'88 5 speed

[nataku83]

Well, I just picked up this somewhat rough '88 5 speed, cirrus blue, lotus interior. I figured I would start documenting the work I do to help me keep track of everything. Anyway, I'll start with exterior pictures as it made it home:





The car looks pretty good overall, but the paint is obviously a very cheap re-spray with no clear coat, and it's starting to get some small chips in it. The interior is definitely the roughest part, and the front seats need to be completely reupholstered.

[nataku83]

Well, I made my first mechanical repair tonight (after starting a number of other fixes, but I'll get to those). The steering box mounting bracket broke while the PO owned the car, and he installed a fix with a number of bolts and washers. There was noticeable looseness in the steering on the drive home, and he included the Mr. Wrench fix (http://www.mwrench.com/download/steeringfix.pdf) with the car, so after reviewing the instructions, I decided to go for it. The whole repair took under half an hour, most of which was me trying to find a suitable location for the jack (the only car I own lower than this one is my Miata, and at least that has sufficient front spoiler clearance to where I can drive it up on ramps, yikes!)

Here are the pics of the installed fix:




It still needs to be welded, but at the moment I:

have the gauges out, and requisite portions of the dash off as well (including the steering wheel), since the odometer is busted and the fuel gauge is flakey

have the ICV off - idle was an appropriate 700 rpm sometimes, 1500 rpm other times (usually once the car was hot) and 'stuttered' pretty badly in 3, 4th and 5th when in gear and under 1600 RPM with the throttle closed. A resistance test showed that the middle pin on the connector was open, while the outer connectors were at about 3x the "spec'd" resistance.

have the intake boot from the air filter to the AFM off, since it was very badly torn

Parts are on order for all of these, and I'll post pics with the fixes, and then take the car to have that steering bracket reinforcement welded on.

[The Sixer Kid]

The car look great. There are not very many 88/89 cars with the highline.

See here for info on the Mwrench fix: viewtopic.php?t=9069

[nataku83]

Thanks for the feedback!

What exactly do you mean by "the highline." I know the PO was a forum member, so probably some users on here are already familiar with the car - but it looks like a lot of the interior was swapped with an L6 or various other 6ers, so I'm not entirely sure what's original. I'm guessing the leather headliner might be an original part that indicates it's a highline, but I'm still not too familiar with the e24 world.

[The Sixer Kid]

Highline is something of a slang term in the e24 community.

As far as I can tell, every e24 sold in the US for the model year 88 and 89 were highlines.

This included:

Leather everywhere (doors, headliner, knee pad, glove box... minus the dash though)

Power everything

World Bumpers

M30b35 engine. Like I said earlier, the vast majority of these were bolted to the 4hp22eh transmission. Some (like mine) have been converted to 5-speeds.

[nataku83]

Well, I got the cluster back in, and the odometer / trip meter appears to work (thanks to odometergears.com). I've been having issues with the car idling at around 700 RPM sometimes and 1500 RPM other times, so figured I'd check the ICV.

The middle of the three terminals read open when connected to either of the outer plugs, and the resistance between the outer plugs was out of spec, so I bought a used one and tried installing that. Unfortunately, it seems that wasn't the only culprit.

I checked the TPS, and it looked like it was giving intermittent readings with the throttle closed / almost closed. Sometimes it read open, sometimes it was closed, so I ordered a new one. I hope this fixes it, I don't want to have to start tracing down vacuum leaks, or looking even more in depth at the fuel system...

[nataku83]

Alright, after a new-to-me ICV and a brand new TPS, the idle appears to be settling at around 750 RPM with maybe 50-100 RPM of wandering. It does seem like the idle is at around 900-1000 when if I put the car into neutral while moving, and then settles down to 750 once I stop. This may be a small vacuum leak or it could just be the E24's lumpy idle, so I think I'll ignore it until after I get a chance to adjust the valves.

I also noticed today that the rear blower actually does work, but only when the A/C button is pushed. Is this normal? I'll try a search in a bit, but I figure I'd post here just in case someone is still reading...

