And so it starts, Maeve

[gwb72tii]

Longer section of each inner sleeve faces center of car. From the BMW manual page 33-28

But wait BS, wouldn't it go from page 28 to 33 instead?

[Blue Shadow]

Longer section of each inner sleeve faces center of car. From the BMW manual page 33-28

But wait BS, wouldn't it go from page 28 to 33 instead?

Well it would except the chapter starts on page 576 or something on the pdf as mentioned in the table of contents.

Dang Germans, can't try to figure em out. but I guess section 33 is the rear axle in all their manuals.

[Mike W.]

He said page, not pages...

[gwb72tii]

I know, I know, it's just that I was sitting here in Whistler, B.C, after a great dinner with nothing to do so I thought I'd try to keep BS honest, lol, and wound up stubbing my toe.
And if you've never been to Whistler in the summer its one of the great places to visit.

[Blue Shadow]

And if you've never been to Whistler in the summer its one of the great places to visit.

I like the road sign on the way up 99 the coast road before going inland to Whistler that announced M Creek, one on each end of the bridge.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Vanco ... FQAw%3D%3D

[gwb72tii]

No progress the last week, we were in Whistler BC for fun. If you've never been, lot's to do if you like the outdoors. We e-biked for the first time, and went across the suspension bridge at the top of Whistler. Everyone is happy in Whistler, strangers will stop to assist you with a smile, could not be better. Great food, something we care aboot (see what I did there?). And then a free concert in Olympic Plaza. Good times.

[thrty8street]

Did you have to preload the suspension before torquing down the TA bushing bolts/nuts?

[gwb72tii]

Haven't gotten that far yet. My car has been on my lift for a long time as most of the time it would be my wife and I trying to push it back on if I rolled it off. Plus the old motor is out and the new one is not yet in.

edit: just re-read your post. Which trailing arm bushings do you mean? I know about the front suspension but have not read/heard about the rear?

[thrty8street]

I just meant the trailing arm itself -where it attaches to the subframe. I was not sure if the rear suspension needs to be preloaded before the bolts on the trailing arms are torqued down.

[gwb72tii]

I'm not aware of any loading necessary for the rear trailing arm bushings.
Maybe someone smarter than me can chime in and educate us.

[gwb72tii]

On to the dirty work. Cleaning up 36 years of dirt, game and oil:




The transmission tunnel as well. The firewall insulation is dried out and cracking:

[Fantastic28]

Interesting thread!

[gwb72tii]

slow progress but going to work on the car all day tomorrow.
Cleaned up the oil filter assembly. It was caked in dried up oil and grease. Elbow grease, brake cleaner and aluminum alloy cleaner cleaned it pretty nicely. If Maeve was going to be concours I'd have the assembly bead or sand blasted back to new aluminum, but Maeve will be a daily driver.
More tomorrow.

[gwb72tii]

Kind of a long day cleaning aluminum bits like the intake manifold, alternator bracket, etc.
I went to Harbor Freight and bought soda for my cheap ass sand blaster. it's one of those hose end attachments with a smallish media reservoir on top, all of about $30 on Amazon. The soda does a nice job of cleaning all the assorted crap that found its way onto the manifold over the past 35 years. I'll post pics later, but the manifold looks great.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CJNNJKFF?re ... asin_title

I'm thinking I should go buy a lotto ticket. We drove the car from Mesa, AZ to the great PNW, and then parked it and started the disassembly for paint and mechanical refresh. I have found numerous bits either worn out or damaged that, if they failed, they would have stranded us on the way north. The most recent is the gasket for the oil filter assembly. Interesting that BMW has 3 different designs due to updates on the block design over time (I assume). I took the oil filter assembly off the old motor, and it had the wrong gasket. Oh well, the new motor now has the correct gasket. Pretty lucky the motor didn't pack it in at some point when we were cruising along at 70mph.

[gwb72tii]

Gradual progress; removing, cleaning and installing old parts from the previous motor onto the new motor.


And the soda medium cleaned the intake manifold nicely. But as is common, the old intake manifold gaskets stuck to the manifold, so no other choice but to scrape with a box cutter blade and then 400 grit sand paper.

[gwb72tii]

This is basically my day today, continuing to clean 35+ years of dirt, oil and grime. This is the battery tray where crap collects, plus you can see the results of a leaky power steering pump. This crap is hard to get off:

[gwb72tii]

...
Next step is cleaning a very dirty engine bay before installing the new motor:

You're installing such a nice motor next to a fuse box with zip ties? When's that getting upgraded to match?

Project looks great, excited to see the engine go in.

I have all this room and time to do the blade fuse upgrade, but thinking I should wait until I get the new motor in and running so I can tell if I do it correctly.

[Mike W.]

I have all this room and time to do the blade fuse upgrade, but thinking I should wait until I get the new motor in and running so I can tell if I do it correctly.

Indeed, I would wait. You kind of want to do one major thing at a time so if something doesn't work, you have a better idea of why. Not that I've always ascribed to that theory, but I think it's a good one.

[Blue Shadow]

This is basically my day today, continuing to clean 35+ years of dirt, oil and grime. This is the battery tray where crap collects, plus you can see the results of a leaky power steering pump. This crap is hard to get off:

You are complaining about the nice, metal battery tray when we have folks here that don't have any metal in that area? This is a more count your blessings than a pita.

Use chemicals. That stuff will come right off.

[gwb72tii]

There was so much shit caked on there would be no way for battery acid to eat into he metal lol

[gwb72tii]

AS BS suggested, a little elbow grease and chemicals. Looks better.


And I'm pretty much done with transferring bits from the old motor to the new motor. Next weekend it finds its forever home in the engine bay:

[Galahad]

You're installing such a nice motor next to a fuse box with zip ties? When's that getting upgraded to match?

Project looks great, excited to see the engine go in.

I have all this room and time to do the blade fuse upgrade, but thinking I should wait until I get the new motor in and running so I can tell if I do it correctly.

Not a bad idea, messing with multiple things at once can cause problems

[gwb72tii]

Tomorrow is the day! Torque the flywheel bolts, install the pressure plate and clutch, add the tranny and then get the entire assembly in the car.

[gwb72tii]

Here is a pic of the injectors that came with the car, 27lb Ford. These will be replaced with stock spec new Bosch injectors.

[John in VA]

5.0L Mustang injectors are what I used with the Euro cam - ran great!