Gear Oil, Diff Oil, Replaced Coilpacks with Later model coils (not a hard modification, just have to delete the external ignitor as the new style coil packs have them internally) Much better no more on boost miss-fires. Went for a thrash.
(imported from here) Red and orange don't look good... So I painted them... (imported from here) That may not have been completely necessary, considering you can't really see them. But I did it anyway, cause I'm a t**t and I just couldn't live with it. Just like when Freiburger didn't like the black doors on the white junkyard Cuda, I guess. And yes, I did mask off the serial numbers and such with a very obvious piece of tape (imported from here) I also completely gashed the top part of tread for the top nut of the shock because it wouldn't come off so I had to use a dremel and a screwdriver and a hammer. That's probably a bad thing. Hopefully I can bodge something so the new nuts I ordered will still go on properly. Also ruined the top spring pad and one of the top mounts by getting loads of steel dust from the dremel in there, and setting fire to it when I tried to get the nut to expand/loosen... I am about as delicate a mechanic as Clarkson, but no matter! I will succeed! I'll try and undo the nut on the other shock with an impact wrench... I only realised "If it was put on there with an impact gun, it will come off with an impact gun too!" after I had already made a mess of this side... Will update with a pic of the new height when they're finally on, in a few weeks probably... gonna paint the top spring plates first and clean everything and such though.
Plugged the left rear tire, was at 17 psi, now inflated and fixed. Also changed oil and filter. Isn't fun on a dirt driveway.
I bought a 2003 BMW M3 Convertible recently, and I picked it up on Friday. I noticed that the transmission (SMG) would slip into neutral in hot weather. I went to the dealer a picked up a salmon SMG relay, as it's often the cause of this issue for $20. And it worked! I drove it a while when I was first looking at it, and the transmission shifted just fine. Also, the hydraulic pump was replaced 20,000 miles earlier, so I knew that wasn't causing the issue. The front disks need to be replaced soon, and a few small cosmetic issues need to be addressed. But otherwise, not bad for a <$15,000 car. I'll post some better pictures tomorrow if I get the chance. Here are more pictures: https://imgur.com/a/nlpeX
You can add the "M" package to a car that AFAIK adds the badges, rims and body kit. I was car shopping for a 330 last year and came across quite a few of them with this option.
If I was in a situation where I could own an M3 as a secondary car, I would definitely choose a six speed manual over the SMG transmission. As this will be my daily driver, and will most likely have to sit in Austin traffic from time to time, I found that the SMG is a pretty decent compromise between a manual and automatic transmission. Although the convertible adds around 300 pounds to the car, It's nice to have the option to put the top down on a nice day. And since I have no future plans on taking the car on a track, it's just fine. It's more just a matter of personal preference, and what was on the used market at the time I purchased the car. If you look at the vin, non-M cars have WBA instead of WBS as the first 3 characters in the vin, which is a easy way to differentiate a real M3 and a fake. If you're referring to ZHP E46's, I'm pretty sure none of them, at least to my knowledge, have many visual characteristics similar to M3's. Hope that helps.
Soooo, all of the components of my suspension control system for my buggy is ready to be installed. The main components I still need to put the gauge on the dashboard. Functions: When the toggle switch is up, the inlet solenoid is activated, the pressure gauge shows the pressure in the tank and you can fill each shock independently by pressing any of the red buttons. you can also connect a compressor pipe to the solenoid bank, open the valve and pump up your tires etc. When the toggle switch is in the middle, both the inlet and exhaust solenoids are closed, so you can equalize the pressure in any 2, 3 or all 4 shocks by pressing 2, 3 or all 4 red buttons. when you press any red button, the gauge shows the pressure in the corresponding shock/s. If the toggle switch is down, the exhaust solenoid is activated and air can be let out of any/all shocks by pressing any/all red buttons. - - - Updated - - - Video coming soon, hopefully. - - - Updated - - - compressor and tank is mounted, now its just the piping that needs to be finished and the wiring that needs to be done....
Don't be hatin so easily guys. The M3 SMGs are actually really not bad at all, at least on the E36s they're actually very good and since the system of the E46 is based on the E36 one, I imagine they're both really good compared to other cars. There's this guy on bimmerforums who's a real OEM-fetishist(he's called M-Parallel), who used to own a mint E36 coupe 325i with EVERY optional extra retro-fitted, guy was a real M3 nut. He actually traded his for an E36 M3 convertible with an SMG(again, unbolting all his custom installed extra's from the 325 and retro-fitting it to the M3). That said, yes, I too would've gone for a 325 with a manual over an M3 with a sequential, but even then. on the E36 and E46 they're just not as bad as people make them out to be, or as bad as they are on other cars @hondaprelude: Your car looks really nice, congratz on it! Love the color, the wheels and love the bulge in the hood those things have, car looks really clean and original too! Is the yellow lighting in the cluster stock? It looks kinda weird with the orange/red on the cd player and then having yellow in the cluster. Presume a previous owner fitted the yellow? Also, question: On the pic of the shifter, what's the button between the 2 left windows? I think your climate control system is exactly the same unit as in the E36? As for what I did.. Wellllll... Everything you see except for the top spring plate has been replaced, and the top spring plate has been sanded and sprayed with Hammerite Rubber pads, springs, top mounts are brand new, and the shocks were new last year and haven't done more than maybe 1000 miles/1600km, if that, so they're "new" too. And I've got 2 strut tower reinforcement plates laying around too, so my strut towers won't crack from the extra forces. Gonna use an impact gun to get the nut off the other shock maybe tomorrow or something. Can't wait to see these puppies on the car.
