Uwbuurman: 1978 323i polaris: almost done

[uwbuurman]

So that seatbracket is a goner. I quickly got hold of a donorpiece and started dismanteling and welding. Again.



The hole is clearly dented and the tread is gone.



Out!



Fitting the new one



Welding



And finished

[uwbuurman]

After that, I still had to clear some parts of the floor. A nasty job, but it has to be done.

[uwbuurman]

[uwbuurman]

Then I needed to drill some new holes in my freshly restored shell…

8 holes for the ventwindows.









And the A pillar has this round hole. The drainhose from the slindingroof fits there, so I want it going out there instead of letting the water go into the sill, as BMW designed it.



But hee, on the other side the hole is missing. It keeps you wondering what BMW did to there panels.



So I outlined the hole. No pic of the hole after drilling, but trust me, it’s there.

[uwbuurman]

[uwbuurman]

[uwbuurman]

After the welding all was done (finally) it was time for the next step. I loaded the E21 on to the trailer again and got it to a carrestorer, who sanded and sandblasted i tand gave it an epoxyprimer coating. I’m happy with the results!!

On this pic the e21 just arrived. It’s in the pleasant company of two bugatti’s from the early 30’s, two BMW 1602 full cabrio’s from the same owner. One of them has also been restrored by Brové in the past. Same story as mine. Bad, bad, bad… The son of the owner is working on his E30 Baur, that once belonged to his mother.







Last week they sanded the skin. Roof and side and rear panels are sanded by hand, 6 hours of work.



Nice to see the old copper welds come out.

[uwbuurman]

Last few days the car has been sandblasted and sprayed in epoxy primer. It came out very nice!

[uwbuurman]

And she’s back home!

[uwbuurman]

This topic is now up to date! after getting the e21 home, I have done nothing to it. From now on, I will update this every time there is a new update.

Close inspection learned that there are a couple of spots where little holes are blasted innto the metal. Rusty spots, that where worse than I thought, the spots where the roof has been put on, and a few more spots. I'll have to attent to those spots before I can go on with sealing all the seams and putting the undercoating back on the underside and in the boot and put the sound damping material back in the car. After that is done, I'll spray the inder side, the enginebay, the interior and the boot in colour. This will all be somewhere between April and September (I hope)

[croma_man]

hats off, sir !

[Jeroen]

Many thanks for sharing and translating all the detailed info on this more than impressive project, making it all available to the English section as well.

Really looking forward to the next updates, not expecting you have to pull things apart anymore so it's all forward from now. Good luck!

[jimbob]

+1
A great refernce for any e21 body repair.
I have enjoyed following this up to date

[jimbob]

Just looking at the shell again in primer, it looks so good and must be damn
satisfying to have your e21 at this stage.

[uwbuurman]

Thanks Gents!! indeed I'm very happy to get it this far! I do have to close some little holes and a few spots where the metal has gotten to thin have to be sorted aswell. 'Some spots need new metal and other spots will do with tin coating, but that means also sandblasting on spots and flametorching it. But it's almost ready for some colour!!! :