BMW e46 330d Touring

[duds100]

The most recent of my car history has been an 3.0 e36 M3 coupe, and then an e46 M3 coupe. Both lovely cars. The s50b30 sounded superb and I liked the spread of the 5 ratios, but the e46 chassis felt more exploitable and the wider power band of the s54 was undeniable.

A house purchase & a set wedding date unfortunately pressured me into selling the ‘M’ and also my trusty T4 2.5 TDi Transporter to free up some funds.

I have an R1 mini track car, so I need to have a diesel towcar to pull my trailer.

In light of this I trundled round in a b5 Passat TDi PD130 TDi Estate which I aquired nice and cheap as a stop gap, all-be-it, boring tow car. I had been looking for an e46 330d manual touring for about 5 months - a rare beast it seems! My thoughts are, 20% the cost of an M3 but 80% the fun (am I dreaming?) and can pull my little mini too.

Must haves were;

- M57
- Touring
- Sport
- Manual
- Heated seats

Nice to have

- TV/Nav double din
- Black leather
- Harmon Kardon
- 6 spd M57TU 201BHP
- not silver

After the afformentioned 5 months I took the plunge on one which I picked up in Derby from a second hand car dealer. It’s a 184 PS Manual Touring in Orient Blue, which actually looks quite similar to my carbon shwartz M3 which I loved. It has grey leather with wood trim, not my taste, but it’s got the Nav/TV option and the seats are heated which the fiancé will be pleased with. It’s pretty rough to be honest, rust is an issue and it drives awfully!

However, I managed to swap it for the passat & £300 his way so it owes me less than £1000 which I am happy with. I’ll let the pics do the parlant.

Edited by duds100 on Monday 18th February 17:53

[Lukas239]

Will be watching with interest. Look at Helix's thread on the same for basically anything you need to know

[helix402]

Good choice! As mentioned in the last post I’m on my second 330d-the tale of both is fully documented on here and most common problems dealt with.

They respond well to a remap too.

[duds100]

Over the past few months I have been busy sorting a lot of the Touring’s issues. Essentially... I bought a lemon, but with the spec I wanted being so hard to find, I was happy to pick this one up and crack on with the vast amount of jobs even if it may not be cost effective in the short term.

Short version... the Touring is now driving great with all dash lights eliminated! (Dives full stretch for nearest timber worktop...)

(Very) Long version.

Issues/tasks/upgrades;

Delete roof bars
Investigate lack of power
Sort sloppy gear change
Investigate poor idle NVH
Replace dented LHF door
Replace head light lenses
Install removable non-visible tow bar in sport bumper
Fit A/C compressor
Fit receiver dryer & re-gas system
Fit new front fan pack
Fit rear subframe bush
Replace NSF wheel bearing
Delete EGR
Delete primary CAT (ecotune downpipe)
Replace all VAC lines
Clean injectors & inlet manifold
Full service, air / oil / fuel filters
Fit FAB
Fit RTAB
Fit sachs dampers
Fit eibach pro kit
Fit billet UJ
Fit H&R ARBs
Fit front/rear droplinks
Replace NS engine mount
Fix washer leak
Fix handbrake & annoying NSR rattle
Replace wood with carbon cube trim

Apologies for not being great with a camera but my real love is the nuts & bolts but hopefully the pics tell some of the story.

New inner/outer steering arms & black series front arm rear bushes on;





Steering now feels nice & direct away from centre so was not surprised to find a purple 067 rack in there when I had a peak. Standard fit on these I believe, I put one on my M3 and I remeber it a lovely improvement in precision away from centre.

Also Installed a billet steering UJ







Replaced NSF engine mount, replaced all engine VAC lines, deleted the EGR & primary CAT. (Forgot to take a pic with inlet manifold off, sorry) This sorted the power loss out and idle tactility. Delighted to report it very much feels like the 7.9sec 0-60 / 140mph car is should be now.



H&R bars, droplinks, SACHS M-Sport dampers, eibach pro springs, f/r top mounts, dust covers, bump stops, & RTAB’s installed.









