TX02's Xanga

BMW Hiatus

Wed, 05 Nov 2008 21:33:01 GMT

I recently relocated to Washington, DC. Unfortunately, I couldn't bring my 02 with me immediately. Until I can afford to make that roadtrip and find storage for it, I have to leave her in storage in Texas.

I'll update as soon as I get her up here!

New Windshield

Tue, 19 Aug 2008 15:38:41 GMT

It's nice to have a windshield that's actually clear.

The poor guy from Safelight took three hours to install it. An average, newer windshield takes an hour. I'll be happy to not have water dripping inside the car when it rains, though.

MSII Unit and Relay Board Mounting

Mon, 28 Jul 2008 13:50:49 GMT

I had originally planned to mount the relay board somewhere in the engine bay, but I couldn't find a suitable place that I thought was protected from the two natural enemies to electronics; water and heat. I had both the MSII unit and the relay board loose in the glove box until I decied to mount them properly. I'm a little limited in my options because I have the pipedream of someday returning my Behr A/C to working condition and still have the console mouted inside.

I settled on mounting the MSII unit on the bottom of the glovebox and the relay board inside it.

Not too bad and the relay board uses one of the bolts from the MSII unit to hold it in place. The plexiglass dust cover works nicely in there.

Of course, I'm just waiting to get my car back from the shop so that I can take her to the drive-in again soon.

Title!

Fri, 11 Jul 2008 13:57:11 GMT

After a full year of owning the car, I finally got the title transferred into my name and had the car properly tagged and registered.

When I first received the title, it stated the wrong VIN. Apparently, the car had been mis-titled since at least 1978, according to the Kansas Highway Patrol. After the previous owner graciously investigated, hired a lawyer and pushed the case through the Kansas court system, a Kansas judge granted a "quiet title" on the car. This means that the car gets a clean title and all previous history gets erased. Nice.

So, that took 6 months or so, and then I had the car down for 6 months or so doing the transmission, shifter linkage, various gaskets, a battery and the EDIS. I found it hard to pay for the registration before the car was actually on Texas roads. So now, after more than a year, I finally have the car in my name. Yippee!

We're still working out the insurance/nose damage issue, but I'm confident that that will be solved soon. I have a weekend roadtrip to Austin (375 miles or so) planned in a few weeks, so I will hopefully have everything fixed by then.

Well, That Sucks.

Mon, 23 Jun 2008 14:38:37 GMT

My friend backed his in-laws' Lincoln Navigator into my kidney grill. It's pushed in an inch or two. Looks like crap and it broke one of my Hella 500 lamps. That sucks.

Well, it could have been worse. No one was hurt and the car still drives.

Shortened Bumpers

Fri, 13 Jun 2008 17:31:13 GMT

Aside from a recent guibo (flex disk) failure, I decided to spend my time adding my Hella 500 driving lights, fixing and moving the existing fog lights as well as pushing the huge, federally-mandated 5 mph bumpers inboard. They made great benches, but they look a lot better whne they don't stick out far enough to mimic park benches.

Before:

After:

Here's how to push a stubborn front bumper inboard while you take your time with the set screws:

With the fog lights relocated under the bumper and the Hella 500 driving lights mounted in their holes, I think that I'll be able to handle any form of darkness.

She Moves!

Thu, 29 May 2008 16:46:16 GMT

I finally got the car on the ground and driving last night. There was an issue with engine/transmission movement that I think I fixed by adjusting the limiter on the passenger side motor mount.....but not before I dug the fan into the radiator. Luckily, nothing was punctured.

The EDIS was giving me crap until I figured out that I had the PIP/SAW wires backward. With a new, solid positive power line to the realay board, I finally got a good reading and control for the MS unit. The ignition advance table from Tim Skwiot is great. The motor accelerates nice and smoothly.

I really can't wait to do the rest of the EFI stuff.

Into the Breach

Fri, 23 May 2008 14:52:14 GMT

It's been a while, but I'm trying to patch up a lot of projects on the car at once. The list of changes since the car last moved are as follows:

1. Oil Leak Fix: The lower timing chain cover had an improperly installed gasket that leaked oil like nobody's business. I finally tore all that apart to get to it. I ordered a new gasket set, but it won't be here until next week, so I'm making my own out of some leftover gasket material from when I made water pump gaskets.

