HELP! building an e46 318ti

[msperling]

Hi all,

First let me say, I am a novice when it comes to cars. I am thinking about enlisting the help of a few friends who know their way around cars better than I (one builds engines for Saleen) and undertaking a project which would involve buying a 318ti (1995 with 200K miles is cheapest) and putting a supercharged e36 m3 engine in or possibly an e46 m3 engine. How much more difficult is e46?

I might sell my 2001 M Roadster to try this project, since it would be fun and quite possibly more track ready than stock M Roadster.

I estimate i would need to buy the engine, the car, possibly (tell me if definitly) the transmission, suspension, wheels, brakes, AND WHAT ELSE? Body kit and racing seats paint stuff etc will be purchased but not too relevant to my perfomance concerns here.

What have I forgotten? and any rough estimates of cost? I am talking with people at Race Marque Systems next week and any comments from knowledgable people will be GREATLY appreciated.

P.S. I am not gonna sell the car or anything until i have a good game plan, im not totally crazy.

Appreciate the help,

Matt Sperling

[clex2]

Matt,

Sounds like you want something fun and a little different. There are a few of us here who have ti's with motor swaps ( J!m, Steven, myself). I can tell you they are a whole lot of fun. It's like your M Coupe with 4 seats. FIrst, it won't be cheap and you will never recoupe what you put into it when (if) you sell it. That's just part of the experience. As far as what you've listed, that's most of it. But there are specifics you should entertain when you actually decide to build this thing. You'll want to figure out what suspension you'll want, b/c the front suspension off an M3 will alllow for M3 brakes. Infact, if you can, you'll want the entire rear subframe off an M coupe. it fits right in and it is stronger.

Check out the Compact6 site. It has a little info that you might find helpful, but the site has no traffic, but it's up anyway. http://www.benliaw.com/compact6/

The site belongs to Ben Liaw of Rogue Engineering. He had one of the nicest ti's I know of. I was fortunate enough to buy it from him.

[bmw///m3///]

Hi all,

First let me say, I am a novice when it comes to cars. I am thinking about enlisting the help of a few friends who know their way around cars better than I (one builds engines for Saleen) and undertaking a project which would involve buying a 318ti (1995 with 200K miles is cheapest) and putting a supercharged e36 m3 engine in or possibly an e46 m3 engine. How much more difficult is e46?

I might sell my 2001 M Roadster to try this project, since it would be fun and quite possibly more track ready than stock M Roadster.

I estimate i would need to buy the engine, the car, possibly (tell me if definitly) the transmission, suspension, wheels, brakes, AND WHAT ELSE? Body kit and racing seats paint stuff etc will be purchased but not too relevant to my perfomance concerns here.

What have I forgotten? and any rough estimates of cost? I am talking with people at Race Marque Systems next week and any comments from knowledgable people will be GREATLY appreciated.

P.S. I am not gonna sell the car or anything until i have a good game plan, im not totally crazy.

Appreciate the help,

Matt Sperling

....lucky.......... better post some pics as it comes along

[vwt3]

Hey msperling try this link http://www.rogueengineering.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=1995330ti

Rouge engineering web site.
vwt3

[m-technik_ti]

If you are gonna do a swap, stick with the s52/s50 out of an e36 m3. There is plenty of info out there for this swap, you could probably pull up some info from just doing a search on this forum.

As for an s54 from an e46 m3? Prepare to spend a couple of months and and a hell of a lot of $$ doing that swap. Getting all the electronics to work in unison would be pure hell; everything would need to be replaced or built from scratch. I spoke to a guy who did a s52 swap into an e46 and after months of work he still cant get all the glitches out. Everything from the traction control, abs, ecu, harnesses and even the dashboard needs to be reworked. Furthermore;the Double Vanos of the S54 will not work without the stock ECU. In order to get it to work properly, you'd have to get the entire wiring harness out of an S54 M-Coupe/Roadster as well as the DME. It's not worth the trouble when you can probably have an S52 built for less then a used S54. Plus there are plently of products out there that can help your s50/52 reach and exceed the power output of the s54.

[BMWDRIFTER]

Make Sure You Take The Rear Suspension Out Of Your M Roadster And Swap It W/ The Ti's. Your Buyer Will Be Pissed When He Breaks The 4cyl Diff. But It Will Save You A Lot Of Money

[msperling]

Thank you guys, input was helpful. e36 is the direction im headed since e46 is unreasonable.

thanks again,

matt

[MarkD]

Thank you guys, input was helpful. e36 is the direction im headed since e46 is unreasonable.

thanks again,

matt

I know a garage here in Toronto that has installed an S54 in both a 1997 Z3, and in an E36. In both cases, they retained the original DME.

If anyone is serious about this swap, send me an email for further info.

MarkD