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Thread: Visceral M3 / My Estoril E36 M3/2/5 Journey

  1. #26
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    Quote Originally Posted by pbonsalb View Post
    If the pedal has been like that for a while you might want to buy a new pedal and aftermarket delrin or bronze bushings rather than just the bushings.

    Great thread bringing an E36 back to spec or even a bit more. Inspiring. You should buy an E92M3 for a beater or daily driver to take the strain off the E36.
    Just installed the bronze bushings and while it helped a bit, it's still not perfect. The next step to rectify it will be the Mason Engineering pedal.

    Luckily the E36 isn't my daily, I think it only saw about 2500 miles this year. I'd love to buy an E92 and probably will someday, but between this project, my other project car Nissan, and my 1960 F100 I haven't touched, I'd probably end up broke!
    Past: '99 Hellrot/Dove M3 | '97 S14 1JZ | '06 Triumph Daytona 675 | '01 330I M-Tech I | '99 Silvia S15 | Current: '96 Estoril/Black M3

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  2. #27
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    Great read and great progress. Love how it’s coming together.


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

  3. #28
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    I've always hated rattles, creaks and groans in the interior of cars. Hate hate hate them. So after putting the black interior in, I wanted to take some extra steps to keep the interior as "fresh" as possible. One of the things that has always bugged me is that putting ANY pressure on the center console resulted in a super annoying creaking sound. The video below gives you an idea of what I'm talking about, but the microphone on my iPhone makes it sound much louder than it actually was.



    Went to Home Depot and picked up a bag of adhesive backed felt circles, these are about $3.



    This required a lot of trial and error, but I eventually found the sweet spot for placement of these. Probably overkill on the drop in cupholder/ashtray piece but with the added width it actually made the whole assembly feel way more sturdy.



    Another crucial point is where the whole bottom piece meets the center shift surround piece. I had to trim the little pieces down to be very thin, but once they're sandwiched in you cannot seem them and they don't bow the piece out either, making it look misaligned. I only needed one on the driver side and two on the passenger side.



    Again, the microphone picks up way more noise than there actually is, this piece is pretty much dead silent now in person. See video below.




    The Racing Dynamics strut tower bar has been bugging me for some time now, so I decided to take it apart, sand down the pitting and hand polish it. As you can see below, it was definitely aged.




    Vinyl removed and DA sanded with 180 and 220 cleaned it up pretty nicely.



    I went up the scale to 400 and 800 on the DA, then switched to wet sanding by hand with 1000 all the way up to 2500. Then hand polished with Never Dull.



    Now just need to replace the Racing Dynamics sticker and put some sort of sealant on it.

    Also spent some more time on the door panels today getting the incredibly gross old padding/adhesive on the armrest pieces. This was gumming up even 80 grit pads so it had to be soaked with solvent and scraped off with a putty knife, again a time consuming procedure.



    Found a couple more hairline cracks that will be filled with epoxy and sanded smooth.



    The main door panels are just about ready to wrap with the new material. I tried to mock them up with a heat gun and some patience, but I'm not sure if I'm going to be able to pull these off in one piece. I may need to lay a piece inside the map pockets first then figure out a way to seam the big overall piece into them.


    Past: '99 Hellrot/Dove M3 | '97 S14 1JZ | '06 Triumph Daytona 675 | '01 330I M-Tech I | '99 Silvia S15 | Current: '96 Estoril/Black M3

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  4. #29
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    Wrapping up some work I’ve been doing to the gauge cluster. Since the ASC system was deleted the light was on in the cluster. Rather than wiring up a bypass trick I killed two birds with one stone: remove the bulb and replace the faded logo with a new one.



    Old faded logo:



    Replacement logo font looks good. The middle color on the stripe isn’t as purple as I think it should be, but it’s fine.



    Set down into the recess



    And all back together. Rather than spend the time and money to have a local decal shop fab up a non-translucent sticker overlay, these little emblems were about $9 for a set.




    While I was in there, I decided to address the airbag light as I don’t intend to have a factory steering wheel back in the car anytime soon. Rather than pluck the bulb and have it still dimly lit by the backup passage, I left that all in tact and put some electrical tape on both sides.



