Yoda, the Z3 Coupe, Finds a New Home!

This blog has reported on a lot of projects at the Grant St. Garage, but it actually began before we ever found and purchased the Garage on the next-to-last day of 2011. It started (on another blog site, now defunct) as a project log for a car I bought in September of 2011, my 1999 BMW Z3 Coupe.

Not Another Dash!

How is it that I keep getting into this situation??? This time the subject is the 1999 Z3 Coupe - the car that was the genesis for this blog:

Milestone Reached!

Not much posted about the Z3 Coupe lately, which is kind of odd. After all, this blog got its start as a project log for that car! But as things happen sometimes, the project car sort of morphed into my daily driver. And I like it that way, because driving that little car makes me happy!

For the past year, I've been saying "nearly 200,000 miles." Today, the milestone was reached, and I can drop the "nearly." 

Jack Miller, of Jack's Auto and Aero, once said to me, "You're unlikely to put the next 100,000 miles on it." I decided to take that as a personal challenge! I'll post the picture when it hits 300,000.

Road Trip!

In the nearly three years that I've owned the Z3 Coupe, this blog has recorded a pretty good pile of work I've accomplished (with the help of some good friends) to bring it back from some deferred maintenance and looming problems. After all that, it was time for the Coupe's first substantial trip, and I couldn't think of a better one that to participate in the Hemmings Cruise-In in Bennington, Vermont, to celebrate National Collector Car Appreciation Day. The short version: great trip, and the car ran flawlessly! A 692.3 mile round trip, with the car delivering 25.4 mpg with an average speed of 48.4 mph.

Transmission - DONE!

After the HUGE effort that Kelly Williams helped me with (parts 1, 2, and 4), along with Bob Zimmerman (part 3) and Troy Nace (also in part 4), along with some serious tool development and trans repair by myself in part 5, it was finally time to put everything together and get the car going again. John Zimmerman was the person who helped with the heavy lifting to finish the project in this post, part 6. What a project. Along the way, I wondered if all this effort could possibly be worth it, but now that everything is working and really, really improved I can say: YEAH! What a sense of accomplishment to get a transmission out that seriously didn't want to be disturbed, renew all that needed to be renewed, and put it all back together.

Transmission Progress!

After I completed the detent repair on my transmission, it was time to prepare to re-install it. First up was rebuilding the shift mechanism, which basically involves replacing everything that isn't metal. Not hard, and I had ordered the parts months ago. The time-consuming part was just cleaning all the grease and gunk off.

More Stuck Stuff!

With the transmission out and on the bench, it was time to fix it! The problem was with the shifter, and it is a very common problem with this series of transmissions. The spring-loaded detent pins that center the shifter seize in place, making it very difficult to shift, and also making it hard to find 3rd gear. The fix is "easy" but it requires removal of the transmission. I've already documented how "not easy" that part was, with nearly every bolt seriously stuck. As you'll see, the trans had stuck stuff too!

Unsticking the Stuck, Part 2 (of 2!)

Today, Master Electrician Bob Zimmerman came to do some work at both my house and at the Grant St. Garage. When you see pictures in the shop, with the huge bank of 6-bulb florescent fixtures and quad outlets every four feet, that's all Bob's work. He started over at the electric meter, and rewired the whole place. Bob's dad, John Zimmerman, came along to supervise and help think. Turns out that was helpful in the end too.

See, I got the bright idea to text Bob:
"Do you have a MIG welder?"
Bob: "120 Volt"
Me: "Bring it!"

Patient ready for surgery!

Starting at the end: here's the transmission, sitting on the workbench, ready for surgery:

Two Steps Back

Work has been slow at the Grant St. Garage. Kelly Williams and I did get to spend a couple of hours on the Z3 Coupe almost two weeks ago now. After my success in getting that stuck bolt on the transmission out, we thought we were finally making progress.

We did get a couple more bolts out, and also removed the "X-brace" that was limiting access - sneakers in the shot to give it some scale!  That brace is showing just a couple places with a tiny bit of surface rust, so I'll clean it up and treat them with POR-15 before reinstallation.

Supporting the Engine

In part one of this Winter project, Kelly Williams and I started the process of removing the transmission from the Z3 Coupe. We ran out of time and energy at about the same moment, with a big bolt that was very hard to turn. I fretted over that, and even emailed Mike Miller, the BMW club tech specialist. His advice was succinct: "It is either stripping or not stripping." In other words, the only way out of that mess is through it! If it comes out, all is probably well. If not... well, out comes the Sawzall, followed by much cursing.

