Rescued a '01 740i M Sport, just now getting around to introducing myself here *long*

[legend921]

I am interested in seeing your radio refresh. When you replace the screen, is the screen higher resolution in anyway or sharper?

[Manny G.]

Thanks for the words of encouragement guys

Update time!

So I took a much needed LONG break from EVERYTHING I had going on project related. My normal day-to-day work has kept me really busy and I just found myself with way too many projects going on at once. This break allowed me to refocus and prioritize the E38. I put together a to-do list for the car because I found myself overwhelmed trying to keep it all in my head. My wife suggested I do this since I am terrible at staying organized -- it's really helped.

Right -- First on the list, THE MANUAL SWAP RESUMES. I picked up a used drive shaft out of a '00 740il with 99k miles with the intent to have it resized and balanced. The driveshaft in the 'iL' with the auto is 1761mm, I need 1709mm for the manual swap in a short 'i' body, so I had to hunt down a driveshaft shop (preferably locally) to resize and balance it. Finding a local shop, while still a little bit of a challenge, was proving to be easier than trying to get the actual original BMW driveshaft from Europe. I did get confirmation from BMW AG that the "NLA" driveshaft was in fact available in a small pool but it would not be shipped to the US. I have a 'might work' solution around this by using myGermany to ship to a German address which I pay to reserve and then that warehouse ships to the US. I'm having the 'iL' shaft resized in the meantime as a plan B, but I'm going to be getting one of these NLA driveshafts shipped to me. A few people I asked for locations to get it resized said to send it to a place in Texas. I also knew about one place up in the Carolinas. Again, I wanted stay local just like I did with the DME repair. This being Florida, and lifted trucks being a popular thing, I was referred to a local place who would be able to do it out of a shop called Gears & Rears. They have a Facebook page but unfortunately no pictures. It was muddy, it was dirty, and it was out in the industrial side of Broward County Florida. They were about getting work done not fancy pictures. They had some pretty beefy lifted trucks out front all on custom setups. I just dropped it off this morning, said it would be a few days.

I also started pulling out the headliner so I can have it re-wrapped in Silver Alcantara. The A-pillars are OK, typical broken tab not so much of a big deal on the A's,.. B-pillar is OK too nothing broken just dirty. Then there were the damn C-pillars. What is it about these things that make them all prone to breaking the tabs where the screws mount? Every single one I find used also has broken screw tabs. I'd like to find a pair, regardless of how dirty the fabric is, so long as the screw tabs are in tact.

I've about 99% given up on waiting for the NLA shift arm to arrive from Lithuania. The last tracking update was from December. Post office has a case opened to try and find it as does the Lithuanian Post Office. Someone somewhere has a box with a complete original 1998 740i Manual shift linkage in it. I have a plan B here to, go with a longer shift arm out of a manual E39 530i and cut it down and weld it to size. My original plan is to do this manual swap without cuts, but if this holds me back for too long, I'll have to deal with cutting the E39 arm and dealing with the outcome of 1 cut.

I am interested in seeing your radio refresh. When you replace the screen, is the screen higher resolution in anyway or sharper?

Hey so I pulled out some pictures from that. The screen resolution is the same, but it does seem a little bit sharper? Could also just be how badly sun damaged the old one was.

This was the before and tear down process. I used an original Sharp brand LCD screen compatible part number, newer revision I think?
IMG_20191201_135559.jpgIMG_20191201_135949.jpgIMG_20191201_142925.jpgIMG_20191201_142719.jpgIMG_20191201_142239.jpg

[Manny G.]

And this is how it looked after, with the plastic still on the Screen.

IMG_20191201_155753.jpgIMG_20191201_155659.jpg

[Manny G.]

Almost forgot to add, a quick picture I snapped the other day when I took it out to pick up food from a local restaurant.. looked nice enough to warrant a picture.

IMG_20210314_143229.jpg


edit- it's rotated for some reason?

[clarkitect]

Almost forgot to add, a quick picture I snapped the other day when I took it out to pick up food from a local restaurant.. looked nice enough to warrant a picture.

IMG_20210314_143229.jpg


edit- it's rotated for some reason?

The ghost of Mooll.

[Manny G.]

So, you're not going to believe this, but after 5 1/2 months, the post office finally delivered the E38 manual 740i shift linkage that I had given up hope of ever receiving.

