1978 323i driver/project

[cgifool]

M4 jack nuts arrived, ($20 shipped for 25 from a vendor on ebay : https://www.ebay.com/itm/Steel-Blind...W/322027695812)

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I've got a number of extras, send me a PM if you want some.

I spent about 90 minutes messing with them last night and was ultimately successful, but not without the usual few learnings along the way..

Installing them requires screwing in a bolt and tightening it until the nut completely collapses - but it was a little hard to tell when to stop, so I managed to strip the first one Also, I had to hold it from the inside with needle nose vice grips to prevent it from spinning while tightening the bolt). There's a $30 tool for this, but I have a feeling I'll never need it again.

After I stripped the first one, I figured out how to remove it (by surrounding the area with painters tape for insurance and drilling carefully - the head pops off and then can push the rest in to fall down inside the door)

Lesson learned, don't try and tighten the bolt too tight.

I installed each one with a little bit of touch up paint in the hole and a little dab of duct sealant around the lip of the nut to try and protect against rust.

Also, now it needs 30mm screws instead of 20mm due to the deeper location of the threads.

I'll get some oval-head screws to replace these hex-head ones I had on hand.

Still, very happy to have a solution in hand!

Just did the passenger side for now, it was late and the driver side door panel needs to come off before I can do that side.

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[cgifool]

Got the other two jack nuts set and mounted both mirrors. Not even bothering to plug the wires in because neither one works properly anyways.

I didn't realize they fold flat against the car, learned something new today.

Also reinstalled the radiator and hoses, and adjusted the alternator belt. Planning to put the plugs and coolant in tomorrow and have it ready for inspection.

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[cgifool]

Last week I replaced the timing belt, but the engine wouldn't start afterwards. I thought at first I had maybe gotten the timing belt off by one tooth, but it turned out that I had forgotten about the idler pulley turning the distributor. It had gotten moved while the belt was off, causing the car not to start anymore.

Last night I pulled the distributor, turned the rotor to point to the index mark while engine was at TDC, put it back in, and the car now starts and runs again! Woot.

While I had the distributor out, I found a small piece of metal stuck to one of the ignition trigger things, which turned out to have fallen off the rotor rev-limiter. I tossed it, looks like it must have come off when I removed the cap, because it wasn't banged up at all.

Replaced the rubber O-ring on the distributor shaft with a spare I had waiting for just this day. The old one was hard like plastic and immediately broke when I tried to remove it.

Discovered my 4-year-old glue job on the advance unit vacuum straw had failed, so I tried hot glue (which failed), then cleaned it up really well and tried UV-cure superglue, which seems to have worked.


Discovered some green corrosion at the coil end of the coil wire, so I unplugged all the cap wires and cleaned the two that needed it, and put it all back together.


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[cgifool]

Today, I received a new OEM cap & plug wire set, ordered from Athens Greece off eBay just last Thursday, with free shipping. Amazing!

Seller name is chadoubmwparts - highly recommended! he has quite a few OEM and NLA parts listed.

Over the weekend I got the ignition timing set, at least pretty close. Looks like I might be one tooth off on the distributor, which prevents me from getting the timing mark quite all the way to 0 at 1500 rpm. I also haven't checked the fuel pressures, but, it now seems to start easily and fast idle when cold, and run well cold or warm, with no knocking when I step on the gas, so it must be pretty close!

Also, loosened the rear bumper bolts and adjusted it to be centered from side to side (it was nearly touching on the left, with a 3/4" cap on the right).

Went for a short test drive, runs and drives well but exposes the need for the suspension items next on the list!

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[cgifool]

Last night I spent an hour on the driver side door, putting the door panel back on.

- re-glued the plastic inner liner to the door.
- found and replaced a missing clip and at the top front of the door panel, which holds the very front of the trim against the door/window.
- inserted the spring behind the door panel where the window crank protrudes
- replaced the armrest with a slightly nicer one, with better plastic/chrome trim. used the right screws this time.
- crudely put together the exploded pieces of the electric mirror controls - it fell apart when I last removed it, and the mirrors aren't functional anyways, so it's just for looks.

My drivers door hinges or door brake have an annoying squeak now.