[nataku83]

Well, after getting the idle reasonably settled, I took the car to be inspected. Passing a safety and emissions inspection is necessary to transfer a title in TX, which can be a real pain with a car that needs as much work as this. Anyway, the car failed the first emissions test pretty miserably, both HC and CO %.

<img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3440/400 ... d422_o.jpg" width="800" height="229" alt="inspection1">

I interpreted this as the car running rich. The PO also claimed the car needed a new O2 sensor to make the CEL stay off, but I never had it come on, so I wasn't sure of this. Anyway, I dropped the exhaust to make getting at the O2 sensor easier and discovered that the guibo "recently" installed by the PO was damaged! It looked like he installed it with all of the bolts facing the same direction, re-used the lock nuts, didn't torque down the bolts enough, and used 1 incorrect bolt with a number of washers to try to make it fit better. I'm amazed I didn't notice any significant driveline vibration on the 700 mile drive home with this thing.

Anyway, you can see below what the old guibo looked like. Notice, the damage is only around 3 of the holes, which were where the bolts were installed in the incorrect direction. It seems those installation directions need to be taken seriously!

<img src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2672/400 ... 09fe_b.jpg" width="1024" height="773" alt="P9130002">

While I had the guibo off, I also removed the shifter, replaced the rubber boot that was pretty much disintegrated, replaced the shifter cup bushing, and replaced the shift rod joint and the little foam buffer that goes in there. Reinstalling it with new moly grease and all of the little spacers and circlips was a pain, but I finally got it all together. The shift action still feels too light, but I guess it's improved over what it was before.

I removed the old O2 sensor, and replaced it with a new universal bosch 4 wire sensor, and then spliced it into the old harness and routed everything correctly. TX will allow you to get an emissions waiver if you spend > $100 on emissions related parts, and the car still doesn't pass, so I decided to also replace the coolant temperature sensor (I suspect this could have been causing everything to run rich if it was telling the injection system that the coolant was cold all the time), set all of the valve clearances, and replace the spark plugs. I used Bosch Platinum +4, even though they seem to be fairly disliked, simply so I could get over the $100 threshold.

By the way, the valve-train looked good, one of the banjos was a little loose, but I tightened that right up. The valves were all either correct, or within a thousandth or two, but I went ahead and made sure they were all set to spec.

<img src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2536/400 ... bf5bc4.jpg" width="500" height="377" alt="P9170005">
<img src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2578/400 ... 2ecbe7.jpg" width="500" height="377" alt="P9170004">

Finally, the moment of truth. I took the car back to the service station, they put it up on the dyno, and couldn't believe the results! The car passed with flying colors.

<img src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2658/400 ... f903_o.jpg" width="800" height="200" alt="inspection2">

It's great to finally be able to transfer the vehicle title into my name. Now I don't have to worry about losing the car due to some sort of sketchiness in the transaction, and can put some money into it.

While it was up in the air, I also replaced the pitman arms attaching the trailing arms to the rear subframe. The previous ones were pretty humble looking...

<img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3428/400 ... 6c44_b.jpg" width="1024" height="773" alt="P9130003">

I recently took the car to a chain muffler place and had the mwrench bracket welded to the bottom of the subframe. It seemed to tighten the steering up quite a lot over having the bracket sitting in there loosely. The upper control arm bushings were torn, one was completely loose, and the other was just a bit degraded

<img src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2469/400 ... f8baab.jpg" width="500" height="377" alt="PA030003">

I bought some of the Meyle HD bushings, and a 6 ton hydraulic press, and put the new bushings into the control arms. The ball joint boots were also in poor condition, so I removed them and am waiting for replacement boots from BMPDesign before reinstalling the control arms.

Short Term To Do List:
I have new front brake pads, wear sensors and engine mounts on order right now. I had to remove the calipers and loosen the dust shield to be able to pull off the control arms, so installing the new brake components will be necessary before I put the car back on the ground.

I also got a used, crack free '88 dash off eBay for very cheap (it's almost perfect), so hopefully I can get around to getting that in soon as well.

