just another 525iT

[cmybimmer]

Nice! Very Clean and simple.

What size are the fikse's? They look great, but I feel one more inch in diameter would be perfect.

Other than that, it's where I want my wagon to be. Modded, yet subtle.

[s14brent]

Nice! Very Clean and simple.

What size are the fikse's? They look great, but I feel one more inch in diameter would be perfect.

Other than that, it's where I want my wagon to be. Modded, yet subtle.

Thanks man, i wanted to keep it subtle. I do agree 18's do look better, but fiske fm5's in 18's go for more than I'd like to pay for wheels on my daily. The gas mileage has been better with the 17's also (vs the mpars), and surprisingly these 17's clear my m5 brakes. The wheels are 17x8.5+12 square, and I am running spacers on top of that. The car definitely looks better in pictures, the paint is faded in a couple spots, but i really do like this.

[cmybimmer]

Yeah I liked the ride comfort when I had the Style 19's on my wagon, but it made my car sit way too low and my bumper was taking a massive beating on the slightest of grade changes, and I started scraping on small speed bumps. Reminded me of my e36 days loll. Had to put my 19" wheels back on.

Did you place your rear diffuser on?

[s14brent]

lol, yeah i had these on my e36 m3 also! so sad story about the rear diffuser, i had it in my storage (on a rack) waiting until i got my exhaust done....day comes that i'm getting my exhaust, i find the diffuser cracked in half.....probably from the las vegas winter/summer change unfortunately. but i brought it with me to mock up the exhaust, just need to buy a replacement eventually.

[s14brent]

Sometime last year I replaced the passenger front window regulator, and the driver side took a dump about 2 weeks ago. This one was way worse than broken plastic tabs.




To add some more bad news, I had some bad luck this past weekend. hit a construction area with uneven metal plates and blew out two tires and in the process destroyed two fiske fm5's....super upset about it. Also ripped off the bumper bracket on one side of my front M5 bumper. Hopefully I can file a claim with the city and get reimbursed a little.

I wanted to keep these wheels for the e30 (after i got wider flares) and eventually go back to 18s on the wagon, but I guess I procrastinated too long. Anyways....i picked up some e60 style 124's (18x8+20 18x9+32) with some nexen tires (245/40 & 265/35) w/decent tread from a local e30 buddy. These actually look waaayy decent. running 18mm spacers in the rear and 20mm up front. The spacers also convert the hub from 74.1mm to 72.56, but they still fit in the wheel wells (just barely). Hopefully I will have a picture with the ride height and front end back on to update here in the next 24hrs.



I will update this once I get the ride height all dialed in - in day light. After I took this picture I raised up the car (so it has about 1" wheel gap up front and 1.75" in the rear) I decided to plastic epoxy the bumper mounting bracket back on. I'm just letting it set/cure over night. I really don't think the state is going to cover this or will try to fight it I'm sure. I found the website and you can't even file a claim online anymore. You have to go to the office downtown. My insurance is a $500 deductible that I don't necessarily want to pay for either, so I'm hoping to file with the city and hope for the best.

[BimmrMeUpSnotty]

That blows! Hate to see that man.

[s14brent]

That blows! Hate to see that man.

It could have been worse I guess, nobody got hurt so that's most important here I suppose. I got it buttoned up this afternoon. the plasti-bond seems to have worked. It's kind of boogered on, and unfortunately the only color they had was like SAND? so i didnt take any photos of the mess LOL.



I wanted to raise the front up a bit since the wheel gap is uneven between front and rear, but just by going off the sideskirts i'm going to leave it the way it is now. I think it looks great for a quick fix. I might take it out for an alignment soon.

[jp5Touring]

Seriously nice effort, love all that you've done on the Touring.

[s14brent]

Seriously nice effort, love all that you've done on the Touring.

Thanks man. Wish it was in overall better shape, but slowly...

