[Leucosticte]

Originally Posted by 3PedalJake

Sometimes small steps are measured in miles. I really thought I was gonna have to cut these brake lines off, but patience and heat finally won. My microtorch is my hero tool today

Do you think it's possible to remove these lines with the subframe still on the car? I'm swapping to 335i calipers soon and I was going to do all the brake lines in the process but the ones that are under the subframe seem close to impossible. I'm not even sure how you're supposed to get a wrench on there without dropping it.

[3PedalJake]

Originally Posted by Leucosticte

Do you think it's possible to remove these lines with the subframe still on the car? I'm swapping to 335i calipers soon and I was going to do all the brake lines in the process but the ones that are under the subframe seem close to impossible. I'm not even sure how you're supposed to get a wrench on there without dropping it.

If they aren't rusted shut it might be possible, difficult but possible. If they need persuasion I wouldn't bet on it. As you say there's just no room to get a wrench up there between the subframe and body. This is a pic from the 330i I did a couple years ago that wasn't rusted half as bad as the 325i I'm working on now.

[3PedalJake]

Originally Posted by Leucosticte

Do you think it's possible to remove these lines with the subframe still on the car? I'm swapping to 335i calipers soon and I was going to do all the brake lines in the process but the ones that are under the subframe seem close to impossible. I'm not even sure how you're supposed to get a wrench on there without dropping it.

Side note. IDK if the xi uses larger rotors, but I know the 325/328 RWD use a smaller rotor than the 330/335. I was going to swap the 325 to 335 calipers/rotors, and found externally they will fit with, the bracket is just taller to accommodate the larger disk. The rub is the inner dimensions, they also use a larger parking brake and it's not compatible with the axle carrier, and no way to retrofit it. I didn't want to give up parking brakes so scrapped that idea.

[Leucosticte]

Originally Posted by 3PedalJake

Side note. IDK if the xi uses larger rotors, but I know the 325/328 RWD use a smaller rotor than the 330/335. I was going to swap the 325 to 335 calipers/rotors, and found externally they will fit with, the bracket is just taller to accommodate the larger disk. The rub is the inner dimensions, they also use a larger parking brake and it's not compatible with the axle carrier, and no way to retrofit it. I didn't want to give up parking brakes so scrapped that idea.

The 335i rear calipers will bolt on to the xDrive axle carriers since it uses the same ones as the 335i.

Didn't you get new axle carriers for your 325i anyway? (From what I can see in the first pic at least) Could've gotten the larger 335i ones or xDrive ones, just a thought.

[3PedalJake]

Originally Posted by Leucosticte

The 335i rear calipers will bolt on to the xDrive axle carriers since it uses the same ones as the 335i.

Didn't you get new axle carriers for your 325i anyway? (From what I can see in the first pic at least) Could've gotten the larger 335i ones or xDrive ones, just a thought.

Good glad they'll fit. I'm assuming that it also uses the wheel speed sensor in the wheel bearing not the tone ring on the axle like the RWD.

Yes I could have/should have but I didn't realize all this till I already bought salvage knuckles, blasted them and had them powder coated, and bought new axles. D'oh! too much to redo for a car that isn't going to the track and stops just fine.

[3PedalJake]

Today replaced e-brake cables and derusted/primed/painted the chassis subframe area. The ebrake cables fought me (surprise), had to clamp vise-grips on them and beat them off with a hammer. The replacements are Febi-bilstein. I'd recommend against them, they don't have a ball end like the OE, they have half a ball with the back side a hex, much longer than the OE and wouldn't go in the holes of the cable puller without removing the brake handle, standing it vertically and inserting the cable end then rotating it down. PIA.
I did a kinda half-assed job on the rust removal but got the flaky stuff, shot it with rusty metal primer then gray enamel. Put a new heat shield on, original was missing probably turned to powder long ago. Looks better than it did and I'm done with the dirtiest part of this project, now to start assembling the new parts!

