Here is the car soon after i bought it. Its a '91 318is.








The first thing that i did was some weight loss. I gutted the interior, and scraped all of the tar out of the body and trunk. Removed all the stereo, speakers, and CD changer. I swapped out the power windows for a set of manual windows.

Next thing that i did was suspension and wheels. I have the GC kit with camber plates. 440F 700R.

Wheels are the 17x8 et25 Apex ARC-8's in satin black. With vorshlag wheel studs.

Tires are 235/40/17 dunlop direzza star specs. I had to roll the fenders, and trim out some of the front wheel well liners. There is no rub now.







Then i bought this. LS1 and T56 from an '04 GTO with 68k mi. I got it from Cleveland Pick a Part. $4k shipped. All accessories included and has a 6 month warranty. We have been using Garret and Steve's LS1 build guide. I recomend any one doing this swap, spend the $100 and get yourself a copy.



All of the work is being performed by my friend Nick Ray at MCS Motorsports in Las Cruces, NM.

Pulled the M42 and started making room for the V8 and 6 speed.





Time to build some mounts. We set the motor back as close to the firewall as possible. There is less than 1" of clearance.









Bought a rebuilt Maval Z3 2.7 LTL steering rack



Modified the oilpan to clear the steering rack, and added a kickout for some increased capacity.







Motor is resting on the subframe in this pic. It sits level on the mounts.



LS7 clutch and flywheel



Pro 5.0 shifter for T56



Here is the tranny mount







WOOT!



Mounted








Nick just finished building some custom headers. They had to be shorties for clearance issues. Headers are 1 5/8" primaries into a 3" collector.



velocity cone



Cleaned up the motor and tranny this weekend. Its amazing what some Purple Power and a Pressure washer will do.





Painted my valve covers black



My valves are looking pretty clean for a 68k motor

 

Also, I got all my exhaust parts in this week. I cant wait to hear how this thing sounds.



spun cats with 4" of metalic substrate








Got some work done this weekend.

Pulled the subframe and diff to refresh some bushings. I still need to get some trailing arm bushings, and am looking to get some half shafts in better condition than mine...







cleaned up and painted my subframe.




Hoping to get started on wiring this week.

spaghetti




have quite a bit of room for radiator setup. Hoping everything will clear without using an LS2 waterpump




shifter




Well alot has changed in the past couple of weeks. My friend Nick who is doing most of the work on the car, has split up with his partner at MCS. They have closed down the shop, and have been busy moving out. Needless to say not much progress has been made on my car.

This weekend, we moved the car to Nick's dad's shop, where the car will be completed. His shop is badass. Its out in the country, and he has every tool you can imagine.

Here is the shop.




view from out front of the shop


This saturday, we welded in some slotted dungeon motorsport trailing arm brackets, and swapped in new bushings. Now I should have plenty of rear camber and toe adjustment to play with!

Rather than cut most of the existing bracket off, we just opened the old bracket up so that we could weld the slider to the outsite. I think this will make for a sturdier setup.








notched the subframe bushing a bit to clear the bolt


rear end ready to go back in - Im in desperate need of some half shafts. PM me if you have some for sale.


Also, I have gotten some new parts in.

Mishimoto 3.5" dual pass radiator.




Most of the parts of my brake setup from Lee Vuong at Massive.
(Im still missing front hats, hardware, and brackets)











We still have the wiring to work out, but for now we are gonna work on some of the fun stuff (exhaust and brakes)

-Matt

 

Looking good. Great shop

 

Wow, unbelievable work! What brake set-up are you using (i.e. what brake booster)? Or are you going to run the HydroBoost system that Steve and Garret recommend? I'm putting together the pieces for me E30-LS1 right now. Thanks in advance.

Chris

 

subscribed, props on such an incredibly badass project

 

very cool project

 

Thanks for the compliments guys. Its exciting to see all of these LS1 e30's popping up


I am gonna run a manual brake setup. I didnt want to go to the trouble of relocating the booster. I have pretty large pistons on 4 piston calipers 1.75F and 1.25R. I am gonna try using the stock MC for now, and see how it feels. I will prob eventually upgrade to a tilton setup. I also may adjust the pivot point on the pedal to soften it up a bit. Time will tell.
-Matt

 

cool build

 

Good stuff. Let me know how it feels once you get her running. I'm still sorting through my options.

Chris

 

You fire her up yet?

 

******* AWESOME swap project man, cant wait to see it all come together.

love the brake setup, will be great on such a light car.

is that the stock rear end? (yikes!)

man, '80's cars plus modern LS1 T56 swaps are such a great thing.

props dude, looking real good, crazy color for a v8 bimmer!

 

Great project. It's amazing how similar that rear end setup is to the second gen RX7.

Andrew

 

Nope, not yet. Didnt get anything done this past weekend. We are gonna run the exhaust this coming saturday. We still need to finish up on the wiring before we can get it started.

Yeah, I am pumped to get the brake setup put together. Im hoping that pedal feel will be okay with the stock MC.
That is the stock rear end. Ive got my fingers crossed that it will be up to the task. I bolted in a larger case 3.73 lsd.

 

Hurry up and get that wiring sorted out!!! I want to see 2 new ls powered e30's running this weekend!!!

 

So, we made some progress this weekend. Finished up the exhaust








welded








Brought the car home to try and get a couple things done during the week.


I am having a hell of a time tring to get the half shafts out of the hubs. I have been banging the **** out of them. I heated up the hubs, and tried again, and still nothing. You guys have any ideas?

 

can you weight it and get some corner weights? Looks great so far!

 

Thanks, I have some pre swap corner weights written down some where, and when we are done, I am gonna do a comparison. There is still alot of weight to add to the car (brakes, driveshaft, radiator, etc)

 

sweettt!!!!!

 

Half shaft out of the hubs? Find the biggest hammer you can and swing. I spent ~2 hours trying to get w/ a half shaft on the girlfriends suby, had lunch, went to lowes got the biggest hammer they had. Came home, problem solved after about swing three.

Can't wait to get started on my e36... likely wont be for another year though Keep up the inspiration.

 

Can you use a three jaw puller? I've had to resort to this in the past when a sledge hammer failed.