unmolested 97 328i, found complete 95 M3 donor. thoughts

[deadempire]

Pretty much in the title. 95 m3 coupe with complete (assuming) stock suspension/brakes etc. and driveline. etc. Cheap is like a $1000. I was thinking I would justify the purchase base on swapping the brakes trailing arms, sway bar, etc, after refurbing the squishy bits. 328 has a newish set of bilsteins already so I'm not planning to use the M's. I'm mostly wondering if there are actual performance gains to be made stealing from the older M3. No complaints about my current setup other than i remember what my 97 318i drove like with a dinan stage1. I'm looking to get back to that general level of response, and if the M can move closer to that sacrificing it's parts . I haven't had a chance to really do my homework on the suspension since it's a want and not a need, but I need to buy the yard car now if I'm going to catch the window.

In summary, a lot of unknowns regarding the delta's between the stock suspensions of the 97 328 and the 95 M. The 95 though complete is realistically never going to be a road car again. Possibly a cheap track car seed platform.

Thanks in advance

[bluptgm3]

The biggest hurdle is that the S50 is OBDI and the 328 is OBDII. The OBDII Crank Position Sensor Trigger is on the crank, viewed by a sensor thru the side of the block near the starter. The S50 does not have that provision. The S50 CPS is on the Front Timing Cover and reads the Trigger Wheel on the Harmonic Balancer. I believe the OBDII ECU expects a different signal than that provided by the OBDI sensor.


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[deadempire]

I haven't even begun to dig into the hurdles as they may be regarding the engine swap or potential frankenstein jigsaw that might be involved there. I'm conservatively speculating that worst case scenario in which I use essentially none of the parts off the donor directly, I should be able to break even if not parting it out. Seats as core's to reapolster, transmission, bumpers etc, I'm told it ran just fine and the ultimate bullet that took it down was that they lost the key, and after doing some due diligence and knowing the general flavor of the folk harboring the thing, I believe it's a fair wager that the engine will be non-catastrophic in nature but suffering some ptsd. nevermind that at a minimum the last time the vehicle was registered in Ca was 2014 and the back title fees in this dystopian absurdist arthouse film of a state have the balance due to bring the tithings current are incumbent upon the new owner and, I'm hard pressed to imagine a scenario where there would be any cost bennefit analysis that lead to this one being restored itself; It's at this point worth more in parts.

To your notion of converting the 50 to an oBD2 config I pretty much figured there would something like the crank sensor that was just different enough to make that particular swap undesirable for my plans. I did come across the scenario though in which the cams from an S50 were swapped into an M52 along with a tune, and since I'm getting Vanos maintenance telltales, a cam swap seemed like something to maybe consider when it's opened up for the essential maintenance anyway? Or in liew of that if there isn't a show stopper or some reason that the M52 head was superior to the S50, maybe just swap the head and cams, which now that i think about it, would never make it to the new block without a tear down and valve job, guide check, assuming the bolt patterns and whatnot allowed for interchange. but I feel like I'm holding the drink at an AA meeting rambling on about the drivetrain in a suspension forum.

Thanks for the input though.
cheers

[bluptgm3]

Or in liew of that if there isn't a show stopper or some reason that the M52 head was superior to the S50, maybe just swap the head and cams, which now that i think about it, would never make it to the new block without a tear down and valve job, guide check, assuming the bolt patterns and whatnot allowed for interchange.

While the S50, M52 and S52 all use the “400” casting, the S50/S52 use the same valve springs however different valve spring than the M50/M52.

Some chatter that the later “400” casting got some additional machining.


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