[Lochstar8]

Looks amazing man and I’m planning to do just about the exact same thing over the next few months on my Canadian 323i. I’ve already got another subframe from another car that I’m planning on getting blasted but I think I’m going to go the POR15 and 2k urethane route rather than powder coat as I’ve heard it chips easily. (no personal experience just read online). Then after that I’m going to try and stop ALL of the rust on the under side of the car similar to the Beautiful work you’ve done on yours. Then I’m planning on putting a layer of marine grease on the ENTIRE under side of the car. Are winters are NASTY so I’m not playing around. Happy to have stumbled apon this thread to join the journey.

[Leucosticte]

Originally Posted by 3PedalJake

Good glad they'll fit. I'm assuming that it also uses the wheel speed sensor in the wheel bearing not the tone ring on the axle like the RWD.

Yes I could have/should have but I didn't realize all this till I already bought salvage knuckles, blasted them and had them powder coated, and bought new axles. D'oh! too much to redo for a car that isn't going to the track and stops just fine.

Yeah, I do think that's how the wheel speed works.

Speaking of getting things powder coated, do you know a good place in Jersey? I wanted to powder coat my calipers before putting them on.

[3PedalJake]

Originally Posted by Lochstar8

Looks amazing man and I’m planning to do just about the exact same thing over the next few months on my Canadian 323i. I’ve already got another subframe from another car that I’m planning on getting blasted but I think I’m going to go the POR15 and 2k urethane route rather than powder coat as I’ve heard it chips easily. (no personal experience just read online). Then after that I’m going to try and stop ALL of the rust on the under side of the car similar to the Beautiful work you’ve done on yours. Then I’m planning on putting a layer of marine grease on the ENTIRE under side of the car. Are winters are NASTY so I’m not playing around. Happy to have stumbled apon this thread to join the journey.

Thanks happy to have another rust ranger along Lochstar! This is my first time doing the powder coat so IDK how it will hold up. The subframe & diff I painted with rustoleum farm & implement paint, I've had good luck with that along with the rusty metal primer. I think the grease is a good idea, after the paint cures for a bit I think I'll dose it with cosmoline. Every time I curse NJ winters I think to myself could be worse, I could be in Canada lol. Thankfully I have a truck and a old accord to go out in the snow with, my BMWs rarely eve go out in the rain, too much work getting them looking good. Look forward to seeing your progress on the 323.

[3PedalJake]

Originally Posted by Leucosticte

Yeah, I do think that's how the wheel speed works.

Speaking of getting things powder coated, do you know a good place in Jersey? I wanted to powder coat my calipers before putting them on.

I have a friend that runs a business making skylights, part of the mfg process is powdercoating so he does it for me on the side. Don't know of any place that does it commercially. I'm getting ready to do my calipers too, I was just gonna paint them with VHT. I went to price seals for a rebuild, holy crap like $90 just for the front seals. They're not leaking so just gonna mask them off and spray.

Where abouts in Jersey are you? I'm in central south near Atco.

[Efthreeoh]

Originally Posted by 3PedalJake

Today replaced e-brake cables and derusted/primed/painted the chassis subframe area. The ebrake cables fought me (surprise), had to clamp vise-grips on them and beat them off with a hammer. The replacements are Febi-bilstein. I'd recommend against them, they don't have a ball end like the OE, they have half a ball with the back side a hex, much longer than the OE and wouldn't go in the holes of the cable puller without removing the brake handle, standing it vertically and inserting the cable end then rotating it down. PIA.
I did a kinda half-assed job on the rust removal but got the flaky stuff, shot it with rusty metal primer then gray enamel. Put a new heat shield on, original was missing probably turned to powder long ago. Looks better than it did and I'm done with the dirtiest part of this project, now to start assembling the new parts!

Excellent progress!

I want to point out to readers of this thread some may not realize. The car 3Pedal is working on is 18+ years old. He just replaced an aluminum heat shield that is hidden deep within the chassis* that only comes out if you remove a major section of the suspension. But here,18 years after the car was built and some 12 years after the last E90 was manufactured, the heatshield is STILL available from BMW. That is one of the benefits of owning a BMW, the company keeps obscure parts like this heat shield available decades after the last date of vehicle manufacture.