Finally, when I bought the car, the tank was almost empty. After refilling it, the fuel gauge refused to go back down again, so I'm guessing the float could be stuck in the sender. I'd like to try to take it out and see if it's something I can loosen up, or if I need a new sender. I have the o-ring for this, and it doesn't seem like a big deal to remove, so hopefully I can get this addressed soon as well.

If anyone has any tips, feel free to suggest them. I'm sure I'll be doing a lot of "search" when I start in on this stuff.

[Chris Wright]

Have you seen my post and downloaded the ETM and Work Shop Manuals?

[nataku83]

...i haven't really felt the need to look at them. i know the etm will help before i do the fuel level sender. i also bought the e28 bentley.

[Chris Wright]

With the Bentley and the ETM, you're pretty well set, I just wanted to make sure you were aware of the info in the post. I figure people are getting tired of seeing it!

[mikeB7]

Looks like good intelligent work so far. The car has fallen into good hands.

It's a good basis for work, too, I'd say, being a late model 5-spd and presumably rust-free TX car.

What are your longer term plans for it?

[nataku83]

Thanks, I appreciate the compliments.

So far I have been quite disappointed in the way it drives. My E30 is much more sprightly, if a bit slower and less stable at high speeds. My intended plan was to fix EVERYTHING wrong with it mechanically, and see if it becomes a nice car to drive. If I get reasonably attached to it, I will continue to do a cosmetic restoration, including reconditioning most of the leather interior, the necessary body work (there are quite a few small dings on the driver side door / rear quarter, as well as one section of poorly matched body filler on the bottom of the rear quarter that is not noticeable unless you look at it exactly right) and a paint job. I also intend to replace the beat to hell, but functional, '86 Euro sport seats with a pair of highline comfort seats.

If I end up not liking the feel of the car, I will probably sell it for what I can get after it's running perfectly. I will definitely paint the nose and front valence, but probably not do any cosmetic restoration beyond that, with the possible exception of too good to pass up deals that I find, like a crack free dash for $200. I have already sunk more than 50% of the purchase price into parts alone...

I am hopeful that I will eventually enjoy the car, though. Welding the steering bracket seemed to make a fairly big difference already, so hopefully the HD control arm bushings will get it the rest of the way there. I think I also forgot to mention above that I replaced the transmission mounts. When I dropped the transmission brace, it turns out BOTH mounts were completely sheared through, and the weight of the transmission was the only thing holding them in there. I do not understand how pretty much EVERY SINGLE PIECE OF RUBBER could have failed, and yet the vehicle was still drivable.

[nataku83]

Ok, this was a bit of a pain, but I got the old, cracked, silicon adhesive encrusted dashboard out. Here are some pictures to enjoy!





And a couple of the old dash next to the new dash. The camera manages to hide some of the defects and fading on the old dash, the new dash looks great in person. By the way, if anyone wants this old dash to rebuild (original dash off of an '88 ) or experiment with or whatever, let me know. It's free for local pickup, or will ship at cost, which is probably between $50-60 within the US. I'll post this in a fs thread later, once I'm ready to ship.

[jmitro]

any idea where I can buy the Mwrench repair?

any tips on removing the dash?

[nataku83]

well, I didn't purchase the mwrench fix myself, the p/o did and never got around to installing it. However, it looks like you can contact the guy who makes them directly, his website is

http://www.mwrench.com/
email: [email protected]
phone: four zero eight three five four zero one two three

As far as removing the dash goes, it's actually pretty easy. Just keep track of fasteners as well as possible. I think the process was basically

1) Remove instrument cluster - no biggie, I had to do this once before to swap odometer gears. Part of this process is dropping the steering column a bit, which helps with the dash removal. It is also a good idea to remove the knee pad mounting brackets before pulling the dash.

2) Remove glove-box. 3 bolts and two plastic pins. Then remove the plastic cover over the glove box hiding the ecu.

3) remove the climate control face plate.

The dash itself is held in by 3 brackets - 2 on either side, and a 3rd above the glove box. I think the metal latch plate where the glove box closes is also attached to the dash. You don't have to remove this to get the dash off, but there is a wire on that plate, so I removed it anyway. Then just pull up and off, the clips near the firewall come out fairly easily.

