[Aussieatlarge]

Originally Posted by Hoper

how'd that get in there? did you have the fuel rail off while you were doing the blasting?

did better than me Aussie, I ended up with a full engine rebuild after my first walnut blasting effort

Originally Posted by Hoper

how'd that get in there? did you have the fuel rail off while you were doing the blasting?

did better than me Aussie, I ended up with a full engine rebuild after my first walnut blasting effort

Yup. The rail was off but on the other side of the garage. No matter how cleanly I tried to work, the walnut shells get out. Usually when manhandling the vacuum adapter and gun to get around corners and up the sides of the port. I assume they got into the open fuel line. My bad.

I was looking at a log from just before the engine shut off due to the walnuts and it ran very lean for a bit. Just as well the ecu was smarter than me.

My dct, abs and tyre warning lights are back on. Probably a bad wheel speed sensor. I am getting more and more tempted to by an used F series 340i or (shhhh don't tell anyone) a new KIA stinger. Yes really. Can't afford a new Beemer and I am addicted to the power. I hate Mustangs and am a bit old for a hot hatch (golf/i30/focus/megaine).

Did you blast into open valves?

[Hoper]

Originally Posted by Aussieatlarge

Yup. The rail was off but on the other side of the garage. No matter how cleanly I tried to work, the walnut shells get out. Usually when manhandling the vacuum adapter and gun to get around corners and up the sides of the port. I assume they got into the open fuel line. My bad.

I was looking at a log from just before the engine shut off due to the walnuts and it ran very lean for a bit. Just as well the ecu was smarter than me.

My dct, abs and tyre warning lights are back on. Probably a bad wheel speed sensor. I am getting more and more tempted to by an used F series 340i or (shhhh don't tell anyone) a new KIA stinger. Yes really. Can't afford a new Beemer and I am addicted to the power. I hate Mustangs and am a bit old for a hot hatch (golf/i30/focus/megaine).

Did you blast into open valves?

yep had a valve that wasn't quite shut, was a bit hard to see working by myself and even though once the inlet was clean I could clearly see the valve was open, to put it bluntly, I did a bit of a she'll be right and didn't work hard enough to clear the shells out of the cylinder

1 cracked piston later...

have blasted 3 friends cars since then, no issues, but I'm really careful to blow the cyls out before moving on to the next cyl, irrespective of whether I think anything got in there or not, live and learn hey

engine now has forged pistons and rods, and is fully balanced, so I got something good from it, and got to rebuild the engine from the ground up

[Aussieatlarge]

Originally Posted by Hoper

yep had a valve that wasn't quite shut, was a bit hard to see working by myself and even though once the inlet was clean I could clearly see the valve was open, to put it bluntly, I did a bit of a she'll be right and didn't work hard enough to clear the shells out of the cylinder

1 cracked piston later...

have blasted 3 friends cars since then, no issues, but I'm really careful to blow the cyls out before moving on to the next cyl, irrespective of whether I think anything got in there or not, live and learn hey

engine now has forged pistons and rods, and is fully balanced, so I got something good from it, and got to rebuild the engine from the ground up

Originally Posted by Hoper

yep had a valve that wasn't quite shut, was a bit hard to see working by myself and even though once the inlet was clean I could clearly see the valve was open, to put it bluntly, I did a bit of a she'll be right and didn't work hard enough to clear the shells out of the cylinder

1 cracked piston later...

have blasted 3 friends cars since then, no issues, but I'm really careful to blow the cyls out before moving on to the next cyl, irrespective of whether I think anything got in there or not, live and learn hey

engine now has forged pistons and rods, and is fully balanced, so I got something good from it, and got to rebuild the engine from the ground up

So you "walnut shell" locked the cylinder. You must have been pissed off.
I actually thought about connecting my leak down tester to blow out the cylinders.

The shells i got were not as fine as I would have liked. Maybe that was why the gunk stayed behind. The valve stems were perfect but it needed some scraping for sure. I even used a propane torch to try to burn the carbon to harden it but that didn't work. I sand blasted my hand and it hurt and i removed paint from a steer surface so the blaster was good. I made most of the mess when deliberately braking the seal between the 3D printed adapter and the port. I figured the shells were being sucked up before they impacted the valves. What success do you have now days? I have a good compressor but used a gravity gun. Used a homemade sandblaster (bottle and tube) first. Messed around with opening size and Venturi. Bottle exploded when tube got blocked so i bought a gravity feed.

