New member intro

[DarkApollo]

Hi All!

This past weekend I went and picked up what I thought was a well maintained E85 with a 3.0i and 6spd, however when I finally got it home I discovered a LOT of issues. All in all the trip home was a nightmare but my wife has convinced me to fix it up instead of selling it.
Now, I am not new to BMW or turning wrenches (I had an E46 328i that I did all of the work to, rebuilt the VANOS, cooling system, power steering, alt, etc... plus owned a small performance shop for years) however the previous owner of this car did a real number on it.

I guess that's all I have right now.

 

[jock156]

Welcome

 

[buzyg]

Well saved sir. Enjoy the driving. 8)

 

[paddy wright]

Welcome along

 

[Mr Tidy]

Welcome to the forum, and good luck getting your Z4 back to good health.

 

[DMike]

Hi and welcome to the forum! As you have worked woth the e46, youl’ll find the e85 pleasant to work with, plenty of room in the engine bay. Hope you get alll sorted out. Nice top color, btw

 

[MikeyH]

Welcome to the forum, lots of good advice on here.

 

[DarkApollo]

Thank you all for the welcome!

I just want my car to be back on the road SAFELY.
So far the issues seem to be manageable, though now that I am making a list Im not so sure.

The "MUST BE FIXED" list
I NEED to replace the headlight wiring harnesses. The guy destroyed them installing crappy halos. The low beams are not even wired in and it ONLY has high beams. But YAY the stupid CFL halo lights work.
I need to actually attach the front struts to the car. He removed the after market strut brace and did not put the nuts back on the struts, and then drove around like that, so the studs are broken off.
The brakes are spongy but there is still A LOT of pad life left. So that just needs bled or master cyl replaced, but it holds pressure so bleeding those first.
The brake light is on and I know there is a broken pad sensor wire on at least one corner.
ABS/TC lights are on. Hoping that is just a sensor.
Engine light is on, not sure what that is for yet as it is not road worthy for me to go get it checked (my OBD2 scanner is.. somewhere.)
Both roof motors are broken.
The wing mirrors do not move.

The rest is just cosmetic.
Need to replace the interior plastics behind the seat because, again, destroyed.
Dream Red leather is ruined, so that needs replaced (Was told by an upholstery shop that for the extent of the damage it would be cheaper to replace since the covers need to come off anyway)
Need to replace the god awful wood trim (looked great in my 328, but not in a roadster) because it is destroyed and the aluminum looks SO much better.
The radio has an 'infinity knob', spin it 1000 times and the volume might go up enough to hear it..

 

[True-Blue]

I need to actually attach the front struts to the car. He removed the after market strut brace and did not put the nuts back on the struts, and then drove around like that, so the studs are broken off.

WTF!!!…. I hope the car was very cheap

 

[DarkApollo]

WTF!!!…. I hope the car was very cheap

It was not.. Because I had him send me videos of everything I asked for so I could see the condition before taking a 5 hour train ride to come get it and everything looked good. I paid right in the middle of the KBB value. I knew the headlights were 'cobbled together' but I didnt see the harness being hacked up in the video and I just assumed that since it was regularly driven and recently inspected, the most basic of things were in working order, like headlights and the freaking suspension.
At some point between the two weeks of him sending me the videos and me getting there.. He did this... If anyone is wondering, it is darn near impossible to find M8x1.25 press in studs. McMaster has thin panel studs, Dorman does not have them that small, and any place that I DO find them has a 4-6wk delivery time. Thankfully I have a metric ton of fasteners collected over a life time of "Well.. the car is back together but.. why do I have extra bolts" so that is the project for after work today..

Yep.. Seller thought this was totally safe to drive on. Even argued with me that he took it on a few hour road trip the day before I bought it to say good-bye and "It handled like it was on rails".

Note though, this was what it looked like after a few hours of my return drive when the steering wheel got really twitchy and it would cut in HARD. It started making a hard clunking sound on every bump so I pulled over to investigate. I imagine when I set off the drivers side still had two studs at least locating it in the tower. The wheels did not look out of camber when I bought it.

 

[DMike]

Right top shock mount cracked, strut tower eyelets for cross braces torn and rusty… Has he been doing stunt scenes with this car? What else could be messed with the front shocks?

