Interior Cleanup

After a few weeks of early season skiing the weather is warming up a little bit so I now have some time to get back to working on the car.


Finished up scraping off all the interior sound deadening material, ended up being about 13 lbs worth.

Picked up a set of used Corbeau Forza seats from a friend. They are crappy and uncomfortable but will do the job at least for 1 season until I have more cash in the budget for seats.

The headliner was the last thing that needed to be removed before the cage can start being installed. It ended up being much more of a pain in the ass than anticipated. But at the same time I removed all the sunroof components and will eventually hard mount the sunroof panel, no more tilt/slide sunroof now it will either be in or out. Headliner, sunroof track and motor was about 10 lbs worth of stuff.

After ripping off the headliner foam there is a bunch of glue still on the sheetmetal which will need to be cleaned off. Easier to do it now while there is space rather than trying to work around a cage.

Carpet Removal

First attempt at removing the interior carpet resulted in me finding out that in order to remove the carpet in one piece I would have to remove the entire dash. This would end up being a big pain in the ass so I decided to just cut around where the carpet passes under the dashboard. Yanking the carpet out still sucked after cutting around the dash but after 20 minutes of pulling on it it finally came out. Weighed in at 35 lbs which now puts me over 200lbs of material removed.

With the carpet removed I can see that there are some rust areas in the floor which will need to be address, for now they have been primed to prevent further rusting. The sound deadening material on the floor also needs to be scraped off, there isn't nearly as much as was in the trunk but it might all add up to 10 lbs.

Done so far

When I bought the car it was idling rough and needed a little assistance when started cold, so I replaced all the vacuum hoses and hose clamps (everything was original) this helped the cold start issues and smoothed out the idle but there is still some tuning to be done to compensate for the cam which the previous owner had installed.

Next up was the tach which was no working, I assumed it was due to the 3V batteries on the service indicator circuit board so I ordered some replacements and soldered them in. It didn't solve the problem and I haven't had time to investigate further.

In order to get ready to have a roll cage installed I am in the process of gutting the interior. First up was the trunk liner and the rear seat; combined weight of ~50 lbs. Next was to scrape off the sound deadening material from the trunk; weight ~53 lbs.

Also now removed are the front seats (~45 lbs each non-powered) and the center console. Next up is to remove the carpet and scrape off the sound deadening material from the interior of the car.

The background bullshit nobody really cares about

After participating in two HPDE's with my '96 Nissan Maxima and competing the local autox's for a year and a half I decided I needed a dedicated vehicle.

I wasn't willing to risk my new daily driver on a road course, so I began my search for a track vehicle that I willing to put through the wear and tear of track days and autox and wouldn't be devistated if I happen to make a mistake and put it into a wall. My requirements for a vehicle were RWD, manual, 4-cyl turbo or 6 cylinder engine and preferably unique. First thoughts were 944 Turbo S or 280Z Turbo, I then came to realize that the Porsche would blow my budget in maintenance costs and the Datsun would be too difficult to find one in good shape and had limited aftermarket. So with the recommendation of the fellow racers I decided I was on a mission to find an e30 325is. After searching the want ads for a couple months and ebay I found what appeared to be an '87 325is in good shape in near by Massachusetts. I ended up buying it and am currently in the process of getting it in shape for a full season of track days and autox in 2008.