It is complete shift rod, shift arm, shift lever with the rubber surround. Confirmed length stamped on it is C=341.6 which is 15mm longer than the E39 M5 shift arm. I now have 2 E38 740i shift rods, one brand new and one used, may keep it around for duplication purposes in the future.

...pics to come later today.

[KinkedChrome]

So, you're not going to believe this, but after 5 1/2 months, the post office finally delivered the E38 manual 740i shift linkage that I had given up hope of ever receiving.

It is complete shift rod, shift arm, shift lever with the rubber surround. Confirmed length stamped on it is C=341.6 which is 15mm longer than the E39 M5 shift arm. I now have 2 E38 740i shift rods, one brand new and one used, may keep it around for duplication purposes in the future.

...pics to come later today.

Very awesome. I'm excited to see the pics of the parts! Also, I'm really jealous of these parts....

[Manny G.]

Low and behold, here it is. The elusive factory shift linkage for the E38 740i 6 speed manual.

Here is a complete selection of linkage parts from a E39 M5 and E38 740i 6 speed. E38 part is placed above each matching E39 part.

IMG_20210518_165651.jpg

Learned something interesting here with the selector rod. E39 M5 one is bent, the one that came with the factory E38 linkage is straight, the E38 one I purchased from backorder is bent.... interesting. I did notice that there was a superseded part from an E34 535i IIRC which was labelled 'straight', I'm thinking now that there is a factory E34 part that is available as is for a straight rod E38 shift linkage

IMG_20210518_165745.jpg

Label and part number for the backorder fill bent E38 selector rod

IMG_20210518_165753.jpg

And the pièce de résistance (aside from the driveshaft) , E38 740i original unmodified shift arm on top, E39 M5 shift arm on bottom.

IMG_20210518_165811.jpg

Part number stamping for the shift arms. 25 11 1 222 726 (M5) vs. 25 11 1 222 242 (740i)

IMG_20210518_165935.jpg

[Manny G.]

740i shift lever top, M5 shift lever bottom.. they are nearly identical, maybe few mm differences above the pivot point.

IMG_20210518_165955.jpg

Rubber surround, E38 top, E39 bottom. They are different, or one is just older style than the other

IMG_20210518_170013.jpg

Same with the shifter cup, E38 on top has a ring retaining the tabs compared to the E39 one

IMG_20210518_170027.jpg

The box that carried these hens teeth. One end was mangled, mail carrier mentioned that it might have been sitting in customs as a package that got damaged by a conveyor belt. She asked me to open an inspect to make sure it was ok -- all looked good.

IMG_20210518_170129.jpg

And finally, this is the modified drive shaft I got back from the place that shorted it for me. They took the length off the furthest end near the flange where the guibo is because he wasnt going to be able to balance it and believed that would be the best place to remove the 52mm without affecting balance. We'll see, otherwise I have to take it to a place in South Miami (would rather not) to have it balanced.

IMG_20210518_170215.jpg

[etownbrawler]

Kinked Chrome , I would like to purchase a set of 4 monoballs for the rear swing arms for a E39 M5 ,off you please .

[etownbrawler]

Very awesome. I'm excited to see the pics of the parts! Also, I'm really jealous of these parts....

I would like to purchase a set of 4 rear swing arm monoballs for a E39 M5 ,how can I get a hold of you? Thanks

[tonman]

what a great read! good job on all the work you put into it. really shows love for the car(s)

[Manny G.]

Quick update, Headliner was dropped off about 3 weeks ago to local upholster E3 Customs here in Pompano. Having it redone in grey real Alcantara, I've already seen the smaller parts done... waiting on the large headliner and the sun visors to be done. I'm going with 2006 E90 sun shades due to how they are being re-wrapped, I will be able to keep my mirror. Previous sun shades had a heat pinch around the mirror, newer models had a plastic frame.

I will follow up with some pictures when I pick it up and start installing it.

In the mean time I will be replacing the center air vent intake up near the firewall... the one with the flaps that push in when you close the door -- that one. Pics to follow soon as well.

