The forever long E36 SBF Swap. Now: Mostly Complete.

[seriniboy]

update. the tfi relocation is done, has been for a bit. but I've been trying to find an old electric oven to use for power coating so I can do my valve covers, intake and egr spacer while everything is apart.

found an old one, uses dials and has no window but works. I checked the accuracy of 5he thermostatic switch by comparing it to my digital thermocouple probe. it's not even close to accurate, have to keep a good eye on it. set around 325 it'll overshoot to about 410 and then drops till the switch h trips again around 330. need it at 400. thought about putting a pid controller on it with a ssr for the element. but I might just make due till I can find an oven with a digital controller.

anyways,

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next up is the intake, same color as everything else. trying so somewhat match my wheels. currently the intake is sitting in my sand blaster half blasted, there's like 3 layers of paint and is been so hot and humid out there I've only been doing a little in the mornings after work. hopefully it'll be blasted and done and back together by next weekend for the local car show, only 2 left, been wanting to get it there for months and it just hasn't worked out.

[Laminar]

Those look great! How do you like the Eastwood setup?

[seriniboy]

I like it quiet a bit, but that's coming from someone with zero experience with powder coating prior to it. I think the results are good, all my brackets and such prior to these were cured in a toaster oven and turned out well (I've sand blasted all my parts, a good clean Somewhat uniform surface is imperative from my reading). but I dig it, would definitely recommend. I've been getting my powders from prismatic powders btw. HUGE selection and good quality.

[seriniboy]

well no car show yesterday due to rain. bummer but I haven't been feeling well and saw rain in the forecast so it wasn't ready any ways. made my way out there yesterday night/ this morning and got it back together.

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big improvement, kind of makes me want to pull it and paint the engine bay

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[Laminar]

Super clean engine bay. Makes mine feel like a ratty mess!

[seriniboy]

Yours is packaged well, race proven and doesn't look bad by any means.

i have my tfi relocation done, most ive run it has been to start it and blip the throttle a couple times. fires up fine ides and revs fine. the tach though when blipping the throttle responds fine, but then when its coming down with engine speed it noticeably floats back up and then come back down(engine speed is smooth and is not acting up). i believe the tach signal is from the negative side of the coil and runs through the tfi as well.

i think ive got something going on with a weird ground or maybe a shielding issue. idk ill have to look more into it. ive already tried another coil, had a new one on hand. not the issue. could be the tfi itself, its a new motocraft unit, but everyone online says they get bad ones off the shelf pretty often. cant rule that out just yet.

[Laminar]

My tach seems to "freeze" a bit around idle RPM. I wonder if that's not on purpose to make the driver think the idle is steadier than it actually is. While my idle cycles 950-1050rpm, the needle stays frozen on 1000rpm. When revving up and down it seems to move smoothly though.

[BimmerBreaker]

I can't speak for whatever engine computer/decoder to talk to the BMW gauges/whatever you are using, but the stock gauge cluster reads very accurately from the factory - to the extent that a trained eye can diagnose misfires by seeing if the tachometer needle wavers at idle

[seriniboy]

been a bit but going with the always over doing things/changing to much at once.. I decided to get a mspnp2. got it and installed it. base tune started right up after setting fixed timing, albeit very rich.

but when driving it it would not rev past 2500. thought it had something to do with the tach acting weird but rpm signal looked good in tuner studio. found that I fat fingered a setting (spark out put) turned that back to 'going high. then it sounded like I was having some ignition issues in the upper rpms. tested my latency and it was terrible! had to adjust it to over 200uSEC to keep locked timing solid when reving. I imagine the tfi relocation added some time to that, although I've read that even some stock setups can get up there in hardware latency.

running alot better but feels like it's got a random miss, not on any certain plug though, so I'm going to throw on another new tfi module I've got to test it. I've been looking into an edis8 swap but I'd like to get it sorted and running well first before I throw another variable in there.

on a side note my innovate mtxl is messing up and was only displaying htr and not a reading. waiting on another rs232 adapter to hook the mtxl up and update the firmware.

after good ill be doing some more data logging and tuning, which I basically have no idea about. atleast it's running and I'm getting to learn some things.