* TBH I didn't even know there was a heat shield tucked up above the subframe. I've never looked at that section of the car that close. And I have removed my diff in the past. I just never noticed it.

[Leucosticte]

Originally Posted by 3PedalJake

I have a friend that runs a business making skylights, part of the mfg process is powdercoating so he does it for me on the side. Don't know of any place that does it commercially. I'm getting ready to do my calipers too, I was just gonna paint them with VHT. I went to price seals for a rebuild, holy crap like $90 just for the front seals. They're not leaking so just gonna mask them off and spray.

Where abouts in Jersey are you? I'm in central south near Atco.

So the calipers are an interesting thing to me, if you ever want to go to 335i calipers in the future there's rebuilt ones that AutoZone sells that are original ATE calipers with new seals and stuff. The bleed screw is horrible though, definitely get the OE ATE one because the one they put on there is garbage. Here's a link to one of them:
https://www.autozone.com/brakes-and-...335/563439_0_0
The $40 core charge makes this even better, you're basically paying $50 per caliper at that point.

I've seen lots of painted calipers but it seems like the paint never really holds up, so that's why I wanted to get a powder coat done. If I can't find anything reasonable I can see if I can find some suitable paint. Since these calipers don't have any rust or dust on them I hope it applies on them nicely.

I'm in Edison.

[Leucosticte]

Originally Posted by Efthreeoh

Excellent progress!

I want to point out to readers of this thread some may not realize. The car 3Pedal is working on is 18+ years old. He just replaced an aluminum heat shield that is hidden deep within the chassis* that only comes out if you remove a major section of the suspension. But here,18 years after the car was built and some 12 years after the last E90 was manufactured, the heatshield is STILL available from BMW. That is one of the benefits of owning a BMW, the company keeps obscure parts like this heat shield available decades after the last date of vehicle manufacture.

* TBH I didn't even know there was a heat shield tucked up above the subframe. I've never looked at that section of the car that close. And I have removed my diff in the past. I just never noticed it.

I've barely found anything that I wanted to get for my E90 that was NLA and that stuff was very very obscure.

I hope they continue to stay available for the foreseeable future without becoming prohibitively expensive. I remember seeing some old posts mention parts prices and I was surprised, certain things were a lot cheaper than they are today (can't think of an example off the top of my head, would have to look) but I recall price increases of multiple times.

[Efthreeoh]

Originally Posted by Leucosticte

I've barely found anything that I wanted to get for my E90 that was NLA and that stuff was very very obscure.

I hope they continue to stay available for the foreseeable future without becoming prohibitively expensive. I remember seeing some old posts mention parts prices and I was surprised, certain things were a lot cheaper than they are today (can't think of an example off the top of my head, would have to look) but I recall price increases of multiple times.

One example is the engine belly pan. The first one I replaced was in 2009 and from a dealer without a discount they were $50. Now the belly pan is $250+.

[Efthreeoh]

Originally Posted by 3PedalJake

It's a little Butane powered torch with a push-button igniter. It shoots out a cute little micro sized blue flame just like a blowtorch but mini sized, perfect size for heating things the size of brake line nuts. I got it at Harbor Freight (Along with many of my other tools lol).

https://www.harborfreight.com/butane...rch-63170.html

Thanks for the info; trip to HF in my near term future.

[3PedalJake]

Today got my calipers blasted. Was gonna paint them too but of course it started raining just as I was finishing up with the blast gun so didn't get to painting. I decided to just go ahead and strip them. The boots and seals all look perfect so I'll just reinstall them. The rears are almost new, I installed them 2.5 yrs ago just before my setback and they only have about 1k miles on them. The front aluminum calipers were grimy but surprisingly the boots and seals looked brand new after 20 years.

Leucosticte Thx for the tip, if I get to that I'll keep it in mind. Re. paint durability, I think most problems are due to inadequate prep. For castings IMO blasting is the only acceptable solution. Irks me to no end the vids where ppl leave them on the car, scuff them a bit with a wire brush, spray with brake cleaner and paint thinking that's gonna hold up.

