FuzzyWuzzy

End end of Feb 2021 Update

Removed the hood, which was surprisingly light at 28lbs, awkward as all hell to move by yourself though. A fiberglass version would be cool, but that 28lbs would be hard to beat; IIRC when I reached out to a company that made one already for the E60, they said theirs was roughly 25lbs. Maybe they use a thicker core material or something, idk. Maybe I'll still try my hand at it at some point.

Also drained the oil and the coolant to start prepping the engine. Removed the airbox and intake manifold to give me more access to continue disconnecting the various electrical bits. Front bumper also got removed along with the front crash bar. Removed the headlight cleaning crap which dropped the weight by another......1.06lbs! Wooo! Just one less thing to deal with, tbh. I never used it and was never going to use it.



Not sure how well you can tell in the picture, but holy hell is my power steering cooler shot. I don't know how I wasn't having issues with it.

Also, I wish I had no qualms about the wiring or the engine like I normally do whenever I'm at the junkyard. Granted, no one may end up wanting this engine and trans with nearly 200k on it, but it won't hurt to try. At the very least, the three stage intake will be worth around $230.

Also, after removing everything, I forgot I never got the AC evacuated....I have a mechanic neighbor who might be able to do it or I can pony up $140 for a kit off Amazon.

kd7iwp

You know, I've had headlight washers for years with my E46 and now with my E61 and I always thought it was silly and pointless. Then last year I was driving 4 hours to Sun Peaks for a ski trip and we were driving at night and there was lots of snow, but the roads had been cleared pretty well, just large walls of it on the sides of the road from the plows. I wasn't nervous, but everything was so dark it was quite hard to see, figured it was because all the snow was covered in sand and had turned to a brown color. I passed a few big trucks and whatnot but visibility was surprisingly bad. Then all of a sudden when I cleaned my windshield after passing a truck the entire road lit up in front of me and I realized it was that my headlight washers had just gone off. It was an unbelievable difference and I was super-impressed and thankful for them. Got to our destination and the other 4 cars with us had headlights that were completely mudded over and here mine looked rather clean.

amesser325

I'm sure I will. I haven't seen anything (tho admittedly haven't done a ton of thread searching... yet) so it makes sense. I'm just going to buy an M5 as a donor so that I can pull whatever I need, like harnesses, modules, brake lines, brakes, etc. I've started looking at a few of the various systems and will probably start the M5 teardown towards the end of the year.

There is a factory roof rail delete trim option that seems to be about $800 (can't recall if each or pair) but that kinda defeats the point. Once I get down that far into it I'll look into finagling something - seems like there could be commonality with the sedans and just hiding a seam near the middle attachment point. We shall see I guess.


Well, there's that. Good to know, I assumed there had to be someone smarter than me who had done that work. That's actually my biggest unknown for my swap at this point - which DWA/CA system to use - tho I'm sure I just need to put some effort into it when I get there. Seems like all M5 stuff then just effectively the car thinks it's an M5 sedan. With airbags.
Anyway, long ways away from that.

I drove it for 30k mi after - absolutely loved it. Could definitely see the driveline savings to the tune of about 3 mpg. The steering felt much better (the whole car felt better, really) but I accidentally deleted Servotronic so there are a few mitigating factors that muddy up the sensations. There's a lot of other changes too, like steering geometry itself, plus the steering linkage contraption to get around the half shaft, and going from noodles for sway bars to M5 F/R. At some point after the swap I subbed in a set of the green springs from ISC at like 6 or 8k spring rate to more closely balance out with the air springs, because the 10 or 12k that came originally had a terrible buckboard ride to it, and that really nailed down the great ride I was looking for originally. Overall, the swap saved 200 lbs but I can't say I could feel the weight so much as the other changes. Plus it was really satisfying to know that I did it all myself so I was probably biased from that.

Cheers,

Andy

FuzzyWuzzy

I've seen the OEM rail delete options and the cost just doesn't justify it, personally. Haven't seen any available used pop up on eBay or Facebook, ever.

