‘02 BMW 325ci 5MT | www.eluisphoto.comTumblr (3.0; @325ci)http://325ci.tumblr.com/<p><strong>Sunday, December 17, 2012. </strong></p> <p>It&#8217;s been two months now that I&#8217;ve done a blog post, but that&#8217;s only because virtually nothing new has been done to the car! Aside from replacing my old hood roundel with a new one last week or so, that&#8217;s pretty much just about it. It is winter break now, though, which means that I&#8217;ll be performing some maintenance on the car (fluid change, cleaning ICV, replacing CVV, and some other stuff) as well as installing a couple of new goodies that I&#8217;ve purchased for the car (projector retrofit and bluetooth integration)! Looking to get my hands on an E46 M3 leather steering whee, as well.. Just waiting for the right one to come up on either the E46Fanatics f/s forum or eBay.</p> <p>Needless to say, I&#8217;m excited for what&#8217;s to come. I&#8217;ll also be purchasing an M-Tech II front sometime soon, hopefully, which should be a huge improvement over the stock, scratched-up, dinged-up bumper.</p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/38135408477http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/38135408477Mon, 17 Dec 2012 00:04:00 -0800<p><strong>Wednesday, October 17, 2012.</strong></p> <p>Just had an unfortunate back-to-back set of days for the E46.</p> <p>After a nice, relaxed day at school on Tuesday (October 16, 2012), I was welcomed to a flat front driver&#8217;s side tire just as I was pulling out of the school parking garage thanks to a lovely nail on the road that I must&#8217;ve driven over on the way to school. I had to pull over switch that wheel out for my spare in the trunk. Thank goodness the area I did the swap at was pretty leveled or else things could have gotten ugly real fast. I was able to do it in about 15-20 minutes or so. Had to sacrifice my clean clothes for the day, but it&#8217;s better than going through the trouble of having the car towed. Good thing the stock jack can get really low, too, given that my car sits at a pretty low ride height - albeit, lower than most (if not all) low-profile jacks can go. Got the tire fixed in the evening, everything&#8217;s good to go.</p> <p>Today (October 17, 2012), on the other hand, I was involved in a car accident on my commute to school. It took place at the intersection of Fulton and Arguello, where I was among many other cars yielding to incoming traffic as we all had to make left turns. I was behind the furthermost car, so we had already creeped up a bit passed the pedestrian crosswalk, and then the traffic light goes to yellow. The car ahead of me just finishes making their left turn, and I proceed to making mine after making sure the coast was clear and since I couldn&#8217;t stop anyways given that I had the right to complete my turn. Turns out some lady in an &#8216;03 Civic was trying to beat the yellow and ended up hitting me. As soon as I saw her speeding downhill from Fulton street (I was driving nothing but uphill), I hit my brakes and prayed that an accident could be avoided. She was going way too fast (and the fact that she was going downhill didn&#8217;t make it any better) and ended up hitting my car while I was at a stop. Head-on. We then pulled over and exchanged information. The damage was relatively minimal for my car, with my DIY tow hook license plate bracket literally taking one for the team. No scratches or anything, aside from a little puncture from the screws that attached my license plate to my bracket. Oh, and let&#8217;s not forget that by the end of all of this I&#8217;ll be in need of a new front license plate. Hopefully the tow hook area isn&#8217;t damaged, either. Her civic had a little hole on the front bumper from where my tow hook bracket was sticking out. After taking pictures and whatnot, we drove off to our respective destinations. I&#8217;m going to call my insurance company first thing in the morning (I was extremely busy today and literally had no time&#8230;) and file a claim. Since it was head-on, even though I&#8217;m confident that I&#8217;m not the one at fault, it&#8217;s going to be a toughie since there we weren&#8217;t able to get any witnesses or police reports. That said, regardless of anything, I&#8217;m just glad that no one was hurt and that the car did it&#8217;s job in keeping my well-being safe. You live and you learn, can&#8217;t do anything about it but keep my head up and stay positive.</p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/33826577152http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/33826577152Thu, 18 Oct 2012 00:21:00 -0700<p><strong>Monday, October 15, 2012.</strong></p> <p>Had Drew stop by to adjust a few things with my suspension and he was also able to do my CDV delete. It feels so much better now, still wondering how I went so long without doing the DIY. Getting off of first is less of a drag, and going from first to second just feels simply better. Recommended!</p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/33717224372http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/33717224372Tue, 16 Oct 2012 11:14:00 -0700<p><strong>Wednesday, October 10, 2012.