The Mean Greenie - 330d

[Waseem 333i]

Have you done anything else on the cooling system besides the thermostat? This week I've been busy with my one. Those plastic are proper rubbish when they get old and so are the connectors. The hoses also dont come cheap either. I had oil cooler issue then ended up cracking two coolant hoses when bleeding. Then broke another hose as I was busy replacing the ones I cracked. If only parts prices were not so crazy alot of these car would be in tip top shape

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[Luigi_S]

When I replaced the thermostat, the car starting running at the correct temps. I got home one afternoon after a good long drive in traffic and something told me to check under the bonnet. I discovered a pinhole leak on the coolant expansion tank where it was squirting the coolant out. I hadn't noticed this before, probably because it wasn't getting up to temp.

I have a new expansion tank that I will fit once everything else goes together. Apart from that, only the thermostat has been changed. Oh, and I cleaned the rad of 13 years of gunk and replaced all the coolant when I got the car.

Touch wood, the rest of the system seems to be sound.

 

[Waseem 333i]

That plastic return pipe is expensive. The top one from expansion tank is also pricy. The rest are okay. Then there is another one bolted to the cylinder head just under the intake manifold. That might be the first one to go. It's just a plastic piece which can be bought from goldwagon cheap. Just be very gentle with the hoses.

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[Luigi_S]

Got a lot done this weekend. Yesterday was spent stripping out parts from a donor car in the scrap yard. Seats, trim, dash and finally carpets.

Today got all the carpets and trim parts cleaned. Cleaned the carpets 3 times and I'm sure they can still be cleaner. This is after the first time:

Got everything stripped out of my car including the dash, just the carpet to to remove tomorrow:

All ready now too for something I wanted to do in the future, but managed to get all the kit yesterday for a good price. I will be retrofitting PDC. Hopefully get some terminals tomorrow so that I can make a complete wiring harness without having to just patch wires onto the exisitng piece of the harness. Everything including the gong is there.

PDC sensors with harness to the PDC module:

PDC module with a short section of harness to the front and the gong with a small piece of harness for both connectors that go to the gong.

As I say, I will be removing the terminals already in place and replacing them with new terminals and wires to run to where they need to go as per factory.

 

[Nobz330i]

This is so interesting, I can't wait for outcome :clapper:

 

[that_guy_Ettiene]

Thats a lot of effort! So far so good, keep it up

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[sash]

Great work.

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[Blueskys]

Luigi have you worked on these cars before?

Stripping out the complete interior incl dash is not for the faint hearted or noob, dashes have got to be one of the most fiddly things to take in and out, so many clips and wires and stuff to break.

 

[tman]

raise: Great progress!

 

[Luigi_S]

Luigi have you worked on these cars before?

Stripping out the complete interior incl dash is not for the faint hearted or noob, dashes have got to be one of the most fiddly things to take in and out, so many clips and wires and stuff to break.

I've done a little work on my E46 M in the past. I retrofitted OEM Bluetooth and had all the trim re-painted. I have, however, never removed a dash from an E46 before, but have worked on many cars and had many dashes out over the years. I used to have a company in the UK that did a lot of this so it's not unfamiliar ground.

As you can see, it's out and all intact.

 

[osiris]

This is insane man! well done! Car is going to look really good when its done :coolShake::coolShake::coolShake:

 

[Waseem 333i]

Wow. That's one impressive feat. If possible, on that pdc can you please check which wire activates it and where is that unit located. After I did that manual conversion on my car the pdc stopped working. I assume that the gearbox or gearbox ecu gave signal to activate it. I would probably wire it up to the reverse lights to make it work again.

 

[Gizmo]

Wow. That's one impressive feat. If possible, on that pdc can you please check which wire activates it and where is that unit located. After I did that manual conversion on my car the pdc stopped working. I assume that the gearbox or gearbox ecu gave signal to activate it. I would probably wire it up to the reverse lights to make it work again.

Do your reverse lights work currently?

 

[Luigi_S]

Wow. That's one impressive feat. If possible, on that pdc can you please check which wire activates it and where is that unit located. After I did that manual conversion on my car the pdc stopped working. I assume that the gearbox or gearbox ecu gave signal to activate it. I would probably wire it up to the reverse lights to make it work again.

Reverse signal is in a multiple connector housing on top of the fuse box, the connector you are looking for is X428. It will be the yellow / Blue wire and you will need a terminal with part number 61131387140 to connect onto the run. It looks like this:

The signal then goes to pin 12 in the power connector of the module.

Didn't feel like I got a lot done today as I was waiting for terminals from BMW. When they arrived, I was short of one connector for the module earth, the fuse box terminal and all the terminals for the power connector of the module. The last 5 terminals I could wait for no issue, but the other two are a right pain, I cannot put the dash back or anything at this stage. They saying 5 to 10 days for those terminals to arrive.:blueCry:

Here are a couple of pics I took today:

This one is showing the harness I fabricated and how i use some thicker and stronger tape to wrap around when the harness goes through a sheet metal opening, in this case the steering rack top mounting bracket

At least I managed to get the passenger front side of the carpet in place. Was quite chuffed:

Didn't line up to badly either in the end, not that you see any of this, (and the fact that that cutout around the gear lever is already in the carpet):

Still no news on my starter motor either. At least I could carry on with all the mechanical gubbins while waiting for the terminals if it was with me.

---

Oh yeah, forgot to add, I might be able to get me some E46 M3 seats with full electrics and heated. Only thing is, they black and not beige and they don't have the seat back covers.

 

[that_guy_Ettiene]

^M3 or like M6 seats like in Gizmo's touring would be awesome.
I really really dislike the standard seats.

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[Luigi_S]

^M3 or like M6 seats like in Gizmo's touring would be awesome.
I really really dislike the standard seats.

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I've got the Sports seats in mine, they very cool and they support in all the right places. Maybe you can buy mine if I go for the M3 seats, lol.:rollsmile:

The drivers side has a little damage as below, but otherwise they all good.

 

[that_guy_Ettiene]

Yeah we can talk about it.
Who then wants a set of std seat for their E46?

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[Luigi_S]

Well, picking up the M3 seats tomorrow............:rollsmile:

Oh yeah that will put the car back another few weeks as I will probably have to wait for more terminals to come from Germany. Will need to make up some new harnesses for the heating and the electrics for the seats. Might as well do that while everything is still out.

And I got my starter motor, so can get that and all the other bits of the engine in tomorrow.

 

[Cornel]

Can't see all your pics(thanks to photokaket) but the parts that I saw, wow nice work man!

 

[Luigi_S]

Sorry man, yeah, can't go back and edit my posts to update the pics unfortunately.

Got the starter, alternator and power steering pump in today. Need to still put the intake manifold and all the other bits and bobs back on. Not too much in a rush with that now that I have the M3 seats to wire up and fit.

Speaking of which..........

Drivers Seat:

Fully optioned, but not sure they heated (still need to check):

You can see a little of the damage on the front section of the seat.

Passenger seat:

Back of the drivers seat with no cover:

Small damage on the drivers side bolster:

The seats are filthy from being stored so long with some storage depression marks, which I am sure will sort themselves out. Next step is to deep clean and treat the seats, then test them completely and repair any of the issues that may be present.

I only have one rear cover, so will need to find another one. The biggest issue now is that I was actually sold on having the beige interior with some adjustments, now I have black M3 seats. Probably get them covered in the future to beige!!!!!