 

[DMike]

…looking at your image, the right rear wheel starts to look suspiciously deep in the wheel well, too.

 

[N4LLY]

Jeeessh

Normaly i would say "Most excellent ! Congrat's" but :?

Good luck getting it straight

 

[DarkApollo]

Right top shock mount cracked, strut tower eyelets for cross braces torn and rusty… Has he been doing stunt scenes with this car? What else could be messed with the front shocks?

Yeah the shock mounts will be replaced.

I ran the codes last night. Cyl 6 misfire, HO2 sensor, and coolent temp sensor. All things easy enough to fix.
Now that just leaves the traction control light which, knowing this kid beat the snot out of the car, could be anything.. Thankfully the ABS light is not on so I do not suspect the pump..... yet. I need to bleed the brakes so that could be part of the problem too.

Looking at different code scanners to read out the rest.. NT530 or a hacked version of ISTA
My current scanner is on a laptop anyway so lugging around a laptop isnt an issue.

 

[MikeyH]

Wow, lots to do. Good job you know what you are doing, not sure whether or not it would be at the breakers had it been me. :thumbsdown:

 

[DarkApollo]

Wow, lots to do. Good job you know what you are doing, not sure whether or not it would be at the breakers had it been me. :thumbsdown:

Believe me, every morning I weigh my options between "its just typical BMW nickel and dime stuff and I know how to fix it" and "I could probably make my money back by parting it out, keep the engine and trans, buy a cheap WELL MAINTAINED high-mileage 3.0 auto and swap everything out..."

Downloaded ISTA, bought a USB cable and also ordered a Foxwell NT530 just to CMA on diag tools.
The cluster has the tamper dot too.. so yay I get to mess with that. Need to reset the VIN in the cluster and the mileage to hopefully pull it from the light module to update it with the correct mileage. I have a chip reader already. I know the last registered mileage from carfax so it isnt off by much, under 5k, so Im not TOO upset about it.

YAY.. nightmare. -_-

 

[Gee-Lanty]

I’m in the same boat, well similar.

My car was a garage Queen for much of its life, had one owner for 16 years. Bought it knowing that fact, unfortunately I didn’t consider it got passed around 4 young owners after being sold, and it turned out they had completely molested it.

Had a whole load of problems, everything including the suspension, steering box, cooling system, interior, seats, roof, headlights, pretty much everything bar the engine was on its last legs.

Every time I fix or replace something my car just gives back in enjoyment. Never want to part with it. So glad I bought it!

Must say I bought the full wood interior set for my car including steering wheel. I honestly cannot understand how people do not like the wood trim, what could be a more luxurious trim than wood?! Certainly not brushed aluminium imho..

 

[DarkApollo]

I honestly cannot understand how people do not like the wood trim, what could be a more luxurious trim than wood?! Certainly not brushed aluminium imho..

Because it is hideous. It does not belong in a roadster. A 5 or 7 series, yes. But not here. Plus it is easily damaged by the sun, the lacquer cracks and peels and chips. I had it in my 3 series and liked it. But in a sports car? A roadster? No. Ew. I will be selling my full set once I replace the center with the nice aluminum.

 

[Gee-Lanty]

I honestly cannot understand how people do not like the wood trim, what could be a more luxurious trim than wood?! Certainly not brushed aluminium imho..

Because it is hideous. It does not belong in a roadster. A 5 or 7 series, yes. But not here. Plus it is easily damaged by the sun, the lacquer cracks and peels and chips. I had it in my 3 series and liked it. But in a sports car? A roadster? No. Ew. I will be selling my full set once I replace the center with the nice aluminum.

Each to their own. I think the Zed looks so classy with the wood…in the right colour of course.

What species of wood do you have?

 

[DarkApollo]

What ever the ‘premium wood trim’ was. It is hideous and does not go with the interior. Gray dash, red seats, red door cards, and this horrible brown trim that matches nothing. It just does not belong. The brushed aluminum looks cleaner, matches the light gray plastics, the brushed silver door pulls, and the red accents.
In my 328 it was walnut burl so I imagine that is the same for this.
In my 328 it went well. Because IT WAS the accent. Gray interior with the wood trim dash and center console and shift knob. It worked really well. It looked good.