I spent a few minutes trying to eliminate it with some good spray lube, but utterly failed Could there be paint in the hinge maybe??

On the rear bumper, I connected the license plate lights, and they aren't working

I'm pretty sure they were fine a week or two ago when I disconnected them to mess with the bumper. Adding this to the list of electrical gremlins I haven't gotten serious about yet! (dome light not working, only one horn beeps, inner high beams don't turn on, rear window defogger not working)

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[320iAman]

"My drivers door hinges or door brake have an annoying squeak now. "

I had a squeak in the door from contact of the roller with the bar-- sprayed lubricant, oiled ect would not last--then tried Mobil synthetic grease on the two--this worked..

Randy

[cgifool]

Last night I spent an hour trying to get the passenger door panel reinstalled like the night before, but ran into some hiccups along the way.

On this one, the metal trim strip and weatherstrip along the trip of the door panel had come off of the panel. I removed all the clips (carefully so they don't scratch things up), glued the weatherstrip back on the metal, reinstalled the clips, glued on the door liner, and put the door panel on the car.

Only THEN I discovered I'd gotten the weatherstrip just a tiny bit offset from the proper position, maybe 1/8", causing it to pinch the window seal a little, looks weird, and makes the window harder to roll up and down.

Meh. Gotta take it apart and do it again. That's when I decided to stop for the night. Ah well, that's how it goes!

[cgifool]

Last night I worked on a couple things:

- Trying to clean off some light overspray along the bottom VIN tag. After lots of research online, I tried first with a clay bar, and then with "Goof Off", with basically no change. The Goof Off did work quite well removing overspray and paint from a few other small areas and rubber grommets. Not sure what to try next, but I'm tempted to just get a replica made at some point and keep the old one for posterity.

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- Annoyingly, I discovered a little more surface rust under the seam sealer in the area of the vin tag. I scraped at the edges to try and reveal it, doesn't seem to go deep or far (but then again it never does)

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- Installed an OEM plug wire set and distributor cap - was a little annoying because there were no numbers on the wires at the distributor end of the thing, so I had to use a multimeter to figure out which wire was which. Also, since I had aftermarket wires previously, I had to remove all the little screw-on things from the spark plugs for the caps to fit. Also, annoyingly, I can't reinstall one of the valve cover nuts because the plug wire harness is a little thicker, and some of the valve cover studs are too short. Guess I'll have to fix those now

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- Fortunately, the car still runs after all that, and the new plug wires do look nicer (black color instead of red, and bundled up in a rubber tube where they go around the front of the engine instead of a couple zip-ties keeping them corralled). It does hesitate and idle low when in the 50s, so I'll check the pressures one day soon.

[cgifool]

The other thing I spent time on last night was figuring out how to get to the motor in an old-style flag power mirror.

I barely found anything at all online about how to take these apart, but a friend noticed the similarity with early 911 power flag mirrors, and I found some useful forum posts and photos about those. After taking mine apart, they are quite close in operation, and I think the same kind of retrofit repair is probably doable - converting from a "motor & solenoid" mechanism to a "2-motor" mechanism from a later model car.

First, I was able to remove the mirror from its backing plate by carefully forcing and wiggling a metal putty knife in from the side. This one was clearly already a replacement and illustrates how well the double-sided foam tape worked (quite well).

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Next, I carefully drilled out the four rivets holding the base plate to the aiming mechanism behind, and removed it.

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Removing the rubber moisture cover and the two screws holding the mechanism to the mirror body releases it.

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There is a white case with two pieces sandwiching a motor, solenoid, a little gearbox of some kind, and a couple spools of very strong and fine cord. These cords wrap around an aiming frame that the mirror base plate was attached to.

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Gently prying the plastic case halves apart (they are held together only by friction) reveals the guts.

Testing with a power source, both the motor and solenoid still work. Its just that the shaft is spinning freely and not turning either one of the strings. They are pretty tight, but I'm not sure where the original problem occurred. Anyhow, it seems this one is pretty much beyond my skills.

