What's going on in my shop currently...

[fredo]

Fredo,
Its just a 3d printed part I make to cover up openings in the engine and accessories when I'm cleaning them. Here's some more pics of other ones.

Very cool idea.

[BADCLOWN]

Sucks a white/NB sedan bit the dust but talk about a perfect donor car for a wagon swap

[GeorgeH]

Sucks a white/NB sedan bit the dust but talk about a perfect donor car for a wagon swap

Agreed, but I think we did more justice to the ZHP than anyone else (short of fixing it).

[BMWCurves]

An AW wagon w/ a ZHP engine swap is absolutely drool worthy

[GeorgeH]

We left off with cleaning the engine bay. The engine has now been installed along with the front suspension. We used the ZHP "yellow tag" rack with new inner and outer tie rods which were connected to the 330 spindles. New wheel bearings went on the spindles with new rotors and the 330 calipers were painted and installed new pads and stainless steel brake lines. The ZHP sway bar was used with new tie rods.






Initially we reused the "newer" shocks and struts from the touring and installed them with the ZHP springs, but Jack decided to go with Koni yellows and those were swapped in.






Moving backwards I got a little carried away cleaning the chassis and while its not show quality it is cleaner that a street car needs to be, ha.






Even with 275k miles and being a manual transmission the RACP was in excellent shape.










But since we are in there we decided to go with a set of Vincebar Vince Skinz. Every situation is different but I am leaning more and more to the idea that epoxy/riveted plates are the most reasonable solution for most people and Jack's car was no different.










The rear suspension was completely refreshed. The ZHP had a bit more distress cosmetically so we used the the subframe and upper control arms from the touring. But the trailing arms being specific to the 330 we used those. The plan did not call for a complete restoration but giving them a quick shot of black paint is a happy medium. The dust shields were savable but since we had it all apart and they are relatively cheap it made sense to replace them.








And reassembled with new subframe and diff bushings. The trailing arms got new bearings and ball joints for the UCA and LCAs (like an M3) along with Syncro Design Works RTAB ball joints. The LCAs were replaced and the UCAs got new inner bushings. We wanted to keep the 3.46 diff, but found one with a bit lower mileage than the 275k in the touring. New brake rotors and the calipers were painted and installed with new pads and stainless steel brake lines. *The Bilstein rear shocks are still installed as the interior hadn't been disassembled yet to access the shock mounts.






The exhaust is installed with the Dinan Muffler sourced from the ZHP.




To be continued...

[san]

What?s your go to method to install the rear suspension?
Install subframe and then one component at a time on the car?
Or
Install everything to the subframe offline and get the whole assembly in?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[GeorgeH]

What?s your go to method to install the rear suspension?

Install subframe and then one component at a time on the car?
Or
Install everything to the subframe offline and get the whole assembly in?

The majority of the time I assemble the suspension on the car. Working by myself its often easier because I can do it with one person.

If I have it torn down to nothing then I usually do:

• Subframe
• Control Arms
• Trailing Arms
• Wheels
• Set ride height and torque inner UCA & LCA bolts to spec
• Install diff
• Install CV shafts
• Install Coil springs
• Install shocks
• Install sway bar

If I install it as an assembly then I do:

• Install Control Arms onto the subframe with everything UPSIDE DOWN
• Install Diff STILL UPSIDE DOWN
• Flip everything over right side up
• Install Trailing arms
• Install CV shafts
• Install Coil springs
• Install shocks
• Install sway bar
• Install wheels
• Set ride height and torque to spec

[GeorgeH]

I didn't realize I was behind on this post, so getting caught up...


With the bottom side done now moving to the top side. ZHP harness laid out ready for dissection.




Noting wire and connector lengths for reassembly




And the aftermath.




From this we got the front and rear ride height sensor wiring and all wires to each xenon headlight. Additionally all the wiring to add the SZM and also to the seats for heating. *I also kept the MT wiring for a project in the future.




