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I picked up a third e36 today, a white 98 auto sedan with a bad motor and transmission. My hellrot sedan was sideswipped a few weeks back and while it is still drivable, it looks like hell but has rust in the rockers that makes the chassis not worth the effort to repair. The white chassis is not perfect but about as close to rust free as possible and should be worth the time I put into it. My loose plan for now is pulling the motor and trans from the red car, clean up and reseal/re-gasket each and then make one good car out of the two.
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Sorry to hear about your sedan. Bad drivers on the road will be the dimise of us all.
Do you have a good garage to work in?
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IMG_20191102_165851.jpgIMG_20191102_165907.jpgIMG_20191102_165924.jpgIMG_20191102_165933.jpg
I still haven't found a decent photo hosting service so I'm just attaching the pictures directly which never looks good.
Fortunately I have a good sized garage for projects but I have a bad habit of keeping it too full of other toys and projects. My bowrider and vert are taking up most of the space.
I'm all over the place on power train plans. Before pulling the running m52 out of the red sedan, I'm going to check the condition of the heads from the two dead motors I have. If either are salvageable, I might just fix up that motor and put a getrag manual swap into the new ride.
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White sedan looks good! There was one in my area but had rust visible so not sure if it sold.
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Pulled the head off of the bad m52b28 that came out of my vert. It had no compression on cylinder 6 and was drinking oil, reportedly it had never overheated and was just running rough. I pulled the thing and promised myself to leave alone sit till I finished the stroker/vert project. I put a straight edge across the surface of the head and I think it is good. The exhaust valves on cylinder 6 are not seating due to a ton of carbon buildup. I suspect the oil separator had failed and the car was sucking oil into the intake, cylinder 6 being the lowest, collected the most upon each shut down and caused the carbon buildup, that is my working theory at least. In any case I think it will clean up well.
Last edited by gdavid; 11-16-2019 at 06:34 PM.
Balogne Cajones
Not sure on your experience. Check for cracks in the head. They can be very small. Any line that connects valves to coolant port is a crack. They can look smaller than a hair.
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I'm going to have my local machine shop take a look at it. They aren't BMW specialists but can check for warpage or cracks, I've taken two heads to them so previously, one was bad one was good. The bad was warped beyond saving and they didn't recommend resurfacing it, the second was within specs and they did not advise even skimming the head which seems to go against the grain from what is commonly reported on this board but they have a good reputation and all is well so far.
The drivetrain in my beat up hellrot runs so smoothly that I'm hesitant to mess with it but it is an oily mess and I'd like the white sedan to be pristine. It blows smoke on a hard pull after idling which is probably just valve stem seals, but that means pulling vanos off and the cam trays out at a minimum. I have replaced valve stem seals in the past without pulling the head by using compressed air in the cylinder to keep the valve up and may go that route but by the time I have the head stripped down that far and the motor is out of the car, pulling the head off make the job easier. The smart play might be just leaving it alone, dump it and the transmission into the white car as is and putting together something wild to drop in later. I'm changing my mind every hour.
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Still figuring out my plans but leaning towards doing a minor cleanup of the functional, automatic drivetrain from my red sedan into the white sedan. The steering rack and power steering pumps in both cars are a mess so I'm going to send a pump out for rebuild, rebuild the rack and order new lines before I do the drivetrain swap. After the white car is up and running, I'll start gathering parts for building up a more interesting drivetrain for it, I'm leaning towards getting a e46 SMG 6 speed and converting it to a manual. I really should reduce my overall e36 footprint by completing the vert and selling off spare parts. Unfortunately, I don't have much in the way of desirable parts to sell from the red sedan, I'm going to cherry pick the best of its interior to use in the white car, I can probably find a drift boy that will want the 3.91 open diff, but can't think of much else.
Last edited by gdavid; 11-08-2019 at 09:51 AM.
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Google BMW M50 Cracked Head, then pick Images. Scroll down a couple of rows and you will see a head with the cracks highlighted by a Sharpie.
My bad, you have the M52, but the same cracks happen. You could change your search to M52 instead of M50.
Last edited by JDStrickland; 11-08-2019 at 02:08 PM.
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It is an early m52 which used the same head casting as the m50's so your point is well taken. In addition to inspecting it for warps and cracks, I'm encouraged that I found the source of the lost compression, the exhaust valves on cylinder 6 clearly aren't seating, I thought the previous owner of this motor told me that cylinder 5 had bad compression but he may have misspoke or I am not recalling the conversation correctly. On my last project, I ended up cleaning the head effectively through multiple rounds of scrubbing with seafoam and a toothbrush to remove all the carbon deposits gently. I hand lapped the valves after that, with some fresh valve stem seals and this head all cleaned up I will have a nice head start on any engine build.Originally Posted by JDStrickland
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I pulled the cams off and valves out of this head today. The exhaust ports were especially coked up on cylinder 6 but all of the exhaust valves were pretty nasty. I cleaned it up and inspected it enough to convince myself it is crack free. The machine shop can double check it but I want the head surfaced for sure. I've at least decided that this will be the engine for the white sedan. I suspect the piston rings are coked up as well, so they will be coming out, quick hone to the bores and replace the rings. If I can come up with a cheap m54b30 rotating assembly, I will go that route again.
