heinzboehmer's 2002 Topaz 6MT Coupe

[Thoglan]

I also got an MK60 to swap into the car. No pics unfortunately, but I'll be documenting the swap so lots of pics will come later.

Please do, that's something I'd like to do on mine eventually. Although it seems like you just about need a donor mk60 car to have all the parts.

[heinzboehmer]

Please do, that's something I'd like to do on mine eventually. Although it seems like you just about need a donor mk60 car to have all the parts.

It's actually not that many parts! This is what I got, off the top of my head:

• MK60 valve block/electronic unit
• MK60 brake booster/master cylinder
• Brake booster check valve
• Yaw sensor that goes under the driver's seat
• Wheel speed sensors
• Hard brake lines
• Random grommets for the engine bay

The vacuum line with the check valve that goes into the brake booster looks like it can easily be cut to fit onto the new booster, so no need to worry about that. Everything else is just wiring. I have yet to look into that fully, but it shouldn't be too hard. I'm pretty sure I could get away with just moving pins around in the connector and stuffing the extra harness away, but I'll probably end up cutting it down and repinning all the wires to make it look a bit more factory.

I'm sure the biggest pain will be running the new brake lines (especially the one that goes over the gas tank and the one that goes behind the engine), but oh well. At least I'll end up with a fully refreshed braking system after all of this.

[Casa de Mesa]

I keep watching these updates, heinzboehmer and loving following along! Can't wait to see some of the other parts I know you have make their way onto the car!!

[heinzboehmer]

Thanks!
Yeeeah they've been sitting for way too long lol. Need to find some time to get everything installed on the car.

[heinzboehmer]

Got a couple small things done recently.

First, I swapped out the original brake booster solenoid connector on top of the airbox for a new one. The old one was falling apart and I needed to pry it off of the port anytime I wanted to take it off. Couldn't find any place that sold Norma connectors individually, but fortunately, I found someone on eBay selling them in packs of 4 for much cheaper than the CSL one. I did consider just buying the CSL one because OEM and whatever, but I really like the flexibility of the vacuum line I have now. It makes working on that part of the engine bay way less annoying.

Comparison pic of the old and new parts:



I also swapped out my side mirrors (finally). The old ones had been corroded ever since I bought the car, but for some reason I kept forgetting to buy new ones, until now.

Comparison pic of the old and new mirrors:



I was also initially planning on extending the heater wiring, but I found that it was not necessary at all. Managed to take stuff apart and reroute the wires. Wrote about it here: https://nam3forum.com/forums/forum/m...nto-a-late-one

[bigjae46]

It's actually not that many parts! This is what I got, off the top of my head:

• MK60 valve block/electronic unit
• MK60 brake booster/master cylinder
• Brake booster check valve
• Yaw sensor that goes under the driver's seat
• Wheel speed sensors
• Hard brake lines
• Random grommets for the engine bay

The vacuum line with the check valve that goes into the brake booster looks like it can easily be cut to fit onto the new booster, so no need to worry about that. Everything else is just wiring. I have yet to look into that fully, but it shouldn't be too hard. I'm pretty sure I could get away with just moving pins around in the connector and stuffing the extra harness away, but I'll probably end up cutting it down and repinning all the wires to make it look a bit more factory.

I'm sure the biggest pain will be running the new brake lines (especially the one that goes over the gas tank and the one that goes behind the engine), but oh well. At least I'll end up with a fully refreshed braking system after all of this.

Do you have the 818.3 or the 813.3 ABS unit? The 813.3 is the part you have custom program the ABS module with race programming.

I have the 818.3 unit

[heinzboehmer]

Do you have the 818.3 or the 813.3 ABS unit? The 813.3 is the part you have custom program the ABS module with race programming.

I have the 818.3 unit

Pretty sure it's the 818.3

Came out of an 04 convertible, so it's probably not the ZCP unit. I had enough of a hard time finding the swap parts for a decent price (i.e. not $1500+ on ebay), so I just settled for the non-ZCP one.

Once I get the mechanical bits swapped in, I might start messing around with the electronics/firmware. This module is the one big module that still hasn't been fully understood. It would be cool to disassemble the firmware and be able to "tune" the DSC like we can with the DME. At that point, flashing back and forth from the Bosch motorsports firmware should be pretty simple.

[Bry5on]

Pretty sure it's the 818.3

Came out of an 04 convertible, so it's probably not the ZCP unit. I had enough of a hard time finding the swap parts for a decent price (i.e. not $1500+ on ebay), so I just settled for the non-ZCP one.