--------------
so fuel pump went out on me. I replaced the fuel pump relay first thinking it was that, the location is pretty stupid (behind the glove box) but turns out the e39 fuel pump is just so quiet compared to the walboro in my e30 LOL. I got some china lifetime warranty pump from o'reilly's because I needed something immediately, not proud, but lifetime isn't so bad.



while I had the back seats out, I decided I should put in the rear seats I pulled over a year ago from a local part-out. I believe these were dyed, but he did a pretty good job, but the plastic trim near the seat belts need a refresher. Also the headrests aren't in great shape, but ultimately I think they're better than the grey ones I had in there prior.



Same thing goes with the front seats. (not the best, but good enough for now). Wish I had time to swap the carpet, but I have work in a few hours. Did as best I could in the given time to vacuum inside and clean the carpet up.



and finally



The headrests are electronic, not sure what combination of seats these are, but they look like 7 series headrests if i'm not mistaken. either way I think it looks wayy better for now. Hopefully nothing else needs to be replaced on this thing for a while. I'm still deciding when I'll have time to do rear subframe bushings on this thing. I haven't had much time to or the spare funds to really dump into this as home improvements seem to be endless.

[s14brent]

so..i'm wondering what would cause the serpentine belt to snap when it was replaced when I did the swap. I did the idler pulley, tensioner pulley, and conti-tech brand belts, and on my way to SEMA last week, this happened.



got it home and could barely steer it into the garage. Found these tangled around the PS pump pulley.



after getting the car up on jackstands I noticed the super bent PS pulley and luckily it was just the bracket which happens to be the same part # as e36's with m52b28's.




Both idler and tensioner pulleys had a good 1.5-2mm of horizontal play so I next day aired new belts and skf pulleys from pelican parts since it's closest to me. I also swapped out my battery since it was under warranty and the voltage was low.

Parts came in and everything runs fine again. just super confused to why this happened in the first place. all the bolts i pulled off were tight, i'm just glad the clutch fan and radiator didn't get destroyed by the belts when it all happened.

[s14brent]

I sold this car back in december 2020 to a friend of mine and replaced it with a 21' tacoma TRD OR/6MT. I didn't realize I changed my image hosting since then and none of the photos work here anymore. Long story short, I have the opportunity to buy the touring back for cheap so I might be poking around the forums again. I think I'll be just garaging it for a bit while I decide what to do with it as I still have my e30 that I use specifically for grassroots drift events. I think he was working on the full black interior swap, looks like it has oem nav now, and I think he swapped on stock header(s) and full oe exhaust (not pictured). There are a few things that need to be addressed like a leaky valve cover, and I guess the AC kinda took a crap. BUT I kind of want to prep this for our local auto-x just for a season and see how it goes before dumping a bunch of money into it. There's also the thought that I could always just keep this around for a backup chassis in case someone wants to cash me out on the e30 one day, who knows! I guess I'll keep you guys' posted, but here are some pics my buddy sent over in its current state.

[dragracer440wed]

Hi s14brent, back when you did the engine swap to M54B30 did you have to reflash the DME? I have a 03 525iT and have access to a 03 530i as an engine donor.

Thank You
Ezra

[s14brent]

Hi s14brent, back when you did the engine swap to M54B30 did you have to reflash the DME? I have a 03 525iT and have access to a 03 530i as an engine donor.

Thank You
Ezra

I had the m54b30 dme reflashed. I tried to have the b25 dme tuned locally but it was just issue after issue. so I actually had someone on here code the b30 dme for me. no issues since but our smog here isn't as strict as commiefornia - i guess if you direct swap, do the cats and secondary air pump/evap stuff/airbox (keep it as stock looking as possible!)

[s14brent]

i can't believe its been sitting at the PO's house since 10/23 when the deal was made. i ended up finally getting it towed home 03/09/25 LOL




The plan is to slowly go through it and see what it needs. the exhaust manifolds are off and need a couple studs replaced and reinstalled. I'll probably change up the muffler since the other one was kind of obnoxious.

