After 2 years of knuckle busting hard work, and a small fortune spent on parts and upgrades the car is finally done.
This project started with a desire to capture the traditional essence of BMW. After realizing that the newer BMW 3 series lost a lot of what made its predecessor so awesome, I decided to go back to owning an E46.
I remember reading somewhere that the reason why BMW put the window and door controls in the center console on the E46, E36 and many other older BMW models was because they wanted the driver to always keep his left hand on the steering wheel. Up to that point BMW had been a true drivers car. You can tell by the driver bias dashboard, amazing handling, driver friendly controls, and breathtaking performance. However, in the early to mid 2000ths things changed and BMW was dead set on increasing their market share. That’s when things went wrong for consumers such as myself, people who fell in love with BMWs bad guy, gangster, image. All of a sudden BMWs were being marketed as family friendly cars with pointless driver aid features and Free Warranties and Service Plans.
Now, I understand BMW had to change and adapt to its Japanese counterparts. Since the early 2000 they were offering more options and better service plans at a fraction of the cost of a BMW. So BMW reallocated funding and spent more on service plans, warranties, and more standard features. But all of these extra goodies came at a cost, spending more money on standard features and complementary service plans while keeping the vehicles price competitive meant that BMW had less money to actually build cars. So first time in my lifetime I saw some clear signs of money savings across most BMW car models. I know these things may not be obvious to a typical car buyer but for all of us Beemer nuts it was loud and clear.
With the introduction of the E90 in late 2005 the BMW 3 series went from a drivers car to an everybody car. Don’t get me wrong I like the E90 and for that matter I like all BMWs but I just don’t like them as much as some of the older models. As a businessman, I can understand the reasoning behind BMW changing their approach towards building and marketing their vehicles, however as a BMW lover I can’t say I am happy with it.
Some of the absolute horrid changes BMW has made over the last decade is to replace its AMAZING hydraulically assisted steering to an electronic system which lags in almost every way in comparison. They are now dumping their new 2 liter turbocharged 4 banger in many new models. I am all for fuel economy and turbo however, I would assume the new drivetrain should always be better than its predecessor and with the new 2L that is not always the case. The older inline 6 cylinder had more usable power across a wider RPM range, was more rev happy, and did not sound like a tractor at idle like the new generation 4 bangers do. In fact the older generation E46 and even E90 inline six cylinder motors had the nicest sound note of any other 6-cylinder car within that category.
So for all those reasons I decided I wanted to go back to owning an E46. I guess you can argue that part of the reason why I wanted to backtrack to the previous model may also have been due to nostalgia, I have always regretted selling my 04-325I Sport but at the time I needed the money to help my mom buy a new car so I had no choice.
I was dead set on getting another E46, so my next step was to find a used one, I wanted to keep it as close to the one I used to own as possible. I had to have the face lifted model 2002-2005, Black on Black, rear wheel drive with Sport Package and it absolutely had to be a manual. There are a few things I was willing to settle with but an automatic transmission was never one of those things. Having a sporty automatic transmission car is like having a good-looking girlfriend with male genitalia, she may be pretty to look at but you sure would not want to take her for a ride.
After a couple of months of searching I found a craigslist car listing for a black on black 2004 325I sport. The car belonged to a 35 year old female that had not taken care of it. It had about 180 miles, it was tired, the clutch was slipping, the engine was giving off many codes and running rough at idle, the battery was junk, both front fenders were dented, the hood was damaged and most of the other body panels had minor dings on it. However, when I finally saw the car in person I saw something promising. The car was free of rust, and accept for the roof it did not seem to have ever been repainted so, I knew it was a great platform for an awesome car build. This is where my adventure began.
This was the actual vehicle sale picture posted in the craigslist ad:
http://i937.photobucket.com/albums/ad211/superblue1999/photo_zps4tfqcsrw.jpg
One of the first things I did when I first got the car is do a full drivetrain swap.
http://i937.photobucket.com/albums/ad211/superblue1999/photo%2000_zpsnanw9tm6.jpg
The entire drivetrain was replaced with a modified drivetrain pulled from an 05 BMW 330I with about 27k on the clock, the engine looked like it was brand new.
http://i937.photobucket.com/albums/ad211/superblue1999/photo%208_zpsy3n4daxj.jpg
We had a little time so we made this quick and dirty video of my 2004 BMW E46 project car. Pardon the bad camera work, my rolling tripod broke halfway throw shooting we tried mending it but still a lot of the cool scenes were not salvageable.
here are some of the things that I have fixed, and replaced on this car:
1. Engine Swap from a 2005 BMW 330I with 26k
2. New short through shifter from an M3
3. Cold air intake
4. Bav Auto performance ignition coils
5. New mass airflow
6. Magnaflow cat back exhaust
7. All new drivetrain mounts and bushings
8. Supersprint header
9. Upgraded radiator with new expansion tank and hardware
10. New Bosh starter
11. New AC Compressor
12. All new power steering with all the hoses reservoir and components.
13. New light wait aluminum pulleys and belts
14. New gaskets, water pump and much more…
15. New BMW battery
16. Proper paint job (all glass trim was removed)
17. New fender liners
18. All new exterior trim.
19. New fenders
20. New front Grill
21. New windshield
22. All new BMW emblems
23. New side mirrors
24. Spider once peace smoked front headlights
25. HID Conversion kit
26. Depo clear side markers
27. Depo Euro Tail Lights
28. New hood
29. Wheel spacers
30. New M3 replica front bumper
31. ZHP style rear bumper
32. CSL style rear spoiler
33. Roof spoiler
34. E39 sport rims
35. H&R Cup kit with Bilstein lowering springs
36. Front and rear strut tower brace
37. White Line front and rear sway bars
38. White Line polyurethane Control arm bushings
39. New control arms
40. and much, much more….
Check back for more videos and updates on this project.
Cool Project!