MyE28.com

I figured it was about time i made a thread showing the progress of my 533i turbo build. Now that school is finally out, i have had time to do all the fab work and get my car to a point where it is almost ready to run. Here are the specs of what im doing. Keep in mind im in school so almost everything used and this is what would be considered a semi low budget build. In the end i will post an excel sheet but i hope to keep it under 2k and in the end anything above 320 whp will be great.
rebuilt m30b35
ms2 v3 with a lc2 wideband
m5 clutch/pressure plate
holset hx35, wanted an hx40 but couldnt pass this up for the price
80 lb deka injectors
35 mm tial wastegate
bosch bpv
-12 an oil drain for the holset
1/4 hardline for oil feed
3 inch steel exhaust
free intercooler that i think is to small. i ditched the valance and will just run my is bumper cover. I only had to spot weld a few brackets to eliminate it.

Everything that i could mig weld i did, i couldnt imagine trying to tig all that. I tig welded all the aluminum bungs plus the stainless transition cone the goes from 2.5 to 3. The wategate has a 9.5 psi spring so well see how that does, all the tube for that is .120 wall. I used vbands for every connection that i could just to make assembly easier. I plan on using the stock icv so i left that in the stock location. The oil feed was made using steel 1/4 tubing. my dad has a fancy hydualic flaring tool to make an flares so i figured why not. It was easy to bend and goes from the oil filter housing under the oil pan tucked along the subframe and then up to the turbo. Inline i plumbed a vdo oil pressure sensor. The map sensor and boost gauge are both tapped into the intake, 1/4 npt. The intercooler is made up of pieces i could find off craigslist. I know the iat sensor is too close and needs to be reloceted, i figured that out after i installed it.

Heres some things i discovered along the way, first no one makes a -12an drainflange for a reasonable price, i used some 1/4 in aluminum and tiged it to a male -AN fitting. I had some triangular flanges plasmacut out of 3/8 steel then i found out i should've cut them from stainless, Why? Turns out stainless buttweld pipe is half the price of mild steel. yay china. Anyway heres some pics of whats been done, i still need to drill the return to the pan and finish my gauges.

I do have a few questions though, first where is the best place to plumb the bpv, does it have to be as close to the tb as possible of can i have it anywhere. Also i can just vent that ti the stmospher right? it doesnt have to be plumbed back in. Second do i really need a better solution than just venting to the atmosphere with crank case vent? I know slight vaccum in the crank case is beneficial but i dont think it will make that much of a difference under boost.

Nice! Let us know how it runs,when you get it tuned.

I don't know that a vacuum on the crankcase is totally essential as there are several running this configuration. Perhaps someone else can chime in?

Nebraska_e28 wrote:I don't know that a vacuum on the crankcase is totally essential as there are several running this configuration. Perhaps someone else can chime in?

I have done a lot of searching and most people just stick a little filter on it and vent to atmosphere. I also came across a product where you run a line to your exhaust and then you slight vaccum but also burn oil.

Anyone has suggestions for a muffler that isn't loud, I had a magnaflow on the car before the turbo and I still might try to use it but it has a 2.25 inlet. Also I don't have to worry about having a cat for another 2 years because that's when I'll actually have emissions.

So I got the car running today, I had to feather the throttle to keep it going. I'm using the stock iacv so I'll look into the settings. It was 10 pm and it's basically an open dump so didn't run for more than a min. So far the motor sounds like it's firing correctly. Now I have to finish up with gauges and make a new center console since all the ac and heat components are gone. Can't wait to throw this thing in gear.

mitch5 wrote:So I got the car running today, I had to feather the throttle to keep it going. I'm using the stock iacv so I'll look into the settings. It was 10 pm and it's basically an open dump so didn't run for more than a min. So far the motor sounds like it's firing correctly. Now I have to finish up with gauges and make a new center console since all the ac and heat components are gone. Can't wait to throw this thing in gear.