Other things i'd like to address is the rear sls...has a slow leak now, so I'd love to convert it with some matching fortune auto parts that i have laying around with new bilstein struts. I'll keep updating this as progress is made. I might try to fill in the blanks from the original posts now that i have image hosting elsewhere.

[s14brent]

I got the headers back on with the OE heat shield gaskets. I hate those things. It was not fun at all putting on the 16 copper nuts with the heat shield in the way, thankfully the front 3 runners was pretty easy to get to with my milwaukee, so only half of it was terrible i suppose. I also had to clean up the o2 sensor wiring as it was in pretty bad shape. The new exhaust gaskets (headers back) that he got had to have the bolt holes extended a bit. Used a rotary carbide to make them fit.

Threw on a spare s52 oil cap I had, the one on there had a pretty bad looking seal, so why not. I also threw in an old chasebays PS reservoir I had from my e30 (before i went with the full -an kit. I really liked this thing so I've had it set aside since the deal on the wagon was made (almost 2 years ago). I also replaced the hatch shock - PO replaced one side previously.
I replaced the OE airbox the PO put on with the old AFE setup I had in originally. I cleaned the filter and oiled it up and added on a drysock to help keep it clean out here in the desert. After priming the car a few times, the car actually started up and ran REALLY well. I was scared there was some kind of bad surprise waiting for me. I know I'm getting older because the exhaust might be a little bit too loud for my preference now. The only real surprise was how soft and loose everything felt on the test drive. the shift knob flew off when i shifted into 2nd, and I forgot how soft a stock clutch setup is - it was kind of a funny moment. Brake fluid service, oil & diff fluid change are on the to-do list next (i think). I found out the front fortune auto coilovers were set at full soft, so it should feel more to my liking with a 4-6 clicks.

The plan after the fluid change is to replace SLS rear suspension with bilstein b6 (already ordered)+febi top hats and see if i can fit some of my old e36 m3 perch + swift springs back there. If it doesn't work out I'll probably order up the unicorn perches/possibly longer rear springs. I actually have spare 14kg rear swifts and 9kg swifts that I can throw up front (also from my e30- but they might be a little short for this boat). When I refreshed the fortune auto fronts originally in the past I threw on new 8kg Fortune auto springs, new radial bearings, and perches. I'm really hoping to just recycle as many parts as I can to keep the costs down!! After I feel comfortable with the car being roadworthy I will go ahead and finally register/insure the car as a 3rd.

I think the plan will be to take it out to the local auto-x and just see what she can do. It's been a while since I looked into e39 things and was surprised to see racingdiffs makes a LSD retrofit kit for 188k using e30/e36 LSD's. I actually have a spare e30 lsd unit that would need a complete rebuild, but potentially could get the new ramps from racingdiffs as well making it into a 1.5 way and up the lock up percent. Pretty cool to have options now!



I started to work on the interior. Does anyone know how to wire up a horn with an aftermarket wheel/hub? The original slipring was notchy and tbh the wheel has seen better days and I have all the parts here to throw on a momo prototipo. I also will probably be throwing in a cheap bucket seat in as well since I'd love to just throw this boat around at the local grip events while deciding what I want to really use this wagon for.

unfortunately the oe sat/nav isnt wired up, its just sitting there. I actually threw in an old nakamichi cd300 that may have been in this car at one point in the past. but I do need a new dash kit for that.



-----


got the oil change, differential fluid change, and brake/clutch fluid flush done today.. I think I'll do the trans after putting some miles on it.



kinda sketch...the right rear caliper bleeder wouldn't close fully....it would be tight but it would still leak under pressure, thankfully i had a spare bleeder valve from a spare e36 m3 caliper, and its the same thread pitch and amount of threads, just physically shorter! I was worried I'd have to replace the whole caliper tbh! There was a ton of air in the system, how scary. I used a full liter of ATE TYP 200 with my motive pressure bleeder. I love that tool! So the diff fluid wasn't as bad as i thought it would be tbh, I used a half bottle of mobil 1 to flush it out and I feel like I wasted it! I used those new squeeze bags of full syn valvoline 75w90 and i swear those are the best method for guys working under jack stands still (like me).