Once I get the mechanical bits swapped in, I might start messing around with the electronics/firmware. This module is the one big module that still hasn't been fully understood. It would be cool to disassemble the firmware and be able to "tune" the DSC like we can with the DME. At that point, flashing back and forth from the Bosch motorsports firmware should be pretty simple.

I swapped my M and non-M MK60s last weekend, so I’ve got a donor non-M for us to hack apart now

[heinzboehmer]

I swapped my M and non-M MK60s last weekend, so I’ve got a donor non-M for us to hack apart now

Awesome. I have no idea what the differences between the M and non-M modules are, but I'm down to mess with the module you have. Also, if they're easy to take apart (i.e. non-destructively) and grab a dump from, we can also do that with the M one I have sitting in my garage. Won't be going on the car for a month or so, since some of the parts I bought for the swap are backordered.

[maupineda]

Got a couple small things done recently.

First, I swapped out the original brake booster solenoid connector on top of the airbox for a new one. The old one was falling apart and I needed to pry it off of the port anytime I wanted to take it off. Couldn't find any place that sold Norma connectors individually, but fortunately, I found someone on eBay selling them in packs of 4 for much cheaper than the CSL one. I did consider just buying the CSL one because OEM and whatever, but I really like the flexibility of the vacuum line I have now. It makes working on that part of the engine bay way less annoying.

Comparison pic of the old and new parts:



I also swapped out my side mirrors (finally). The old ones had been corroded ever since I bought the car, but for some reason I kept forgetting to buy new ones, until now.

Comparison pic of the old and new mirrors:



I was also initially planning on extending the heater wiring, but I found that it was not necessary at all. Managed to take stuff apart and reroute the wires. Wrote about it here: https://nam3forum.com/forums/forum/m...nto-a-late-one

Would you share the link to those connectors? I have a broken one and my OCD makes me want new lol

[heinzboehmer]

Would you share the link to those connectors? I have a broken one and my OCD makes me want new lol

This is where I bought mine: https://www.ebay.com/itm/13151059535...IAAOSwUwFaQjal

I actually still have three that I have no use for. If you want, I'll send one to you if you pay shipping. Should be super cheap to ship within the US.

[heinzboehmer]

Today I found out that adding another S54 to my car surprisingly made it slower:



Plan is to build this engine slowly. Not gonna do anything crazy with it, just machining, new rods and pistons, cams and all the regular S54 stuff. Everything looked good (and felt good under my fingernail), but we'll have to see what the machine shop has to say.

Doing this mostly for fun. Have never built an engine before so I want to learn. This one might end up in my car (and then I can rebuild the one that's currently in there) or it might end up in something else (clownshoe?). Now I have to figure out how to properly store all this so it doesn't corrode. Don't think I'll be doing any work with this for months, still have to work my way through my queued projects.

[Casa de Mesa]

This is awesome. What did you get the 2nd motor from?

[heinzboehmer]

Craigslist lol. Was prepared to find a destroyed engine, but fortunately it looks pretty good!

Came with a bunch of stuff too. Just missing ITBs, oil pan and valve cover to be a complete engine. Got it for $2k, so pretty good deal I think!

[heinzboehmer]

When I replaced my mirrors, I bought a genuine BMW part for the driver's side and an S-Tec branded one for the passenger's side. FCP said S-Tec was OE for the passenger's side, but not for the driver's side. I thought that was weird, but the price difference wasn't enough, so I just trusted them.

The passenger's side mirror fit with no issues, but the driver's side mirror was very wavy. So wavy that I drove the car for about five minutes before driving back home and swapping the old, corroded glass back in. Thought it was funny that the genuine unit was worse than the OE one, but whatever. Returned the BMW one and bought an S-Tec one to use instead, since it had worked perfectly on the driver's side. And of course, turns out S-Tec is actually OE, since the BMW logo is clearly ground off:



Unfortunately the S-Tec part was also wavy. Not surprising, since it turned out to be the same part, but at least I got the same thing for $30 less.

Also, I noticed something that I didn't notice last time. The glass was perfectly flat when not installed, but became wavy once clipped in. Seems like the clipping (and holding) mechanism is distorting the glass. Great.

I went and pressed on the eight "preload" tabs (pointed out below) with my fingers until they weren't sticking out as much. This seems to have reduced the force on the glass enough to not distort it when installed. Nice, fixed.



Hopefully the tabs don't spring back and re-distort the glass. If they do, I'll probably cut them off and some foam/double sided foam tape for preload instead. I'm slightly annoyed at BMW for switching to the newer glass mechanism. The old one works great and is held in place with a radial locking mechanism, instead of using a bunch of tabs to clip in. I see no need for the switch, but I guess these new ones are probably cheaper to produce.

Anyway, after much more effort than needed for a simple mirror glass swap, I finally have glass that doesn't look terrible