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I started a S54 swap thread over in the engine conversions section: https://www.bimmerforums.com/forum/s...tic-Dream-Swap
I pretty much have all the S54 issues sorted and have all the other parts I need but decided it'd be wise to first overhaul the front and rear suspension.
Here's a spreadsheet of every part for the suspension overhaul, it's part number, etc!
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...it?usp=sharing
This covers:
- All new control arm bushings and ball joints front/rear, inner and outer
- Koni Sport Shocks and Struts
- Vorshlag Camber Plates
- H&R OE Sport Springs
- Tie Rods
- Swaybar Links
- Subframe Bushings
- Diff Bushings
- Front and Rear Wheel Bearings
- Swaybar Mount Reinforcement
- RTAB Pocket Reinforcements
- Front Subframe Motor Mount Reinforcements
- Cheapo but decent rear camber arms
- Aluminum 1-piece X-Brace
- 330i ZHP Steering Rack
I've received all parts except the Koni shocks which showed ships in a week when I ordered from ECS, they're ETA to ship is 5/17...
Took 4 hours to get to this point... I'm still amazed at the lack of rust on this car, thank you California.
Last edited by M52 POWER!; 06-13-2017 at 02:25 PM.
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Quick wipe down with a rag, ooh it even says M3!
Bushings actually look decent for how old they are, pushing 21 yrs.
Started breaking down all the susp components
I took this shot with the subframe upside down which shows the passengers side upper control arm sits "higher" than the drivers side, intentional?
Diff bushing
Last edited by M52 POWER!; 05-10-2017 at 12:06 AM.
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I got some man size 12-point 36mm and 46mm sockets to take off the front and rear hub flange nuts.
Setup my harborfreight 3-jaw puller to push the axles out.
Aaaand it broke on the first try....
I ended up following this video and it worked perfect, had both axles out in 5 minutes!
Pressing RTA bushings out with a 20-ton press
Got creative with pushing the flanges out but it worked a cinch.
In just under an hour I had all the RTA bushings and bearings out! Awesome.
Control arms were cleaned and painted, drying now and then I'll be pushing all the new parts in tomorrow.
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Awesome. I need to do this, as does probably everyone on this board... Great work!
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Finished installing all RTA bushings and bearings.
Pressed the upper control arm inner bushings.
Pressed diff bushing out and replaced.
Pressed 1 of 4 subframe bushings, the other 3 are going to be ultra hard to do. Will likely end up burning them out too haha...
Also need to press the new rear diff bushings.
This weekend I'll be welding the RTA plates and subframe swaybar plates in too!
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BMW E36 M3 Expert
Great work so far!
hates woodgrain
jealous...great work
^ sold
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OK so I found some more time over the weekend to progress a bit further...
I got creative and was able to push the other 3 subframe bushings relatively easily and quickly which was a bit of a relief.
Here I am mid-way pressing a new bushing in. I was a bit skeptical that 2 sockets and adapters setup like this would work but it actually worked beautifully.
Did the score-cut and chisel method to remove the old bearing inner races off the hubs
Installed new snap-rings and pressed the hubs back into the new wheel bearings
Removed the diff cover to press new bushings and also inspected all the LSD unit bolts since it's known that some of them were installed w/out thread locker from the factory, all 100% perfect!
Pressed the old diff cover bushings out
Spent like an hour cleaning the diff cover.....
Installed new bushings
Here's all the rear end components with all new OEM bushings installed
Trimmed the AKG RTA pocket reinforcement plates since it's impossible to weld this upper/inner area with the gas tank installed
Prepped the RTA pockets, got real dirty doing this :p
Welding the plates in
Got real dirty again with the die grinder removing the excess proud weld. Then gave them a few coats with self etching primer
Welded the swaybar reinforcements on and ground the excess welds
Cleaned and primered
Painted
Used body seam sealer to re-seal the underside, fill in any gaps etc
Next I'll be spraying the RTA pockets with 3M rubberized underbody and once that dries I can actually start re-assembling@
Oh yea, can't forget I'm also in the middle of re-greasing the axle CV units
Last edited by M52 POWER!; 05-24-2017 at 12:49 PM.
Your mom goes to college
Fantastic work
98 Estoril ///M3 4/6
S54 swapCSL
Member
Amazing. Want to come do mine?
1999 M3/2/5 - Titanium Silver - Track/Weekend Toy
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Wow, this looks great. Thanks for the inspiration!
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Great work!
Member
BMW E36 M3 Expert
You sort of missed the mark on the reinforcement plates. You're supposed to tie them to the body and the protruding theaded bosses. You kind of hit them and that front one almost not at all.
Should look more like this
Because this happens
Last edited by Braymond141; 05-24-2017 at 08:25 PM.
Member
Yes in retrospect I agree I could have gotten some more weld around the threaded inserts although welding is new to me and not one of my strong points. There is weld on the threaded inserts just not full perimeter. Before doing this project I researched the failure points and could see that most rip the threaded inserts out due to metal fatigue of the surround areas. IMO by adding the plates to the overall sheet metal I am still greatly reducing the flexing in these areas to prevent this failure.Originally Posted by Braymond141
Member
Looks great appreciate all the pictures. What press and adapter/bushing kit are you using?
I'll take ya eyez!
One of the best things I ever did for my M, now to do it all again with the replacement. Looking great! Can't way to work on my swap again
Member
It's a harbor freight 20ton press, you can pick them up for about $150 with their coupon. Comes with the press plates. As for adapters it's mostly large sockets and other random parts that I found.
