Alpine White 535i Build

**kyletilley** · 02-23-2019, 11:50 AM

Hi all,

First post. I've been a long time lurker and figured it was about time I posted up a thread of my own.

I was shopping around for a cheap daily driver, ideally an E34 or 39 Wagon. However, this popped up as a trade in at a local dealership. Â‘89 535i, 5spd manual with an lsd.

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

It looked clean in the pics but you can never tell, as the dealership was only half a mile from my apartment I figured I’d walk over and check it out.

When I got there I was amazed by how solid the car was, the dealer didn’t bother joining me on a test drive, so I took it straight to my shop and put it on the lift to have a proper look around.

Worlds worst steering wheel aside

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

Sizeable oil leak, power steering leak and a useless left front strut but mechanically it was pretty sound. Bottoms of the front fenders were rusted out, and it had started to go into the sills, but other than that the car was remarkably rust free! Drove it back to the dealership and $1000 later I had a new daily.

Fast forward 3 days, and I broke out the polish.

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

Polishing turned into poking the rust on the front fenders, never poke the rust hole......

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

Which turned in to removing the front fenders,

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

which led to getting the torch out and cutting the rust out the sill....

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

That has since evolved in to all new bushings and arms for the steering and suspension including Moosehead UCAB,

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

Bilstein Sport shocks, Bav Auto Springs,

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

Fresh badges

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

Was also lucky enough to pick up a set of 5 Rondell Style 72's

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

New front fenders, M5 side skirts and rear bumper are enroute, along with an mtech2 wheel with fresh alcantara

And.... I’m back to having no daily driver ��

While working through the car I decided to go ahead and fix any issues that popped up.

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

I've seen worse but decided to tidy it up anyway.

Been weighing up engine swap options, however as the leak down test was really strong, (almost disappointing as I was LS shopping, haha), I am going to build a turbo kit for the M30 and go from there. I see little point in swapping out a perfectly good engine.

I’ll update the thread as I go, hope to see some of you out and about!

**Neel** · 02-23-2019, 02:12 PM

**kalevera** · 02-24-2019, 11:05 AM

No pics

but glad I could help contribute to this project with the side skirt

**kyletilley** · 02-24-2019, 11:45 AM

Weird. The pics worked on my laptop yesterday....

Thanks for the side skirt, picked up another from England along with the rear bumper.

**kyletilley** · 02-24-2019, 11:06 PM

Originally Posted by kalevera

No pics

but glad I could help contribute to this project with the side skirt

Do the pics work now?

I uploaded them via Flickr, so hopefully that fixed it!

Fitted the new bushes, arms and struts today, what I didn't realize was there are two different ABS ring sizes on the E34, and guess what, the new struts are the 83mm and the old the 97mm.

by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

The only visible difference on the outside, was the locator bolt for the brake rotors, here's a comparison.

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

That's delayed progress a little but we'll crack on again tomorrow evening and hopefully she will be a roller again. In other exciting news, someone actually bought the awful steering wheel which came on the car!

It is being replaced with this... Can't wait for it to arrive.

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

**theBMWbeast** · 02-25-2019, 03:01 AM

I hope you got a fine spline steering wheel. And if the car was originally airbag equipped, you’ll need a spacer to make it all work. I used BMW part #32311120260 for my 370mm mtech2 (love it, not driving a school bus anymore).

Can’t wait to see where this thread goes, welcome to the cult of the M30!

**kyletilley** · 02-25-2019, 10:32 AM

Originally Posted by theBMWbeast

I hope you got a fine spline steering wheel. And if the car was originally airbag equipped, you’ll need a spacer to make it all work. I used BMW part #32311120260 for my 370mm mtech2 (love it, not driving a school bus anymore).

Can’t wait to see where this thread goes, welcome to the cult of the M30!

The wheel has yet to show up so I guess we’ll see! It came off of a 1990 car, and mine is an ‘89, so I think it will fit..... Famous last words!

Big fan of the M30 so far, that might change when I replace the timing chain next week....

**Neel** · 02-25-2019, 10:48 AM

Originally Posted by kyletilley

Big fan of the M30 so far, that might change when I replace the timing chain next week....

dont forget to get timing chain guides as well, because you know while your in there.

**kyletilley** · 02-26-2019, 11:23 PM

M5 rear bumper showed up.....

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

**762Armo** · 03-01-2019, 01:59 PM

Cheap daily and the build you're doing don't seem to add up... but we sure are glad to see it happen.
How is it that nobody asked about the great background pics. Do you own this shop? I'm jelly.

**kyletilley** · 03-01-2019, 11:26 PM

Well, it started out as being a cheap daily..... I enjoyed the car way more than I expected to in the three days I drove it (before poking the rust hole :P) so decided it was worth playing with.

Yes it's my race shop, the business is Era Motorsport (www.eramotorsport.com), we specialize in vintage race car prep as well as car and driver development.

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

I came over to the US racing in 2013, even had a year driving for Bimmerworld!

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

I set up the company because I didn't want to not be able to pay my mortgage when the pro driving eventually goes away, that and I get a huge buzz from driving the old stuff!

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

**kyletilley** · 03-02-2019, 03:16 PM

New strut tops went on today, contrast between the old and the new.....

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

Also fitted fresh wheel bearings front and rear, wow the rears sucked to do!

**BleedsBlue** · 03-02-2019, 07:18 PM

Great to watch this car taken from neglected rough stone to polished gem

Also, I’m terrified to pull my skirts and front fenders.

Are you on IG?

**kyletilley** · 03-02-2019, 10:37 PM

Originally Posted by BleedsBlue

Great to watch this car taken from neglected rough stone to polished gem

Also, I’m terrified to pull my skirts and front fenders.