I took quick measurements and the six large rectangle holes are roughly 53mm x 19mm; the two smaller ones are 30mm x 19mm. Trying to find a rectangle plug that would fit doesn't seem likely, either. I can find a 30mm x 20mm that would possibly fill the small one (maybe shave it down a bit on top to make it more flush), but can't find anything for the larger one. I've found essentially 0.75" x 1.5", but zero 0.75" x 2". I've checked eBay, Amazon, Fastenal, McMaster, etc etc. Basically if it's not a common metal tube size, it doesn't exist. Maybe the plugs would work with a fair bit of trimming done, but the curves that the trim has might not work if the plugs are plastic and I can't seem to find rubber ones.

I even came across a roof rail clip/cover that the Mazda 3/6/CXs use that would've been nice to have as they're pretty thin and long enough and less than $2 for a set of 4, but they're only 13mm wide.

I know when I owned my GTO, the wing delete was popular and common enough that someone made pretty durable stickers to cover the circular holes, so finding something similar could be doable. Probably wouldn't match, but it'd make the ability to adding the rails back on whenever slightly more feasible!

Looks like your idea of taking a sedan's trim and cutting it in half and figuring that all out may be the best "cheap" option.


Nice! Sounds extremely worth it. Wish the E61 was available as RWD in North America; no idea why BMW only did it for the E91. I'm honestly surprised your thread didn't get more attention since it was an E61 going full RWD; not exactly an easy or common thing done.

amesser325

Getting off into the weeds I think the fillers could be 3M black, so that whatever the solution it's all black, Shadowline style. I hope that is my biggest problem at the end of it all...

Oh definitely worth it. I thought about doing it years prior when the first transfer case crapped out but didn't have the courage or space to do it. Yep, same here. I guess it's the US curse of the wagons, and I suppose a healthy dose of BMWs slow response to most every other vehicle trend... Which is to say once they saw others selling AWD they figured it's better for EVERY car to have it in order to make the sales. Then again, I'm a curmudgeon and just want a manual 2WD car. Get off my lawn and whatnot.

Andy

FuzzyWuzzy

Early March 2021 Update

Kinda productive, I think.

I ended up buying new lifters/trays and springs. Didn't feel comfortable with the knock-off lifters and I ended up just buying PAC1218 springs because I have no way of finding out what springs the Elgins actually are. Lesson learned. 5% cashback on eBay, too, so I technically got $20 out of the deal.

Got all of the fiberglass supplies in on Friday, so I decided to build a cheap 6'x4' plywood table to handle the behemoth known as the pano roof and slowly start to block off everything on it I don't want:


I'll be using spackle to finish filling and covering all of the railing areas (cheaper than bondo and I already have a good bit. I'll seal it by using some primer). I came across a Mini Cooper R56 forum that essentially did the same thing sans spackle to their pano here. Using that to get a good idea and what not. I like how they raised the front and back parts up and I may steal that idea. Overall, theirs came out decent enough, but ruined the weight with the balsawood.

I've gotten most of the front end off now and quickly running out of space lol:





This leaves the steering rack, power steering, engine, transmission, rear driveshaft, and the front subframe. While everything is out, I'll be scrubbing the engine bay down and maybe applying some thermal coating or sound deadening. Not sure yet.

But I will say that exhaust system is another heavy and awkward beast. If the weights on bmwfans are correct and I'm reading it right...the middle exhaust section w/ the center muffler and two smaller cats is 64.4lbs, the rear muffler is 28.7lbs, and the two front cats total 17.2lbs which brings us to 110.3lbs. I'll be recycling the cats (and use that money to buy the Terminator X...), maybe save that rear piping for whatever may happen in the future as it's pretty large, try to sell the two remaining mufflers (unlikely), and then scrap the rest. I'd re-use the cats, but after nearly 200k miles and 15 years, I think it's time for new ones.