Last edited by gdavid; 11-10-2019 at 07:24 AM.
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I finally finished cleaning up this head and valves. It's not assembled because I will drop it off to be skimmed this week. I'm torn between selling it to fund the miscellaneous and maintenance parts when I swap my beat up daily's drive train into this chassis or hang onto it for a future engine build. I think I will pull the head out of this white sedan to see if it is salvagable, I doubt it will be, the PO said it overheated multiple times and he attempted to drive it further so it will be a miracle if it isn't cracked or warped beyond use. If it is good by some miracle, I will sell the one I just cleaned up and still have one for my next build.
Balogne Cajones
From my experience.. Whos owned dozens of e36, and worked on atleast a few hundred in large scale repairs.. Screw all the work. Just buy a great condition one for the 4 or 5 grand. The money is worth rather than buying a thousand dollar heap that costs 5 grand to fix and 400 hours of your time and frustration.
Although I dont take my own advice on this quandary.
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Yeah, that ship sailed couple years ago. I paid $4k for my first one which was clean and low mileage but automatic and plain jane. It's served me well as a commuter but I enjoy working on them as long as they are rust free. I don't want to get into a surprise rust repair again like my vert project included.
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I'm finally about to get serious with this project and mapping out which direction I will take. This will be my build thread, serve to track the progress and solicit suggestions on upgrades. There are a lot of parts at my disposal and between the my other two e36's, I've worked on about every component of these things.
Current status of the white sedan:
Bad engine, reportedly overheated badly
Bad automatic transmission, it was reportedly slipping prior to car overheating. When car is started in park, it is in gear and trying to pull ahead
Very good body, zero rust underneath, front left fender has a couple dents, hood has two good sized chips in it, white is forgiving
Headliner is decent, sunroof is not sitting flush with roof
Tan interior is good with exception of "A" pillar trim and carpet which has a wear hole in the driver footwell, seats are tear free and presentable
SRS fault for driver seat belt
15" Style 41 wheels with dry rotted tires
Goals:
OEM plus daily driver
Absolutely no fluid leaks
Absolutely no valve tapping
Fresh suspension but no compromises on comfort, bushings will remain rubber
Fresh brakes
Retain emission compliance
Parts on hand:
-Running, stock 328 automatic sedan, ~122k miles, burns/leaks 1 quart/2500 mile (oil pan, vanos hose and valve cover leaks, probably valve stem leaks), 3 year old rear wheel bearings, rtabs, front control arms & bushings & struts, 3 year old rear axles, smooth 3.91 open diff, 100% functional sunroof, new quibo, vibration in driveshaft (I suspect u-joint), rockers are rusted out and body damage down entire right side, I made out well on uninsured motorist claim and this car owes me absolutely nothing. Transmission occasionally shifts hard, full of fluid but I haven't changed filters
-Spare m52b28, ~121k miles, motor had low compression on cylinders 5 & 6, valves were coked up & not seating, head is good and cleaned up, I have not pulled lower end apart, I suspect rings are carboned up. Cylinder bores appear good but have not been measured
-S52 intake cam and NVm50intake cam to run as exhaust
-Hakentt tuned DME currently in my vert
-Mismatched 15" wheels with fresh tires
Definite Projects:
Pull interiors, swap carpets and cherry pick best of interior bits
Replace or refinish left fender and hood chips
Swap tires
Swap trailing arms with fresh bearings & newish axles
Replace drivetrain with something
Fresh cooling system
Options:
- Pull drivetrain from running sedan, replace gaskets and valve stem seals, replace transmission seals & gaskets, scrub and run as is
- Rebuild spare m52, upgrade cams, mate to refreshed automatic transmission
- Stroke spare m52, upgrade cams, mate to refreshed automatic transmission
- Stroke & bore m52 to s52
- Run white sedan as automatic, manual swap now or manual swap after selling my vert
- Swap rims to 16" or 17"
- Delete sunroof and refresh headliner
Considerations:
If I sell my vert, the budget is higher and I will definitely manual swap white sedan
My preferences are a bit tame and I don't care for many of the common "upgrades", I'm not offended by the tan interiors or 4 spoke steering wheels, m3 bumpers & trim look nice on m3's but I don't need to copy the look, I don't want an aggressively geared diff (although LSD would be nice), I can live with the squishy 15' tire handling at least until I wear out this current set.
