There’s very few things a couple of zip-ties can’t fix.
A few weeks back I picked up a 1991 BMW 318i sedan to act as my primary mode of transportation for the coming year, as well as play the role of a track toy and autocross tool. The car drives well compared to some of my past projects, but it’s still far from perfect. There were a few small items I took care of recently to get it back on the road, some of which were solved by the clever use of zip-ties.
The biggest hurdle with getting this E30 legal for the road was its lack of license plate lights. New York State has yearly inspections and the lack of lights would immediately fail it. FCP Euro was nice enough to send over a set of replacement light bulbs and the respective housings for me to install, but alas, it wasn’t as simple as popping the housings in and calling it a day.
The mounting points for both license plate light housings were rusted out to the point where there wasn’t enough metal to hold them in place. I don’t know how to weld, so replacing the rusty holes with new metal was out of the question. Instead, I used a couple of zip-ties to secure the lights in place. Thankfully all of the wiring was still present, so all I had to do was plug everything in. Just like that, I had license plate lights. No, zip-ties aren’t the most elegant solution, but they get the job done. And that’s the only standard I have for this car right now. If it works, it works.
Thank goodness I didn’t have to do any wiring for these.
Brian Silvestro
It’s not pretty, but it works.
Brian Silvestro
That idling issue I mentioned in my previous update? It’s proving a bit harder to solve. The intake boot on the engine was clearly original and in desperate need of replacement. I assumed one of its many cracks were the cause of the bad idle, so I replaced it with a new part from FCP Euro. Unfortunately the new item didn’t make the idle any better. I have a few more hoses I’d like to replace that might do the trick, though. Once I get some time to mess around in the engine bay I’m sure I’ll find the culprit.
Yikes.
Brian Silvestro
I’m still on the fence about whether to add back power steering. The car came with the system deleted, and it’ll take a few hundred bucks in parts to get it back to normal. Plus finding a power steering pump for this engine is weirdly difficult. The only time manual steering really bothers me is when I’m parking, but even then, it’s not that bad. The deciding factor will be how it feels on a twisty back road.
Another thing I’d like to address are the brakes. They work just fine, but the pedal is a bit soft. And since I plan to do some high-performance driving, I want more grab. I have a feeling new race-temp fluid and a set of track-ready pads are in my near future. I’d also like to get a set of 15-inch wheels so I can fit some interesting tires (there’s not much to choose from in the 14-inch arena, at least in E30 size).
Now that this E30 is legal for the road, I’ll be spending a lot more time behind the wheel in the coming weeks. Which means more things will inevitably go wrong. Stay tuned.
Keyword: My 318i E30 Project Is Officially on the Road Thanks to Clever Zip-Tie Usage