Aj's Imola, E46 M3 6spd

[Ajcanadian]

A good photographer friend of mine has been teaching me a thing or two about photography.

I had someone come down from Grand Rapids, Michigan to buy my car. My car really wasn't for sale. The guy put a feeler post and I threw the idea of maybe selling it. He ended up making me a very strong offer for the car which I agreed to. But I had to back out (yes I'm that guy. If I sold this car, I probably would've regretted this decision for the rest of my life.) I looked into replacing the car for an E9x M3 but I don't think an E9x M3 is for me.

[Ajcanadian]

After installing the headers, I ran into an issue. The hardline that goes into the expansion tank would occasionally leak. Luckily this was an easy and cheap fix.

I also went ahead and got an alignment after lowering the subframe, installing the coil overs and fine tuning the ride height. The car really needed it.




Old hose out with the new one in.



I needed some fresh rubber for the arc8s. I didn't go with some expensive tires mainly because I'm running an aggressive alignment and didn't want to run through tires due to camber wear. For a street car and my driving habits, these toyos are fine.




I lowered the rear of the car a little.



Finally took the car in for a much needed alignment.


Took the car on a little road trip to help a buddy buy an E28 533i 5spd


Hey look there's the 30% of the E46 M3s population of my area.



I started to take the m3 to cars n coffee and a lot of car meets.



Can you tell goodbye egg yolks?






Some interior shots.

[Ajcanadian]

After having the subframe reinforced it was time to do the rod bearings again. My car was a 2002, so it went through the rod bearings service bulletin at 22,000 miles. This was something, I really didn't want to push my luck with. I figured, with the car having 101k miles it was time to do them again. I went with all BMW parts and did some of the while you're in there things such as steering guibo.




This is how the old bearings looked. I had some life left in these bearings but the added piece of mind is nice. Apologies for the poor picture.


The car also got catless headers because I kept on getting cat codes.
The 1,200 mile break in period, meant I had to find excuses to drive the M3.

[Ajcanadian]

I ended up breaking my center support bearing and cv joint on my zhp. So until, I get my new driveshaft... the M3 is back on daily duty. Here are some quick snaps of how the car sits. Pretty happy with it but I need to lower the rear and get an alignment.

[Circa Surviven]

Love the look of the new steering wheel!

[Ajcanadian]

I've been doing tons of little things to the M3 ever since it was stored, for winter.

But before we jump into that. I'd like to introduce my new winter beater. A 2004 330/6 Zhp. Imola red with an alcantara interior. The car has absolutely 0 rust. She's seen a lot of roads, and she's got 234k miles on her. But she's been well taken care of since day 1. I was extremely lucky to have found such a nice daily.




Both of the cars pair up really well and I'm happy with the match.

My steering wheel trim was showing some age and it bothered the heck out of me. So I decided to send it out to TexasZ3 and he knocked it out. I decided to condition the leather on my stock steering wheel and that revealed a new problem. The 12 O'clock position had some leather cracking and that drove me nuts. I ended up replacing that wheel with an alcantara wheel from Coby.



Some of you may remember, I made a post earlier asking what type of brakes my car had because they didn't look like stock e46 m3 rotors. I ended up finding out that the 2nd owner of my car put on competition brakes front and rear. He also bought a genuine csl trunk for the car. I ended up buying front brakes for it as well as parts for rodbearings. The car has 100k miles on it and the rodbearing service action was done at ~22k miles. RIP wallet.


The old rotors were toast, they have a big lip on them. They've been on for over a decade on the car.


The car had an aftermarket AFE drop in cold air intake which has seen better days. But I quickly ditched that for an OE replacement.


I bought bc racing coilovers for the car and it was long overdue to install them. Luckily this is just my street car. I don't plan to track it or autocross it, so bc coilovers made sense. Good bye koni yellows with h&r springs.


Unfortunately I have no pictures of the coilovers installed. So here's some pictures of the car dumped right after I installed them without fine tuning the ride height.



Believe it or not, I've bought 3 sets of wheels for this car. Vmr wheels, e9x m3 comp rep wheels, and lastly apex arc8s. I've wanted apex arc8s for the longest for this car.




I'm patiently waiting for the spacers to arrive and then fine tune the ride height.

[Ajcanadian]

I seent that GT350R. You weren't joking.

The miata on the back also has a turbo.

[Sharocks]

I seent that GT350R. You weren't joking.

[Ajcanadian]

Color combo is rare, is he just bored with it? I guess there are other fast sedans now that do it better to a degree.

He found a different car he wants to approach, that suits his liking more. It was more of me telling him to buy it and it sold him when he heard it's got a V8. He's more into JDM cars and American cars. He's got this 240sx that's fully built. I'm the one that like's EU cars more.

[Sharocks]

Correct, it's my step brother's. Managed to talk him into getting him that

Color combo is rare, is he just bored with it? I guess there are other fast sedans now that do it better to a degree.

[Ajcanadian]

Isn't that M5 on Cars and Bids right now? Looks good man.

Correct, it's my step brother's. Managed to talk him into getting him that

[Sharocks]

Isn't that M5 on Cars and Bids right now? Looks good man.

[Ajcanadian]

I've been a little busy with school and work but I've managed to do a few little things here and there.



I ended up pulling all the tint and got the car tinted at 35%. Old tint was gross and the previous owner peeled the tint off the front two windows.



After having the subframe reinforced, I got to enjoy the car quite a bit before tucking it away for the winter.
I bought bc coilovers for the car. I figured since this is a street car, it should be fine.



The soft touch plastic on the center console was showing a lot of wear and I wanted a cleaner look so I used fcps black friday sale and bought the euro center console.

Gave the seats the leatherique treatment.



I was coming back home from Ann arbor and the car triggered a Service Engine Soon light. Once i got home and scanned it, turns out it was for the cats. I wanted to buy the euro headers but I couldn't manage to find any at the time so I bought the Megan's. I'll be installing these once I do the rodbearings. The car has a hair over 100k miles and the last time they were done was under recall when the vehicle had ~22k miles on it.

My foglights were showing a lot of wear and one was also cracked. I bought depo clear fogs and painted them yellow.


I absolutely hate the amber reflective corners. Not only are they a PITA to get out and install. They look awful. I bought clear ones and then painted them in imola red. I managed to break one of the new set after painting it while installing it.


My interior trim pieces were showing a lot of wear. The previous owner wrapped the brushed aluminum trim and swapped the door panel arm rests too. They didn't look like they belonged to a 100k mile car so they had to go. While removing the door panel I discovered a lot of mismatched/broken interior trim clips. I wonder where my rattle was coming from.





Also got new sidemarkers

[Ajcanadian]

Nice pickup on the Imola M3 and glad the Koni's and H&R springs worked out for you!

Thanks Alex! It was the right timing, I was about to pull the trigger on bc coils but the moment I saw your price, I couldn't have said no.

[alexM3Chicago]

Nice pickup on the Imola M3 and glad the Koni's and H&R springs worked out for you!