    All done, thrilled to not have XMAS tree dash anymore. Next I’ll have to address the failing adhesive and dim points around 80mph and 4,000 RPM’s.

    Past: '99 Hellrot/Dove M3 | '97 S14 1JZ | '06 Triumph Daytona 675 | '01 330I M-Tech I | '99 Silvia S15 | Current: '96 Estoril/Black M3

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  5. #30
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    Looks clean. For the steering wheel, I just used a 3ohm resistor for the airbag light.

  6. #31
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    The gauge cluster looks really nice now!

  7. #32
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    All done, thrilled to not have XMAS tree dash anymore. Next I’ll have to address the failing adhesive and dim points around 80mph and 4,000 RPM’s.
    the easiest way to address failing adhesive is to remove the overlay and sand the plastic behind to make it opaque...did this about 7 years ago on mine

  8. #33
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    Another part of the black interior swap was to get the rear deck changed over. Rather than track down, buy, and pay for shipping on a “black” rear deck that had already faded to purple, I decided to try and make my own. My grey one had some deep scratches in it and even some small pieces of broken glass stuck into it from when it was broken into years ago. The old grey fabric was pretty stubborn to get off at first. After I soaked the whole piece in some solvent it started to come off a bit easier, but still less than friendly.



    It took some time at Michael’s to find a black fabric that had the same texture as the factory looking fabric, but I eventually found some. Considering how thin the fabric was I picked up some cotton backing to lay down first to help hide any imperfections and give it a little bit of padding. If I were to do this over again, I probably would have found some thin foam as it’d probably be easier to work with.




    I used some strong 3M adhesive on the leading edge, nearest the rear seat, as this portion is hidden under the cover. I used this because I needed a good anchor to pull the fabric tight when spreading it over over the entire piece.



    Base fabric all laid down and trimmed. Note the yellow on the leading edge, that adhesive is potent stuff and will bleed through into the black fabric, so use it sparingly and let it dry completely before adding the black fabric.



    The next day after it was all dry I started laying down the thin black fabric. I started at the leading edge and worked outwards towards the edges. I used a plastic squeegee and a fabric glue I also picked up at Michael’s. You’ll need something that dries clear and doesn’t go on so heavy that you’ll see it through the fabric.





    It’s a bit time consuming and can be easy to mess up, so if you’re trying this, take your time. After it was all laid down it was time to trim and glue the excess to the underside of the shelf.



    Again, rather than trying to find unbroken speaker grilles in black I just had these painted black. Half of the foam had already blown out.





    A little glossier than I would have hoped, but it’ll be fine for now.



    All finished!



    Also threw the new OEM center arm rest in.
    Past: '99 Hellrot/Dove M3 | '97 S14 1JZ | '06 Triumph Daytona 675 | '01 330I M-Tech I | '99 Silvia S15 | Current: '96 Estoril/Black M3

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  9. #34
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    Quote Originally Posted by DrftKingIII View Post

    I've heard great things about the Mason Engineering pedal, but with the head gasket repair coming up and a braking system that is overdue for an overhaul, it'll have to wait.

    All said it done, the job wasn't that bad. I did it for two or three hours a night after work and had most of it done this past Sunday. I'm glad it's finally wrapped up, but now I'm just itching to replace the Vaders with proper seats and upgrade the steering wheel while I'm at it. Also debating doing a half cage but we will see!

    I honestly didn't think it was true, but I ran into the same issue and a new OE pedal and delrin bushings mostly fixed it for me. The Mason pedal is FAR nicer, but the price difference was crazy at the time (about 5 years ago). Plus this is my DD, so even if it was angled a bit I wouldn't mind.

    With the driver side seat out this job is a breeze. With the seat in there, it's a tight fit... Your upper back and neck are going to have a good workout from the stress.
    "Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind."
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  10. #35
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    Nice progress! I have the delrin bushings instead of the bronze. Looks like a new pedal will also be required to fix side play....

  11. #36
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    Over the past year or so I’ve had the looming suspicion of a leaking head gasket, as the last oil report from Blackstone showed an increased level of Sodium and Potassium, up even more from the small trace from the year prior. While I didn’t see any milky substance in the oil or on the oil cap yet, I noticed the cooling system was pressurizing far more than normal. A full 24 hours after driving, opening the cap on the expansion tank would let out a light hiss and the fluid level would rise. Not ideal.