This forum post, seems to point to a viable repair strategy. I looked on ebay and it seems a suitable new replacement motor of this type should be available for $50 or less. I have a couple late 320 power mirrors on my shelf, maybe I'll see what they look like inside

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/porsc...han-100-a.html

[cgifool]

Today I took the car up the road to get inspected, but sadly, their inspector is out sick

Car started right up at 38 degrees and ran really well once I let it idle a bit to warm up.

I also finally have 2 proper muffler tips and installed them, they look great! I never treated these as a priority until everything else around it was close to done.

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[Beam318ti]

I totally respećt your slow but steady progress on this car and the wonderful documentation of the struggles and the progress. I have enjoyed reading this thread and the updates. You should feel proud of what you have achieved. Well done Sir and nicely executed.

[Brob]

Great progress, FYI Walloth Nesch has new mirrors and they are not outrageous. They are currently discounting freight as well

[cgifool]

Got a front license bracket mounted, but I won't get a chance to go for inspection until next week sometime. I will probably put thicker spacers in, but for now I like that the angle of the plate matches the angle of the kidney beans

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Drove the car a few times anyways, and although it's totally great to be "driveable" again, there's a few nagging "drivability" issues I have to deal with now that I was putting off in the effort to get it all reassembled.

- car pulls left on braking. ive been chasing this one a while, and currently think it's from a worn out left inner tie rod.

- something wrong in the diff or axles - a "clunk" noise from that area whenever I let off the clutch, which started exactly after I rebuilt it, and pinion seal started leaking immediately. I'm afraid I may have either not seated one of the races enough, or not preloaded the pinion nut enough, causing the mystery clunk.

- rear shocks too tall, I set the circlip in the wrong position after installing longer springs. Pretty sure this is making the car feel "dartier" like as if it was toed out a little.

- interior still looks like crap with the center console out and wires dangling.

- brand new speedo cable, makes an annoying noise at low speeds. pretty sure they coiled it up a little too tightly for shipping. just like the last time. at least the speedo needle doesn't vibrate (much) any more.

[cgifool]

Yesterday and today:

- mounted the front plate to the bracket. I think I'll get another one of the same for the rear plate, which I think would bring it up an inch or so and look a little cleaner.

- one side at a time, removed the rear shocks and compressed the springs enough to lower the height clip to the lowest setting. the rear of the car looks higher than the front, which I don't THINK is lowered.

- fully adjusted the parking brakes so they actually work reasonably well now. the brake lever was "floppy" for the longest time, and was preventing it from working well until I fixed it earlier this year.

- sigh. when I removed the passenger side shock, I noticed the paper top gasket was missing. clearly I'd forgotten to install it last time, because I have a spare. got the spare all ready to go and,... forgot it again when I put the shock back on. LOL, guess it'll wait a little longer!

[320iAman]

Today, I received a new OEM cap & plug wire set, ordered from Athens Greece off eBay just last Thursday, with free shipping. Amazing!

Seller name is chadoubmwparts - highly recommended! he has quite a few OEM and NLA parts listed.

I bought two New BMW Cylinder Head Rocker Shafts- Exhaust and Intake for M10 Cylinder head from him a while back-one is nla-quite happy with the purchase,, another seller I have bought from that has very good prices is egyautoparts on eBay they are in Cairo and he gets BMW dealership parts , ect as well to sell.

Randy

[cgifool]

Got my inspection and registration sticker yesterday, all legal to drive on the road now!

And just like that, back on stands for a while to do the control arms, tie rods, and “mystery clunk”.

[cgifool]

Took a break from thinking about the car for a few weeks, and starting to ramp back up for another round.

I received a set of head bolts and valve cover studs - replacing the head bolts because I have the old hex-head kind and want to replace them with the updated torx-kind. Also, the valve cover studs are various lengths, and most of them only protrude the bare minimum amount.

Last I spent a few hours just putting away tools, throwing away trash and empty boxes, organizing my parts and shelves (large bare spots have appeared since putting most of it back on the car).

I spent an hour alone plowing through all the random hardware on a highly-piled magnet dish and a dozen sandwich bags with items left from junk yard runs or my own car (mostly hardware I ended up replacing, or extra ones from overbuying), storing in a couple of organizer boxes - I have 5 or 6 of these now and love them! They're perfect for all the smaller hardware and crush rings and o-rings and wave washers, and dash hardware, and bumper hardware, and plastic trim clips of all kinds and... you know

[cgifool]

Last night I spent about 90 minutes removing the 4 wheels (fixing to get them repainted), and both control arms.