[GZilla]

Quick update, Headliner was dropped off about 3 weeks ago to local upholster E3 Customs here in Pompano. Having it redone in grey real Alcantara, I've already seen the smaller parts done... waiting on the large headliner and the sun visors to be done. I'm going with 2006 E90 sun shades due to how they are being re-wrapped, I will be able to keep my mirror. Previous sun shades had a heat pinch around the mirror, newer models had a plastic frame.

I will follow up with some pictures when I pick it up and start installing it.

In the mean time I will be replacing the center air vent intake up near the firewall... the one with the flaps that push in when you close the door -- that one. Pics to follow soon as well.

E3 Customs is legit. I've seen their work before and they go over the top on their work. When I wrapped my headliner in suede it took about 2 hot summer days to do it. One full day of just scraping off the old cheeto-looking adhesive off. How did the smaller pieces handle when removed? C-pillars had weak plastic tabs from my experience at least.

[Manny G.]

E3 Customs is legit. I've seen their work before and they go over the top on their work. When I wrapped my headliner in suede it took about 2 hot summer days to do it. One full day of just scraping off the old cheeto-looking adhesive off. How did the smaller pieces handle when removed? C-pillars had weak plastic tabs from my experience at least.

Hey sorry for the late reply to this, I must have missed the notification of the reply.

• The A-pillars had the Torx screw holding them in fine and they held up ok when I pulled them out.
• The B-pillars did ok except for a small part of the lower part of side of the guide piece for the seat belt strap. When I slid it off, it cracked off about 1" but still otherwise held up ok.
• The C-pillars had no attachment to the tab that is screwed to the body... and these are notorious for that, same on the E39. I took a shot at ordering a 2nd set off ebay that I saw had 2 good mounting tabs each, but when they got here, 1 broke off each in shipping (!!!!!) so I had to settle with 1 mounting screw hold each side... which when I mounted, each then broke off as well and in spectacular fashion. They simply were too fragile, completely shattered apart under the tension of being placed where it needed to screw in. I was then stuck with 2 sets of C-pillars without mounts, and just decided to send it. What saves the C-pillars from falling out on the E38 is the rear deck and speaker box. There is also a ridge along the back window side that is supposed to sit over an edge on the C-pillar, but that's only if it hasn't broken off as well... mine are partial enough to keep it together.

The best part of it all is when I picked the parts up from E3, brought them home and started installing, the moon roof sliding panel handle was brittle and my thumb went right through it. I learned that the part isn't sold individually and I now had to decide whether to head to the junk yard and play roulette with the options there or try to just buy a panel for the handle. I was lucky in finding a part number stamped on the handle, not official?- 811694468-04, but there was one listed on ebay -- see next post for photos from the ebay auction




... and now back to the show,
IMG_20211108_174055.jpg
IMG_20211108_174619.jpg
IMG_20211108_173924.jpg
IMG_20211108_173943.jpg
IMG_20211105_165639.jpg

Some of the photos are rotated only on the forum, not sure why? Might be resolution?

Anyway, first picture is the special part of this since re-wrapping E38 sun visors wasn't possible due to the seam around the vanity mirror being a heat pressed seam. E3 said they have done this headliner but the owners usually opt to remove the mirrors. This being a 7 series, that just isn't an option to me and I just needed to find an option that would work. When Eric@E3 told me that the heat pressed seam was the issue, I immediately remembered the vanity mirrors on the visors of my F10 M5... they have a plastic frame. I took a chance and went with the earliest set I could find on ebay, went with a set out of a 2006 E90. They are nearly a direct swap except one minor catch, one of the 2 Torx screws that mount them doesn't line up perfectly. It's off by about 2-3mm, but in an area where a new one can be drilled and used instead just fine. (I thought I had a picture of this but either it was a blurry one I deleted or I forgot to take it. I will take a new picture next time I'm in the car)

[Manny G.]

Regarding the sunroof handle, not sold individually:

s-l1600 (2).jpgs-l1600.jpgs-l1600 (1).jpg

[Manny G.]

I also finally tackled replacing the broken air channel ducts for the microfilter under the hood.

New one on the bottom, but the forum rotated the picture so its on the top lol
IMG_20211117_113706.jpg

Took advantage and cleaned the heck out of the cavity with some engine degreaser and a steam gun, vacuumed out the bulk and cleared the drains with trimming wire, wiped it all clean with some diluted Simple Green

Here's one before
IMG_20211117_121448.jpg
Both after
IMG_20211117_121435.jpg
IMG_20211117_122454.jpg

[Jpaytonmiller]

740i shift lever top, M5 shift lever bottom.. they are nearly identical, maybe few mm differences above the pivot point.