[jzx_andy]

A friend and I walnut blasted our cars today.

We ended up filling the "shut" intake valves with brake cleaner as it would pool up above the valve stem, and you'd know 100% that the valves in that cylinder were closed. Blasted each port for about 30 secs, scraped whatever remnants were left in the port and valves, vacuumed/blew everything out with an air gun and then repeated the whole process for good measure.

Took about 3 hours per car as we were being suuuuper careful and did one valve at a time. Definitely can be done in about 2 hours if you have done it before and know that you can do all six cylinders in 2 batches of blasting, rather than one at a time.

[Socket]

Originally Posted by jzx_andy

A friend and I walnut blasted our cars today.

We ended up filling the "shut" intake valves with brake cleaner as it would pool up above the valve stem, and you'd know 100% that the valves in that cylinder were closed. Blasted each port for about 30 secs, scraped whatever remnants were left in the port and valves, vacuumed/blew everything out with an air gun and then repeated the whole process for good measure.

Took about 3 hours per car as we were being suuuuper careful and did one valve at a time. Definitely can be done in about 2 hours if you have done it before and know that you can do all six cylinders in 2 batches of blasting, rather than one at a time.

how does it drive after the walnut blast??

[jzx_andy]

Originally Posted by Socket

how does it drive after the walnut blast??

So much smoother hey. Power delivery feels a little less violent but definitely a bit more zippy! Haha.

[Socket]

Originally Posted by jzx_andy

So much smoother hey. Power delivery feels a little less violent but definitely a bit more zippy! Haha.

In the words of Kath n Kim ..... Noice

[jzx_andy]

Swapped my old voltage regulator out for a new one. The brushes on my original regulator were worn down to about 30-40% after 145k km.

Cheap and easy DIY maintenance item. Definitely recommend if you have some decent mileage on your car and haven't gone through an alternator yet.

[Socket]

Originally Posted by jzx_andy

Swapped my old voltage regulator out for a new one. The brushes on my original regulator were worn down to about 30-40% after 145k km.

Cheap and easy DIY maintenance item. Definitely recommend if you have some decent mileage on your car and haven't gone through an alternator yet.

How do you replace these mate ??

[jzx_andy]

Originally Posted by Socket

How do you replace these mate ??

Unplug battery
Remove your air filter or airbox (if your intake is on the cold side of the motor)
Unbolt and remove the red terminal from the passenger side of the alternator
Remove a few torx screws on the rear cover of the alternator
Unplug the voltage regulator
Remove a few torx screws that secure the regulator to the alternator
Remove voltage regulator
Put new one in and follow the above steps in reverse to reassemble

[jzx_andy]

Swapped out my Precision Raceworks coil kit for the Nexsys B58 coil kit. The B58 kit is well thought out and easier to perform maintenance with, compared to the original N54 spec PR coils (nothing mounted to the intake manifold, etc).

Fitted a M3 strut brace

Fitted some cf headlight covers to dress up the engine bay

Pieced together some custom length front endlinks and fitted them


Still a lot to do over the next month or so (sump gasket, oil pan baffle, engine mounts, M3 rack, coolant system overhaul etc), so will throw up some pics in due course

[Socket]

Originally Posted by jzx_andy

Swapped out my Precision Raceworks coil kit for the Nexsys B58 coil kit. The B58 kit is well thought out and easier to perform maintenance with, compared to the original N54 spec PR coils (nothing mounted to the intake manifold, etc).

Fitted a M3 strut brace

Fitted some cf headlight covers to dress up the engine bay

Pieced together some custom length front endlinks and fitted them


Still a lot to do over the next month or so (sump gasket, oil pan baffle, engine mounts, M3 rack, coolant system overhaul etc), so will throw up some pics in due course

Thats some nice tinkering there Andy... how much was the Nexsys coil kit and how do you rate it??