</strong></p> <p>Drew installed my Meyle HD FCA&#8217;s w/ FCAB&#8217;s and OEM steering coupling today. We did run into an issue with removing one of the OEM FCA&#8217;s, which led Drew to his last resort - torching it with good &#8216;ole Butane. Thank goodness for the Home Depot down my street! Aside from that, though, the car looks great. The camber is a bit off on all sides (which is to be expected), explaining why the car sits a bit higher on the driver&#8217;s side than the passenger&#8217;s on the front, and sits a bit higher on the passenger&#8217;s side than the driver&#8217;s side on the rear. Nothing an alignment can&#8217;t fix, though, which I&#8217;ll be getting most likely after a week passes.</p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/33717104423http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/33717104423Tue, 16 Oct 2012 11:12:00 -0700<p><strong>Tuesday, October 9, 2012.</strong></p> <p>Drew from Swift Motorworks (aka <em>Drewdown</em> from E46fanatics) came down today and installed my ST coilovers w/ Meyle HD RSM&#8217;s (w/ Z3 reinforcement plates) and OEM FSM&#8217;s (w/ OEM reinforcements), as well as my Meyle HD RTAB&#8217;s today. Turns out Kalim recommended me to him and he was free  during the beginning of the week. Everything looks great so far, pretty stoked on everything. He&#8217;ll be coming back tomorrow to do the FCA&#8217;s, FCAB&#8217;s, and OEM steering coupling, so I&#8217;m pretty excited for that.</p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/33715754982http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/33715754982Tue, 16 Oct 2012 10:42:00 -0700<p><strong>Thursday, October 4, 2012.</strong></p> <div id="post_message_25201465"> <div class="KonaBody">Was supposed to drop my car off to <em>The Shop San Bruno</em> today and have my suspension installed, ready to pick up tomorrow. Turns out, the guy there wanted $40 more ($520) than he quoted me via e-mail ($480) and came up with some excuse to not include my OEM steering coupling (that I clearly mentioned in the e-mail) in his estimate when I came to the shop today. He basically said that he forgot to include it when calculating everything and that it would cost more to install the steering coupling despite quoting me $480 to install everything. I said no thanks and went off. I was kind of looking forward to today and tomorrow that so I&#8217;d be able to enjoy my car for not only the weekend, but fall break (Monday and Tuesday off) as well. Oh well, better safe than sorry - seemed a bit suspect after they came up with that excuse in the first place as soon as I stepped in. Might even just have Kalim (<em>cyberkaa</em> on E46Fanatics) do the install of my parts next month or something along the lines of that.</div> </div> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/32925458690http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/32925458690Thu, 04 Oct 2012 22:42:36 -0700<p><strong>Monday, September 17, 2012.</strong></p> <p>Haven&#8217;t given the E46 a wash in quite a long time, so I definitely just <em>had</em> to take some pictures of it today after cleaning it. These images may very well be the last photos of the car in the way we see it right now! I&#8217;m excited for what awaits in these next couple of weeks!</p> <p><img src="http://www.eluisphoto.com/img/s2/v61/p1131598142-4.jpg"/></p> <p><img src="http://www.eluisphoto.com/img/s4/v63/p1131598094-4.jpg"/></p> <p><img src="http://www.eluisphoto.com/img/s4/v67/p1131598092-4.jpg"/></p> <p><img src="http://www.eluisphoto.com/img/s4/v68/p1131599456-4.jpg"/></p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/31784154331http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/31784154331Mon, 17 Sep 2012 23:09:00 -0700<p><strong>Wednesday, August 29, 2012.</strong></p> <p>Got rear ended today&#8230;</p> <p>I was yielding to a bunch pedestrians as I was about to make my right turn (onto 19th avenue at the corner of Judah &amp; 19th Avenue, San Francisco, for those who care), and some guy in a &#8216;96 Chevy ran into me. We pulled over to the side and exchanged information, and he couldn&#8217;t stop apologizing and telling me how terrible he felt. Fortunately, I was in a good mood today (and wasn&#8217;t all too upset after seeing the damage - one relatively deep 6-7&#8221; paint scratch on the rear bumper, as well as a couple of other dings here and there, but there were already a good amount of paint chips and whatnot from the lovely PO. Nothing wrong with the car.) and things should mostly go my way anyways after all of the insurance business is taken care of. Since I&#8217;m planning to upgrade to an M-Tech II rear (and front, of course) in the next year or so, I&#8217;ll probably hold off the re-spray of the rear bumper and just put this money towards my up and coming suspension upgrade. Let&#8217;s hope all goes well (and as planned), though, first of all!</p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/30500982158http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/30500982158Wed, 29 Aug 2012 20:48:00 -0700<p><strong>Saturday, August 25, 2012.</strong></p> <p>My dad was able to help me out today by taking the E46 to Wheel Works while I was at work. Since my one-year warranty was still valid (November &#8216;11 to November &#8216;12), he was able to get my wheels &amp; tires balanced, as well as my car aligned, in hopes of fixing the steering wheel shake that I&#8217;ve had for this passed week or so. The way things went, whatever it was, the balance &amp; alignment helped out the shaking wheel only to a certain extent, slightly lessening the vibrations. The shaking while steering is still there, though, so I&#8217;ll definitely be looking into it a little more. Let&#8217;s hope it&#8217;s nothing too crazy to deal with&#8230;</p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/30226978006http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/30226978006Sat, 25 Aug 2012 23:12:00 -0700<p><strong>Saturday, August 18, 2012.