After I've introduced myself in the appropriate section of this forum I'd like to introduce one of my current projects. Yes, it is one out of three but currently the only really active one while the other two (E24-635CSi 5-speed and E24-635 Auto tranny) are on hold.
I'm in the lucky position of having a rather large workshop very close to my house. Here I have two sandblasting cabins plus access to a hoist and a bunch of other useful tools, which I partially own myself and partially am allowed to use FOC.
When I got my 850Ci (produced 03/1990) in May 2009 it was in pretty poor shape. Exhaust system was partially falling off due to corrosion, the engine ran like crap, AC not running plus a bunch of smaller issues due to lack of service. It was a typical witness of a car which was owned by someone who can't afford it.
One of the first things to do was fix the exhaust system. I was lucky to get a set of rear muffles plus a center resonator FOC from a German E31 club member who had converted to an after market stainless steel system.
2nd was to find the reason for the poorly running engine. As soon as it warmed up it ran like a tractor. I've checked the ignition and fuel supply system, replaced distributor caps, spark plugs, cleaned and overhauled the electronic throttle bodies but none of those activities brought the result I was hoping for. Some day I had this bright idea of checking the Lambda probes because the issue was quite obviously temperature relevant and the first few minutes this old engine is running on pre set values until the Lambda probes are heated up enough. So I figured out which one of the cables in the DME connectors (this car has two DMEs, one for each bank) carries the O2 sensor signal and this finally brought me to the solution. Some idiot had reversed the cables underneath the car. This resulted in the O2 sniffing in the left bank exhaust system sending it's values to the right bank's DME and vice versa. No wonder the engine ran like crap. As a side effect it ran very hot and on the left side the almost completely broken off rear muffler pointed upwards and the exhaust tips melted the rear bumper as shown on the last picture above.
I corrected this and from then on the engine had the power it is supposed to have plus ran smooth like a V12 is supposed to run. Of course I implanted a set of my performance chips into the DME and the EML unit.
The car came on some 8.5"x19" chromed ASA rims with cheap Chinese no name tyres on them. They were so ugly I didn't even bother to take pictures of them. Since I had a set of AC Schnitzer 3-piece rims in stock which were originally planned to go on my black 635CSi I corrected this issue rather quickly.
As usual on those cars the cast alloy gear for the electric sun blind was worn out so I needed to fix this as well.
I found someone who offered those gears in steel and now this issue should be history hopefully for the rest of the car's life.
Last summer I also invested into a used KĂ„RCHER steam cleaner which was very helpful in getting rid of 19 years old dirt in the carpets. It was a bit of a pain to remove it and I have to admit that I have not taken it out in one piece but decided to cut it in half which made the entire process so much easier and afterwards I just connected both halfs via plastic cable binders. Since it is all hidden under the center console it is invisible now.
I took the carpet outside and steam cleaned it thoroughly. Thanks to the warm summer weather it dried rather quickly and already the next day it was ready to be put back into the car.
thanks. Yep, I'm a very happy bunny and I know it. I've been dreaming of something like that since I was a student which is quite some time ago now. Sometimes you're lucky and dreams come true. So never give up :thumbsup
BTW, this is how I started my wheel business - in my own garage. Not sure though if I'll ever be as successful as Bill Gates. They guy in the picture is NOT me but a friend of mine.
Whenever I drove of the Autobahn with slightly higher speed it felt like the car is running on eggs, Time to inspect the shocks and what I found on the front axle was indeed crying for a fix. Most likely still the original BOGE shocks because it was not a replacement shock in the strut but the way it comes from the factory:
I had a set of used shocks from an E34-540 touring floating around and since overall weight as well as weight distribution are almost identical I decided to give it a try. Diameter of the shocks is OK, but they are slightly too long:
So I custom made a special nut and fitted the shocks nevertheless since my car was damned low anyways (AC Schnitzer coil overs). It was a great improvement over the old shocks but I'm still dreaming of a BILSTEIN/Eibach combo.
Of course the FTPs were pretty shot matching the overall condition of my car. But I'm not willing to spend €500,- for a set of new ones. I finally found a set on the bay for a reasonable amount of money, but also showing their age.
I "fixed" this by painting them with several layers of clear paint from a rattle can. It's still on there but I'm going to remove it now and re do it with some professional clear paint incl. hardener using professional equipment.
The non original steering wheel (non original because it has an airbag while my doesn't have any airbag periphery) has been a severe pain to my eyes from the very beginning. It cost me about €200,- to cure me from this :silly
It looks very similar to this one. For some strange reason I obviously never took a picture of it :confused
Will fix that once I have the car back from the body shop.
Two more positions on my wish list got deleted soon after.