So It Begins... Winter Project 2014!

The Z3 Coupe is back in the air, and it will be there for a while this time. It's the start of the 2014 Winter Project!

The Project List includes:

Let There Be (More) Light... a Little

A few weeks ago, we were invited to a fun outdoor party at Matt Sware's new house in Strasburg.  The party didn't start until 8:00 pm, and it was fully dark well before then. Mary Ellen and I went in the Coupe, so we could park next to Matt's 2000 M Coupe - same color! He saved me a special space next to his. We looked very mysterious parked together there in the dark. I tried to take a picture via flashlight, but that was an absolute fail.

For those of you who don't know, Strasburg is out in the country, and we took the country back roads to get there. Dark! Really dark. I guess we're spoiled, since both Mary Ellen's BMW 328 and my new VW GTI have xenon headlights, but it felt like we were making our way (in John Biemiller's evocative phrase) by shining a flashlight out the window. I resolved then and there to try to upgrade the lights.

Unsticking the Stuck, Part 1

Sometimes nuts, bolts and screws just get stuck, and no amount of effort will unstick them! I previously posted about a visit to Jack's Auto and Aero, to enlist Jack's help with stuck nuts on my exhaust system, and some serious seized brake lines. What I didn't tell in that post was that there was one more stuck bolt, and it is still stuck.

Stopping the Clutch

The BMW Z3 was built to a budget. All cars are, but the Z3 in particular has a bit of a "parts-bin special" reputation. In the early 90's, there were very few convertibles even being sold. But then Mazda hit a home run with the Miata, and BMW decided to test the waters with a brand new model - the Z3, introduced in 1996. To save development and parts costs, many Z3 parts were recycled from the BMW 3-series coupes and sedans, and the interior in particular was rather cheaply made.

It's obvious that the original spec for the Z3 included a stop behind the clutch pedal, to limit the pedal travel. Every Z3 convertible and coupe has a threaded hole in the floorboard, behind the clutch:

Sign of the Times

I love my little Z3 Coupe, but I am the first to admit that it's a "ten footer." That is, it looks like a new car from ten feet away, but get close and you can see plenty of road rash, a windshield filled with stone chips, and a few faded spots.  You know, patina - folks are paying big money for that at auctions these days!

We're planning a road tour with the Nittany Bimmers chapter of the BMW Car Club of America, and I decided to make a little sign to put in the windshield when the car is parked. Kind of a preemptive strike against those who might think, "That's not exactly pristine." It will be laminated, so I can write the exact mileage on at the show.  You saw it here first!

Diving into the Door, Part 2

In Part 1 of this saga, I detailed removing the door card and finding a crucial reset procedure so the window lift mechanism would work again.  Now, it was time to remove the window, replace the sliders and grease everything up.  There was one more web link that was really useful for that procedure:

http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum/showthread.php?709563-Replacing-sliders-and-greasing-front-door-tracks

Diving Into the Door, Part 1

The passenger side window on my Z3 Coupe was slow... REALLY slow.  Especially descending.  It was so tortuous that I would usually reach across the car and help it down.  So, off to the Internet I went, and found some disquieting info.  This is an incredibly common problem on BMW's of the E36 vintage, and there is a real danger of severe damage.  There's a post welded in the door, which functions as a pivot for the window mechanism.  Let things bind for too long, and that can snap off, and then you're in a world of hurt.  BMW says replace the door.  Internet pundits say you can weld it back, after total disassembly, but who wants to get into that mess?

A Visit to Jack's

In my last post, I mentioned that there were two (of six) brake lines that I was unable to remove.  I was fearful that if I put on too much pressure, the hard line would shear, and then I'd be stuck!  I decided to pay another visit to Jack Miller's shop in Bainbridge.  An independent BMW service facility, Jack's Auto and Aero has been involved from the beginning of this project.  In fact, there's a brief video of the shop in my very first post.

Turns out that this was a very wise decision!  Jack was astonished at how tight those two brake line connections were.

Shocking! Part II...

In Part I, I showed the start of this project to install new Bilstein shocks and Bavarian Autosport springs in the Z3 Coupe.  That ended with the rear done - now it's time for the front.  This is well-documented on the web, so I won't do the step-by-step procedure.

I will, however, post a picture of a technique that I read somewhere.  Everyone who saw it laughed at me, but it worked great.  See, after you remove the strut, you have to support the suspension and brake assembly so that it won't swing out and damage the brake lines or other components.  The idea is to insert one lug bolt, and tie a rope from there to the engine lift point at the front center of the block.  Worked great!