1984 320is

So I haven't done any more cleaning up in the engine bay since the last update. Just been too damn busy I guess. But I did find a nice donor car for a few of the go-fast parts I need for the 2002. This old man sold me an 1983 320is with only 109k on the clock for $400. The thing was a runner, but it spewed a serious amount of fuel out the fuel pump when it ran, like if you let it idle for 5 minutes you'd have a huge lake of gasoline under the car, and the thing idled at 3K. So the old man had a friend that does a lot of speed and has a tow truck and he agreed to tow it down from Vallejo. The seller was 61 and just makes a living flipping cars. He said he just likes cars a lot. He had maybe 8 old German cars on his driveway and littering the entire neighborhood... include a gray market 323i Baur. The guy flipped his lid when I told him how much the gearbox alone was worth in that rusted out old ragtop.

Anyhow, I slowed the fuel leak down by tightening up some hose clamps, got the thing started, and served up N.Oakland one saturday morning to see how the gearbox and differential sounded. I got her up to 60+ on Market Street and it all sounded legit. The LSD came into effect when I dumped the clutch at 4k and left a nice two-wheel screetch at a few stop signs, and the gearbox shifted nicely. So i took her back home and pulled this bad boy out:

A 3.91 Limited Slip Differential with pretty low mileage... for its vintage. It should clean up well, whever I find time to clean it out and swap out the rear cover to make it a direct drop-in for the 2002.

Today I pulled the motor out of the red donor car. Man I couldn't figure out why the motor didn't want to pull right out for the life of me.. duh I forgot to disconnect the exhaust manifold. It was almost dark out and of course the exhaust studs were rusted solid on there, so I busted out the acetylene torch and just cut the pipe after the Y connection. Next step is to find a buyer for the motor and seperate out the 5 speed gearbox. The gearbox and the LSD differential alone would have cost me $500 to source, plus I got another set of Recaro seats. Man, I got two sets of bucket seats and three sets of rims for a car that doesn't even run. That's how we do I guess.

Taking things apart is a lot of fun actually... Putting them back together... we'll see about that.