2002 E46 M3 // Build Thread

[pynacl]

Snow finally melted and we've had a few good rains in to wash all the salt away. Took the M3 out today and gave it a test drive after all the changes. Ran like a can of beans. Turns out I had crossed the two pre-cat O2 sensors when doing the header install. Finally got them swapped and it's no longer a can of beans. Tossing in a lil sound clip of the new X pipe too, sounds freakin awesome in person.

IMG_2441.mp4

[YoungCR]

Throaty!

[patsbimmer1]

That sounds great!

[pynacl]

patsbimmer1 said:

That sounds great!

Thanks Pat! The tone is absolutely perfect, exactly what I was going for. The volume on the other hand is ridiculous, I'm sure you could hear it from a mile away. With that the drone is also a bit vicious at 2-2.5k RPM. Might need to go with a different muffler, but going to just enjoy it for a bit!

[pynacl]

@Rekpointsnapped a couple exhaust clips this past weekend. Sounds pretty dang good for an S54!

[pynacl]

Took the car out for the first decent drive of the season! Cruised along the Saint Croix river for about 200 miles to a neat stone barn pizza place down in Pepin. So happy with how the car has transformed over winter!

[m42b32]

pynacl said:

Took the car out for the first decent drive of the season! Cruised along the Saint Croix river for about 200 miles to a neat stone barn pizza place down in Pepin. So happy with how the car has transformed over winter!

That color combo 

[pynacl]

m42b32 said:

That color combo

Thank you!! The cinnamon isn't everyone's cup of tea, but I really like it against the steel gray's blueish tones!

[YoungCR]

Exhaust sounds excellent, mellows out the rasp to a nice tone!

[Jdesign]

I hate the way S54's sound. This is an exceptional exception!

[Andrew]

Wow your exhaust sounds amazing.  Is it raspy at all?

[pynacl]

Andrew said:

Wow your exhaust sounds amazing.  Is it raspy at all?  

Thank you!! This setup virtually eliminated all rasp. I installed each component one at a time and the resonated X pipe seems to be the main contributor to the tone / rasp elimination!

[pynacl]

Big update for me - I bought a house! Was lucky enough to find myself a 4 car garage. The garage needs insulation, drywall and a shit ton of love but the bones look great. Huge thank you to @Rekpointfor helping with the move!

Also got a new Husky tool chest I really dig so far. Quality is pretty good for the money, definitely no snap on, but perfect for me. Has drawer liners, soft close drawers, power etc.

[Rekpoint]

Project garage build starts NOW. Fantastic size. Just needs to be finished!

[YoungCR]

Looks like plenty of room for a lift on the future, congrats!

[pynacl]

No big update, but now that I’m in my own house and no longer a tiny apartment I was able to bust out the pressure washer again! M3 and E90 both got a much needed deep cleaning. M3 also developed an interesting issue with one of the brake pressure sensors, so that looks fun.

136,852 miles

[pynacl]

Side story - I sold the Imola parts car that the cinnamon interior came from. Ended up getting the full interior, an Eisenmann exhaust, tons of interior parts I was missing and made a pretty nice profit. Sure I’ll regret not keeping a spare S54 some day

[pynacl]

Not exactly car related but I knocked out the first step of the garage build - insulating the walls. Such a pain in the ass removing the shelving system the previous owner had. Half was built with nails, at least 1000 of them. After getting all shelving removed, I went with R15 in the walls and eyeing up R38 for the ceiling. My plan is to just finish insulation and vapor barrier this summer and drywall / paint next.

[pynacl]

Noticed a little spot of oil on my garage floor after not driving the car for a bit. At first I thought it was coming from the oil drain plug, but a closer look made me suspect the center oil pan gasket. Sucks I didn’t choose to replace it while the rod bearings were done recently - feels bad dropping fresh oil. Also deep cleaned my reinforcement plate while it was off and it looks pretty darn good!

[pynacl]

Small change - I swapped all the interior lights to LED a while back and just never really liked it. Feel like it modernized the car in a way that didn’t feel right. I’m an idiot and threw away all the original bulbs, so I recently had to go through realoem and gather each bulb part number to buy them through FCP. Feel like the standard bulbs just fit the car better and pair nicely against the cinnamon interior.

Heres a few crappy pics of LED vs standard