Member
Update!
So even though I've done an overhaul like this before on my 96 328is like 12 years ago this project has been a bit more challenging and taking longer than I anticipated. Back then I installed all powerflex poly bushing crap (which soon failed) and installing the OEM bushings this time around makes everything much more challenging but hopefully (IMO) worth it for what I am seeking out of a upgraded OEM+ street car. Along the way my OCD gets to me and I typically end up cleaning every part and fastener and sometimes repaiting "because I'm in there, might as well!" which adds a decent amount of time. I also have a full time job and family now tooIn the end it should be very worth it though!
I started with spraying the primered RTA pockets with 3M underbody (sorry I didn't get any pics of this).
Cleaned, sealed and filled the diff up with new Castrol Syntrax Limited Slip 75W140 Diff Oil
Spent 45 mins with a brush and cleaned the rear underbody, it was filthy and so was I after
Really surprising how much dirt came out of there!
A little OT but I filled all the chips and 1 gouge mark on my lip spoiler with bondo, sanded smooth and sprayed with a few heavy coats of plastidip. The heavy coats make it so that it has nearly zero texture and has a very OEM stock finish to it. No idea on if this will last but if it doesn't I'll buy a new lip spoiler then...
Pic is before sanding, didn't get one after but obviously much less bondo.
Finished rebuilding the axle CV joint inners and outers
Can't forget new swaybar links
Everything back together ready to go in!
In position...
Finally it's back in!!!!
So next I'll finish mounting the trailing arms, ebrake cables, reinstall brakes, driveshaft, exhaust shield, exhaust etc.
I just got confirmation that ECS finally shipped my koni sport shocks so I'll be installing the rears this weekend and also start pulling the front suspension apart which should (hopefully) be much easier and quicker to do than the rear. I can't wait to see the moderate drop this should give the car as well as the much improved handling and grip!!
Last edited by M52 POWER!; 06-04-2017 at 12:57 AM.
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Damn shit's fresh. How did you know your old powerflex subframe bushings failed?
Member
They mushroomed the washers (now a known issue and I addressed it) but also the poly started to fall apart and get "cut up" overtime from the normal slight movement of the carrier. In addition to this the RTAB's move on 3 different axis, all of the aftermarket solutions (aside from spherical monoball bearings which is racecar stuff) restrict 2 of these 3 axis and I can't see how that can be good for the car, handling or the bushings.
Last edited by M52 POWER!; 06-01-2017 at 03:12 PM.
Member
How bad was it to get the sub-frame bushings lined up with the studs and bolt holes with the whole rear suspension assembled? When I did mine I bolted the sub-frame onto the car with just the upper and lower control arms installed, then I installed the diff, axles, and hubs after. It wasn't super easy, but I still feel I avoided a lot of swearing while trying to slide the whole sub-assembly around on a floor jack to line up the sub-frame bolts.Update!
Everything back together ready to go in!
Finally it's back in!!So next I'll finish mounting the trailing arms, ebrake cables, reinstall brakes, driveshaft, exhaust shield, exhaust etc.
I just got confirmation that ECS finally shipped my koni sport shocks so I'll be installing the rears this weekend and also start pulling the front suspension apart which should (hopefully) be much easier and quicker to do than the rear. I can't wait to see the (moderate) drop this should give the car as well as the much improved handling and grip!!
Nicely done, your pics make me wish I had done more the clean mine up that much as well.
Member
Honestly not bad at all. It's kinda weird but the whole assembly "teetering" on a piece of wood and the jack is really quite stable and easy to move around.
Then to install:
While raising it with the jack slowly you line the front bolts up, even when they're out of line a bit at first you simply guide it by hand making small adjustments here and there. Once you have them started you give a couple pumps of the jack, then go back to the subframe and give it a wiggle so it slides up the bolts and repeat this 3 or 4 times. Now that it's about halfway raised into the bolts you can just keep pumping the jack raising the subframe until it makes contact fully seated to the underbody of the car.
To install the rear bolts I very slightly reduced pressure of the jack holding the subframe to the underbody of the car so I could manipulate the subframe while installing the bolt into the bushing and "wiggle" it until I found the bolt hole center in the body. Repeat for the other side. Then "jounce" the whole subframe so all holes are centered without unequal pressure, raise the jack up 1 pump to fully seat the subframe to the underbody again and tighten all the bolts. Then finish by torquing to spec.
This sounds really complicated now that I typed it all up but it's actually super simple in practice. Total time from floor to installed to body was right around 20 minutes!
Last edited by M52 POWER!; 06-02-2017 at 10:40 AM.
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Which oetiker clamps did you source for the outside CV on your axle rebuilds? Having a hell of a time getting the NAPA oetiker clamps to seal as the one that came with the GKN boot kit did not fit!
Member
I re-used the BMW ones since they were in great shape and the GKN's were terrible.
Member
My shocks actually showed up after nearly 2 months!!!!!!!
Pic of my little girl and I, she's actually very interested in everything I've been doing. Future ///M owner
Springs
Old blown out rear shocks
New shocks and reinforced mounts!
Assembled (I then realized after this pic that I forgot to add the bump stop metal caps and installed those too!)
Also, I cut about .75" off of the bump stops
And installed. Notice the bump stop metal caps are now installed.
Last edited by M52 POWER!; 06-05-2017 at 05:01 PM.
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