Hopefully in a bit, I can post some info on how to get it back in!

[nataku83]

Well, I've got the dash mostly in, but haven't put the glovebox or knee pad back in yet. The coolant temp sensor appears to be going all the way to hot when you turn the ignition on, so that's one more little thing to track down...

While the car's been sitting, I went ahead and jacked it up and replaced the engine mounts and loosened / retightened the thrust arm bushing bolts so that the bushing would be properly pre-loaded. I went down to the dealership to get new lock nuts and washers for the engine mounts (the ones on there were NOT lock nuts and missing the washers, and one of them was loose...) thinking they'd have an M10 locknut in stock... No such luck. I put in an order, and included a small trim piece I broke as well as the engine mount hardware and it's been over a week and the parts STILL haven't come in. I'm wondering if the local dealership is jerking me around since I'm in there about once a month with a parts order usually less than $50.

Here are the old mounts - there's a big crack in the rubber on one, and a big crack in the metal housing on the other.

[nataku83]

Well, I took the car out a few weekends ago to see how things were working. It seemed that the heater wasn't working, the center HVAC slider wasn't working, there were no backlights for either HVAC climate control knobs and the car was difficult to shift, particularly into reverse and neutral.

I removed the HVAC panel and found that the linkage for the middle slider, which the previous owner had emphasized replacing, was broken. I was able to superglue this back together quite well, and lubricated everything so now it slides quite easily and works great. I believe that the heater problem was a loose connection on the temperature control knob, so i cleaned up the connector pins with some 2000 grit sandpaper, applied some dielectric grease, and reassembled. I can hear the heater valve closing when I turn it all the way to the cold position, so I hope it's working.

While I had this out, I also replaced the bulbs, and everything appeared to work. I decided to try to replace the last non-functional dash light, which is for the headlight switch. I was testing the socket for voltage, and suddenly all the dash lights went out! I guess I shorted the socket. I was hoping this was just a bad fuse 23, but the fuse looked fine. Also, the dome light, volume control fader and window switches were still all illuminating normally. After checking the ETM, it looked like the dimmer on the headlight was the most likely culprit. A quick check of the headlight connector socket showed that the wiring harness connections were all fine.

I pulled the headlight switch, and sure enough, pins 2 and 6 read open. I pulled the switch apart and found the circuit board was disgusting!

I immediately concluded this was the problem, and commenced sanding down all of the connections with 2000 grit, and then coating them in dielectric grease. Fortunately, I was smart enough to check the potentiometer before reassembling the switch. The circuit board wasn't the problem, it was actually the potentiometer. I took it out and observed that two of the loops in the coil were broken near the fixed, bottom connector. I soldered these together and to the connector, checked everything out, verified continuity, reassembled, replaced the bulb for the headlight switch, and voila! everything works.

While I had the car in the garage, I also decided to check out the shift linkage. It seems that, due to a burr in the shift rod connect stub, I had installed it upside down. I took it apart, cleaned out the hole for the pin, reassembled it correctly, and reinstalled it on the car. Hopefully this will have fixed my difficult shifting problem, although it seems unlikely that this could have made much difference.

Lastly - I removed the driver side lock cylinder to try to re-code it to my key. It looked like the trunk lock would be the easiest to remove to get the correct tumbler sequence, but once I got it off I found that a) I couldn't get it apart and b) it had the wrong number of tumblers. I just gave up at that point and decided to guess and test my way through the correct code. It turns out this is exceedingly easy, as my replacement lock cylinder was just a 4 digit code, and tumblers 2 and 4 were barely used. My procedure was just to remove all of the tumblers, and then reinsert a tumbler in the first empty position of the lock, insert the key - if the tumbler sat flush with the key in, time to repeat for the next tumbler position. If it did not sit flush with the cylinder with the key in, remove the tumbler and try another one. It probably took about 5 minutes to work my way through all 11 tumblers. I should also mention that Barry provided me with a matching passenger side lock. I disassembled this cylinder and added it's tumblers to my reserve for re-coding the driver side lock. I doubt it would have been possible to recode the lock without these extra tumblers.