[Laminar]

MSPNP2 can't do sequential ignition can it? I went LS coils from the start and have no regerts.

[seriniboy]

it cannot, it would have to be batch fire/wasted spark. I remember seeing that you had coil packs and that the explorer engines were edis. the big thing that makes me standoff ish on it is figuring out the crank trigger wheel while not compromising dampener balance or pully offset backspacing.

if I come across an explorer in a salvage yard I'll yank the ignition bits and balancer off of it for a rainy day if I do decide to do it.

[seriniboy]

edit: double post.

but laminar, have you looked into knock sensing? I've done a little digging on it but was wondering if you had any info on it?

[Laminar]

I'm pretty sure I have an Explorer cam sensor and probably also a crank pickup just lying around since I'm not building another small block.

I'm planning to run knock sensing on my next project since it's turbo, I bought the internal knock module and have it installed. My new engine has two knock sensors from the factory down in the valley.

The more I dig, the more I see that there's not really any structure or method to it with the Megasquirt when it comes to figuring out frequency or gain or any of that. The MS guys I've asked basically said "Thanks for the $80, try it and see if it works."

[Joh]

nice to see some activity here. not that I've contributed greatly. like somebody else said earlier, mine is still non op due to over complication on my part. more 5.0s!!!!!

[seriniboy]

Well Joh, I've over complicated it again.

I had a decent tune going and then my wideband 02 started acting up. got another. lasted about 3 hours of driving. only thing I can think is that with the mspnp I moved it to the stock 02 location pass bank instead where I had it be hind the y pipe. it being closer and not using the 1" tall 02 bung was killing them.

well it started getting cold so it was either pull the long tube and weld a new bung in maybe be able to tune it a bit more or buy the cheap hot side kit on ebay. true to format my logic prevailed.

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using my buddies borg to mockup for fitment. not the best.

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had to cut a brace and cut the weld for the flange y and clocked like 8* and moved it back a tad for better fittment. still really close to the core support.

which brings up that my fan is massive. 3000cfm black magic set up as a pusher. thats not going to work with the intercooler.. may not work at all actually even as a puller. so I can't get my radiator any further forward with the stock core support. so I decided to tube the core support.

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I've also built my own down pipe of of pieces and 3" 304ss. I know. my stainless mig welder are shit, judge me if you want. splatter everywhere. but it'll all get wrapped and with the rate I go I'll probably have a version 2. waiting on my flex pipe and v band to come in. probably need to add a brace to it.

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[Laminar]

Awesome! Love the tube core support. Mine is just a hacked up mess. Can't wait to hear this thing making choo choo noises.

[seriniboy]

burned in most of my core support welds and made my bash bar. was able to cut right behind the bolt holes on the stock impact absorbers and weld my bent 1.5" bash bar to that. worked out really well actually

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here's a pic of how the 1.5" bash bar mounts to the bumper fascia. flat head cap screws with the fender washer instead of the plastic rivets.

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thanks for the kind words laminar, I'm ready to hear it too.

[seriniboy]

apologies for going so long without updating. with the holidays and then getting covid it's been an interesting time.

anyways,

I decided to make a nose panel cover out of textured sheet a.b.s.

heat and bending in a brake, only took 4 iterations to get the 5 down and be happy with the bends.

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fuckin attachments. my phone does weird shit.

[seriniboy]

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anyways, there's that.

[seriniboy]

I couldn't decide what color I wanted to powder coat my housing, and I decided to try my hand at polishing at first.

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I'm happy with the way it turned out for not really knowing what I was doing.

[seriniboy]

figured out my upper coolant hose

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aeromotive 340 stealth

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went ahead and milled this doodad for maximum clearence for ps hoses past the header. had a buddy tig the fittings in after pics were taken.

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I'll still put some heat sleeving on them.

[seriniboy]

wrapped the hot side and that's about it.

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