IMG_20210518_165955.jpg

Rubber surround, E38 top, E39 bottom. They are different, or one is just older style than the other

IMG_20210518_170013.jpg

Same with the shifter cup, E38 on top has a ring retaining the tabs compared to the E39 one

IMG_20210518_170027.jpg

The box that carried these hens teeth. One end was mangled, mail carrier mentioned that it might have been sitting in customs as a package that got damaged by a conveyor belt. She asked me to open an inspect to make sure it was ok -- all looked good.

IMG_20210518_170129.jpg

And finally, this is the modified drive shaft I got back from the place that shorted it for me. They took the length off the furthest end near the flange where the guibo is because he wasnt going to be able to balance it and believed that would be the best place to remove the 52mm without affecting balance. We'll see, otherwise I have to take it to a place in South Miami (would rather not) to have it balanced.

IMG_20210518_170215.jpg

@manny G. Would you consider selling one of those shifter arms? Name your price.

[Manny G.]

@manny G. Would you consider selling one of those shifter arms? Name your price.

So by selling "one of those shifter arms", you're referring to either the E39 M5 one, or the E38 one which I went through hell to get.


Which one? Keep in mind there is no way in hell I am letting go of the E38 one at the moment.

[Manny G.]

So, last Friday, after dragging it out for months -- probably almost 2 years now actually, I finally decided to execute the order for the last list of parts needed for the trans swap. Roughly $1600 in new parts ordered and shipped. I also had been having sessions every other Friday with a PDR guy who was coming and removing the hail damage from the body panels... he's about 85% done so far.

Ordered a brand new BMW M5 Clutch, dual mass flywheel, E38 manual trans brace, misc things from the pedal box, master and slave cylinders with bracketry (learned the e39 M5 clutch bracket is now NLA fyi ), as well as all the transmission cooling delete stuff. Then while getting the brakes done on my F10 M5, I decided to have a chat with my buddy who is the lead tech at Redline Bimmer here in Pompano FL. He strongly advised against me doing the trans swap myself in my garage with just Quick Jacks. I needed to hear this. In my head I had gone so far down the path of doing the swap myself that I really had not thought out the hassle of dropping the heavy auto trans with only about 2ft. of lift clearance. Most importantly, it was a moment of me realizing that I, again, bit off more than I can chew. In the back of my mind, I kind of knew this all along, and stubborn old me thought that if I could just find someone to help, maybe it wouldn't have been so bad. My real problem was more about finding someone to help than it was about the actual hassle of the labor. Sure I heard often "hey bro let me know if you need help" from people who heard about the project, but I know better. I've had to move from one place to another before and heard those same words and same tone, it sounds nice to offer the help but when it comes time to execute, excuses and other things come up as to why they can't. Moving from NJ to FL back in 2014, I realized that I left behind all the people, the community, that I could've relied on to help get this done. The friends and community I had now found here in FL weren't the same as the ones in NJ and this took a while to process. Hell, it took years to catch up with me but when it did, it felt really heavy and sad. It's not that I find anything wrong with my FL based car community, but there are differences that I wasn't ready for. I can say, without a doubt, the car community in South Florida is generally about as shallow as a kiddie pool.

Full on mid-life-crisis has entered the chat.

So I came to the realization that I've lost the passion for cars... and I can't even lie to myself about it anymore. The last two years just whizzed by and I didn't get much done except sit on the sidelines and reflect on things I did up to this point. Crazy to realize that a wake up call during an ambitious project would send me down such a wild path of this realization. I thought about all the BMWs I've interfaced with in the last 22-23 years..events, car cruises, meets, picnics and rallies... the people I've met and lost along the way. I spent a lot of time just wrestling and dealing with the perception of being a quitter in my own eyes, I'm not sure I've completely sorted out the quitter thing yet, and maybe that is what has motivated what is possibly the last fiber of interest I have in getting a project like this done. Along the way I found so many more layers of myself that I buried when I became a 'grown up'. I rediscovered my love for freestyle BMX bikes from the 80's as well as reignited my skill at 90's fighting video games, something I gave up on when the world pushed me towards being a 'grown up man'. I got started in my IT career professionally a month after my 19th birthday and never knew anything else since then.