Bump stops had all but disintegrated!





New rear back plates & shoes, everything free’d off, cleaned & adjusted accordingly. The NSR spring shoe retaining pins had left the party for pastures new so the shoes were banging / rattling around on the drive flange which turned out to be the source of my incredibly annoying rattle I had from the rear corner. Hurrah!







After driving for a few miles to let the suspension bed in, I measured the ride heights. The OSR arch gap was really low. I had the same issue with my old M3 and remedied it by utilising different thickness spring pads across the rear axle. 5/7.5/10& 14.5mm are all available from BMW.

Factory stock ride heights on an e46 Sport with 18s should be;

Front 602mm +/- 10mm
Rear 567mm +/- 10mm

However, when I put the pads in to achieve these heights it gave a somewhat squat look to the rear so I ended up bumping up the rear a little so the arch gaps matched better front to rear. I like a bit of rake front to rear, it helps a bit with understeer, and also I tow my track car with the Touring so this allows for a little squat when pulling my trailer too.

I eventually settled with using a Lhr 7mm pad and rhr 14.5mm pad which equated to these ride heights;

Lhf 597mm. -5mm delta OEM
Rhf 597mm. -5mm delta OEM
Rhr 577mm. +10mm delta OEM
Lhr 579mm. +12mm delta OEM

This is how it’s sat now & I think it looks just right, especially with the roof bars now deleted. I bolted on some new front wings too. Rear arch rust bubbling will be sorted at a later date.



While I was messing about with the pads I dropped it down on to my corner weights;



I’m 70kg so if anyone was wondering, a 2002 e46 Touring (184PS) 5spd manual with 30L of fuel on board weighs 1619kg.

That, as it happens, is exactly 59kg heavier than my old ‘03 e46 M3 coupe 6spd manual was. Not too shabby really considering it’s a touring with the extra glass, and being a boosted diesel lump has the turbo / intercooler pipe work, a space saver in the boot, and a big steel tow bar under bumper, both of which the M3 did not have.

I ended up with a 50.4% cross weight which I am happy with considering the front perches are not adjustable and the smallest thickness rear pad available is 5mm.

So on to some more maintenance. A remap is on the horizon so I changed the rubber doughnut and transmission brace rubbers. Refreshed all the gear linkages and installed a Z3 slightly shorter throw shifter. Also changed one tired rear subframe bush.











Then dropped it down onto the floor and headed over to my frends workshop who has 4 wheel laser alignment.



First thing I did is square up the rear subframe as there was a very small offset side-to-side. I slackened all the bolts, got a big lever bar in and then tightened up the bolts so the rear subframe was square in the chassis. I had previously cut the pins off the new front top mounts and milled 10mm off inner side of the slotted holes in the turrets so I could dial in some more front camber. I settled on the following fast road setup;

Front camber -1.6
Front caster +6 (not adjustable)
Front toe 0

Rear camber -1.8
Rear toe +1mm

That about wraps it up. The car is mechanically back up to full strength and driving really nicely. Once the budget tyres wear out I hope to fit some MPSS’s and some fast road brake pads. Somewhere amongst all that I want to get the ECU remapped.

I will need to sort the growing rust issue too but for now I am going to enjoy getting every last ounce of fun out of the landsails!

Here is a pic of how it looks currently. The interior recieved numerous wet vac’s, and a big deep clean before it looked respectable.

Then I swapped the woodf for the carbon cube trims, new grey OEM mats & a black m-sport gear knob provided a nice lift to the cockpit.

It’s a nice place to sit now I really prefer it to the factory option wood it had. Steering wheel is on the list to get re-trimmed.

Edited by duds100 on Monday 18th February 17:06

Edited by duds100 on Monday 18th February 17:13

Edited by duds100 on Monday 18th February 17:47

Edited by duds100 on Monday 18th February 17:51

Edited by duds100 on Monday 18th February 17:52

Edited by duds100 on Monday 18th February 20:51

Edited by duds100 on Wednesday 20th February 14:02

[helix402]

Good work. They are very capable all round cars.