</strong></p> <div id="post_message_24923554"> <div class="KonaBody">The stupid steering wheel shake came back again at around 35-40 MPH today while driving.. So, I&#8217;ve decided to just take both of the front and rear spacers off, and then slap them back on after my suspension overhaul which I hope to do by the end of 2012. That means new shocks &amp; springs (ST coilovers), new RSM&#8217;s, new FCA&#8217;s and FCAB&#8217;s, and new RTAB&#8217;s. Should do the trick, given the fact that I&#8217;m positive that nothing is wrong with the spacers themselves (or the way that I mounted them, at that) and that my suspension components have 152K miles on them.. The shake would be expected, I&#8217;d say, since the spacers just merely add stress to the already worn out (and pretty much blown) components. Yes, I know&#8230; 152K miles.. BEYOND overdue for an overhaul. I will definitely be doing my car good this final quarter of 2012.</div> </div> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/29743955281http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/29743955281Sat, 18 Aug 2012 23:17:00 -0700<p><strong>Friday, August 17, 2012.</strong></p> <p>Today, I was able to check the spacers once more in attempt to diagnose everything to the fullest of my ability. It turns out the passenger side front spacer had a little play when it was mounted to the hub, that Nedal &amp; I didn&#8217;t quite seem to address in the beginning when installing everything. That said, I removed it and cleaned everything, and took the time to mount everything properly this time around. Torqued everything back to spec (88 lbs/ft), took the car for a spin, and amazingly - no more steering wheel play! The car feels better and does seem to corner better with the slightly widened stance, although I haven&#8217;t been to test it out all too extensively.</p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/29677964586http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/29677964586Fri, 17 Aug 2012 23:42:00 -0700<p><strong>Thursday, August 16, 2012.</strong></p> <p>The E46 has been having some slight steering wheel shaking as of late (around 35-40 MPH and 70+ MPH), so tomorrow I&#8217;ll be checking everything to make sure the spacers and whatnot are properly seated to the hub, etc. If that&#8217;s not the issue, the wheels &amp; tires may be simply in need of a balancing. Did some reading up and researching on this issue and most issues seem to either be slight mistakes with installation or unbalanced wheels/tires (due to wheel weights falling out during installation, etc. which is natural and sometimes to be expected), so I&#8217;m hoping it&#8217;s one of those.</p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/29607855668http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/29607855668Thu, 16 Aug 2012 23:23:45 -0700<p><strong>Wednesday, August 15, 2012.</strong></p> <p>Went over to Nedal&#8217;s house today and he helped me put on my 12mm front and 15mm rear spacers, and I helped him out by coding convenience features and some other stuff on his E46! The installation of the spacers went smoothly and I&#8217;m hoping everything turns out well. The car definitely looks a lot better with a slightly more aggressive look. Unfortunately, no photos as my car&#8217;s been quite dirty due to the lovely Daly City fog we get over here, but I will have some new images up as soon as I give the car a well-deserved wash! </p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/29607712571http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/29607712571Thu, 16 Aug 2012 23:20:21 -0700<p><strong>Tuesday, August 14, 2012.</strong></p> <p>Went to O&#8217;Reilly today and purchased a can of CRC MAF sensor cleaner and tackled the 15-20 minute DIY job today. Everything was super straightforward and went very smoothly. I wasn&#8217;t able to drive the car after, though, but I&#8217;m sure that I&#8217;ll notice a difference the next time I drive it (which will probably be tomorrow) since I&#8217;m not quite sure if the PO cleaned the MAF at all to begin with. Let&#8217;s hope all goes well!</p> <p><img src="http://www.eluisphoto.com/img/s4/v63/p200625451-4.jpg"/></p> <p><em>A diptych from today.</em></p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/29467892431http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/29467892431Tue, 14 Aug 2012 23:49:00 -0700<p><strong>Friday, July 27, 2012.</strong></p> <p>Got around to replacing my pre-cat O2 sensors today with Bosch #13477 as preventative maintenance, courtesy of <a href="http://forum.e46fanatics.com/showthread.php?t=313882" target="_blank">this</a> DIY guide, and wow - the new sensors in comparison to the old ones (which could quite possibly be over 150K miles old) are truly night and day.</p> <p><img height="612" src="http://www.eluisphoto.com/img/s1/v57/p208446386.jpg" width="612"/></p> <p><em>Pictured: old (above) and new (below).