Awesome! Let us know how it goes. Why did you remove the heater? I like the safety of additional ways to remove heat on those hot days, so to me it seems like a safety item for the engine.

We'll the core is cracked and for the last year I was driving the car I never had it overheat, even in the Phoenix summer. Since I removed all the ac and heater controls I might as we'll remove the rest of the systems. This is turning into a track car most likely.

In other news though my tps is acting weird, using m30 auto and the wide band is getting no power, probably because all the wires on my harness were lengthned by someone else so I have no idea what wires were factory. I have it idling with a cracked throttle but not with the Bosch valve.

today i got the car running and driving, my first issue was that the lc2 wideband wasn't getting power so i had to check the heater relay and it turns out the ground was bad, after fixing that and calibrating the sensor i was getting an arf reading. The car how ever runs stupid rich and wont tune because my tps is bad, i tested my m30 6 wire and couldn't get it to behave like a resistor so i will be finding a replacement.

Other items needed attention so i changed the diff and tranny fluid today,

mitch5 wrote:today i got the car running and driving, my first issue was that the lc2 wideband wasn't getting power so i had to check the heater relay and it turns out the ground was bad, after fixing that and calibrating the sensor i was getting an arf reading. The car how ever runs stupid rich and wont tune because my tps is bad, i tested my m30 6 wire and couldn't get it to behave like a resistor so i will be finding a replacement.

Other items needed attention so i changed the diff and tranny fluid today,

Great! What do you think is next in getting better drivability?

Getting a working tps will be the biggest improvement, then I can let autotune do it's thing. That and playing around with idle control and enrichment. Right now I need to finish the exhaust

I figured out the tps issue, i was using the three wires that normally would just give a wot signal, turns out the wires i needed to use are the wires that go to the tranny, the solid black, yellow and red. Now the tps is working. I started driving the car around and tuning but in my suberbian neighborhood i couldn't do much. , Once i finish the exhaust i will find some long roads to tune on, then i will push the car more. Now i haven't been able to find any info on hx35 m30 setups so i wasn't sure what to expect going into this, but based on my limited driving time boost kicks in at about 3200 rpm, not bad.

So im still tuning the car, large injectors are a head ache. I finished the exhaust and it is a straight 3in back to the magnaflow muffler, the car is a bit too loud for me so i might add a resonator.

Now I have a question, this is my first turbo car so the sound is pretty new to me, under boost at high rpm like 4500 a horrible squeel comes from the turbo. I did a google search and found that an exhaust leak between the mani and turbo can cause that. I have a oil pressure gauge but its not wired so im not sure the pressure of oil the turbo is getting. Any experience with sounds like this?

Nope, but probably some sort of air leak.
Being the year that it is I think we all have 1080p phones maybe take a vid of the noise.

Do you have an air compressor? Make alittle boost leak checker too check intake leaks.

So now i have gotten the tuning under control, i had a leak in my map hose but now thats fixed the car isnt hard to tune at all. I fixed that noise i was hearing too by making a boost pressure tester, it was at the connection to the throttle body.


Now i have other issues to attend too.

1st. The car doesn't always want to crank over, i turn the ignition and nothing but a click. Then other times it engages the starter and it starts everytime. i already checked my grounds so now im thinking maybe the starter?

2nd
What kind of temps do you guys running turbos tend to see and what is an acceptable operating temp?
I need to figure out an accurate way to monitor my temps. I live in az with a gray car so my coolant is already 120 f on a dead cold engine. Before replacing the coolant sensor i was getting temps of 230 on tunerstudio while my digital temp gun was reading 177 at the thermostat housing and upper rad. I decided to replace the temp sensor and thermostat, i then used airlift to rid the system of air. The temp sensor now reads 200-205 while driving but as soon as i pull over and use the temp gun it read 180. It looks like im going to have to make my own table of thermo resistor values because I just dont know which value to believe.