2. Transmission Replacement: This may have been overkill. I broke a shifter mount because it was so hard to shift with what I thought was bad synchros. As it turns out, it was a throw-out bearing. With the 228mm clutch and flywheel, an E21 323i throw-out bearing is necessary to actuate it. With the smaller 215mm clutch, you can use the E21 320i bearing, which is 5mm shorter. When I originally installed my five speed, I had the help of a local BMW mechanic. Instead of using the E21 323i bearing, he modified the fork to make up for the 5mm difference. It seems that over the course of 5 years or so, the modified parts worn down enough to make it difficult to shift, which felt like synchros going out. I sourced a new transmission and had it ready before I figured out the probable cause of the problem. So, now I have a spare five speed.

3. Brake Booster Issue Solved, I Think: Ever since I installed the bigger brakes, I could never get the right pedal feel. The last car turned out to be a rusty, nightmare of a scam, I assumed that the brake booster was dead, too. When I began transferring parts to the current car, I was excited to find that the brake booster worked.....until I installed the larger tii master cylinder and bigger brakes all around. Same rock-hard pedal. After some poking around on the FAQ site, I checked and discovered that I was missing the special squared O-ring that goes between the master cylinder and the booster. I feel a little dumb for missing it, but I'm excited to finally see my brakes at their full potnetial.

4. Electrical Problems: I could never get a good, constant power supply to the MS unit, which, I think, is why I have no spark advance curve on the EDIS4 unit. I'm getting a relay today to run good poer off the new battery.

5. Exhaust: I had a quick, cheap and dirty exhaust on the car. It worked okay, but the downpipe was rusted through and the whole thing was welded together, which sucked for transmission removal. I sourced a good-but-used downpipe and resonator. I de-rusted them and gave them a coat of high-temp paint, so now I can have a mostly-stock exhaust.

I'm hoping to finish all this by tomorrow, so I can road-test everything.

Transmission Out

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 13:36:20 GMT

To Do:

1. Replace transmission with another used unit until I have the funds to get mine properly rebuilt.

2. Fix oil leak (improperly installed lower timing chain cover gasket).

3. Replace battery (Red Top Optima!).

4. Rewire power to EDIS and Megasquirt. I finally traced my MS power issues to faulty wiring. I'm going to run a direct line from the battery post to the relay board. I also plan on mounting the board on the inside of the car, which means I need to source some gaskets for running wiring through the firewall.

As for now, I have the transmission and most of the exhaust out. All that remains in the exhaust system is the 02 Again manifold, which is holidng up nicely. I've readied the exhaust parts with a coat of 1200 degree paint and I just received the "exhaust hardware kit" from Bavarian Autosport. I know I could have sourced that stuff a bit cheaper, but it was $20 and came with new BMW hangers (and even the little plastic hanger-spacer-things), bolts, a clamp and the seal & gasket. It's kind of odd to have a stock exhaust on a BMW. Both my 2002s and my 1600 lost their exhausts to rust and I just went with a cheap header and whatever muffler and pipe my exhaust guy could fit cheaply. My 1600 had a muffler that was so big that you could see half of it from the bask of the car. I'm curious what a mostly stock exhaust will sound like.

Electrolytic Rust Removal

Mon, 14 Apr 2008 01:57:21 GMT

I got a used but rusty resonator in the mail to go with my newly painted downpipe. Instead of taking the time to wire-wheel the rust away, I useed the opportunity as an excuse to try out a science project that I've been wanting to do for a while now: Electrolytic Rust Removal. The concept is simple: by passing electricity through Iron Oxide (rust), one can release the oxygen atoms, effecitve returning the rust to it's original iron state.

After a little researching, I constructed this:

I made a bath to completely submerge my resonator in water, which I mixed with baking soda (about 1 tablespoon to every gallon). I then connected the positive end of my 6 Amp Battery Charger to a steel rod that I placed in the bath, but not touching the resonator. The negative clamp was attached to the resonator itself. After about 18 hours, it looked like this:

Now, all the rust turned to black iron particles that were soon brushed off. The silver part was never rusted...rather coated in baked-on mud.

Then, a coat or two of 1200 degree high-temp paint to keep the rust off in the future. This thing will look nice under the car.......where nobody will see it.

Overall: fun project. I'm kind of looking around for other stuff to de-rust now....