</em></p> <p>The DIY was relatively straightforward and fortunately, I was able to get away with using slightly smaller socket extensions (3&#8221; and 6&#8221; put together). Upon finishing the DIY, I was only able to drive about 10 or so miles but I&#8217;ve already noticed much better lower-end torque and a smoother idle (and it was already pretty good before replacing the O2 sensors in the first place). I&#8217;m sure the long-term effects will give me better gas mileage, as well as other improvements. More to come soon!</p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/28186847908http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/28186847908Sat, 28 Jul 2012 00:42:00 -0700<p><strong>Friday, July 20, 2012.</strong></p> <p>Passenger side window regulator is just about done - just my luck, right? After a rather successful cooling overhaul and whatnot, something <em>had</em> to give out. I&#8217;m planning on holding it off for a while since it&#8217;s still partially functional (as far as opening and closing the passenger side door is concerned), but I&#8217;m sure that it will trigger my OCD after a few weeks, or even months of not being able to use it (and because I like all of the electronics of my car working in general - I&#8217;m just that type of person). We&#8217;ll see.</p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/27683940626http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/27683940626Fri, 20 Jul 2012 23:35:00 -0700<p><strong>Wednesday, July 18, 2012.</strong></p> <p>Received my set of ten extended lug bolts in the mail from Turner.. For 15mm spacers!</p> <p>What I&#8217;ve been holding off for about a week or so (from posting on the internet, at least) is that I recently came across a superb deal on E46fanatics for a set of used Rogue Engineering 12mm spacers with extended lug bolts for only $30, and later came across a set of very slightly used Eibach 15mm spacers without lug bolts for $40 off a member from Bimmerforums. Since that 15mm Eibach set didn&#8217;t come with the lug bolts, I immediately placed an order at Turner for some extended lugs (roughly $40 shipped, which was the best deal I could find). Fast forward to today, and I have everything that I need.. Spacer-related, of course: all purchased for less than the price of a set of NEW 12mm or 15mm spacers with the extended hardware. I can&#8217;t wait to put the 12mm&#8217;s on the front of the car and the 15mm&#8217;s on the rear. Maybe around that time I&#8217;ll be able to get around to replacing my pre-cat O2 sensors as well. Only time will tell!</p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/27614696002http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/27614696002Fri, 20 Jul 2012 00:04:19 -0700<p><strong>Thursday, July 12, 2012.</strong></p> <div id="post_message_24705890"> <div class="KonaBody">Finally completed my DIY of the E46&#8217;s expansion tank, upper &amp; lower radiator hoses, water pump, water pump pulley, idler pulley, and belts today. Definitely got a lot of work done today and was also glad that I was able to properly bleed the cooling system (drove the car today for easily over 1.5-2 hours combined and noticed no ill-effects whatsoever; when the car heated up to operating temperature the needle stayed at 12&#160;o&#8217;clock and didn&#8217;t dare creep a little bit further) after reading many stories of people having issues with getting that final, crucial part of the DIY done. Overall, I&#8217;m very glad that all went well (despite taking a bit longer than usual since this was my first time ever doing a cooling system overhaul) and am thankful for all of the forums and websites that helped me out with this!</div> </div> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a> </p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/27179400435http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/27179400435Fri, 13 Jul 2012 23:08:00 -0700<p><strong>Wednesday, July 11, 2012.</strong></p> <p>Decided to finally take on the cooling system overhaul today (replace expansion tank, water pump, upper &amp; lower radiator hoses; the thermostat would have been replaced but the PO got it done right before selling the car to me) and was able to get the hard stuff done - taking out the ET, upper &amp; lower radiator hoses, and that good stuff. Unfortunately I wasn&#8217;t able to finish everything since it got dark &amp; cold out, but I&#8217;ll definitely be completing everything tomorrow.</p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/27179274524http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/27179274524Fri, 13 Jul 2012 23:05:00 -0700<p><strong>Monday, July 9, 2012.</strong></p> <p>Placed an order today on two Bosch (13477; OEM) pre-cat O2 sensors and two quarts of Red Line MTL manual transmission fluid from Amazon today! Gotta love Amazon Prime, can&#8217;t beat free two-day shipping. </p> <p>This upcoming week and next week, I&#8217;ll be tackling the cooling system overhaul job, followed by replacing my pre-cat O2 sensors, as well changing my manual transmission fluid and differential fluids. I haven&#8217;t been able to do anything as of late due to vacation with the family, but as soon as we get back home hopefully I&#8217;ll be able to find the time to get all of these DIY&#8217;s done.</p> <p><a href="http://www.eluisphoto.com" target="_blank">www.eluisphoto.com</a></p>http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/26850175789http://325ci.tumblr.com/post/26850175789Mon, 09 Jul 2012 12:59:26 -0700