing in Portland my mother and i (best travel partner i could ask for and a trooper for letter me store 4 cars in her driveway) had a hour ride south in a shuttle. We met the guy in a hotel parking lot, drove the car around the block, and paid him $3,250 for a BMW with 143,000 miles on the clock. Everything seemed to be fine with the car minus the typical tailgate wiring and the window guide bending. We then went to target and bought a memory foam mattress, pillows, blankets, and some snacks for the back of the wagon. We spent the night camped along the beautiful Oregon coast.
642621
The next morning we got up and drove to Boise, Idaho where i had a friend we could stay with. Problem is about 2 hours east of Portland, in the middle of nowhere, an hour in each direction to the nearest town with over 600 people in it, and my tire blows up. Now this wouldn't of been a problem because i had a spare but after one blew up i inspected the others and sure enough there was a large slit on the inside of one and the front tires were inflated to 45 pounds to hide the fact that they were warped (live and learn i guess). So, for the next 4 hours we were stranded in Arlington, Oregon (population 583) on a Sunday. I could not believe it but a lady at the gas station gave me a card for the local mechanic and after giving him a call he said he might have something that would fit my car. Problem was he was about 3 hours away. So after exploring the town (every single inch) the guy shows up and has a brand new set of copper tourings ready to be installed. The guy did not up charge me for the tires, charge me a higher rate, or even give me the hard time about it being a Sunday. Hands down the nicest and most honest mechanic I had ever met. So, after emptying all of the cash i had in my wallet to tip the guy (reminded me of Jeremy Clarkson) we were on out way to Boise, Idaho. We spent the day hanging out in Boise but the next morning we left at 5am and drove 30 hours straight (2,000 miles) stopping only for fuel and food. This is where the mattress and pillows really came into play. One of us would drive while the other slept. I ended up driving for 22 out of the 30 hours :eyecrazy

Sorry for the essay but i figured it was a good story. You don't have to read it if you don't want to. Sadly, this is all I have time for tonight. More on the build coming shortly. i currently have a 5 speed swap in the works:buttrock

[Fuel Motorsport]

We made the drive to move a buddy from GA to San Francisco. We did Savannah to Denver in 2 days, then spent 8 days heading northwest to Oregon, then south to California, camping at national parks along the way. The Midwest was part of the drive was brutally boring. Kansas was the worst. We stopped in this tiny town on the interstate called Colby ("Oasis on the Plains") and it was another universe. Every place we went into (nothing fancy, a gas station, Arby's, and the visitors center), the mouth breathing locals stared slack jaw at us like we were from another planet. We still crack jokes about Colby, lol...

As for my swap, I went all OEM. I got lucky with my flywheel. I wanted to resurface the OEM donor and wasn't having any luck finding a shop that would take it on since it is dual mass. I posted on the GA sub forum and a guy I never met who works two buildings away from me offered to give it a go on his lathe at home. I gave it to him in the parking lot at work and he brought it back the next day in perfect refurbished condition. That was a cool experience. As for clutch, I went with an OEM Sachs 265mm.

Touring the national parks is something i really wanted to do! That sounds incredible and hopefully you drove the pacific coast highway in California. That one is still on the bucket list. I can't believe people still live in towns like that. I currently live out in the country but only 45 minutes from downtown Cleveland. I couldn't imagine living way out like that. Crazy......

Why did you want to get the flywheel resurfaced? (ive never installed a clutch before and i haven't gotten around to doing my research yet. The parents just want the parts car gone lol) It seems like there is a really good E34 following down in Georgia. A lot of people are almost scared to work on German cars. I find them very logical and simple for the most part. I haven't tangled with the inside of an engine so i can't speak to that. The things some people are able to do out of their garage is impressive

- - - Updated - - -


Awesome. Funny you're in Cleveland cause I picked my 530i this february right outside Cleveland. If you put an exhaust on the M60 they sound godly

Oh, don't you worry. An exhaust is definitely coming. For now i was thinking about just straight piping the final 3rd. I follow Aaron Churton on Instagram and he said that there wasn't too much droning but the exhaust is still loud enough. I have wanted to do that for a long time but i couldn't bring myself to do that on an auto. Just didn't seem right to me

[moroza]

Resurfacing the flywheel is to give it a flat, scuffed surface for optimal clutch adhesion. After some use, flywheels and brake rotors can develop grooves and shiny spots, neither of which grip well.

Places like Colby are populated because a century or two ago, a bunch of Easterners (or fresh arrivals from Europe) got lured by lots of "free" land, and their descendants have managed to make it work well enough - or to not know any better - to survive and stay. I took my E34 on a roadtrip up to Inuvik, NWT (https://www.bimmerforums.com/forum/showthread.php?1486364-E34-in-the-Arctic-(56k-no-way)), and passed through a handful of communities that are at least as desolate, but to my eyes a lot more beautiful, and with rather different history; those are populated mostly by Natives, or by off-grid types from further south. They struck me as rather friendly, though they were Canadians.