The rubber boots on control arms and tie rods are all cracked and falling off.

3 of the 4 tapers were surprisingly stuck and had some corrosion on them, even though I'd only had them apart just a few years ago.

Fortunately, since I'm replacing everything I was able to use the pickle fork to separate it all without worrying about damaging stuff.

I did confirm there's some play in the left inner tie rod once I had it disconnected, as well as both control arm-subframe bolts being a little loose; all hopeful signs I'm on the right track for eliminating excess play in that region.

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[cgifool]

I had the local gas station dismount my tires and remove the valve stems. Wheels ready for refinishing!

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These center caps are surprisingly expensive ($42 apiece). Good thing I have enough of them!

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Removed the left & right tie rod assemblies. Left inner clearly has play, and the boot on the end is all broken. The right one isn't worn out, but the adjuster was seized at some point and rounded off so I'm replacing it anyways.

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Looking through my stash of new parts for this job, I'm gratified to see I already have every single part I'll need except for the 4 washers on the control arm - subframe bolts (missing) and new 28mm lock nuts for the sway bar ends.

[cgifool]

I dropped the wheels off for repainting last week, I'm expecting them back in 2-3 weeks. No big rush.

Over the last few days I received the new lock nuts and washers for the front end work, and last night I got back to it.

Getting the control arm back on was a little puzzling at first until I figured out I needed to drop the front sway bar brackets first. Also, figuring out I needed to screw the inner tie rod on and jack up the control arm to get the outer tie rod end into the control arm hole. All the taper holes were wire brushed well and coated with anti-seize (nasty stuff).

I ran out of steam when I got to the passenger-side tie rod. I'd gone with UFO brand, and discovered the boss at the base of the threads on the inner tie rod is 1mm larger diameter than the original - and won't fit into the hole of the steering stabilizer bracket. It would be easier to bore that hole larger, but I'd rather grind the aftermarket part than the factory one.

I also ordered a set of thin combination wrenches so I won't have to use the pipe wrench to tighten these up (32mm)


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[cgifool]

Sunday evening I spent an hour or two working on the car again..

Fired it up for the first time in 3 weeks or so and let it get nice and warm, no issues there!

Filed down the too-wide boss on the passenger inner tie rod, installed it, and flattened the lock plate.

World's slowest front end job, nearly done!

Just need to tighten everything up now (all the mounting bolts are only loosely installed), but driving will have to wait until I get my wheels back from the body shop.

[cgifool]

Picked up my newly refinished wheels from the body shop, as well as some touch-up paint in both colors, $400.

I'm very pleased with the results!

The owner said to wait at least 2 days before re-mounting the tires, and I've found a place nearby that advertises "touchless" tire mounting.

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[cgifool]

Got my tires re-mounted and balanced at Soulspeed Performance, a local race shop. I found them by googling for "touchless tire mounting."

I had a very good experience there: they didn't charge any more than any other shop, and used state-of-the-art equipment. The new paint on my wheels ended up unscathed, they gave me free metal valve stems, and all the wheel weights are stick-ons on the inside of the rim, so nothing's visible from the outside, which is something I didn't even know existed

[URO Parts]

Hi Cgifool, you mentioned a steering stabilizer bracket in a prior post. None of our BMW dealer data shows a steering damper for 1978 USA (or Euro) 3-series cars, could it be an aftermarket bolt-on? Early Porsche 911's had a factory steering stabilizer, but that's one of the few for R&P steering.

[cgifool]

Hi Cgifool, you mentioned a steering stabilizer bracket in a prior post. None of our BMW dealer data shows a steering damper for 1978 USA (or Euro) 3-series cars, could it be an aftermarket bolt-on? Early Porsche 911's had a factory steering stabilizer, but that's one of the few for R&P steering.

If you click here, you can see it in the slide "Tie Rods with Steering Damper". The stabilizer bracket I was referring to is part 32111115250

https://www.realoem.com/bmw/enUS/showparts?id=3071-EUR-07-1978-E21-BMW-323i&diagId=32_0301