Unfortunately, it seems I lost one of the small lock ball bearings, so I have a re-build kit on order which should come with new ones. Hopefully it'll get here by the time I get back from Christmas break, and I can finally get this hunk of junk back on the road!

[barry 88 635]

I am really tired of u putting me down about the car i sold you. I was really specific in my emails to you that this was a project car. I told u this was not a great deal, that u were getting what u paid for, a 88 635 for less than 2 grand. I told u that the interior needed work and every thing else i knew about the car. There was things i did not know about the car which u had found out. The HVAC was working when i had the car and the center slider was working since i could shut off the center vents when it was slided over. Perhaps u did something to it when u removed the dash. I told u the paint was not good. I said the car was safe to drive long distance, the fact that u were able to drive from Memphis to Houston proves that. Maybe u should have paid several thousand more for one in better shape. That car was a 100% in better shape than when i bought it for only 400 less than u paid. I had 2 people that test drove the car local and wanted to buy it for more than u paid and i wish they had bought it. I would have answered any questions u would have had had u asked. You paid for a rare 88 5 speed that needed work. Seeing the average price for a decent 635 is around 4500, i think u got a great deal. If u didnt like it u could have flown back, i did not take a deposit from you. I guess it makes u feel good trashing my name, but frankly im tired of hearing about it.

[nataku83]

Thanks for the tacit permission, Barry. I'm going to writeup a full detail of the sale, and all of the stupid shit you did to the car - and post it on here and bfc. Last night was just another fun experience, as I had to go ahead and drain all of the coolant before Houston freezes over tonight. Thanks for not telling me that you didn't put any anti-freeze in the car! (I suspected as much looking at the reservoir, but couldn't really confirm until I drained it last nght) Between that, not telling me that the CV boot over the muffler was torn (which wasn't easy to see in your shitty garage with your 2 jack stands, and I assume you knew about as you were selling a CV boot kit on the forum right after I bought the car) and it was missing at least one lug bolt, before I took it on a 700 mile trip (which you knew about as you swapped the 16" wheels to 15" wheels right before I bought it), you selling off a bunch of parts that the car really could have used and then telling me you were going to send me some stuff for it and then never answering my PMs, I think I have a pretty good case. The car was 100% better than when you bought it? That's kind of surprising, as you posted some pictures of when you bought it, and 1) the front valence looked perfect with nice paint, rather than cracked and primered and 2) it had the original seats, which while probably in extremely poor condition, could have been reupholstered, rather than cracked, mismatched sport seats without memory and all of the wrong plastic trim.

What was really disappointing is just how the stuff you said you had fixed was not fixed properly. Why did you use mechanics wire to tie the door panels to the door when you could have used the $0.20 plastic clips? Why not install the guibo bolts properly and torque the nuts? Anyway, I wont list everything in this post, as I would like to provide a more detailed post for anyone ever considering buying something you've wrenched on.

The really scary part about all of this isn't just that I was driving a car that was unsafe - the scary part is that you claim to be an aircraft mechanic for FedEx. I fear for those pilots lives everytime I get under this car.

edit: Oh, and I don't really see how I trashed your name in this post, besides mentioning the guibo bolt issues - re-reading this whole thread, that's the only thing I said that you screwed up.

This thread is really meant as a repair log that I can use to keep track of my repairs, and then I can present to the next buyer to show what was done, and how it was done. I'm all about transparency, and I'd like the next buyer of this car to know it was done right. I know that the car was a project car, and I hardly see how posting what was wrong with it and how I fixed it, is in some way trashing you. But, as long as you're pissed off already, let the trashing (or honest representation of your mechanical abilities) begin!

[nataku83]

Ok, quick update. The heater hasn't been working, so while I after I drained all of the water out of the coolant system, I removed the heater valve, checked it's functionality, checked to make sure the heater core wasn't blocked and then installed a L shaped coolant tube in place of the heater valve. I refilled and bled the system with Zerex G-05 (almost impossible to tell it's not water until you get some on your hands), and the heater continues not to work. I think I'm getting heat out of the foot and defrost vents, just not the face vents. I'm guessing that this has something to do with the ducts / fresh air flaps and probably requires me pulling the dashboard again... sigh.