    While driving the car to dinner at the end of January and checking the fluid level the following day I noticed the pressure, even just a short and easy drive, had increased drastically. Popping open the oil cap revealed a confirmation of what I had been trying to put in the back of mind.



    Gross, but such is life of anyone with an E36, really. I went ahead and ordered all of the gaskets, seals, and washers that will be coming apart during the rebuild. As many have warned against the FEBI gasket, I went ahead with the Elring variant. Also noticed a small weep from the rear differential last time it was on the lift so I also sprung for some Redline 75w140 and two new drain plugs.



    While it is all apart I figured it was a good time to replace all of the cooling system and heater hoses that weren’t addressed with last summers overhaul, as well as miscellaneous vacuum lines, upper chain tensioner, knock sensors, etc and convert from the unfavorable expansion tank to the proper Euro setup.



    I’ve never done a head gasket job before but after reading numerous walk throughs and feeling ambitious I decided to go ahead and begin the teardown. Free time is often limited so I told myself I’d take it slow and work on it when everything else is caught up and energy isn’t depleted.

    Pulling the valve cover off revealed that the top end was exceptionally clean, especially considering the mileage on the car. I noticed some notches in the cam gears and timing chain so someone was in here at some point.




    Fortunately everything came apart very smooth and didn’t run into any real issues. With the head off I finally got a good look at the gasket. Those water jacket passages are disgusting! I didn’t immediately see any obvious signs of a breach so I assumed my over-pressurization issue was the result of a small crack somewhere.



    With the head off and on the bench it was time to get it into the washer.







    Off to the machine shop she goes! Next up was to begin prepping the block for the new gasket. Nothing but Brakleen, WD40, a brillo pad, some razors and a whole lot of elbow grease. This was a very tiring and time consuming process as I didn’t want to use any power tools and potentially create a low spot on the block or any other damage.



    I’d say I spent at least thirty minutes per piston, likely more. Once that was done I checked the surface with a straight edge. So far so good.



    Another thing on the list of “While-It’s Apart” was the Beisan Systems Vanos rebuild. Their step by step directions with pictures made this a totally brainless procedure. It was fun to take this apart and study, clean, and put back together.




    I was back and forth out of town two separate weeks out of the month so when I eventually settled back in I went and picked up the head from the machine shop. To my surprise the pressure test came back just fine, no cracks! After looking over the old head gasket with him he pointed out exactly where my breach was, a small one on cylinder 1. Let’s hope he’s right!

    Another surprise was that he said I had 6 bent valves. What? The car was running pretty damn good when I took it all apart! I suppose my definition of “bent” is different from a guy who works in .00010’s of an inch every day. He even went so far as to put them in a drill press and spin them and sure enough, you could see a bit of variation in them. Six new valves, valve guides, new seals for all of them and a full valve job should do the trick.



    Another thing he mentioned was that he barely had to deck the bottom at all as it had warped only a minor bit. Good news! Wrapped this up with all new exhaust manifold hardware once I had it back on the bench.



    I’ve got no real interest in doing headers at this point as I can’t justify spending the money on them only to have to change the mid-pipe, then deal with emissions issues and extra noise and extra expenses and all of that for a nominal increase in power. For now it’s just not worth it to me, maybe down the road when I’m chasing more power. In the meantime in my continued efforts to clean this car up a bit I decided to sandblast and coat these in a high temp silver. Here’s what I started with:



    After a quick sandblast:



    And after a few coats of the high-temp paint. Not really interested in shelling out big bucks for the ceramic coating on factory headers, so this will do for now. We’ll check back after some miles to see how they look then.



    My friend had a roll of header wrap laying at the shop and figured it’d be a good opportunity to wrap these in an effort to keep temps as low as possible, Texas summer heat is real. It was a great learning experience but after reading a bit more online later that night we decided it was best to remove them. Reading one horror story of an oil drip onto the fabric like material which then led to a fire is enough for me to steer clear. It’s a shame because I did quite like the way it looked after it was done.