In the end I found that I was just happier doing kid stuff, there... I said it. I don't know who else needed to read this, but I know I sure wasn't seeing posts like this when seeing others post and work through an ambitious project of theirs. All too often I follow a build thread that is just info - steps - info and then some result saying how it's all done and they moved on. There always seems to be this casual and easy approach to big projects in the ones I've seen.... and I guess they don't really owe the thread anything more than that, but for me this added to the "it must be easy to do" effect of it that has now taught me one of the biggest lessons so far of my life. The art in this is in what you get done in the little bit of time you can dedicate to it while life keeps chewing you up.... and if it doesn't get done, that is ok too because the journey is what it was really about.

Back in November 2019 when I picked this E38 up, I dubbed it "Project White Rose", and I wasn't sure why or how that name came about... but I think now it's coming into full bloom for me.

... updates to come.

[purplecty]

So, last Friday, after dragging it out for months -- probably almost 2 years now actually, I finally decided to execute the order for the last list of parts needed for the trans swap. Roughly $1600 in new parts ordered and shipped. I also had been having sessions every other Friday with a PDR guy who was coming and removing the hail damage from the body panels... he's about 85% done so far.

Ordered a brand new BMW M5 Clutch, dual mass flywheel, E38 manual trans brace, misc things from the pedal box, master and slave cylinders with bracketry (learned the e39 M5 clutch bracket is now NLA fyi ), as well as all the transmission cooling delete stuff. Then while getting the brakes done on my F10 M5, I decided to have a chat with my buddy who is the lead tech at Redline Bimmer here in Pompano FL. He strongly advised against me doing the trans swap myself in my garage with just Quick Jacks. I needed to hear this. In my head I had gone so far down the path of doing the swap myself that I really had not thought out the hassle of dropping the heavy auto trans with only about 2ft. of lift clearance. Most importantly, it was a moment of me realizing that I, again, bit off more than I can chew. In the back of my mind, I kind of knew this all along, and stubborn old me thought that if I could just find someone to help, maybe it wouldn't have been so bad. My real problem was more about finding someone to help than it was about the actual hassle of the labor. Sure I heard often "hey bro let me know if you need help" from people who heard about the project, but I know better. I've had to move from one place to another before and heard those same words and same tone, it sounds nice to offer the help but when it comes time to execute, excuses and other things come up as to why they can't. Moving from NJ to FL back in 2014, I realized that I left behind all the people, the community, that I could've relied on to help get this done. The friends and community I had now found here in FL weren't the same as the ones in NJ and this took a while to process. Hell, it took years to catch up with me but when it did, it felt really heavy and sad. It's not that I find anything wrong with my FL based car community, but there are differences that I wasn't ready for. I can say, without a doubt, the car community in South Florida is generally about as shallow as a kiddie pool.

Full on mid-life-crisis has entered the chat.

So I came to the realization that I've lost the passion for cars... and I can't even lie to myself about it anymore. The last two years just whizzed by and I didn't get much done except sit on the sidelines and reflect on things I did up to this point. Crazy to realize that a wake up call during an ambitious project would send me down such a wild path of this realization. I thought about all the BMWs I've interfaced with in the last 22-23 years..events, car cruises, meets, picnics and rallies... the people I've met and lost along the way. I spent a lot of time just wrestling and dealing with the perception of being a quitter in my own eyes, I'm not sure I've completely sorted out the quitter thing yet, and maybe that is what has motivated what is possibly the last fiber of interest I have in getting a project like this done. Along the way I found so many more layers of myself that I buried when I became a 'grown up'. I rediscovered my love for freestyle BMX bikes from the 80's as well as reignited my skill at 90's fighting video games, something I gave up on when the world pushed me towards being a 'grown up man'. I got started in my IT career professionally a month after my 19th birthday and never knew anything else since then.

In the end I found that I was just happier doing kid stuff, there... I said it. I don't know who else needed to read this, but I know I sure wasn't seeing posts like this when seeing others post and work through an ambitious project of theirs. All too often I follow a build thread that is just info - steps - info and then some result saying how it's all done and they moved on. There always seems to be this casual and easy approach to big projects in the ones I've seen.... and I guess they don't really owe the thread anything more than that, but for me this added to the "it must be easy to do" effect of it that has now taught me one of the biggest lessons so far of my life. The art in this is in what you get done in the little bit of time you can dedicate to it while life keeps chewing you up.... and if it doesn't get done, that is ok too because the journey is what it was really about.