[Darren1101]

Love it.

I could be starting a very similar thread later this week. As you say, manual 330d Tourings are scarce, so I'm about to take the plunge on one with 180k and rust starting to appear. But, so long as the issues are bolt on/off I'm fine with that.

[Max M4X WW]

Interesting read and looks like a nice little project. How many miles has it done?

Also, where did you get the billet steering joint from? Could be a good little upgrade for my 325ti.

[matthias73]

Good bloody effort

Have you considered retrimming the wheel yourself? Check out the "mewant" kits on eBay.

[duds100]

UJ was an m3cutters forum member but you can get them on ebay too;

https://rover.ebay.com/rover/0/0/0?mpre=https%3A%2...

I bought it on 156k and I have just ticked over 170k last week on the way back from a weekend in Devon. Not hanging about in outside lane speeds, I averaged 50.4 mpg for the 340mile round trip. Brim to brim it was more like 46/47mpg though, but still quite respectable.

I can get the instant read out needle to indicate 50mpg, even when climbing a moderate gradient at 70mph. With all the bushes done, optimised geo & 37Psi F / 41 psi R pressures it maintains speeds really well only requiring very small throttle inputs.

I really like the M57. I’m a petrol head at heart but it really does tick a lot of boxes and, dare I say it, actually sounds pretty good! The engine is very flexible, it will pull 5th from 1200rpm no problem at all.

I really should get it mapped...

Edited by duds100 on Monday 18th February 20:42

[duds100]

matthias73 said:

Good bloody effort

Have you considered retrimming the wheel yourself? Check out the "mewant" kits on eBay.

That looks pretty good actually. I got Jack from Royal steering wheels to refresh my M3 wheel & it was a sterling job so I think he will be doing the Touring too.

[m20b25]

Great cars. Good to see one being looked after. Any thoughts on the rust? I’m looking at one which needs 2 front wings and bits on the rear sorting..

[helix402]

A ready painted pair of front wings is around £200. To fix rusty rear arches costs a lot more if you’re paying someone. Repair panels are around £30, the labour will cost a lot more.

[duds100]

As Helix says, I bought a pair of wings painted for £210 and bolted them on. Rear arches I think i'm going to cut and weld in a repair panel. I need to finish my mini i'm restoring first. Once that is ready I can take the touring off the road and address the rust. It will need everything painting bar the roof to get it where I want it. I will replace the bump strips, plinth & windscreen scuttle post paint along with a wheel re-furb so it should looks factory fresh when finished.

Interior needs a wheel re-trim, centre console slide tray, gear gator replacing, and seats renovated to uplift back to mint condition.

[Sf_Manta]

I'm having mine refreshed by a bodyshop... will know the damage in a little under 2 weeks

[CarAbuser]

Threads like these are the reason I like reading PH. Reviews of new Porsche 911s are great but I enjoy seeing a wonky old car getting brought back to life even more.

I've got an E46 320d which I've been enjoying fixing up. It's also on 170k but it's had a much easier life than yours.

I just spent a weekend rebuilding the handbrake assembly, fitting a new main thermostat and doing the cable-tie fix on the passenger window mechanism.

I had Royal Steering wheels do the wheel on my Z4 and it's perfect, but given the total value of my 320d I'm reluctant to get the re-trim done as it represents 25% of the cars value! Might look into the DIY method mentioned earlier.

I'm interested to see your rust fix as I have exactly the same rusty areas. I was tempted to grind it down and try some rattle can spraying but I think it may end up looking worse.

With regards to the remap. I purchased a cloned MPPS v13 off eBay (£10) and did an ECU upload then sent the file away to a chap called "Enda Ward" (EndTuning is his forum moniker) who made changes and sent me a tuned file to download myself for a small fee of £189. He's highly regarded across the E46 forums and I'm happy with how the car drives after so worth a try.

[helix402]

I don’t want to clutter the op’s thread with links to mine, but re rust repair-I have an old thread listing E46 touring rust repairs in detail on a 330d Touring.