[jeevin]

So last summer I acquired a 335is with DCT for around 12,000$ USD, Car had 80,000 miles on it and it was burning oil + pissing oil at all the gaskets.

Spent a bit of time over the winter fixing it up, this included:
Getting the motor rebuilt by Apex Motorwerks out in Vaughn (Toronto, Canada), with Manley Pistons + MaxSpeedingRods (Chinese rods LOL). I did some research on the rods (which I got for 450$), and people were running them in high HP 2JZ builds + Zero to 60 on YouTube also ran them in his 19T car which was running mid 5 second 100-200km times. Also went with OEM Rod Bearings, Cylinder head got cleaned with new valves and valve seals, and new gaskets all around.

I also completed a full DCT service while the transmission was out of the car because we dropped the motor and trans together.

After we got the car put back together, I put about 150 miles on it in 2 days with multiple heat cycles using breaking oil, doing vacuum pulls to get my rings to set and bearings to bed in. Everything looked good logs were clean and nothing seemed wrong.

From there, I set out on my road trip to NYC, 500 miles away. I was still in the engine break in process and I thought this would be a great time to do the Motoman Engine break in process, Drive it like I stole it! Which I did! The roads were completely empty and my god did this car handle well, From going 90 MPH into corners like it was nobody's business to doing pulls from 90 to 130mph to vary the RPMs and pull vacuum along the whole drive to develop a good piston ring wear pattern, this car did not skip a beat. Everything felt good. Got to NYC safe and sound and from there my issues started.

I set out to NYC on a stock LPFP which failed once I arrived there, luckily I had a stage 2.5 LPFP ready to be installed, which I installed and everything was good from there for a couple hours until my new refurbished HPFP from FCPEuro had failed after 4 days of being installed! I looked at the HPFP from an angle with a flash light and you could see oil coming out of it, probably all of it as the HPFP died and I was running on low pressure from that moment. Lucky me, FCPEuro is based in Connecticut so I was able to drive there and pick up a new HPFP, this time getting a brand new one instead of refurbished! Took my ass to harbour freight and picked up some tools, 3 hours later in a parking garage, BAM New HPFP installed. At this point, my tuner had sent me a new revision which took boost from 15psi to 20 PSI and this started my next onset of problems. I couldn't hold boost above 15 psi for the life of me and a couple of days of not understanding what's happening, I finally figured it out. The exhaust vacuum line to the brake vacuum line wasn't connected. Once that was fixed, my next set of issues started, now I wouldn't boost past 18 PSI. Checked all the vacuum lines did a smoke test at a shop and couldn't find anything. Went on FB Marketplace found someone selling new Boost Solenoids and we were making power.

Ended up driving home after all of this, and racking up a good 400 miles while in NYC for 4 days and everythings been good, even picked up some E85 on the way back.

Completed a compression test once I was back which came back as:
Cyl 1: 180 psi
Cyl 2: 177 psi
Cyl 3: 181 psi
Cyl 4: 181 psi
Cyl 5: 177 psi
Cyl 6: 180 psi


Just wanted to share this lil story of what comes with N54 Ownership and long road trips haha! Car is running great, currently on 93oct boosting 21-20 PSI @ 4.5 degrees timing, did some rolls with a few cars (F80 M4, M340i FBO, C63s) , always came out on top

Oil change 1 (break-in oil): This was completed after running the motor at 2,000 RPM via Inpa at 10 minute intervals every 20 minutes to let the motor cool down 3 times
Oil change 2 (break-in oil): Completed after first 50 miles of driving
Oil change 3 (break-in oil): Completed after 150 total miles on motor
Oil change 4 (synthetic + lucas additive): Completed after arriving in NYC, 750 Miles on motor
Oil change 5 (synthetic): Completed after 300 miles of NYC driving, 1150 Miles on motor
Oil change 6 (synthetic): Completed after arriving back in Toronto, 1850 Miles on Motor

So in 2,000 Miles, we completed 6 oil changes, and now I am driving this car to enjoy it!


Mods:
Pure Stage 2 HiFlow
3inch VRSF Inlets + VRSF Outlets
7.5inch VRSF Intercooler
VRSF Chargepipe + HKS BOV
MHD FlexFuel + Inline Fuel Filter
Helix Overdrive 3x HPFP Overdrive
Engine + Trans Mounts
Index 12 Injectors
Stage 2.5 PR LPFP
B58 Coils
B58 Spark Plugs gapped to .019-.02
New Vacuum lines
AR Downpipes
3.5bar TMAP
BMS OCC
BMS Intake
RB PCV
MFactory LSD + Axles
M3 Control Arms all around
XHP Stage 3 Flash DCT
MHD Custom Tune by JSRTuning
New coolant and oil lines all around nothing was reused.
New Waterpump + Tstat

Next steps are: Installing the Axles as I haven't gotten around to that yet, Installing new Bilstein OE Suspension with solid subframe bushings to eliminate deflection along with adjustable rear camber and Dinan Camber plates in the front for better handling to reduce understeer even further, which the m3 arms already do a great job at. May also get an M3 Steering rack, but on the fence on that.

This build costed me 15K CAD for the car, and 25K CAD in parts & labour where applicable, I did most of the labour myself aside from the engine building, and shoutout to my friend Jas @ Phantom Automotive in Brampton for allowing me to use his lift and tools. If you are in the Toronto area, he's the guy to go to for N54s!

After that I am done with this project and it will be my dream 335i build after owning 3 different e92s to be completed.

Thanks for reading y'all!