Are you on IG?

Yeah, in some ways I regret poking the rust hole. That's really what kicked started this whole thing, I keep telling myself it will be cool when it's finished!
I've always had a thing for big 90's German tanks so I am looking forward to having some fun with it.

My personal IG is kyle_tilley & the work one is era.motorsport

**kyletilley** · 03-03-2019, 10:53 PM

So, I had my first temper tantrum with the car today...

Unlike the struts themselves and top mounts, was no really clear info on what struts fit what with regard to hubs and abs rings.

I knew the replacement struts I had purchased were from a ‘95 car which had the third gen option for the strut housings. I wanted to replace the hub assemblies anyway but having to do it three times was pretty annoying!

Attempt 1, fit the ‘95 front struts including existing hubs which had the 83mm ABS ring. Front brake rotors don’t fit.... At this point I should have just said "oh well and bought new rotors", but I ordered new older style front hubs instead.

Fitted them, all seemed good, up to the point where I went to fit the wheel speed sensors. No go! More expletives.

The explanation (for those who don’t know and looking for answers) Sensors are the same, one part code (34521181491), Everything I had read said that the strut housings were the same apart from the top mounts, not true!!! I took this at face value and just eye balled the hole for the wheel speed sensor, looked about right I thought... When I put the wheel speed sensor in it fouled on the back of the 97mm pre 91 hub. Unsurprisingly now I think about it, but it’s 14mm out.

So, long and short of it.

You can run the later 83mm hubs, and still have existing pre 91 wheel speed sensors with a functional abs system as long as you have the post 91 struts. On the flip side, 83mm hubs on a pre 91 strut would fit fine and without issue, however the abs ring would be too far away from the wheel speed sensor to register correctly.

**BleedsBlue** · 03-04-2019, 09:43 PM

Originally Posted by kyletilley

Yeah, in some ways I regret poking the rust hole. That's really what kicked started this whole thing, I keep telling myself it will be cool when it's finished!
I've always had a thing for big 90's German tanks so I am looking forward to having some fun with it.

My personal IG is kyle_tilley & the work one is era.motorsport

Awesome, thank you! It's good to have you, this thread is like a throwback to good photos, marked progress, and helpful info.

If you really want to drop a leg over the slippery slope, we should talk about future performance upgrades once you have established a nice baseline

**kyletilley** · 03-13-2019, 11:59 PM

New wheels finally showed up today!

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

And more importantly! My Mtech2 wheel!!! Love it, well worth the wait.

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

**fo3** · 03-14-2019, 06:42 AM

Great thread OP.
Yeah, there's a rabbit hole needed to jump through when learning about pre 09/91, then 09/91- 09/92 and then post 09/92 E34s with regards to all sorts of changes made during the cars production. A lot of the changes are mainly about m50s and v8s, but some changes were made in suspension and brakes too, which impacts 535s.
I'm dealing with strut mounts myself right now and last year I was dealing with rotors so I remember reading about the abs ring and bolt pattern differences somewhere. E: not a different pattern but where they are in relation to the extra hole

**Sir Montalbon** · 03-14-2019, 07:28 AM

Great thread!

I too have run into issues with swapping strut assembies and getting ABS errors. Haven't gotten around to fixing it, but your info will prove useful when I do.

Awesome shop! Don't hesitate to take wide angle shots of your progress so we can see the e34 and some of the goodies you got laying around!

**fo3** · 03-14-2019, 09:00 AM

Now I remember reading about different hubs. It may have been bmwe34.net
Here they show different hubs and abs rings and give change over date
http://www.bmwe34.net/E34main/Mainte...eelBearing.htm

I also remember there was some other differences, Quickly you could tell visually by whether the 6th hole in the hub was equal distance between two wheel bolt holes, or whether it was randomly placed closer to one wheel bolt hole.

**kyletilley** · 03-15-2019, 10:38 PM

Yeah it's a mine field for sure!!

Thankfully the car is now back on all 4 wheels.

One thing that I feel wasn't mentioned anywhere, or if it was I missed it was that the rotors aren't interchangeable with the 2 different style hubs. That was a pain but hey she's all back together!

Went with Pagid rotors as we have had good experiences with Pagid products on the race cars.

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

While I was there I fitted a set of braided hoses to the front of the car.

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

While I had the car in the air I did an engine, gearbox and diff flush, new Redline heavy duty oil in the diff, what came out was gross. Timing chain is next on the list.....

**kyletilley** · 03-17-2019, 11:42 PM

And she's back on the ground! M5 side skirts and bumper still to go on.

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

Pretty disappointed with the fit of the new left front fender if I'm honest, the right side has a rust free used one I found down in Atlanta which fits way nicer. It hurts my OCD enough that I'm contemplating just taking it off and finding another used one.

Front lip arrived from the Ukraine today, pretty happy with it. I think that it will complete the look of the car.

Untitled by Kyle Tilley, on Flickr

To anyone reading this who is bored, I'm sorry! But I'm doing this thread as much for my own benefit as anyone else's.

**fo3** · 03-18-2019, 08:53 AM

Not bored. You're doing great stuff and taking the time to upload images and make posts here.

**Sir Montalbon** · 03-18-2019, 10:43 AM

I saw that Ukrine lip on FB and was interested. Looking foward to updates on fitment. Care to say how much it was shipped?

**theBMWbeast** · 03-18-2019, 02:27 PM

https://www.instagram.com/p/BlFiuKnHekK/?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet

Pics of the lip fitted and painted on this page, lots of euro guys on Instagram run it.