Next on the priority to-do list is to remove the driver side window regulator. It must have failed again, and its a lifetime warranty part thankfully.

[s14brent]

​ I think I'm going to move forward with the plans to Auto-X/HPDE the wagon. There's no real other point at the moment (so i keep telling myself).

I talked to Ray from KAAZ and dm'd racingdiffs about their e30/e36 lsd retrofit into e46/e39. Turns out the 188k unit in both e39/e46 can be swapped with each other. MEANING....i could technically run an e46 kaaz 1.5 way diff into the e39 if I do decide to make this the dedicated HPDE/AUTO-X car. Lots to think about - lots of monies. (I still need to order tires for this thing, planning on maybe kendas or even zestino 140tw's since I'm liking them a lot recently. Will probably run the tire sizes I used to (235/40/18 and 265/35/18).


​

I got lucky and found out the window regulator was indeed the one I replaced a while back - which means lifetime warranty. So I swapped that out.

I scored a planted seat bracket off a group in fb. I had the slider and side mounts, and i believe thats an e30 seat belt receptical

​​​

bilstein b6's arrived, and febi top hats.

​​​

sls rear suspension got pulled - IF ANYONE IS INTERESTED IN THE COMPRESSOR PM ME. it's in great working order. I think my RR bag had a small airleak so the bags will most likely be trashed. shocks are just old but worked fine.
​​​
I reused the fortune auto e36 m3 spring perch in the rear. It's pretty exciting to see this - and i hope it rides decent when all said and done. These swifts were unfortunately too short to use.

​​​


meanwhile I decided to do the valve cover gasket & spark plug o-rings. I pulled the plugs prior and 3,4, and 5 were leaking oil past the valve cover o-rings. I replaced with single prong BK6RE's gapped at .035 - most of the plugs were pre-gapped from NGK at .032-0.034​

​​​
​​​
​​​

It was part of the PO's to-do list, and he supplied the new gasket set, but the car is still stumbling & throwing random cyl misfire codes...I think the gas is just old, and the injectors might be a bit clogged. I ordered a rebuild kit and will have to wait for that. My spare set of injectors of course have no o-rings so I can't even test them. I did however swap coilpacks over from the s52 and ruled that out since the e39 would say cyl 3&5 then 4&6 etc. but it would be a pending code so yeah, injector rebuild first.

​​​

I dug out all the spare injectors I could find in my storage. threw them in my ultrasonic cleaner just to have cleaner parts laying around I guess.

​

6" 9kg swifts installed up front. I did a quick clean up of threads and tried to spray them with silicone lubricant. spherical and radial bearings were cleaned up before reinstall. The fronts were kind of disgusting dirty. My set on the e30 never gets that gunked up.

​

Turns out the last 2 pairs of swifts I have on the shelf are 7" 7kg and 5" 14kg. I opted to use the recently removed front 7" 8kg fortune auto springs in the rear. Fortune Auto actually recommended to me 9kg/8kg for the touring back in 2016, but I feel like 8kg rear seems low? Either way, 5" swift spring is a no-go unfortunately. I will try this out to get a baseline, maybe some 7-8" 12kg swifts are in the future.

I did a spray of carb cleaner around most of the vacuum lines to make sure the issue wasnt vacuum related. I stumbled across a new silicone intake tube from TURNER for m54b30. They have a nice 1pc intake tube design available now vs the 2pc bmw one, so I decided to order that up as well.

I'm going to adjust the ride height roughly this weekend, (i plan on ordering new tires maybe next month? so I may need to revisit) Fuel injector rebuild kit should be here Tuesday, I really hope they send the right one! more updates soon hopefully!​

*edit* 03/22 no need to keep bumping this post.

I guess I forgot to take a pic, but I installed new m5 ATE front brake pads because the PO bought some and never got around to installing them. Old pads are of unknown origin, but also a little under 50% life. I just remember not liking them from a long time ago, so fresh pads is nice.



and the photo I've been dying to see (car fully on coilovers now)



and i wanted to make sure this seat adapter fit and didn't need any modification.