    Over Easter weekend I was able to button up a few more things and install the new ARP head studs.



    As of now the cylinder head has been lowered down onto the block with the new gasket and is ready to be torqued down. I started the tear down a little over a month ago but haven’t really driven the car since January, so I’m starting to get excited now that the finish line is in sight. I’ve got a few other things I need to do while the intake manifold is still off so that will come soon enough!

    Moving on with the head gasket job and cleaning things up I decided to throw all the valve cover and Vanos hardware in the parts washer, then tumbler, then coat them in a zinc like coating.




    Next I torqued down the head onto the ARP studs and proceeded to do the cam trays, lifters, then the cams themselves.



    It was all pretty easy to put back together. Once the cams were torqued down and the gears installed it was time to throw the Vanos on, which actually went on first try. With everything timed and then tied together I rotated the crank two full rotations and luckily enough the TDC mark on the crank matched up with the 45* angles on cylinder 1 cam lobes and the dots on the backs of the cams. Success!



    Valve cover back on with the fresh hardware and the new M50 manifold installed as well. All the vacuum lines converted to their respective spots, double and triple checked. Almost time to crank!

    As mentioned earlier in the post I decided I wanted to do away with the fail prone factory expansion tank. Although mine was only a year old they’re a pain in the ass to bleed properly and by using the Euro reservoir mounted up near the firewall I can build a proper shroud for the Z3M radiator. After looking up the required euro parts for the conversion it’s evident that using the euro hardline requires manually bending it, adapters to attach it to the water pump outlet, the deletion of the throttle body coolant lines, and just overall numerous headaches to make it work. The US E36 uses a long rubber hose from the bottom of the expansion tank to the water pump pipe, so it shouldn’t be an issue to run a long rubber line the opposite direction behind the head and up towards the reservoir.



    Since I’m retaining the factory hardline that comes out of the back of the water pump I needed a smooth 90* bend coming out of the hardline and turn back towards the firewall and behind the head. I found this line on Amazon for about $15 that fit the bill.



    I trimmed an inch or two of the leading portion to try and keep it as reasonably far from the brake lines. In order to try and keep as much heat out of the brake fluid I got a piece of thermal wrap and ziptied it over the hose in that area.



    It’s difficult to see here but this shows the same hose running between the head and the firewall. I wrapped this part in the same thermal wrap to help abate any excessive rubbing.



    And here it comes up in the passenger corner up the engine bay and meets the reservoir. Much easier than buying the expensive Euro parts and modifying them to fit properly.

    After that was done I mounted the radiator, filled it with fluid, and double checked all of the work at least five times. I went to bed and ran through the whole head gasket repair in my head one last time to try and mentally confirm everything on the checklist. Tomorrow we’re going to *hopefully* fire it up.

    The next morning I reconnected the battery, sat down in the drivers seat and very nervously turned the key. It fired right up! It stumbled around at idle for about ten seconds and then idled silky smooth. Tremendous weight off my shoulders.

    I’ve still got to wrap up a few loose ends by mounting the Euro reservoir properly and on my new gauge cluster setup which is to come in a following post. But for now, it’s good that this is just about ready to be back on the road!
    Past: '99 Hellrot/Dove M3 | '97 S14 1JZ | '06 Triumph Daytona 675 | '01 330I M-Tech I | '99 Silvia S15 | Current: '96 Estoril/Black M3

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  12. #37
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    Nicely done work!

  13. #38
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    Great work, very well done. I've never been too concerned about making high or low spots on the block. It's cast iron, and even with a Roloc disc, you're going to have to sit on one area for a long time to get any kind of material removal.
    "Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind."
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  14. #39
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    Quote Originally Posted by DrftKingIII View Post

    The next morning I reconnected the battery, sat down in the drivers seat and very nervously turned the key. It fired right up! It stumbled around at idle for about ten seconds and then idled silky smooth. Tremendous weight off my shoulders.
    Haha - that's all of us when we do that first crank! Glad you nailed it! And glad it's back on the road!

    -Josh: 1998 S54 E36 M3/4/6 with most of the easy stuff and most of the hard stuff. At least twice. 271k miles. 1994 E32 740il with nothing but some MPars. 93k miles.