It caught on fire.... RIP Escort. Some idiot pressed the lighter in and didn't realize that sparks caught the upholstery.
I just looked this up because I noticed a button on that location while looking for a 328i sedan as well (can't afford but one can dream). Apparently the sedan and wagon have a button on that location to lock the windows, on the convertibles the button is different and it apparently opens/closes all windows simultaneously. I can't confirm it but Google told me this so it must be right.
Thanks! The instrument cluster is stock to my knowledge, and has a much more orange cast to it in the sunlight. It probably appeared yellow due to poor lighting from being in my garage at night. The middle button just controls all of the windows, which I believe is only available on convertible E46 M3's. And I'd imagine the climate control is slightly different, but has a similar layout. The car is stock, other than the Borla exhaust system (which I'll probably end up selling in favor for the stock unit.), a more rigid rear subframe, and a few black trim pieces (which I'll also end up swapping for stock trim.) I need to polish up a few interior trim pieces, get a few small dents and rock chips out of the bodywork, and replace the front disks. I absolutely love owning it so far. And I haven't had any issues with it slipping into neutral in hot whether after replacing the salmon SMG relay. So, yay! And here's another picture of the instrument cluster in daylight. I also took some better pictures of the car yesterday: https://imgur.com/a/peNyH
Gorgeous car mate! Love it In other news: One of my new springs+shocks is on the car... The other one: Not so much. Need to go to a garage and get someone with an impact gun to undo the fucker for me... Hopefully tomorrow.
I have never posted in this thread but thought I might now seeing as how I did a good bit of work on our truck today. (2000 Chevy Silverado 1500 4x4 Z71 Vortec V8 5.3L Ext. Cab Automatic Trans. with 246+ thousand miles) The thing was getting really bad, for starters, when you started it (pun intended) it would either sputter to life, would refuse to start and crank forever until you gave it gas and then sometimes it would not idle and if you didn't give it gas, thenit would die, sometimes I alsmot did burnouts to get out of where I was like a parking lot because I had to keep it revving in order to keep it from dying and when I shifted into drive the thing would of course, go because the engine was revved. But then it would die later at a stop sign, and even then once it got going it would idle at like 350-400 RPMs instead of it usual 500. And this just progressed until we did someting about it. So yesterday we went in and replaced all of the spark plugs with ACDelco (which the engine is actually tuned to run with) and wires (the wires were original) and it worked for a bit, started nice at first, then went down hill again. But at least it was firing on all 8 (which it didn't seem to do before hand). Also that day we replaced the oil filler cap, beause, it got lost somewhere. Then today we replaced the fuel pressure regulator, and for those that know how those are supposed to work, when we checked it it didn't have any gas in the vacuum line, well I went out in the truck to get the new part anyway, came back, took the line off the top, and gas just pored out...so yeah that had gone bad, replaced that, it fired right up, and ever since it starts almost instantly with little to no hesitation. Gonna be weird after going almost a year with having to force it into life to it just starting on its own. Then after that we replaced the air filter which was in bad need of replacing. Also the brakes had gotten to the point where they grind and scrape while driving (only a little) and moaned whie being used and when you cam to a stop the whole truck would shake violanelty (I was afraid if the truck fell apart it would be because the brakes made it fall apart). And we found out why, the inner pad on the rear driver side pair was down to the metal and the inner side of the rotor was almost gone, it was like knife thin and it had warped inward into the spaces between the fins on the inside and it seems like it would just bounce in those grooves and shake the whole truck, and when it was taken off the rotor actually broke around the edges, so we got a new rotor and pads and fixed it right up, the thing is very smooth now. Fixed that yesterday and today did the rear passenger. Amazing what a little time and effort (and money) can do, fixed up something on its last leg and gave it new life again, hope it holds out to 300,000 miles. Next things to do is replace the AC/heater blower fan, that is messed up (either that or the relay (only works on 5)), replace the passenger floor board light (really miner, but I can't stand not having lights work) and then weld an new shock braket to the driver rear, because that shock is againt the bed instead of being on the axle, doesn't sound nice on bumps.
if its only working on 5, its neither the fan nor the relay. The relay is on for settings 1-5, so clearly if you can turn the fan off and have it come on for 5, the relay is at least doing its job. Whats more likely is the resistor matrix. Usually the max setting bypasses the resistor matrix, lower settings switch combinations of active resistance to limit the current to the motor and slow it down. The resistors can be blown out under some circumstances, prevents blower from working on any setting other than max.