Ride height isn't final, but I also told myself I can't order new tires until I figure out the engine misfire issues. Still waiting on parts, but I also think I'm out of free time for the month.

[s14brent]

I actually got all the parts I was waiting for on Tuesday and got everything sorted by wednesday night.




Turner makes a nice 1pc silicone intake boot that replaces the 2pc design for m54's. Pretty sure I caused this tear in the stock boot upon removal. Either way, it was ready to go.




fuel filter/fpr got replaced as well with the fresh fuel injector o-rings and filter baskets. I had a small section of 8mm gates fuel line that was just enough to replace all 3 of these hoses luckily.

after a series of diag steps and crossing things off the "could be wrong" list, I realized it was a stupid error on my part. I got the car with the manifolds removed and simply mixed up the o2 banks. However, everything I replaced was needed, so I don't see it as a full throwing money at parts kind of diag thankfully.




I also got a bright blue PrismaLab FIA seat on a drifthq's garage sale. It's very.....blue but the FIA rating is good through 2027 and I can fire sale it after that. It probably fits a 34w comfortably, i've never had a bucket seat as wide as this one to be honest but the price was right and fit the budget for now. Tires are next, I'm actually thinking of running a fresh set of kr20a 245/40 square vs 235/40 & 265/35. I think for this car I actually prefer the current look/size surprisingly. Next is insurance, moving permit then smog, and registration i suppose. I'll probably get that started in 2 weeks when I'm not working back to back conferences.

[s14brent]

Weekly wagon update! i got these 30mm fortune auto spring perch spacers. Basically to take up some space running 7" springs vs 8"!







did some wire clean up this week, got rid of all the leftover auto-trans harness stuff that was left behind. also ripped out the HID 9006 fog light bulbs and stuck in some generic 9006's i had in a box. Getting rid of the warning lights one-by-one LOL!!



Finally washed the wagon, i actually pressure washed off the plasti-dip on the window trim. It wasn't TERRIBLE maybe 10 years ago, but it was definitely showing its wear and needed to go! I actually got a moving permit for it, and insurance. I need to drive it around and get the car ready for smog!



245/40/18 kenda kr20a's all around - might want to drop the rear another 1/4" again.....won't have time until maybe Thursday this week to mess with it though! I also have a few things on the way like windshield wipers, front sway bar endlinks, and refreshing the whole rear setup (turner metal swaybar brackets, new bushings and endlinks). I'm going to try and aim to take this to autocross on the 20th, but there's a lot I still need to do before then! I also have to download the PAsoft software and try to code out the SLS error message since I couldn't get it to access on INPA



-- edit: 04/09--
I did manage to get the rear ride height to my liking. I was worried about 245/40 being too small of a square setup but I think this will work out fine. I do think 265 is too wide for such an underpowered pig.



Getting PAsoft to work on an old windows 10 laptop took way longer than I'd like to admit, but I did successfully code out the "SLS INACTIVE" warning that was living on gauge cluster. Down to two warning lights (airbag and DCT - both caused by removal of steering wheel/clock spring unfortunately). A better condition stock wheel is not out of the question here, however I do like the setup I have in there currently



Also, good news, car is officially ready to smog!! However smog checks here are only valid here for 30 days, and I could only get an appointment at the nearest DMV on May 15th, so I will wait until after the 15th of this month to get it done (pre-auto-x if i can make it!!) I actually do remember suffering trying to get these monitor checks in the green when I first did the swap on this!

[s14brent]

got about half my order delivered this week so I got to work.



Meyle HD front sway bar endlinks since these were blown/shot



I got impatient and tried to buy an ac belt from oreillys, but they gave me a 4 rib belt that I had to return. continental 5 rib in the back is the correct one for what I needed. Even after correct belt was replaced, ac was not kicking on, checked the 2 fuses in the fuse box (glove box) and checked the aux giant fuse from underneath. I really hate that location, my hands are not small enough to contort for that.