  15. #40
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    Quote Originally Posted by pbonsalb View Post
    Nicely done work!
    Quote Originally Posted by Hova View Post
    Great work, very well done. I've never been too concerned about making high or low spots on the block. It's cast iron, and even with a Roloc disc, you're going to have to sit on one area for a long time to get any kind of material removal.
    Thanks guys. I know it'd take some dedicated effort to really mess it up however I have the unfortunate brain condition in that I overthink everything at the most inconvenient times, such as coming down the back straight at 100+.... "Wait, are you sure you torqued down those wheel stud bolts?" I'd rather exhaust myself doing something the slow and 100% sure way than trying to save 60 minutes and argue with myself that I might have done something wrong.
    Quote Originally Posted by blckstrm View Post
    Haha - that's all of us when we do that first crank! Glad you nailed it! And glad it's back on the road!
    Hoping to make a trip to Austin before it's unbearably hot so I can enjoy some of Hill Country!
    Past: '99 Hellrot/Dove M3 | '97 S14 1JZ | '06 Triumph Daytona 675 | '01 330I M-Tech I | '99 Silvia S15 | Current: '96 Estoril/Black M3

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  16. #41
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    Over my years I’ve grown to genuinely hate the smell of coolant. It’s like PTSD for me, a stark reminder of all the times my RB/1JZ S14 would blow coolant lines, the time my old E36 M3 blew the upper radiator hose halfway to Florida, or even when my water pump gave up at 230,000 miles on my old G35, none of these are my fondest memories.

    Being that summers in Texas are VERY hot and I don’t want to have to do another head gasket job anytime soon, I decided it was best to rely on something other than dummy gauge in the cluster. The water temp needle is buffered to something of the tune of 180-240, so by the time the needle even starts to move towards the hot side it’s already far past “tolerable” temperatures.

    Keeping with the theme of functional yet OEM+ styling, I wasn’t left with many options aside from the traditional VDO setup in the slot under the OBC. These look great for what they are, but are far from your line of sight while on track. I wanted something I could glance at without losing my focus and line of sight for more than half a second.

    A-pillar gauges? No, this isn’t a SRT-4 Neon. Steering column mounts? Functional, but not really a good look in an otherwise OEM looking car.

    I got the idea to order a traditional 2-1/16″ water temperature gauge with a digital readout, take it apart and use the LCD screen and mount that somewhere in the gauge cluster. After reading a couple of endeavors from people taking apart AEM gauges and finding a big circuit board that is unable to be disassembled, that idea was out.

    After another few hours of research I found a company that builds compact digital readout gauges. After exchanging a few e-mails with them I had the option of a single water temperature gauge or a dual setup with water and oil temperatures. I sourced a junk cluster locally and started making paper templates using the measurements supplied by the company.



    My first idea was to use the dual gauge setup in the lower portion of the cluster, where all the warning lights are. Unfortunately the overall PCB board was too tall and even with trimming part of the cluster it wasn’t going to work.



    I honestly could not care less for the MPG gauge, so I figured that would be the next spot I could try. Another strike, too wide overall.



    Ultimately I gave in to the reality that I wasn’t going to be able to fit the dual function gauge anywhere, so I mocked up the single function gauge where the MPG gauge was. Looks like this could work!




    Looked like plenty of room, so I went ahead and placed the order for the single display water temperature gauge.



    Here it is! It’s got a nice little water temperature icon that lights up as well. It should be mentioned that it was ordered in BMW amber backlighting, so it should match pretty well.



    The kit comes with a matte finish tinted PVC type of plastic. The plan is to cut that out to the same shape as the opening for the MPG gauge and glue it in place with a strong but reversible adhesive.



    Template drawn out, now to trim to fit.



    Here’s a rough outline of the trim piece without the protective film overlay. I spent close to an hour fine tuning this piece to almost “snap in” to place where it’ll sit.



    Rough template dropped in to place with the protective film still on. A few more adjustments to this and it was good to go.




    Wiring for the display was fished through an unused bulb hole. You may notice the rough trimming done to the channels for the warning lights. These were eventually ground flush and clean and then the tops were sealed from excess light using electrical tape.