I would've put the temp sensor all the way over by that coupler coming out of the bumper.
Where it's at right now it heatsoaks. Very hot that area. The air is not 200*+

My bad I should've specified it was the coolant temp sensor. I know the mat sensor is in a bad spot I just haven't gotten around to moving it right After the inter cooler.
After using the temp gun on my radiator It appears that my radiator has a lot of dead spots, so that will be getting replaced. I'm in the process of trying to get my temp gauge working in my cluster also.

Good news is I traced my no crank issue to the ignition switch, I'm looking for a decently priced used one now.

Just make sure you get the early ignition switch. The metal coarse spline column uses a completely different switch from the later cars.

Ya I read about that, I might just install a push start button for the starter though. I just ordered a South African behr radiator and new water pump. I want to get my cooling under control.

update on the car: I bought a new south african radiator and a new water pump, took off the old water pump to find that that a bolt had sheared off and rtv was left in its place by previous po. Took a bit of time to drill out the old one and retap. Car is still overheating but i think that is due to the fact that i couldn't get the system bleed properly. Now i am not bleeding the m30 the tradional way, i am using a airlift system that vaccums the whole system down to 25 psi then sucks the coolant in. The only problem is that the system was leaking down meaning that i have a leak somewhere. I checked all my hose connections and i dont see any coolant leaking.

Upside is i have my factory temp gauge working again, says the car is overheating.

Might be your head gasket. Do any of the plugs look too clean? Getting any smell of anti freeze in the exhaust?
good luck

marc79euro645 wrote:Might be your head gasket. Do any of the plugs look too clean? Getting any smell of anti freeze in the exhaust?
good luck

I thought it might have been that too but after tonight i am more hopeful. I found a hose that was leaking coolant so i tightened it. The system still wasnt holding perfect vaccum but i think that was due to the fact that i wire brushed off all the heavy corrosion and junk that was probably sealing the hoses so well. I ran the car around tonight and it stayed around 200f only spiking when the car saw boost. I will probably try to bleed additional air out by jacking the car up.

Discovered that my car needs a new fuel pump. living in az with 110 f. temps was making my fuel pump cutout in the day but not at night. After some research on external vs internal vs both i decided that an internal walbro 255lph will suit my needs. This means deleting the external pump. It seems everyone has a different way of stuffing the walbro in the tank with wkohlers solution being the best but least accessible solution. I will post some pictures of what i decide to come up with.

Update, i tackled the fuel pump and I probably didnt even have a bad pump. As it turned out the good ol torpedo fuse wasn't making good enough contact. Either way i'm happy i installed the walbro and upgraded my lines, for less than a hundred dollars it is great insurance. So i ordred the walbro gss342, with the install kit and after seeing how the low pressure 1/2 inch line wasn't rated for fuel injection i decided to go with aeroquip fuel injection hose. It was 7 bucks a foot at a local store and is the first time a local store was way cheaper than online. I basically welded a steel an fitting to the pick up and went to a bard.The pick up tube welds like shit, of course. Pictures provide better detail.

just when i thought i had jumped most of the hurdles in this project, i blew the turbo seal. I believe this is due to the drain not functioning properly, i have a e34 b35 pan which leaves less room to drill a proper hole and due to the angle of the engine means the drain is most likely submerged during operation. I have not finalized my solution but i think i will be pulling the pan to weld up the hole and will drain the turbo into the lower timing cover. Both of these areas are leaking oil so i might ass swell fix it.

On a good note i installed a 20 amp pushstart button with a ten amp inline fuse, this was significantly easier and cheaper the replacing the ignition switch.

The has currently been running great, i have it tuned for boost but have just been messing with cold start. I had to take the oil pan off to tig up the old drain hole. The new drain is huge, 12 an dumping into 1 inch alm. tube that then is welded to the front timing cover. The next issue is the valve cover is leaking, upon reintsalling the front covers i realized the upper timing cover in about .01 inches higher than the head, i have had the cover off before and didnt notice it. I will probably reinstall it and if not machine it down at school.