Jacks car originally had only a DSC button so to get seat heating we had to add the SZM and then from there the wiring to the seats themselves. Interestingly BMW grounds the seats in different locations. I mean there is a ground stud under the driver seat and BMW uses that one. But on the passenger side (which also has a ground stud) they choose to run it back behind the rear seat back.

Additionally we had to add the RF and RR ride height sensors for the Xenons to the LM and then (5) wires from the LM to each headlight.

Wiring going in








Inspector inspecting




More wiring




Engine bay taped up and ready for assembly.




Interior taped up and ready for assembly. IIRC correctly I had to run pass 18 wires across the tunnel. If you look closely you'll see some places where I ran the additional wiring but for the most part I do my best to get it in the loom or tape it up afterwards. A quick glance likely isn't going to see the extensive wiring modifications to the harness. It probably doesn't matter, but it does to me so I'm bound to do it, lol.












And the ZHP carpets going in

[GeorgeH]

We left off with the interior reassembly. I didn't photo document this well but we swapped in most of the interior from the ZHP which is basically everything from the b-pillar forward. We have a couple of NB touring interiors in stock and picked out the nicest one to install.










With the headliner out, the sunroof cassette was removed. This one was fully of debris and I'm surprised the interior wasn't totally full of water. Since both cars were '04 they already had the updated sunshade drives so I picked the ZHP as it likely had less use? It was cleaned and lubed and installed into the touring.








The headliner was recovered in replica fabric as well as the upper B and C pillars. The ZHP had nearly new A-pillars in it so we used those along with all of the black trim.






Rounding out the interior, the RR door window guide was loose and deformed so it was replaced with a new BMW part.




With the interior, driveline and suspension assembled I started putting miles on the car. I've found there is sometimes a difference in just putting miles on a car and actually "using" it. I like to drive cars like I would or a customer. Sometimes you find that a car acts up when it is driving 5 miles, parked for 10 minutes, etc. Whereas just driving it 20 miles on the highway doesn't show this. So I drive cars to run errands, pick up parts, go to dinner, etc.

Lunch date with a long time friend who has an E46 touring as well. His was is already 6spd swapped and hes building a B30 for it, but the B25 burned an exh valve before the B30 was ready so Jacks B25 engine is now in it. So the engine in the OB touring came from the AW touring which came from an X3, that engine gets around, lol.




Next was the exterior. The front doors were in great shape and the color match was very good so Jack elected to swap the doors to get the gloss black trim and at this point, why not? ha.






The original RF fender had some scratches at the very leading edge that someone applied touchup paint to. It really wasn't bad at all but since we had a good fender... on it goes.




And we couldn't stop there. Genuine MTech2 bumpers were sourced and painted. The ZHP donated its brake ducts as well. The LF had a hole drilled in it for the Dinan CAI. According to the directions it was in the wrong location so I decided to see if I could repair and move the hole. I used a hole saw to cut out a plug from the original duct and the hot stapled and plastic welded it all together.












And the rear bumper going on...

[GeorgeH]

Lets wrap this one up, that's what everyone is here for anyways...

Jacks going to finish the last bit of cosmetics but otherwise the hot rod is done!










Meeting the transport driver, Alex. Guy is an car enthusiast even though her prefers MBs, lol. He dropped the wagon off and says he remembered the "before" but he may have just said that to be nice, haha. Either way we ended up chatting for 1.5hrs about cars.








Alex sent me this pic in Amarillo, TX




And then Alex(L) and Jack(R) on drop off all smiles.




Sure I am biased, but I truly feel this is one of the nicest builds and I am so lucky that Jack took a chance on sending these cars to me and then let me push the project a bit further than we originally planned. The outcome is just so incredible I'm gonna say this is how they shoulda come from BMW.

Walk around video showing the finish, basically overview of what you've seen here: https://youtu.be/H8RjOTtuR5w