    I attached the display directly to the backside of the gauge face support. A copious amount of hot glue was used, but made sure to keep away from the gears of the gauges themselves.



    Also added some compression foam to the backside to help support the assembly as the hot glue didn’t want to stick all that well to the gauge face support. It seemed like there was some sort of slick coating all over the plastics.



    All sandwiched together and tested power with a battery. Success!



    Full gauge cluster reassembled. Now to wire the rest of it in the engine bay and through the firewall. Luckily I have the S52 head that has an unused port in the cylinder head between the throttle body coolant barb and the factory water temperature probe, so that’s where I placed the sender. No drilled and tapped thermostat housing or chopped up radiator hoses here.



    All wrapped up and super thrilled with the final product. The font and color look identical to the odometer. Could not be happier, checked the boxes for OEM styling and a highly visible readout in a great location.



    I need to get around to fixing the failed adhesive creating the dark spots, but I’ll save that for a later date. For now, I’m just going to enjoy having this project finally wrapped up.
    Past: '99 Hellrot/Dove M3 | '97 S14 1JZ | '06 Triumph Daytona 675 | '01 330I M-Tech I | '99 Silvia S15 | Current: '96 Estoril/Black M3

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  17. #42
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    Wow that looks super!
    1997 BMW M3 - Boston Green/Modena

  18. #43
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    thats a really awesome way to go .. great job on that cluster.
    98 Estoril ///M3 4/6
    S54 swap CSL

  19. #44
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    Having the pleasure of restoring my own E36 M3, there is something enjoyable about watching others install fresh parts or restoring others by themselves! I removed my bulb and used the black tape on the cluster. I tried sanding the cluster backing, but it is still not bright the further away from the tightening fasteners you get....will eventually try the glue. I highly recommend the ZHP steering rack...installed mine finally a couple weeks ago and it feels amazing!

    I should have bought an estoril back in the day...still kicking myself! Love estoril/dove though...wish you would have kept it and just revived it! Black is easier to keep clean and I understand the thought process....love the thread!
    1997 Arctic Silver/Black M3
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  20. #45
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    Thanks guys.

    Quote Originally Posted by BMWManiac View Post
    I highly recommend the ZHP steering rack...installed mine finally a couple weeks ago and it feels amazing!
    This has been on my radar for a while now, I plan to do that and the whole power steering refresh kit from FCP at the same time.

    I've got a few other things I want to tidy up and then get it on my local track to see how the car does under some real stress.
    Past: '99 Hellrot/Dove M3 | '97 S14 1JZ | '06 Triumph Daytona 675 | '01 330I M-Tech I | '99 Silvia S15 | Current: '96 Estoril/Black M3

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  21. #46
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    Quote Originally Posted by DrftKingIII View Post
    Thanks guys.



    This has been on my radar for a while now, I plan to do that and the whole power steering refresh kit from FCP at the same time.

    I've got a few other things I want to tidy up and then get it on my local track to see how the car does under some real stress.
    You're welcome to try it out in my car when you come over to Austin*.

    *FYI, I'll be gone to Idaho from about June 14th through July 8th, so this weekend is really the only chance until mid July. Hopefully that's not too far off.

    -Josh: 1998 S54 E36 M3/4/6 with most of the easy stuff and most of the hard stuff. At least twice. 271k miles. 1994 E32 740il with nothing but some MPars. 93k miles.

  22. #47
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    My Cars
    1 Blue, 1 White, 1 Black
    Got out to the local track about two weeks ago, finally. The car did really well in the first three sessions, but developed a decent sized power steering leak so I called it a day.


    Went with two friends, the one in the F80 had purchased the car only the night before, what a way to get to know your new car. The F82 has quite a bit of power modifications, supposedly around 500 whp, but only lowering springs in the suspension department. Both of them would take me for a walk in the straights but the agility of the E36 made it easy to catch up in the corners.


    Having been my first time at the track in years, first time in this particular car, and first time ever at this track, I'm pretty happy with being in the 1:50's consistently all morning, with one 1:49.4 before the power steering leak. I hope to break into the 1:48's at my next visit, likely next month, but the 200-treadwear Direzza's may say otherwise.