Back in November 2019 when I picked this E38 up, I dubbed it "Project White Rose", and I wasn't sure why or how that name came about... but I think now it's coming into full bloom for me.

... updates to come.

White rose have anything to do with your avatar?

[Staszek]

The headliner looks great! Cant wait until mine is done.

So the sunroof handle has a part number but you cant purchase?

[Manny G.]

The headliner looks great! Cant wait until mine is done.

So the sunroof handle has a part number but you cant purchase?

Thanks

So far, yes that's what I had a problem with finding a replacement, cant get it separate from the sliding panel

[Btkeenan]

Great thread and read! Not sure how I missed this thread on my research on here but would have saved me some time hunting for PN’s for sure. Interestingly, you seem to have addressed a fair number of things I have either done or plan to do on my car and are things to “fix” regardless of the cars condition. Looking forward to seeing what else you do to your car.

It’s funny I used to be super active in the “car scene” here in SoCal about 10 or so years ago going to super car Sunday or various car meets most weekends. It was fun while it lasted, but eventually got burnt out seeing/doing the same stuff week in and week out. Went through a bit of a lull doing anything with cars but with my latest acquisition, I feel inspired to get the car back to OEM/OEM+ quality as possible while learning and expanding my own technical abilities along the way.

[Manny G.]

White rose have anything to do with your avatar?

lol no, just happened to line up years later.... white rose was meant to represent a spiritual growth... perhaps a little deeper in meaning a bit. It actually was a translated name of an old poem my grandfather told me long time ago by Jose Marti.


So anyway, the E38.

A new windshield is getting difficult to source, the one on the car now has been cracked since I picked it up, I've put off doing it for so long that I may have maybe waited TOO long. Safelite cancels my appointment when I try to set one up saying the part is discontinued from the dealer. I may need to venture out to a place in Miami that did another E38 windshield for a member of the E38 Palm Beach crew... they are pretty much my last hope aside from searching yards which I really don't want to do for a windshield.

My windshield is polarized, heated, ... but I don't know if it has this "anti-theft" option Safelite kept asking about... and believe it or not, I'm not even 100% sure on whether or not I have rain sensing wipers... I think so?

Choosing the Rain Sensing, Anti-Theft version of the windshield through Safelite comes out to almost $1200
Choosing the Rain Sensing, non-Anti-Theft version, but then choosing Polarized which comes up as an option after, comes out to under $700.

The E38 Palm Beach member showed me a receipt for barely $300 for the windshield. I may not have the privilege to be picky about which version I get

Not being able to resolve this broken windshield is putting a major damper on my motivation for this car.


Also, finally got around to diagnosing the issues with my key fobs and the remote function. I dissected one of the keys a while back and found one of the prongs to the battery on the internal chip had come disconnected leaving the remote to not function. Key still worked in the ignition just fine. I ordered some replacement batteries, Panasonic VL2020 if I recall correctly, removed the old one and soldered on a new one. I charged it externally with 3.3V from a computer power supply for about 2 hours which was enough to give it life, and viola! Pressing the unlock button finally remotely unlocks the car.. same with lock and trunk. Safe to say that all the troubleshooting I did with the rear trap antennas, the GM3 module, etc... all that was fine, simply turned out to be the key fob battery connection. The other key from the set of 2 also has the same problem, I haven't dissected it yet because I didn't want to have pieces of keys loose while I got replacement blanks. The housings on the old ones were beat up. I should be receiving the new blanks today and hopefully having them cut this evening.

Worth noting, I learned that there are 2 styles of the BMW diamond key fobs, the difference being in the shank.

The types are 'hu92' and 'hu58'. The E38 uses hu58, as well as the E39. The E46 uses the hu92. The easiest way to tell the difference immediately is by the groove down the middle of the shank.


The trunk is stuffed with manual transmission parts.... I was planning to drop it off at Redline Bimmer last week, but cancelled and rescheduled Safelite appointments got in the way. I may just sort out the keys and drop it off sometime by the end of the week if not next weekend.