Uwbuurman: 1978 323i polaris: almost done

[uwbuurman]

tnx, mates!!

[Mihajlo]

sooo.. how much oil did you burned that day?
are you sure that somebody didn't put a 2 stroke engine instead M20?

[Jeroen]

Good memories about that Ardennes trip, great atmosphere with the whole group, but some sad ones as well like your issues with the car and the bad Belgian roads!

Anyway, thanks for sharing your experiences. Since the original thread is 67 pages long already and you're only halfway lol, I guess we have some more interesting reading coming up in the near future. Good luck with this amazing project, probably the most thorough restore I ever saw!

[uwbuurman]

sooo.. how much oil did you burned that day?
are you sure that somebody didn't put a 2 stroke engine instead M20?

Haha, nope, this M20 used about some 15 litres of oil that day. Or burned...

Tnx Jeroen, comments like that keep me going in the dark moments. Sometimes I really do want to quit, but then I just read my own topics. That helps!

[uwbuurman]

13 november 2010.

Having my crippled car in my storage, I thought that it would be a good thing to get my Alpina's off and put her on storagewheels. So i jacked her up. KRGGGGG... jacksupport through the floorpanel. #^&*@((()!!!!!Damned!

So I put some wooden beams under it and jacked it up under the subframe. In the meanwhile my batterie has gone dead, so I had to push it on a ramp. Took the wheels of and saw some more holes.

So the front wings have to come off and the engine has to come out. I'm curious wath I'm going to find....

[uwbuurman]

Skipped December, so it’s January 2011, the 2nd to be precise.
I’ve made a start on taking it apart. At first I took of the body parts, link bonnet, wings and bumper. Then headlights, grille and some more parts.
Right side off the car is pretty decent, but the left side needs more attention, I believe. The left front inner wheelhouse has a big hole in the fireplate between engine and dashboard. Outersill left is rotten, jackpoints are gone. So I have to take it apart some more, to see the full exetend of the damage.
Forgotten the camera, so here are some crapy Nokia pics.















Next Tuesday we’ll take out the engine. See how that piece of crap turns out…

Than there is my paint. The bonnet needs a respray. The left door needs to be changed, (whats that part called on the the front bumper?) That thing needs a respray, the wings have a some rust spots. What to do, a full body spray? Hmm, that’s a lot more work, so at this point I don’t want that, but we’ll see what the future brings…

At first the engine has to come out.

[uwbuurman]

January 6th 2011.

The engine is out!! 1,25 hours fiddling, but its out. First I took out the cooling system, batterie and other parts that where in the way. Then I saw that my dynamo was not properly lined out on the block, so the belt was not running straight. All mountingrubbers are gone. Nuts and bolts are changed for stainless steel ones.



When the enigine was out, I clearly could see al the oil on the outside in stead of the inside, but there is nog leak. So I can rule out a cracked lower block.






I took off all the belts. They are only 2k km’s old. But on disassembly I saw some strange things.

Here’s not a lot of room for adjustment…. And what the hell is that big bolt doing there?



These gaskets are considerably smaller than the ports in the manifold and the head. So they are the wrong gaskets.





Nice and clean valve, but it looks like some cavitation in the port.



Oily valve. There are two like this one.



Some strange parts on this engine. Cylinder head is apparently from ’92, 731 version.





The lower block says 20 6E B, 22093501. So this one started its life as an 2.0 6 cylinder in an e30.

[uwbuurman]

So my engine appears to be dead. On the Dutch side of this forum it’s accustomed that we have a new years meeting, and in 2011 we went to ESA in Marum, North Groningen. ESA is a truckservice, specialized in DAF. They also overhaul and rebuild engines. Just for the fun of it, we’d like to see an example off a BMW engine, so I took my M20 overthere for the meeting. Some more pics, you can find here

The engine had some stupid flaws, like to small gaskets on the head and the timing was so far off that it couldn’t be adjusted anymore. As it turned out, the head has been welded in two spots. The valve seats haven’t been removed before, so they don’t seal up enough.
Those were the greased valves. Besides that the welding wasn’t done very nice, coolant channels were welded shut and machined. The flow of coolant has been disturbed, so the engine must have had problems with that.

conclusion: this head is dead because of stupid repairs.

Than the lower block. At this point it doesn’t look to bad, but the hone profile is missing, but I don’t see a lot of wear. Lateron in this week the pistons, driveshafts and cranc wil be taken out. Hopefully I can reuse those specific 2.7 parts, so I can just buy me a brand new second hand b25 and start rebuilding me a 2.7i.

[uwbuurman]

After a cylinderhead with flaws and bad repairs, its time for the lower block. Also a goner…. This engine had less than 2k km ago a new D-belt and service/ maintenance/oil change. Must be that something went all wrong.

Pistons all shot, cylinders have serious wear, beyond repair. Some pics.

[uwbuurman]

March 10, 2011. Collected my crank and piston rods.

[uwbuurman]

got a donor, M20 b25 1989 kat version.

[uwbuurman]

Well I gave it som thoughts, and what I really want are some OEM options that my e21 doesn't have yet. Theay are:
pop out windows
LSD 3.45
and a original sunroof. (whoops... that will be a bitch, getting that sorted..)

[uwbuurman]

So a sunroof it will be! After collecting the B25 last week, today, March 19th 2011, it’s time to get me a sunroof. We, my dad and I, left at 6.30 towards the other end of the Netherlands where Loentje lives.

The Donor:



After I stripped out the interior I started to remove the rooflining very careful, as well as the sunroof itself. The donor was a type 1, just like mine, so the lining has a striped pattern, instead of the type 2 squared pattern. This type of lining is no longer available at BMW’s, so I needed to rescue this fragile piece of cloth.

First took the windows out, then called Arnold D. for some technical advice on removing the sunroof.



Time for the grinder!



I would have cut out the whole front window section, but without an recipro saw not doable.



Upside down on the trailer, in a net construction.



Loentje got himself a beauty of an E21 cabriolet.





From Loentje, we went to see Peter V. who donated his underframe to put the bare chassis on.

Finally at home:





On to the next job!

[Peter V.]

Nice to see the whole story comes here. What a work you have done already to the car.....

[uwbuurman]

Thanks Peter!