While the car lights tires in first, the biggest disappoint is the turbo size, i can confirm that the hx35 is too small for the m30b35. I will eventually post a datalog, but i start building boost at 2900 rpm in second gear, then the car falls flat at 4400 rpm when the boost hits 7 psi. I will eventually turn the boost up to 11 psi to make the car have more power but right now school is priority.

Take away is if you are on a budget build the hx35 will choke the engine.

Here are some screen shots of two pulls, i still need to have someone drive it so i can tune but this is what auto has come up with. Im going to keep tuning at 7 psi then bump it to 11. Im open to any criticism so let me hear some opinions.

i feel you pain with the school being the main priority! Had my car and turbo ( e23 turbo kit) for a little over a month now but i have zero time to do anything with it. Hoping to catch some time during fall break as we get 2 days off. Keep us updated!

Update
So about 2 months ago i blew the head gasket, my guess was that it ran lean and well the pictures tell what happened. I noticed it once i started blowing that sweet white smoke. I let the car sit for a few days and when i went to start it found it was hydrolocked. I drained the coolant then let the car sit till after finals.



After pulling the head and assessing the damage i came up with a plan on a budget.I'll call it stage 2
Stage II
arp studs
stock head gasket(elringer)
sch40 ss304l split pulse t3 manifold adaptor
increase plenum volume and flip tb
install electronic boost control for ms2
reroute down pipe with 3 inch 304l
install pusher fan off an amg g wagon
paint engine and engine bay to go for a cleaner look
fix the exhaust leak issues with the hx35 v-band
run 12psi

first thing to do was check the head and valvetrain. I'm so far deep into this e28 i doubt i will ever sell it and im sure this wont be the last m30 motor i have to deal with, so i decided to make a cam removal tool. This was made with some .120 wall tubing and some various scrap i had laying around. It made removing the cam a breeze.



There was a fair amount of corrosion on the b35 head so i decided to take a crack at digging out the corrosion and welding it.My setup is a thermal arc 185, i was going at it with a gas lens and a 3/32 2% thorated tungsten electrode with some 4043 filler. One side i was able to fill pretty nicely, file it down and keep the pinholes to a minimum. The other side just kept giving me issues, the cast aluminum head just did not want to weld without getting very porus. I tried to adjust the ac balance but that didnt do a whole lot. After trying for hours to weld the other side i started to get porosity where the rings are and gave up. The head was already below the bently recommended minimum thickness and after all the heat had to be warped. I decided to search for another head with no corrosion.






I found a low mileage head from a forum member that should arrive next week, it's a shame because the b35 cam in the other head had very little wear.

The problem with my last setup is that the stock hx35 flange is a vband, but is a non standard size. Its very close to 2.5 inches but not colse enough to seal properly with a standard 2.5 vband. I decided the easiest route was to draw up the hx35 backing plate in solidworks and get it cnc plasma cut. While i was at it i got the triangluler b34 flanges out of .400 plate and a hx35 almost t3 flange cut out of the same 304l plate. I got the hx35 backing plate and some tial 38mm wastegate flanges cut out of 1/4 inch to save money. Heres my welding job..


The next step was to start working on the manifold, my last one was mig welded, wasn't pretty and im sure didn't flow well. This one is going to a top mount adapter style made from sch40 ss pipe. I started by making the merge collector, i used some heat and a 20 ton press to make the transition from oval to circular. This was harder than i first imagined because the t3 flange doesn't allow much room when using thick 1.5 pipe. My welds got better as time went on after i realized how little amperage you really need for stainless. I still need to finish the wastegate routing and then grind the ports.







This is my progress so far, im a fulltime mech. engineering student on a budget so who knows when i'll be able to drive it again. My next task is to relocate or build an expansion tank, to make room for a flipped tb.