I pulled off the front bumper and started to remove some broken panels that will eventually get replaced. I found the aux plug hanging and found that the switch was corroded inside. Because one of the prongs broke off - I had to just cut the plugs off and do some male/female spade connectors for now - I really just wanted to see if the aux fan was dead or not.



got it wired up temporarily for now, turned the car on and turned AC ON, fan kicked on and I had cold air again!!




I also threw on another pair of 15mm spacers (up front) that I purchased, tried my best to match camber angle with one of those magnetic gauges mounted on the rotor. Overall happy with this ride-height and fitment. Overall, I think it's been a great success so far! I am waiting for rear sway bar bushing/endlink/brackets to show up and I'm ready to put some miles on it.

[s14brent]

had a bit more time to work on the e39 this week. the rear sway bar refresh came in. Right Rear end link was separated.



They are not super fun to change, 1/4 turn at a time with 2 wrenches - hands were hurting the next day from something that should be a lot easier to just swap imho. Also on the LR I screwed up and with the ultra thin 16mm wrench I somehow knocked the blue retaining clip off the bushing.....I spent like 45 min trying to get it back on until it basically deformed and was unusable. To just get things moving forward I used some safety wire and will just keep an eye on it.




I got the Turner metal sway bar bushing brackets and tossed the factory aluminum ones away. These are a bit overpriced imho, but I didn't want to take my chances modding up a 7 series RSB bushing bracket. Got some febi bushings to pair along with it for now.




I really wanted to put the mtech rear bumper diffuser on, and i kind of hated the muffler that was on there. I ordered a flat black vibrant single tip muffler, but ended up ordering the wrong part # on accident and got the 3" vibrant exhaust vs 2.5" (1147 vs 1146) and due to just time constraints decided to make it work with a reducer. Turns out the APR muffler that was on there had some cracks in the muffler so it was time. Unfortunately my welder decided to fight me all day, shit looks horrible but its on there. I will need to buy another bottle of 75/25 and the wind didn't help me at all. I think I may still replace the bottle resonator with an ultra quiet vibrant resonator in the future so I will redo the whole rear section again in the future.





I decided to get the car smogged the next day. It passed with no issues! My DMV appointment isn't until May 15th, looking forward to getting this thing plated already!



I have been complaining about the e39 steering feeling a bit heavier than i remember, and i thought maybe it was because of the smaller 350mm wheel on there, however a larger wheel wouldnt make it feel much better imho. I then remembered the e36 m3 had a restrictor built in the high pressure hose, and that the e46 restrictor is in the banjo bolt. Confirmed the part is the same on realoem and decided to give it a go!




I took it for a quick drive and it feels SOOO much better. I'm also glad because I got to dump a lot of the PS fluid and help flush out the system little by little. I definitely want to drive it a bit more spiritedly now!

[mateo8]

got about half my order delivered this week so I got to work.



Meyle HD front sway bar endlinks since these were blown/shot



I got impatient and tried to buy an ac belt from oreillys, but they gave me a 4 rib belt that I had to return. continental 5 rib in the back is the correct one for what I needed. Even after correct belt was replaced, ac was not kicking on, checked the 2 fuses in the fuse box (glove box) and checked the aux giant fuse from underneath. I really hate that location, my hands are not small enough to contort for that.



I pulled off the front bumper and started to remove some broken panels that will eventually get replaced. I found the aux plug hanging and found that the switch was corroded inside. Because one of the prongs broke off - I had to just cut the plugs off and do some male/female spade connectors for now - I really just wanted to see if the aux fan was dead or not.



got it wired up temporarily for now, turned the car on and turned AC ON, fan kicked on and I had cold air again!!




I also threw on another pair of 15mm spacers (up front) that I purchased, tried my best to match camber angle with one of those magnetic gauges mounted on the rotor. Overall happy with this ride-height and fitment. Overall, I think it's been a great success so far! I am waiting for rear sway bar bushing/endlink/brackets to show up and I'm ready to put some miles on it.

