Sorry but this is only a fragment of what I've already done to the car. The thread would be way too much work to put together and there's simply too much to document with what's been done to the car since 2017. I've basically replaced everything on the car other than the steering rack/pump

 

I get it. I've been slowly trying to replace all the broken photos in my build thread and it has been a time consuming headache. I think I got 2 more years (2016 and 2017 posts) to fix until it's done.

 

Removed dealer installed "wood" grain stickers and wrapped with black brushed aluminum. Also installed an Alpine head unit. Pics for before and after.

 

The brushed black aluminum looks awesome! How difficult was that to wrap?

 

Thank you. It was not easy but not too hard either. This was my first time using vinyl wrap. I'll say that the process is very easy but because of the automatic lights and suxh and the HVAC lights and all that, there is a decent amount of templating I did too make sure it was right. I also wet applied where I needed to use the template and that caused it's own complications. Wrapping all you see there took me about 3 hours and it's not perfect but it's pretty good.

 

Fancy new engine under cover from jzz30.com Then I washed it, and drove for 2hrs with my daughter.

 

Drove mine to work for the first time in three months!

 

I love the black interior. Great Job!

 

Finally got the water pump/timing belt/camshaft & crank seals job done. Have to say it was a bigger PITA than I anticipated. I managed to get the crankshaft pulley off relatively easy, but ran in to several other issues:

• RockAuto has the wrong water pump seal listed on their website (2 of the 10 bolt holes didn't line up) Couldn't find it locally, including the:dealership that wanted $25. Ended up using RTV for that
• Couldn't find the bypass metal gasket except at the dealer - $12 - what a rip
• The harmonic balancer puller kit didn't have anything that could take the crankshaft sprocket off- trip to ACE for M6 bolts fixed that.
• Advance Auto gave me a drive belt idler pulley that didn't fit. No one had it locally that I could find and the stealership wanted $144... just for the pulley! I ended up going to a local parts place that does machine work and had them press a new bearing in for $30 total.

All of this because the mechanic the prior owner took the car to for a timing belt 3 years and 15K miles ago didn't do the water pump (which started leaking). The camshaft seals definitely needed to be done as well. So, at 130K miles we should be set for another 60-75K miles.

I've been a little disenchanted with the price of parts. I got out of my BMW E36 partly because parts were so dang expensive. Unfortunately it doesn't appear that parts for these things are much less. I also have to say that driving the automatic is a bit of buzzkill after driving my MT E36. Not sure if this is going to be a long-term car for me. I haven't fallen in love with it yet, but I'll give her a bit more time.

 

I'll say that my M3 was definitely more of a visceral driving experience than an SC will ever be. It's controls are more direct, it's more responsive, and the car provides feedback to the driver like few others can. HOWEVER, with that being said, the SC does some things that the E36 simply cannot. It's a much smoother, quieter, and reliable car than any E36 ever wishes it could be. The interior makes the E36 feel like it was crafted in a third world country by comparison. I also find the SC simpler to work on (despite the issues you ran into). I never had issues finding or justifying the price of parts with the GE, so it bums me out that you had that issue. Hopefully moving forward it won't be so bad!

The two cars certainly have their ups and downs. I think a manual SC is a nice compromise between the two. It makes the car sportier without sacrificing the comforts that make it so awesome compared to driving an E36 around. But, don't get me wrong, I'd buy another E36 M3 in a heartbeat. It wouldn't come at the cost of getting rid of my SC though. I made that mistake once and won't be making it again any time soon lol.

 

Thanks for talking me down from the ledge a bit Rudy! I am kicking myself a little for not grabbing that 5 speed from you. I was a little concerned about what kind of shape it was in after being mated to that GTE.
I think part of my issue with driving enjoyment is that the suspension needs a total refresh. All 4 struts are blown and I imagine the control arms need to be replaced. One outer tie-rod is a little loose too. Once I did the suspension rebuild on my E36 I was in heaven. It was crazy how well that 25 year old car handled.
Also, the seats sit too freakin' high. I'm only 6 foot and my hair touches the headliner (I prefer to sit upright). I had sport seats in my E36 and thought they were comfortable (I upgraded to E46 sports seats shortly after buying the car and I thought those were awesome).
Enough of my complaining. On to researching manual swap options because those W58s seem to be very hard to come by.
I'm curious where everyone buys most of their parts?

 

To be completely honest, I would have been a little concerned about its overall health as well. Granted it shifted gears well, and the fluid wasn't horribly dirty. But if you're going to go through all the work and spend the money, it's nice to know you bought something decent that you can rely on.

A bushing and shock refresh or upgrade would go a long ways for sure! Both E36's and SC's are at the age where all of those parts have slowly worn out or dried up causing a lot of slop. My car with poly bushings on coilovers is a completely different animal on the road and at the track!

Agreed on the seats! I'm only 5'11", so I do ok until I put a helmet on. With the leather seats I have to recline almost past the point of comfort to sit comfortably in the car with a helmet on. I'd also like to change seats to something more bolstered with a slightly lower seating position.

Like any older car, if you're willing to go through and sort it I think your efforts will pay off with a much higher level of driver satisfaction. As for parts, I was able to find everything I needed from Rock Auto or most auto parts stores. I'm surprised you had so many issues with finding simple parts for yours. Rock Auto is typically spot on for me with my car (granted, the new JDM GTE motor makes that a little more trying at times). The GE's make life easy, parts are simple, and they're relatively easy to work on IMO (even compared to my old E36).

I hope you come to enjoy it as much as I have mine! You're always welcome to give me a shout with any questions or to bring the car by my place for a second opinion/set of eyes on things.

 

So I've had to wait a long time for some of these shops to get my parts done. In the meantime I added a lot of little things to the list just to stay productive. I changed the steering wheel to a Celica wheel with Rav4 airbag. My grandfather got me an OEM shift **** brand new in 2014. I decided the car is worthy enough to run it now. On top of that, he got me the best floor mats I've ever seen, custom-made Coco mats with a template matched to my OEM Soarer mats, including the tunnel mat. I feel like I don't deserve to drive this car! Thanks, grandpa.

I also did my valve cover gasket, as well as OEM bolt washer gaskets. Decided to polish the valve cover bolts since I had everything set up for the suspension bolts. Here are some pics of how everything is going. I figured since I'm replacing every suspension arm I'll do the inner and outer tie rods with new boots as well. In the meantime, the powder coater finally finished blasting, zinc primering and powder coating silver hammertone on all the parts. I've got all the bushings installed despite some sleeves I didn't know I had to remove.

The zinc platers finally finished plating all my hardware too. The apple cider vinegar and walnut shells worked great but did not strip the bolts 100%. I had to spend quite a bit of time sandblasting the rest of what didn't strip from the hardware, mainly in the threads. My grandfather had a sandblaster set up in his basement for when he did his suspension hardware. The only thing holding me back now is polishing and ceramic coating the bolt heads. I'm about halfway done with that, but when I'm done with the hardware it'll all start getting assembled.

I used 22PLE VM1 metal/rim coating on all the powder coated parts.

This worldwide panic is creating a lot more free time for me soon so I'm sure I'll have more pics soon!

 

Over the weekend, I've wet sanded and cleared headlights and repainted the front bumper. Few more days after some cure time and I'll be wet sanding bumper and headlights then polishing.

 

Looks wonderful Shay - excellent work!