    Past: '99 Hellrot/Dove M3 | '97 S14 1JZ | '06 Triumph Daytona 675 | '01 330I M-Tech I | '99 Silvia S15 | Current: '96 Estoril/Black M3

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  23. #48
    Join Date
    Aug 2005
    Location
    LI NY
    Posts
    10,267
    My Cars
    Turbo 99' M3
    I love the temp gauge in the cluster - so functional and looks perfect!

  24. #49
    Join Date
    Feb 2002
    Location
    Orlando, FL
    Posts
    8,884
    My Cars
    Turbo 97 E36 M3, 99 M3
    Also, surprised I never mentioned it, the next time your gas door spring gets loose and your door doesn't quite seal...just flip the spring and you'll be good as new again!
    1997 Arctic Silver/Black M3
    CES Stage IV (651rwhp/615rwtq @ 24 psi)

    1999 Techno Violet/Dove M3
    Auto/Convertible and staying stock!

  25. #50
    Join Date
    Nov 2007
    Location
    Houston, TX
    Posts
    612
    My Cars
    1 Blue, 1 White, 1 Black
    Nothing too exciting as of lately, with average temperatures around 105 and very humid I don’t find myself too motivated to be in the garage messing with things. A few minor updates, so I’ll blitz through them;



    Made a friend in our neighborhood, she liked my car.



    Got some PDR done, still lots to do.



    Was immortalized on Google street view, I’m unreasonably stoked on that.



    Last I was under the car I noticed my A/C compressor was on it’s way out.



    No thanks, it’s too hot for that shit. New unit from FCP Euro and evaporator to go with it.



    Lost yet ANOTHER kidney on the highway. Looks nice.



    Really wish these weren’t $50 a piece.



    After the last track day I found two things, first of which was leaky power steering lines. New reservoir and lines from FCP Euro, replaced with the in-line restrictor, and cut the fitting off of the trombone and replaced it with a worm gear clamp.



    The second was my torn front control arm bushings. I spent far too much time debating on whether 95A would be too stiff for the horrid roads in Houston and if I should stick with factory rubber. 100’s of conflicting reviews later I settled with the AKG polyurethanes. Glad I did, I don’t notice any of the ill effects from what other people say and the steering feels far more planted mid corner. Turn in response was improved marginally.



    Still going back and forth with Riot Racing on the P0121 (throttle position sensor) code some 10 months later. They refurbished my unit and sent me another they had in stock. One had severe throttle plate sticking, the other had to be adjusted and is still triggering the code. Pretty frustrating but Todd has been very helpful.



    Drove the car to lunch the one day it wasn’t 100* out. Sat outside. It was nice.



    Finally replaced that nasty windshield trim piece. Took me nearly an hour to get the driver side windshield wiper arm free.



    Lots of cleaning was needed prior to reassembly, as usual.



    Drove the car to a local Cars & Coffee style meet. Still way too hot outside.



    Last but not least, I took the car back to the track and ran it the opposite way. I had more fun running it backwards in this counter-clockwise configuration because the hard braking “u-turns” were a bit more challenging to nail. My best lap last time was 1:49.48, this time it was a 1:48.49. We only had four 30 minute sessions and going into the last session I was hellbent on getting into the 1:47’s. Unfortunately my fuel pump disagreed with that. Per usual with the factory E36 system I was getting bad starvation issues around the carousel since I only had about 1/4 tank left. I’ll add a secondary pump to the never ending list of things to address.

    During the last track day in similar scorching temperatures I was reaching water temperatures of nearly 220* after 5 or 6 laps and I would have to back off and let the car cool down before getting back into it. I decided to pull off the factory pusher fan to really force as much unobstructed air through the radiator, the SPAL puller was enough to cool it down at low speeds. I don’t think the car got above 214* the entire day, no cool downs needed. Still a little higher than what I would like, but I have something in the works to help assist with that.
    Past: '99 Hellrot/Dove M3 | '97 S14 1JZ | '06 Triumph Daytona 675 | '01 330I M-Tech I | '99 Silvia S15 | Current: '96 Estoril/Black M3

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