Last edited by gdavid; 12-26-2019 at 10:50 AM.
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I can rule out a simple refresh of my m52 spare block. I pulled it apart expecting to find the rings carboned up and stuck but found something much more impressive. Piston #6 ring lands are busted up pretty good, snapped the compression ring and put some grooves in the cylinder wall. I will box it all up for now and set it aside for a potential bore out to 86.4mm but that isn't in the budget right now. Next I will pull the m52 out of the white 328 and tear it down.
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Surprising find! Keep at it!
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I pulled the head off the white 328 tonight to check it out. I didn't get it cleaned up yet so I couldn't inspect very well for a crack. The cylinder bores in a couple cylinders showed visible wear about half way through the travel, not vertical scratches but a patch of area with no crosshatching. At a quick glance this block is not a good candidate for a stock bore rebuild. Hopefully the head is salvageable and I can sell it some cash but this block is not worth messing with.
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This past weekend was beautiful and I ended up with more accomplished on the car than expected. My plan was to pull the wiring harness and start cleaning up parts that will be retained with this car through the engine and transmission swap. I had forgotten the engine harness also went to the back of the automatic transmission and was harder to disconnect than on a manual so I ended up removing the exhaust end driveshaft, which needed to come out eventually anyway. The exhaust manifold flanges to the mid-pipe came apart without snapping any of the 6 studs, which is a first for me. The threads are all in good shape so I may sell them off and using another set of manifolds that I've already removed the studs to use bolts and nuts.
As the scope of this swap is becoming a bit clearer, my list of parts and tasks is growing with the ultimate goal of having a 100% leak free and mechanically sound engine, trans, steering system and suspension. Practically every moving piece under the hood or chassis will be replaced or rebuilt. Aside from the mess of oil in the engine bay, this chassis is the best I've ever worked on, it is absolutely rust free underneath and every fastener comes apart with ease. I also cleaned up the electrical connections for the seat belt tensioners and this fixed the SRS error codes, this included pulling the seats, cleaning them and the carpet up. This carpet has a hole worn through it in the drivers foot well and will be replaced by the carpet from my red sedan but in the mean time I want it to be clean and not stink. A disgusting interior really drives me nuts.
I’ve ruled out using either of the short blocks I have on hand so I will need to clean up, repaint and reseal the m52b28 coming out of the red sedan, it needs valve stem seals so I will go ahead and pull the head, and replace the timing cover gaskets as well. I will probably have another head assembled and ready to go on it to save a little bit of time. The project scope is definitely growing but I’m looking forward to having a really clean sedan worth putting some effort into.
Last edited by gdavid; 01-13-2020 at 10:06 AM.
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Sounds good, post pics next time
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Here is a cylinder wall with the wear showing. It is a bit hard to see but they are all the same. The rest are just the general oily mess of the car. It looks like most any other e36 in the middle of a head gasket project.
Also of interest to me is the idler pulley bolted to the alternator. I know some engines have them and others don't but I don't know the rhyme or reason to it. This is my first m52 with it. It has the spring style tensioner like my others.
Last edited by gdavid; 01-14-2020 at 07:28 AM.
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This engine was absolutely filthy, the picture above of the AC compressor looks bad but the oil filter housing and power steering pump were actually worse. The water pump bearings are shot, allowing a lot of slop in the shaft. Over half of the cooling lines showed signs of seepage. The PO reportedly bought the car shortly before it overheated and he gave up on it, I can understand that he hadn't gotten around to fixing deferred maintenance and wanted to drive it a bit, but this stuff was just absolutely unbelievable.
I got a late start yesterday and only removed all of the accessories just to save space when I put this thing in storage. The other m52 with the broken piston and gouged up cylinder wall is still on my engine stand and it is easier to strip this thing don as it sits rather than sitting on the floor. I will be sending out the power steering pump for a rebuild and trying my hand at replacing the seals on the steering rack once I get that out. The two cylinder heads will go to the machine shop for inspection once get a chance to break the second one down. I don't plan to have the valves on either ground, just have the castings inspected for cracks and surfaces, I spoke to the shop a while back and having it disassembled should save me a little labor. There should be some efficiency of scale by bringing in two at once. A spare head with a clean bill of health is practically cash in my pocket. I'll also get an estimate to bore out this block for a future build. The plan is to have the car and parts cleaned up for the swap while the head and pump work is being taken car of. Once the running engine comes out of the car, it should take me about a week of evenings to get the engine and transmission cleaned up and resealed.
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She's a pig lol. There's a guy on this forum that has a seal kit for the PS pump, not 100% sure if he has it for both style pumps. What did you use to strip that piston top, so clean, the one next to it, not so clean
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Superheated antifreezeWhat did you use to strip that piston top, so clean, the one next to it, not so clean
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found too tempting of a deal for a s52 crankshaft
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