Now the engine, woo buddy, that thing is beat. "Slight" oil leak, but it still ran like a champ. No idea how. I didn't really care for it as this was going to happen sooner or later, but it still went strong. Going to sell the intake manifold by itself, same for the alternator and start (both replaced within the last couple years or so), possibly re-use the power steering pump and AC depending on what LSE9x makes possible, and build a shrine for the water pump as it somehow never failed. I can tell it was changed at some point as the hose clamps were both facing straight down in to the subframe unless the guy building this at the factory was a sadist. Then see what I can even get for the remaining of the block; not expecting much other than a couple hundred or so.

Same goes for all of the remaining bits; try to sell and if not, scrap it. Again, as the transmission was nearing it's final days, I'm not expecting a whole lot out of that. I'm typically pretty thorough when it comes to my listings for parts like these and if the offer seems reasonable and the buyer logical, I'm happy.

That should just about do it. I was able to pick up a couple of auto-folding side mirrors off a '10 528xi (someone cut the damn wires to the glass...) at the junkyard during an $80 wheelbarrow day over the weekend along with most of a black headlining for an E53, so a whole bunch of stuff will be getting posted and some space hopefully made in the garage.

Still tracking all costs, even!

LS swap - $2,083.43
AWD -> RWD - $601.01 (expecting this to go down once I can start selling the parts removed/replaced)
Auto -> Manual - $1,445.55 (same for this, but not expecting much obviously)
Total - $4,129.99

From what I gathered, this is still a relatively cheap build and I'd say that's only because I've done my best to find deals when and where I could while trying to source as much of the swap from the junkyard. This still doesn't include the standalone ECU, the new driveshaft, new exhaust, or the brackets all of which will increase the final cost a fair bit.

I could cut the cost down a fair bit by using a GM harness and ECU, but the ECU still requires tuning to remove VATS along with buying HPT; not worth it at that point. I could make my own brackets, but I lack a welder or the experience in making brackets. Not something I want to mess up on at this point.

I'd include the LCI light update cost, but that's not reeaallllyyyy a part of the LS swap as a whole. I just wanted newer lights and hate the knockoffs that are available. Still tracking that cost, though (below $600 total now; still haven't even sold my xenon AHL headlights...!)

Maybe once all is said and done in regards to the fiberglass pano, I'll include the cost of that in case someone else wants to do it if mine turn out to be complete trash/I never want to touch it again. That reminds me, the UK seller on eBay with the non-pano headliner never updated their posting after they said they would so I could buy it, even after sending a follow up message when eBay was doing 5% cashback last week. Real annoying.

FuzzyWuzzy

Mid March 2021 Update

Tried to unbolt the engine from the trans, but there's one bolt that just refuses to be able to be reached unless the whole drivetrain is lowered, so looks like I need to buy a chain. Sweet.

Got the rear driveshaft removed. Rear part was rusted on and required me beating the shit out of the front to get it loose. This leaves solely the transmission, engine, and front subframe

Cut the cats free and was able to nearly immediately sell them on eBay. After all fees and shipping costs, I made a profit of $891.68; sold for $1,050 w/ free shipping. Some places were offering more, like one in Malaysia, New York, or New Jersey, but they also reserved the right to pay you less if the cats weren't up to their standards and since I would be required to ship to locations nowhere near me and leave it up to them...I opted for eBay as my profit would be guaranteed. Thanks to that, the cost has dropped to about $3,240. So far, so good!

Also got to priming the pano:


After all the priming and what not, I can tell I'll still need to use bondo and more primer. The spackle just cracks like no other and is a damn pain. The bright side is that it filled the vast majority of gaps so if I were to do this again it would be spackle, bondo, then primer. Spackle to fill the large gaps, bondo to make it nicer, and then primer to seal everything. For instance, that whole front section is packing tape and spackle and it's crack city. The side are relatively easier as you can get foam board there, but once it starts heading to the corners, it's a pain. Also, don't use dollar store packing tape; it's trash. Just go to Walmart and use the duck brand or whatever it is.