[jzx_andy]

Originally Posted by Socket

Thats some nice tinkering there Andy... how much was the Nexsys coil kit and how do you rate it??

Nexsys/B58 coils
The kit is basically perfect for what it is. There is a MHD checkbox option for it. The kit is basically pnp, no cutting/splicing wires, engine cover fits perfectly and you don't need to remove a silly bracket whenever you want to remove a spark plug or coil boot. The B58 coil boots are secured with one etorx screw and you can feel them "click" into place once they have caught the spark plug. From memory, everything associated with the B58 kit ran me around to $600 AUD shipped. It's hard to recommend any other aftermarket coil solution for this platform, though I haven't come across any detailed reviews on the PRP coil kits.

longterm PR coil review
While the PR coils worked and deliver an increased amount of spark energy over OEM N54 coils, I just really didn't like them as they lacked the fit and finish of OEM coils.

The PR coil boots simply slip on to the plugs and don't have anything to secure them, nor can you feel the boots "click" into place on the plug. So you're always second-guessing if the coil boots are snug, especially after you're done finagling the coil boot wiring and ignition coils/bracket.

I also had long-term hesitations with the PR kit. At least 4 clips on my kits pnp wiring harness became brittle and snapped over a ~2 year period of tinkering. While you can order replacement harnesses and ignition coils directly from PR, you can't order boots from their webstore. The B58 coil kit seems to have more robust connector clips which will hopefully hold over time, but at least I can now order replacement coils and boots from the usual retailers or even go for used ones.

Not having the coils integrated with the coil boots also made it more difficult to do routine maintenance tasks. Getting the plugs out of the head became a cumbersome task, the engine vanity cover doesn't fit properly despite loads of trimming, and is difficult to remove once the kit is installed. I'd need to take the cover off whenever I wanted to remove the oil filler cap. These are all non-issues if you order the N55 PR coil kit (fits N54 from memory) or don't run an engine cover.

coils in general
I don't think aftermarket coils are necessary on this platform. With the benefit of hindsight, I'd generally recommend OEM S55 coils for anyone who doesn't plan on running built N54 numbers. S55 coils are a direct fit and there are plenty of them out there making solid power with them.

[Socket]

Originally Posted by jzx_andy

Nexsys/B58 coils
The kit is basically perfect for what it is. There is a MHD checkbox option for it. The kit is basically pnp, no cutting/splicing wires, engine cover fits perfectly and you don't need to remove a silly bracket whenever you want to remove a spark plug or coil boot. The B58 coil boots are secured with one etorx screw and you can feel them "click" into place once they have caught the spark plug. From memory, everything associated with the B58 kit ran me around to $600 AUD shipped. It's hard to recommend any other aftermarket coil solution for this platform, though I haven't come across any detailed reviews on the PRP coil kits.

longterm PR coil review
While the PR coils worked and deliver an increased amount of spark energy over OEM N54 coils, I just really didn't like them as they lacked the fit and finish of OEM coils.



The PR coil boots simply slip on to the plugs and don't have anything to secure them, nor can you feel the boots "click" into place on the plug. So you're always second-guessing if the coil boots are snug, especially after you're done finagling the coil boot wiring and ignition coils/bracket.

I also had long-term hesitations with the PR kit. At least 4 clips on my kits pnp wiring harness became brittle and snapped over a ~2 year period of tinkering. While you can order replacement harnesses and ignition coils directly from PR, you can't order boots from their webstore. The B58 coil kit seems to have more robust connector clips which will hopefully hold over time, but at least I can now order replacement coils and boots from the usual retailers or even go for used ones.

Not having the coils integrated with the coil boots also made it more difficult to do routine maintenance tasks. Getting the plugs out of the head became a cumbersome task, the engine vanity cover doesn't fit properly despite loads of trimming, and is difficult to remove once the kit is installed. I'd need to take the cover off whenever I wanted to remove the oil filler cap. These are all non-issues if you order the N55 PR coil kit (fits N54 from memory) or don't run an engine cover.

coils in general
I don't think aftermarket coils are necessary on this platform. With the benefit of hindsight, I'd generally recommend OEM S55 coils for anyone who doesn't plan on running built N54 numbers. S55 coils are a direct fit and there are plenty of them out there making solid power with them.

