the one and only e30 s52 engine swap
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So got home earlier then normal today and with a little motivation left in me I decided to clean the garage a bit and get parts organized, VERY very happy that I did.
I completely forgot about these little guys. I still can't stop thinking, imagine if I had this thing all together ready to go and I found them then or even worse! after its in the car and I start the frickin thing, bye bye motor. Even though I disliked the fact that I had to pull the crank and bearings back out after its been all torqued down I'm thankful I caught it now.
Everything is back together now and torqued down as before, this time the right way.
For other progress I got my oil pump cleaned up and installed (not torqued down) as well as my oil pickup tube.
Still waiting on my gaskets and seals to show up, tomorrow gonna drop off the oil pan and timing cover at the machine shop for a nice acid bath and should get it back by the end of the day, then gonna work on priming and painting the pan which will be bmw blue to match the valve cover (Which isn't painted yet, but will be).
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nice progress!
as far as getting a built engine out of your basement...
https://honda-tech.com/forums/general-discussion-debate-40/how-take-motor-out-basement-357271/
please consider one of the two of you has to go backwards up stairs. a fully dressed s50 is north of 400 lbs. short block is less, but either way its a small object so that makes it harder.
(have a plan B )
Dan
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nice progress!
as far as getting a built engine out of your basement...
https://honda-tech.com/forums/general-discussion-debate-40/how-take-motor-out-basement-357271/
please consider one of the two of you has to go backwards up stairs. a fully dressed s50 is north of 400 lbs. short block is less, but either way its a small object so that makes it harder.
(have a plan B )
Actually I've been doing some more thinking on that and I think I might have a pretty good idea. No matter what u do, the engine is gonna be awkward to carry and hard to support between two people. So, instead of carrying it why not just leave it right on the engine stand. People on that thread were saying to put the motor on a refrigerator dolly and maybe a come along to winch it up with plywood on the steps. How about I just hook the come along to the neck part of the stand and pull it up backwards on plywood? For the other side of the come along, there's a closet at the top of the stairs. If I took a thick heavy piece of wood and cut it just long enough to fit behind the back side of the frame and maybe supported it with 2x4's so it didn't fall, wrapped the strap around the piece of wood, and cranked her up the stairs, what could go wrong? For safety precautions I'll station a friend at the bottom end so if something were to fail he can catch it.
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I highly doubt your door frame or that piece of wood would survive that whole ordeal lol
Ye of little faith
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Ive lifted a few motors out of basements before. Each time the theory was to have more people available to lift it than needed. But then again, there was never any planning ahead or thinking about it like you are right now. What about one of those mover lift strap things?
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the fact that you have to concoct some elaborate plan is a red flag to me. however, this is the internet and we need to be entertained, so, carry on.
Dan
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update:
Parts were pretty dirty and brake cleaner wasn't cuttin it. dropped off the oil pan, timing cover, and thermostat housing at the machine shop and picked them up the next day.....
Although the acid tank did a hell of a job getting rid of all the gunk, it still doesn't get rid of corrosion and there is only one true fix for that on cast aluminum.......bead blasting
New seal installed...
Oil pan primed and painted. Used self-etching primer for better stick on the aluminum
I knew something was up when I torqued the bolts down. All that's going through my head is "Why the hell are the studs 2 threads short??" So, after spending a half hour reading forum threads and researching I found that arp, for some reason made their studs to short. Some people mentioned they threaded the stud a few turns out so that the nut reached all the threads. Others mentioned they took the washers out. I didn't like the sound of neither of these and instead got a handful of steel balls, 1/4 inch in diameter from bicycle bearings and dropped them in each of the holes, you could say it did the trick.
Before:
After:
On another note I received my gaskets from ecs tuning. Everything looked good except for something I noticed on the oil pan gasket.
Now, I know I didn't order a victor reinz and I even double checked on the website and the order receipt. So I gave them a call, and they confirmed that a mistake was made and they will send me another gasket right away and I can keep the gasket they sent, so i thought "excellent, no problem there." two days later I got the gasket in the mail, pulled it out of packaging and checked the same spot on the gasket, and once again it said victor reinz. After thinking it over I decided I'll give the gasket a try and not go through the hassle to get a third gasket. If you wanted to know, the gasket I ordered was a febi and the price differences from that and the victor reinz was like 2 bucks so big whoop, as long as it don't leak.
Back when I disassembled the motor, I ended up breaking one of the chain guides clips that hold it to the stud. So last weekend I spent my Saturday morning at my local junk yard pulling a m50 apart on an e34 to get another chain guide...It also still had its oil pan...and it was cracked.
It was well worth it cause it saved me 30 bucks from buying a new one.
pump installed, nut tightened to 18 lb ft and wire tied to the sprocket....safe and secure.
chain guides installed and good news! nothin broke.
Timing cover installed with new gaskets and some right stuff by permatex to keep them sealed. All the bolts torqued to 11 lb ft...
Question....got troubles with the oil baffle.
As you can see, the baffle won't bolt down because the arp main studs are interfering. Do I need it? I can modify it so that it does work but I wanted to check if its necessary to have, for some reason I couldn't find any info out there on this piece.
Next things on the list...
Install rear crank seal
Possibly Getting my cylinder head back this week sooooo...order head gasket, as well as
Stewart water pump
gasket for oil filter housing
vanos gasket
Obd1 coolant hose adapter
aaaaand maybe a few other things I can't think of at the moment.
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So progress on the motor has been slim, got a few things done here and there, still waiting on the cylinder head from the machinist (losing my patience though)
Last Friday I and a friend stopped by the junk yard to go scavenging around and while I was out there I was surprisingly able to round up the last of what I needed for my obd1 conversion including...
obd1 throttle body
Oem MAF sensor
obd1 fuel rail
obd1 valve cover
6 coil packs
obd1 intake manifold ( yup I know I already have one that I had plans to repaint or bring back but the one I found on an e34 was in pretty amazing shape and I couldn't pass it up, still planning on re doing the manifold I have though)
Vanos solenoid off an e34 m50, read up that I will need this as the wire is longer vs. the obd2 solenoid.
One quick question for the obd1 sensors I will be needing...Should I go all genuine bmw parts for those? I honestly really don't want to spend close to $400 on 5 sensors, there's also a m50 out in the junk yard with 220,000 miles but its got all the sensors I need and in good condition, just looking for recommendations here. Thx!
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Crank and cam sensors, yes get BMW OEM. This is based on both personal experiences and many posts of newer non-OE sensors failing within the year or providing poor starting/cutting out at high rpm.
I always keep spare fuel pump relay, dme relay, and crank sensor with me in the car just in case. You could chance it with the junkyard sensors and get extras to keep in the car as spares and replace them with new OE units when its more convenient, just an idea. Temp sensors are just fine to go with non-OE
Oxygen sensor: definitely bosch, or if you for some reason have a hatred for bosch, get NTK at a bare minimum but nothing else. These old style narrowbands are pretty cheap as it is.
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Agreed with OEM sensors
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Crank and cam sensors, yes get BMW OEM. This is based on both personal experiences and many posts of newer non-OE sensors failing within the year or providing poor starting/cutting out at high rpm.
I always keep spare fuel pump relay, dme relay, and crank sensor with me in the car just in case. You could chance it with the junkyard sensors and get extras to keep in the car as spares and replace them with new OE units when its more convenient, just an idea. Temp sensors are just fine to go with non-OE
Oxygen sensor: definitely bosch, or if you for some reason have a hatred for bosch, get NTK at a bare minimum but nothing else. These old style narrowbands are pretty cheap as it is.
Knock sensor? BMW or bosch? the price difference is quite a bit.
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