A new used front which I already had in stock, but in the wrong colour and a set of CSi mirrors. I did NOT go for the outrageously expensive originals but the after market version offered by Thomas Engl. I've sent him the electrics from my original mirrors and got the M-mirrors back painted and ready to be mounted for much less than what the originals would have cost me. Only negative point is, that he can't supply after market heated mirror glasses. If this is a must the original BMW glasses can be fitted though.
Not much to say here actually. As everyone knows the light output of the E31 headlights with original bulbs is pretty ridiculous. Some people ran experiments with higher wattage bulbs which cost them a small fortune thanks to melting reflectors. Even the standard 55W are already too much as many melted driving light reflectors can tell.
Since I'm a fan of HID light (even my MotoGuzzi has it) it was just a matter of time until I was going to do the conversion. A little tricky due to limited space, but possible. The ballasts need to stay outside the bucket though - so space for them inside. The cable routing needs to be done carefully taking into account, that the bucket is moving up and down.
Crazy as I am I did ALL the lamps incl. high beams and FTP lights.
Wokke - I have closed your other thread (in Members Projects Forum) on this project and have moved this thread to that section in place of it as this thread has more photos, details, comments etc :thumbsup
The car is looking excellent, a really nicely-modded example. A lot of work has clearly gone into it, looking forward to seeing more mods and work as you update this thread
and I thought since it is all quite E31 specific it might be useful to have it in the E31 section since quite a few repairs and modifications are very E31 specific
But it is absolutely ok this way - no problem at all.
As I recently found out via the 8 register my car is the third oldest registered 850 in Germany. I'm just mentioning this because that's what the paint actually looked like. Due to a fender bender on the RH side I decided to give the car some cosmetic treatment. After lots of discussions mainly with myself I decided to go FERRARI giallo. AFAIK ALPINA delivered two B12 in this color and BMW did even 14 cars in it. Together with this I'm redoing the headliner which looked pretty beaten up as usual on these cars after several years. It'll be in black Alcantara. A few parts I already did and it looks magnificent.
Following some pictures of the "give her a new dress" process.
Disassembling the car. Most important tool here is a digital camera.
After having removed the windscreen I detected quite a bit of corrosion.
The rear window frame looked ok. No corrosion here.
The sun roof frame had to go out as well
All plastic parts have been sandblasted to remove all old paint. Only the yellow one couldn't be blasted since it is from different material and would be destroyed.
Finally off to the body shop
While I was on vacation in Spain for two weeks the work progress was extremely slow. I had been working my bud off to get her ready for the body
shop prior to going on vacation.
When I returned I was not really impressed about the progress :eek
I had also decided to get the fenders slightly pulled so I can run 295s in the future on my 11" wide rear rims. Currently I have 275s but they are a little stretched.
Since I was around again I started kicking ass a little and all of a sudden some activity started
A 1st color sample was delivered and I made the final choice: FERRARI 102 (giallo)
Fits the paint of my new brake calipers very well too. Those will be mounted together with drilled Zimmermann rotors
From now on it took one week and by the end of next week I hope to have all parts painted. I admit I was a little shocked when I first saw the yellow body shell in the booth under artificial light.
Later i took pictures with my camera flash and the yellow looked quite different.
It definitely looks best on a sunny day
And this is the status from Sept. 12th. To be changed hopefully soon
Guess what I felt....:eek
This color requires daylight. Today I worked on it inside the shop with the large door open. So the front part was mainly under artificial light while the back was hit by daylight. A friend of mine stopped by and asked me why I had it painted in two different shades of yellow :silly
some minor progress today.
I trailered the car back to my place and mounted the rear Zimmermann disks and the refurbished calipers. Also some trim was mounted and the wiring harness in the trunk re taped. As usual on such old cars the original tape was mainly gone and what ever was left was hard and sticky. Now the harness looks like brand new again.
Today I got the doors, the front whatever it is called part (see pictures) and the CSi mirrors. The "whatever it is called part" and the driver door are mounted but the window isn't in yet. This will happen tomorrow.
More by accident I found out that rubber parts become like new if they are being glass pearl blasted.
like new after being glass pearl blasted:
this is what makes the difference to me. The door is even painted on the inside although it is covered at the end.
Just an advice to anyone who is planning a similar project. Take pictures, pictures and more pictures when disassembling the car. I did NOT take enough pictures
Just an advice to anyone who is planning a similar project. Take pictures, pictures and more pictures when disassembling the car. I did NOT take enough pictures
some progress again. Both doors are in and completed. Adjusting them incl. the windows was less tricky than I thought. Also the sun roof got delivered but isn't mounted yet because of the headliner which still needs to be done.
Yesterday I also picked up the trunk lid and currently I'm busy with feeding the cables back in and then doing the adjustment here as well. Somehow the blue/white BMW propeller doesn't match the yellow/black. I wonder if I should change it against one of those after market carbon/white ones.
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