Slow n' Steady E46 Drift Build

[gunnawingit]

So i've been lurking around the forums for a few years now lusting over all the crazy builds i have seen and some of the astonishing work. I've been into drifting for most my life but being the only car nut i hadn't gone to one event till last year where i attended BDC and a Teeside practise day hosted by DRIFTNUTS.

Here comes the start of a costly hobby.

2000 BMW 325ci with a M54B30 conversion

Overall i still got the car at an absolute steal from a good facebook friend however it did need some work doing which would be my first stage. I am going to attempt to do most of this myself which will be a huge learning curve as I've never worked on a car in my life however being a student doesn't allow for a mechanic to work on the car permanently.

The plan is to have it as a 'pro am' spec car so fully caged and a good hydro on duel calipers and so on but to also retain a full front interior so dash and carpet, i still want to be able to take it out the odd weekend so i want to be able to still enjoy it however to still be able to be BDC/Driftcup legal in case i were ever going to get to that stage.

While i have no access to a trailer and not enough to fork out the insurance i have plenty of time to build so i'd rather do it right once then half ass it (as much as possible).

More to follow

files are coming up as too big however i will try put pictures up later

 

[gunnawingit]

So this was a few months ago however i'm backlogging to get you up to speed.

On the day we picked up the car it was a bit surreal to see it in person only ever following the owner on facebook, it was sold as needing work so i knew what i were getting into and we learnt a few of the issues straight away however we were pre aware.

The first issue was the diff carrier bushes were absolutely shot and the car overall was a bit of a mess ranging from mould inside, mismatched panels such as the laguna seca blue convertible m3 doors hidden behind black spraypaint (which leaked a lot of water we came to find out) as well as few other bits and pieces.


Originally the car was going to be a several year build however just recently i got a half decent job so things start to speed up after these first few months however i will warn ahead that i start with very little cosmetic jobs to ease myself into it as well as getting motivation as the car is kept a small while away from my home.

P.S i had to use an outside app to resize the pics, if anyone has any advice to integrate pictures in HD or an easy way to resize then i'd be grateful.

Owen

 

[gunnawingit]

Been quite badly ill the past few months which has stopped me visiting the car and doing pieces however i'm hoping to have some updates in the next few days if my health doesn't play me up!

Owen

 

[gunnawingit]

Sorry for the lack of updates, i should start getting weekends off work soon again which means I'll have time to work on the car.

Since I cannot physically work on the car I've done what every other car guy does and that's window-shopping (or so I thought) and I came across an m50b25. That is the engine from the e36 325i and is notoriously known in the BMW world as a pretty good engine when it comes to boosting.

After advice from Wout at Eizel Motorsport (who is a bit of a BMW Yoda), I have decided that over Christmas I'm going to attempt to rebuild this engine and stroke it to a 2.8 from the m52 engine and then eventually get some boost into it and it into the e46. They've been known to hold around 500 horsepower with just a thicker head gasket however while it's out I'd rather overbuild and avoid dragging it out in the future.

As for other purchases I've recently bought new body panels to fix the bumper and door issue which should hopefully be going on in the next week.


I'll grab some pictures once the engine stand gets here from SGS.