Thats a good price for the Nexsys mate..... Thanks for the very comprehensive review of the different coil packs. This will help lots of people who might be considering aftermarket coils. You should post it up on FB where there are a few more people around (E90post has been a bit quite lately haha)

[The other Ross_W]

Replaced the broken charge pipe in my newly bought 335i with a VRSF one, and installed a new battery.

[Socket]

Originally Posted by The other Ross_W

Replaced the broken charge pipe in my newly bought 335i with a VRSF one, and installed a new battery.

Nice.... did you code your battery (to play nice with the smart charger?)

[Socket]

Originally Posted by The other Ross_W

Replaced the broken charge pipe in my newly bought 335i with a VRSF one, and installed a new battery.

Also if you have trouble posting pics..... this and all E9x/N54 the answers can be found in the DIY section of the forum

https://www.e90post.com/forums/showt...&highlight=DIY

[jzx_andy]

Originally Posted by Socket

Thats a good price for the Nexsys mate..... Thanks for the very comprehensive review of the different coil packs. This will help lots of people who might be considering aftermarket coils. You should post it up on FB where there are a few more people around (E90post has been a bit quite lately haha)

To be honest mate I am getting over the FB car group thing. The 335i groups (esp the American ones) seem to be full of cheap owners, jokers and people just chasing internet clout. Not many people on there are open to ideas and willing to have a proper discussion when alternative viewpoints are offered.

I just want to see cool cars and share ideas, but it seems like FB is more about getting that instant gratification by building cars to others' tastes and agreeing with the hivemind. Maybe it's just a generational thing (crazy to think as I'm only a 30yo) but who knows haha. All I know is time spent on FB isn't good for one's sanity haha.

[Socket]

Originally Posted by jzx_andy

To be honest mate I am getting over the FB car group thing. The 335i groups (esp the American ones) seem to be full of cheap owners, jokers and people just chasing internet clout. Not many people on there are open to ideas and willing to have a proper discussion when alternative viewpoints are offered.

I just want to see cool cars and share ideas, but it seems like FB is more about getting that instant gratification by building cars to others' tastes and agreeing with the hivemind. Maybe it's just a generational thing (crazy to think as I'm only a 30yo) but who knows haha. All I know is time spent on FB isn't good for one's sanity haha.

Ah yep I know what you mean. The american forums especially are full of opinionated morons. Now lock down is over we should organise a cruise or a meet

[Aus335iguy]

I loathe Facebook with a passion that burns like the fire of a thousand suns
I like this place because the membership here seems settled and there's good community spirit. Please keep posting here as I appreciate it.
I do admittedly spend most of my time over on the spool street DCT forum as that's where most of the stuff I'm tinkering with is discussed

[Socket]

Originally Posted by Aus335iguy

I loathe Facebook with a passion that burns like the fire of a thousand suns
I like this place because the membership here seems settled and there's good community spirit. Please keep posting here as I appreciate it.
I do admittedly spend most of my time over on the spool street DCT forum as that's where most of the stuff I'm tinkering with is discussed

Finding a place with good community spirit is rare. I agree the forum members here are a great bunch. I have pretty much finished modding my car (yes true) but am spending the time now working on the audio system. Learning as much as I can about car audio installation and audio tuning. Will be starting the project over from scratch (except for the sound treatment) so I promise to post more content, if anyone is interested in upgrading their system beyond OEM+

[rev210]

Some 285 /35 /18 Nitto NT555R extreme drag radials arrived today. Reporting for daily duty.

Features that made them my pick;
*car is going to do less circuit more roll race with daily duties thrown in. So loss of corner to gain straight line.
*Even more stick than the V70A for straightline and actually double the wear rating 100 vs 50.
*half decent rain capabillity and cornering thanks to the tread pattern and stiff sidewalls(for a drag radial). *Y rated for speed (300kmh)
*1.5 /1.6 60ft capable
*work well even when track temps are a bit colder
*35 profile allows me options for the fronts to retain square. Currently Kumho V70a .