Supposed to snow tomorrow and it's been raining nonstop for the past few days so as long as my garage doesn't flood, the engine and trans should be removed this weekend along with the bondo being laid on the pano. Pre-LCI headlights will get cleaned up as well and posted to eBay to lower the overall project cost by another $300-$500, which would be great. I'll also start listing some of the AWD bits for the hell of it, too.

FuzzyWuzzy

Mid April 2021 Update

Slowly getting warmer, but at least half the day is still below 60, so the fiberglass has taken a back seat for the time being. Hopefully it warms up soon so I can lay it down before the resin goes bad!

Engine and trans were removed. Front subframe had to get dropped to get everything out. Such a pain in the ass. Glad I'm going RWD.



Installed/Put in place the RWD front subframe along with the steering rack. Trying to install the front sway bar, but the bolts just don't wanna catch the threads, so that's fun....

Trying to replace the steering column as well, but some genius forgot to extend the steering column all the way prior to removing things and even after plugging everything back in, it doesn't wanna go anywhere because why not? Makes no sense.



In the meantime while I question burning down everything, I'm cleaning up the wiring as well because I apparently like to torture myself.

Was able to put down some bondo on to the pano as well! Did some minor sanding, might put down one more layer in some places in order to smooth it all out. The mold likely won't come out super pretty without some work getting done afterwards.



Also, eBay today is doing a 5% cash back so uh...



Looks like I don't have to worry about hoping the LS3 manifolds fit. Now I just need to find new manifolds!

And that's really it so far. Ordered front strut mounting stuff, the spring pads, etc. Waiting on the pads to come in from China, so likely I should've just grab used ones from the junkyard but whatever.

FuzzyWuzzy

End of May 2021 Update

I've been a bit lethargic thanks to a cycle. Whoops!

Anyways, got the steering column removed finally. There's a screw/nut (can't remember) that controls the motor screw for forwards/backwards movement. After 10 minutes of turning it, I had enough space to finally remove the last two bolts holding it in in the rear.

Slowly cleaning up the cabling I no longer need with the sunroof being removed, the SOS button, bluetooth, etc. I was under the assumption, because it's what I would do, the wiring would run to the closest fuse block or to whatever module controls it to save money and weight. BMW says no, it should run from the front of the vehicle (SOS button, fwd/reverse switch for roof) along the roofline, go down the D pillar, and loop right back towards the front of the vehicle...This picture is just the front pano roof motor cable and the fwd/reverse switch so far from the rear pass seat. I still need to pry up the sills.



Also went to finally assemble the front shocks to only realize one of the China-shipped top rubber mounts is a reverse as to what is needed...Save money; get more headaches. Also learned the B4s seem a bit...loose than what I assumed. Is that normal? I'll look it up.

I also happened to pick up a fun little 3d printer to try some stuff out, one of which is roof rail plugs:







That was version 2. Initially, I assumed a rectangular plug would work and I didn't get the interior curves correct. I then did this one, made it thinner to print quicker, but then didn't realize there's actually another curve on the outermost side. Idk how I'm gonna design that in Fusion 360 with a 10 minute video under my belt, but I'll manage maybe. I also need to figure out how to create a way for it to secure itself like a typical push-in plug. I may just give up and use tape, but that doesn't seem as fun.


Also trying to figure out if swapping the CAS with a newer push start version would be possible as technically speaking, I won't have to worry about the actual ECU. I think it'd work. I'd much prefer the push start because why not. I'd just need to find a module w/ key at the junkyard.

Also printed a 5 spd shift knob on the printer because I don't currently feel like spending $20 for one that may or may not work or that I'd like.

ucsbwsr

Awesome! I am very interested to see how the pano roof delete goes and what the weight is of your final product.
I want to do the same for added headroom and shaving 60lbs from the roof (if doing OEM conversion).