M-Pars are the way to go on the touring!

[s14brent]

I was missing this right rear trim, thankfully they are cheap and still available unlike a lot of the other wagon interior bits. I'm mainly missing a touring rear bench seat and LR door panel in black, but at least the door panel should be easy to find.



I wanted to add something to change up the look of the car to be a bit more aggressive. I am actually not super familiar with whats available for the e39 m5 bumpers and ended up ordering a cheap ebay lip that was shipped from socal (so i got it in 1 day).
Fitment was actually decent, but the finish was horrid. I had to fix the bumper bracket anyways so it was a good reason to have the whole bumper off again.


If anyone has seen my e30 build thread, they know my favorite thing in the world is sanding (sarcasm). Luckily it didn't take long with some 320 and 400 grit.



Unfortunately I'm not going to wait a week+ to get a bottle of SEM trim black, so I used a bottle of rustoleum satin black that was laying around.



and finally mounted up.





Next up is working on getting the rear windows working...really hoping it's nothing too expensive since both sides can definitely add up! TBH it might be a while before I tackle that..i'm just patiently waiting for my appointment at the DMV to register this already!

[KeysCoupe]

Rustolium Satin Black (#7777) is my go-to for a good trim black. It still looks fresh on the rockers and windshield trim on my TR8 that was done almost 30 years ago. I’ve used it for decades. Just let it dry at least 3-4 days before any rough handling, like snapping over trim clips.
-Donny

[s14brent]

I ended up ordering a new metra radio harness, there were some issues with the old one (multiple loose pins). At first it started as a speaker issue...PO had installed some audiobahn speakers in super chopped up speaker housings.....decided i'd rather have paper stock speakers for now (pulled an uncracked set from the junkyard - first time going in what seems like forever) and eventually i'll upgrade to some bavsound door speakers down the road. Also, the audiobahns were just lightly twisted and e-taped of course. I left the tweeters in for now.



I got the window regulators in. I actually was planning to go with bremmen parts via fcp euro for lifetime warranty, but the RR side was not in stock and $50 more than the lemforeder version that was in stock at ECS, so i ordered one from each place.
Tell me why the lemforeder was a different design regulator and had me confused for a bit.



^ This was the L rear with bremmen parts replacement.
v this was the R rear. safe to say they were both proper f****d


While all the door panels were off, I added some glue to the pockets in the door cards and had them clamped in place overnight. Three of four were loose and rattled unfortunately, pretty much a perfect opportunity to do a quick fix. Meanwhile my 30 day temp-tag has officially expired, and my DMV appointment isn't until the 15th. I'm pretty happy with the progress made within the 30 days.



I soldered in two new panasonic vl2020's into both key fobs also. Keyless entry now works again which is almost necessary on anything 95+ i feel.

[s14brent]

no real issues with the touring since the last post. randomly decided to throw a welded diff in for a possible july night drift event (since my e30 will be going on jackstands for a long list of upgrades soon). Don't fret, I kept my original 3.46 in case I want to switch it back.


I randomly met up a friend with 540iT m62/6spd MT and a 3rd pulled up. So strange, we never usually see these cars here.



had to replace the foot pads of the yakima roof rack. old ones were super gross.

ordered new I/O tie rods. turns out the threads are the same size/pitch as e30/e36 so I'll probably throw on a smaller stack of 5mm of spacers for a little more angle. (not installed yet)

open diff weld in locking plates from Rise Fab Shop


3.46 open diff acquired.


little hot glue gun action!!

new cortico axle stub seals installed


quick cover clean up while rtv cures.

pulled diff out of the wagon

installed SLG axle spacers and extended bolts while i was in there. added fresh fluid/crush washers. I will probably install the tie-rods and flush the diff fluid out in like a 50-60 miles.

randomly picked up some ASA AR1 17x8+18 74.1 hub and threw on my last set of accellera 651 sports for new drift spares. (can be shared between my e30/e39 as burners).