Now that I've gotten to a significant point in ths project I thought I'd share for the first time and maybe get feedback.



Some of you may remember this- I posted it over a year ago. My first attempt at drifting and the nearly stock '02 did well. It did take me the better part of a day to get it down though. At the time all I had was cut springs, some old bilstein shocks and a junkyard 3.91 LSD.

The engine blew a few weeks later so it had to come out.



My son enjoyed that part.

And a new one was dropped in - at least for a test fit.



I found a 2.7 eta engine on craigslist for $150, an "I" head at the junkyard for $100 and the proper "super eta" pistons to fit it all together for $175 on an E30 forum. A local machine shop did some honing and all new rings, bearings and rod bolts were used. I lightened the flywheel substantially to 17 lbs.



The lower cover that holds the front crankshaft seal had its belt cover portion milled off.



Here's another picture of an earlier test fit. I've made my own motor mounts and gotten it mounted and lined up well. I took measurements for the drive shaft shortening before I took the whole mess out to rebuild the engine. I'm using the 323i transmission to make things a bit simpler. I may put the 325i tranny in if it breaks. Hammering on the tranny tunnel was a breeze. Making the transmission mount from scratch was a little more difficult.

I will post more update photos later of the mounts and how it fits. Until then, here are some photos of the car when I bought it and then what it looked like after I got my hands on it.




mmmm my perfect dash.



At the Golden Gate fields drift event in early 2005.



This area was previously rusted through like swiss cheese (just below the window between the door handle and the mirror.) I welded it all up, sprayed it with $15.00 worth of touch up paint and now you can't even tell.



Someone resprayed the car without removing the trim while living near the ocean. A recipe for surface rust. The rest of the paint is nice and the body is real straight. There is no structural rust. The rust issues are also being addressed during the engine swap.

Here it is in front of my other pride and joy, my autocross winning 1975 VW rabbit. It runs Megasquirt EFI, which I also plan to run on my bimmer.



I also have two sets of suzuki gsxr throttle bodies and a hacked off 325i intake manifold. It would end up pretty much like this:



Either that or a nice turbo - or both! We'll see what happens!
_________________
-Daniel

M20 swap blog: http://www.bmw2002faq.com/component/option,com_forum/Itemid,57/page,viewtopic/t,277525/


Last edited by m20ohtwo on 4-20-07 08:05; edited 5 times in total