Efthreeoh I know you'll love the microtorch, but please report on what else you buy that you didn't know you needed before you walked in. I'm a kid in a candy store in that place.

And I'm always amazed with the amount of parts available for these cars, even tho I don't want to pay for them sometimes. Things that matter like DISA valves and the like I suck it up and pay but less important stuff I cheap out on sometimes. My Ebay belly pan that came rolled up is kinda crappy compared to a real one, but I gotta say it fits and does what a belly pan is supposed to do.

[Efthreeoh]

Originally Posted by 3PedalJake

Efthreeoh I know you'll love the microtorch, but please report on what else you buy that you didn't know you needed before you walked in. I'm a kid in a candy store in that place.

Oh, I stay away from HF as much as possible. Thank the Lord it is 45 minutes from home. They should pay a Wife as a (Walmart) greeter just to intimidate guys like you and me to give the, "you really need to think about if you need a new tool", speech as we walk in. I was in there a month ago to buy a 37MM deep-well impact socket. Lucky I was in a hurry. I was in and out in 4 minutes. I need to turn the socket into a oxygen sensor-like removal tool, so it needs to go to my goto machine shop for milling. I need such a tool to remove a stuck coolant block-drain valve that is corroded-in-place on the engine block of my diesel tractor.

BTW, I have that exact stand your polisher motor is bolted to. Mine mounts a grinder. Jealous of the media cabinet.

I'm thinking I need to order some new brake cables...

[Lochstar8]

Originally Posted by 3PedalJake

Thanks happy to have another rust ranger along Lochstar! This is my first time doing the powder coat so IDK how it will hold up. The subframe & diff I painted with rustoleum farm & implement paint, I've had good luck with that along with the rusty metal primer. I think the grease is a good idea, after the paint cures for a bit I think I'll dose it with cosmoline. Every time I curse NJ winters I think to myself could be worse, I could be in Canada lol. Thankfully I have a truck and a old accord to go out in the snow with, my BMWs rarely eve go out in the rain, too much work getting them looking good. Look forward to seeing your progress on the 323.

Happy to have somone else I can ask questions too if I run into problems!!. Speaking of problems I’ve ran into one, how did you get your lower control arm bushings out as of right now I’m Chiselling them out because it’s broken every puller and press I own.

[3PedalJake]

Efthreeoh I'm fortunate Mrs. 3P loves HF, it's in her top stores just below Tractor supply. Only problem with it is if I need something quick for a job I'm doing I have to wait for her to wander the aisles. Quite the little tool addiction enabler she is. Guess she figures better to channel it than let it run loose. That blast cabinet was trash picked completely gutted. I put new gauntlets in it (from HF of course), got a filtration retrofit from a guy on ebay and added a dust vortex collector. Built a feeder for the hopper with parts from Home Depot (another favorite store). Found a pic of what I was using before I got tha, redneck blast cabinet lol.

Lochstar8 The control arm and trailing arm are a PIA with that split bushing. I used a combination of 2 tool sets on them. Cant find a pic of extracting the control arm bushing but I found one installing it. I can dig up links to the tools if you like.

[ZGator]

if you don't have a press then ->

you need a metal cup that can hold the bushing, and a long threaded rod, and some heat - not easy.

something like this:

[3PedalJake]

Today part 1: Masked off the calipers I blasted yesterday and got them painted. I went with VHT blue, I like it. I have red calipers on the 330i but they don't really do it for me, seems like it's screaming "I'm a performance car!" a bit too loud for an N52. The blue is much more subtle, I think it will go better with the Platinum chassis color.

Today part 2: Got the diff and sway bar and brake lines attached to the new subframe and got it hoisted into place. Brake lines connected but gave up short of connecting the driveshaft, pick that and the rest of the suspension up tomorrow. Need a beer lol

[3PedalJake]

Originally Posted by ZGator

if you don't have a press then ->

you need a metal cup that can hold the bushing, and a long threaded rod, and some heat - not easy.

something like this:

That tool is for the subframe to body bushings, I used that it was a miracle worker. I was just emailing with the creator of that tool cause I just sent another guy his way. That thing is worth it's weight in gold.