German cars' reputation for being tough to work on is deserved. E34s and a few others are a bit of an exception. Actually, BMW as a whole, while no stranger to unnecessary complexity, I find better thought-through as far as maintenance than the other Germans. Try a meaningful repair job on an Audi or higher-end Benz, though, and you'd have to be a Lit major to not run out of swears by the time you're halfway through.

[ihm96]

Mine just had a simple set of pipes to a magnaflow muffler put on by an exhaust shop just to pass inspection cause the old muffler was disintegrating and it sounds fucking amazing. My cars been down for two weeks now and then right as all the work finished a brake line blew. Very frustrating, all i want to do is drive her.

I have my clownshoe to drive also, but I need to start driving the E34 so I can do the vanos, cam sensors and 02 sensors to hopefully finally clear up my CEL and cold idle issues.


Touring the national parks is something i really wanted to do! That sounds incredible and hopefully you drove the pacific coast highway in California. That one is still on the bucket list. I can't believe people still live in towns like that. I currently live out in the country but only 45 minutes from downtown Cleveland. I couldn't imagine living way out like that. Crazy......

Why did you want to get the flywheel resurfaced? (ive never installed a clutch before and i haven't gotten around to doing my research yet. The parents just want the parts car gone lol) It seems like there is a really good E34 following down in Georgia. A lot of people are almost scared to work on German cars. I find them very logical and simple for the most part. I haven't tangled with the inside of an engine so i can't speak to that. The things some people are able to do out of their garage is impressive

- - - Updated - - -



Oh, don't you worry. An exhaust is definitely coming. For now i was thinking about just straight piping the final 3rd. I follow Aaron Churton on Instagram and he said that there wasn't too much droning but the exhaust is still loud enough. I have wanted to do that for a long time but i couldn't bring myself to do that on an auto. Just didn't seem right to me

[Fuel Motorsport]

That is a crazy roadtrip but it sounds like a lot of fun. Did you camp in the back of your touring while on the road? Petrolicious did an article about a Z3M coupe (one of my favorite cars) tackling the arctic circle and ever since then i have been dying to do the same (https://petrolicious.com/articles/tackling-the-arctic-circle-in-the-bmw-m-coupe-is-a-great-idea).

These cars may be tough to work on but the way they respond and the feeling you get from the car is well worth whatever complexities you may encounter

Thank you for the information about the fly wheel. Makes perfect sense

[Fuel Motorsport]

Mine just had a simple set of pipes to a magnaflow muffler put on by an exhaust shop just to pass inspection cause the old muffler was disintegrating and it sounds fucking amazing. My cars been down for two weeks now and then right as all the work finished a brake line blew. Very frustrating, all i want to do is drive her.

I have my clownshoe to drive also, but I need to start driving the E34 so I can do the vanos, cam sensors and 02 sensors to hopefully finally clear up my CEL and cold idle issues.

I don't know if i would still be driving an E34 if i had the option to get an ///M Clownshoe. It checks all of the boxes in my opinion. Enjoy that car while you can!

Having a car down is the absolute worst. I have an e46 ZHP that was down for a little over a month and waiting for small parts is really what took so long. the job was simple enough but it was just one thing after another. Hopefully you can get that line replaced ASAP and get her out again!

[ihm96]

Mines actually not an M, its the 2.8 but it has some Dinan bits, is a blast to drive, and hopefully I can keep slowly fixing/improving it along the way. Just recently I did a front suspension refresh of everything but the shocks/struts (getting coilovers in the spirng/when the budget allows) and put in some upgraded bushings. Feels like a whole new car again.

The nice thing is both cars feel very similar but at the same time totally different. The controls and everything in the interior and gauges and all the classic BMW feel, but they have two totally different engines and suspension feel. The 5 series always feels like a great handler to me when compared to most cars, but when coming from my Z3 it feels like a boat with big body roll and a loud rumbly V8. Being able to switch between the two just makes me appreciate them even more.

And yeah waiting on parts is always the worst cause all you wanna do is go drive your car haha. Luckily shes back up and running. Just yesterday installed new moosehead engineering bushings and tie rods, today Im getting it aligned


I don't know if i would still be driving an E34 if i had the option to get an ///M Clownshoe. It checks all of the boxes in my opinion. Enjoy that car while you can!

Having a car down is the absolute worst. I have an e46 ZHP that was down for a little over a month and waiting for small parts is really what took so long. the job was simple enough but it was just one thing after another. Hopefully you can get that line replaced ASAP and get her out again!