e34 Touring
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last night I did step one of the swap: sprayed everything down with PB blaster days in advance. while i was in there, I hacked off my muffler (which is being changed anyway with all this work). all I have to say is I know why Chris giggled like a child when he revved the e34 540 for the first time: the exhaust is so mellow and bubbly and sex things. a little to much volume for everyday, but man does it sound nice.
Dan
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its a beautiful day for a 5-speed swap!
started working this morning:
When you have a touring, you get a free work bench:
Exhaust removed to manifolds.
Diff coming down:
Every single diff to half-shaft bolt was stubborn, and needed multiple cycles of heating, impacting, breaker bar. I didn't strip a single one though, so it was worth the extra hour or so of effort.
Dan
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parking lot is not terrible except the whole cleaning up EVERYTHING each night, and not being able to walk away without cleaning up.
3.15 open coming out (auto's 5th gear is like 0.85:1 or something)
3.23 LSD going in (manual's 5th gear is 1:1)
so between losing the auto and shortening the gearing, a good bump in acceleration hopefully.
Dan
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What automotive build thread would be complete without "the bird"!!!
touring is looking good!
Style 42s? Yes?
thanks!
so true. i love taking stuff apart, until it doesnt want to come apart!
yup style 42 from an e39 (17x8 et20)
Dan
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well just finished working. got all of the tear-down done except undoing the bellhousing bolts and dropping the trans.
exhaust out
diff out
heatshields out
driveshaft out
guibo out
sway bar out
trans fluid drained
trans cooler lines out
trans shift cable out
flywheel disconnected from torque converter
engine cover and coolant reservoir tank out (gives access to top bellhousing bolts)
and auto trans shifter out. good riddance!
Dan
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thanks!
so true. i love taking stuff apart, until it doesnt want to come apart!
yup style 42 from an e39 (17x8 et20)
If you're looking for a set of 16s for winter let me know. Rims and tires (x-ice I think) e39 fitment as well......don't drive my e39 touring much if at all in the winter
Keep up the good work!
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Everytime I see the touring. I like it more and more.
I can't count how many times I've sworn/flipped off inanimate objects while doing my swap.
It's a part of the process really
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Everytime I see the touring. I like it more and more. I can't count how many times I've sworn/flipped off inanimate objects while doing my swap. It's a part of the process really
thanks. they are a great car to have a little more room.
today I didnt get as much done as I wanted (lost half the day because we adopted a dog!) , but still made some progress.
got the car up on my homemade cribs (super sturdy, and no need to remove wheels):
got the auto trans removed
bolts layed out and photographed because there are 3 or 4 different types.
trans ready to come down. super easy with the auto on the m60. it goes straight back and down, no tilting required, easy to balance on a jack with no straps or anything.
out!
"while your in there" replace the rear main seal. mine had a tiny leak already, so glad I planned this. i also have a valley pan gasket leak, hence the yellowly goo which i only cleaned up 75% of the way.
cover and seal out.
new stuff ready to go in:
so some numb nuts (pun intended) decided to weld every one of the exhaust studs/nuts to the topsides of the flanges. also, one of the studs snapped in half when removing. so I spent a while using a dremel to remove all of the welded nuts and drill out the broken stud. was much easier with all the space with no trans.
the idea was nice, but the nuts still get really corroded over time so who wants to reuse them at this point?
also got all the panels/covers off on around the drivers kick panel area to start with the pedal swap.
Dan
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saturday's progress:
for the e34, adding the clutch pedal for an auto to manual conversion means swapping the entire pedal box. the column of the car goes through the box, so you have to pull it.
pull all the column wiring. everything has different connectors, so just yank em.
mark your shaft for re-insertion
the column has an 'impossible to remove' bolt with just a domed head. my solution was dremel a slot into it and use a wrench and a screw driver to break it free. i tried my small impact wrench, but even the impact grade flat head bits just snapped into little bits.
column out
auto box out, manual box with new master cylinder and replacement hex head for the impossible bolt ready to go it.
after you get the pedals in, you can do the clutch hydraulic lines. the auto car has the holes for mouting the resovoir so just bolt it on.
apparently they changed the location of the hard line to soft line bracket sometime in 93 (wtf bmw). i ended up drilling a hole in an L-bracket and just floating it where the hardline ended.
column and pedals in!
this is a jumper you need to make in replacement of the starter relay. it tells the system the car is in 'Park' and allows it to start.
the air show is going on at the lake this weekend, and we are by the airport, so I'm getting flyovers all day. pretty cool!
once i finished with the clutch hydraulics i could switch back to the transmission. flywheel, new clutch and pressure plate, and new pilot bearing installed.
the S5D 310Z. this also fits the m60b40 for the future. new input shaft seal, new selector shaft seal, new shift joint, royal purple fluid.
new pivot pin, clip and throw out bearing.
i got the trans bolted up and the slave cylinder in place, but it was too dark for pictures.
Dan
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she is alive! amazingly, got the project done 95% of the way by last night and was able to drive the car to work.
so far no issues other than that i think the amount of force needed to take the auto trans coolant hoses off the radiator must have cracked it because it is leaking coolant after the car is shut off.
sunday's progress:
transmission in! my neighbor helped me wiggle it into place. amazingly once we got the angle and levelness right, she just slid right into place.
shift linkage new parts ready to go. the parts car shift lever seemed to not be stock length. i could not for the life of my figure out what car it came from but maybe e36 m3? doesn't matter, its a slightly shorter throw than stock and it feels really nice. also adding the ZHP weighted knob and delrin front carrier bushing. there is not very much slop which I've never had before and it feels great.
shift linkage all in place.
3.23 LSD installed. brian did the blue powdercoat for me.
Manual driveshaft installed
Gave the driveshaft a new CSB, and don't forget to preload it towards the front of the car 3-5mm per the Bentley.
Auto trans computer (i think, lol) removed from the car.
after all this I put the car back down and crossed my fingers. fired her up and rolled her forward in 1st and back into place in reverse and everything seemed ok! open headers were awesome.
Cats reinstalled. Exhaust work sucks. So much time is wasted dealing with every one of the bolts being rusted/seized. O2 sensors plugged back in.
I finally figured out that heat + patience works best. Heat+breaker bars not so much. I would set up the bolts and put the torch on them and walk away for a few minutes, then I could tap out the seized bolt with a punch pretty easily. 2 of 4 done in this picture of the resonator flanges.
I still have to do some of the wiring odds and ends like connect the back up light wiring and disable the trans error message, and then put the last interior parts back on, but shes running well so far! Videos to come.
Dan
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Very nice!!
Why no rear Delrin bushing in the back of the carrier ?
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wow! congrats!
The pedal box was the biggest PITA on my manual swap, but I had my engine out of the car. Great work! It must be so much more enjoyable to drive.
thanks! so far much better. haven't given her the beans yet, the internet told me to drive easy for a little while with the new clutch. true?
Very nice!! Why no rear Delrin bushing in the back of the carrier ?
well, it was like $50 for the new OEM rear carrier, then you have to burn out the rubber bushing with a torch and press separate delrin one in. then you have to grind the tabs off the carrier to get it to fit. i just hated the idea of burning and cutting up brand new parts.
Dan
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Understandable on the hacking of new parts lol. I put the Delrin one in mine. It wasn't too bad and I didn't have to cut anything
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As long as you don't do clutch dumps or kick the bejesus out of it. I don't think you'll destroy it. (That's me reassuring myself that I can drive my car without a care in the world)
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