The rebuild kit for the lock showed up, but it did not contain the ball bearings I needed. I reassembled the lock without them and put it back on the car, and it seems to work, although it rotates a little bit more than it should. I put the door panels back on - using the correct $0.20 plastic clips rather than the mechanics wire that was holding them on before. Of course, as soon as I got this back on, I found the other ball bearing! Great, so now I'm going to have to take the door panel back off, and rebuild the lock cylinder again. At least this will let me use the new tumblers, so hopefully the lock will feel very nice when I'm done.

[Chris Wright]

...... I think I'm getting heat out of the foot and defrost vents, just not the face vents. I'm guessing that this has something to do with the ducts / fresh air flaps and probably requires me pulling the dashboard again... sigh.

Is the problem that the temperature is only lukewarm?

If it is lukewarm, then there probably an air bubble in the heater core. Bleed the system from the bleeder screw on top of the thermostat housing. Then take it out on the road and bring it up to temp, bring it back, jack the front up and bleed it again. Let it sit over night, then take it out again, jack it up and bleed it once more. This is what it took to bleed a friends car that we had done a coolant flush on. Hopefully it wouldn't take that for yours, but ..... ?

Or that no heated air comes out of the console/dash vents?

This is normal, heat only comes out of the foot vents and the defrost (black arrows). Fresh air and A/C (white arrows) only comes out of the center console vents and the upper dash vents. The foam seals on the ducts do get brittle with age and can leak, lessening the air flow.

Here is a link showing the air distribution.
viewtopic.php?t=2675&

Here is a link containing a system check table for the Heat - A/C:
viewtopic.php?t=6990

Another one talking about the center slider:
viewtopic.php?t=4805&

<img src="http://bigcoupe.com/ims/pic.php?u=21GvpX2&i=226">

[nataku83]

Or that no heated air comes out of the console/dash vents?

This is normal, heat only comes out of the foot vents and the defrost (black arrows). Fresh air and A/C (white arrows) only comes out of the center console vents and the upper dash vents. The foam seals on the ducts do get brittle with age and can leak, lessening the air flow.

Here is a link showing the air distribution.
viewtopic.php?t=2675&

Here is a link containing a system check table for the Heat - A/C:
http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum/sh ... ?t=1046824&

Another one talking about the center slider:
viewtopic.php?t=4805&

<img src="http://bigcoupe.com/ims/pic.php?u=21GvpX2&i=226">

Holy crap, really? Yeah, I'm getting heat out of the foot and defrost, I assumed that I should be getting heat out of at least ONE set of the dash vents. The dash vents seem to blow completely cold air while I'm getting hot air elsewhere. If this is completely normal, than this car is WEIRD. It would also probably help if I had an owners manual! Anyway, thanks Chris, I think you just saved me from pulling my dash for no reason!

[Chris Wright]

Does the air cut off from the center vents when you move the center slider all the way to the left?

Close the center slider all the way to the left for max heat or crack it open for a little fresh air in the face for those high speed Autobahn nights to keep you awake!

[nataku83]

quick update since I'm bored - bought a 12x1.5 tap and chased the threads on the front wheel, so now I can run 5 lug bolts (once my parts order comes in tomorrow). I'm guessing this won't fix any vibration / suspension issues, but gives me a little more piece of mind.

I'm not too sure about the heater, it may also be blowing luke warm, but I need to fix or replace the center slider to really be able to tell. I guess it wouldn't hurt to bleed the system a few more times, and I need to put the heater valve back in anyway. The parts ordered already alluded to also includes a new bleeder screw, since the one on there was really chewed up.



I also have lower control arm bushings and an idler arm bushing coming in, and when I have the lower control arms off, I may just drop the front subframe so I can weld the mount in at the top. I got a MIG setup and working for all of the rust repair I'm doing on my E30 at the moment, so it should be pretty easy to run a quick bead around the top of the mount if I can get it off without too much trouble.

I sure hope these bushings fix the suspension and steering issues I'm having, I didn't see any play in the ball joints but it's not always easy to detect...