A Lovely Evening by Matthew, James, Joaquin, Salar and Occasional Perfect Timing, Chip.
So it's the second week and I haven't touched the car since previously getting stuck on the steering rack. This is no bueno so I buckle up my big boy pants, round up my friends and prepare for work. The day was off to a great start when James texted me in my bedroom from the hallway of our apartment at 8AM letting me know he has free time precisely between 11am and 3pm. Exactly when my classes begin and end lol. My hopes are high and spirit stays strong. Joaquin said he'd have free time around 3 when I'm free, so we're all good.
So essentially my plan here is to have one other person lift the engine up and out the way enough so I can get down to the bolts on the steering rack. Since the motor wasn't being held up by the motor mounts it was sitting lower than it normally would. Amazingly, not only does Joaquin show up, but so does salar! Yes! This will be good. If you need extra hands or, most importantly, comedic relief for your wrenching, you want these two together.
So we dive into it head first. We get the engine high up enough so that I can slowly back out the 13mm bolts holding the steering rack. I had all of a quarter turn to work with down in the engine so ...it took a while. Eventually i got them all out and still no dice. I can't get it to move. I pause for a second and look at the subframe and I see two bolts holding a part of the steering to it. Maybe I should pull those? Hmmm naahh, there's an easier way. So I consult with the Obi-Wan Jake and he says something sort of like "take out the whole rack it moves as one piece" and i'm like hmmmm naaahhh that still doesn't mean pull those four subframe bolts.
Out of the wild a magical Chip appears in a blazing red v8 american glory. Oh lord now I have Chip, Salar and Joaquin all together in one place. Yep. No work is going to be done. Lol, we goof off for a couple minutes AND VOILA a magical James appears! This is lovely. I give James the rundown of where I'm at to see if he has any bright ideas to pull out the rack and sure enough he says, "oh we probably gotta pull these four bolts, yeah see, they're holding it to the subframe." WELL ALRIGHTY THEN.
Boom, we drop all four bolts and we. are. in.
business. Oh yes boys, the rack is out of the way, the oil pan is free and this engine is coming out.
So with that out the way, we double check all the wires, hoses, connection, clamps etc. and it appears we have cleared it all. We whip up the hoist and get in position.
We give a good yank and she comes! Yes this is good. One more and uh oh. Looks like we still got some stuff hooked up on the intake side. So, lets have a looksy. Until now, I hadn't even realized that the fuel filter was all the way up here haha. So we pull one of the lines to the filter and to our surprise fuel came out. Well..thats not true. We very much expected it, BUT WE DID NOT EXPECT THAT MUCH :lol: Luckily we were able to disconnect the second fuel line without having to open the system and spill more gas. Alright? Alright! We are in business, yet again! Lets get this girl out!
We heeve, we ho, we heeve we...oh hold the fuck up, the entire car shifted left on the jackstands. Oh this isn't right. So we lower the engine hoist a bit and push it back under the car. This is literally impossible, we have pulled everything connecting the motor to the body. So we do another inspection suspecting the exhaust is hitting the frame, but no. Maybe the trans is hitting the trans tunnel, but no. It was the smallest, tiniest little motherfucker of a ground just chillin in between the headers. Smh. I go ahead and source James the 13mm and as soon as he pulls the ground out the whole thing just swings. Oh yes, we can see it now, NOTHING is holding this in.
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Awww yeeee buddy! 8) 8)
So up until this point it's all pretty standard wrenching. Stick with me.
At this point we spend a solid 20 mins trying to devise a method for how to get the engine from the parking lot, to my living room. Here are the issues we face at this moment:
- Engine hoist is too heavy to push up Pheasant and to get over the curb.
- Engine hoist is too big to get through front door.
- Engine is too heavy to lift.
- Well shit.
- Pics for entertainment:
![[Image: y4MX4rX.jpg]](http://i.imgur.com/y4MX4rX.jpg)
ride dat tranny boy
Here is the fully bulletproof tested method to get your S50 into your apartment:
Step 1: Insert your S50 into your Protege5. This will be very tricky, but with enough hands and a can-do attitude it is very possible.
Cautions: Your suspension will undergo madtuck and you may be mistaken for stancenation fanatics. Your engine hoist may get stuck under your muffler due to such madtuck, the solution is to jack the car up to release the hoist. #doyouevenscrape
![[Image: bWHB27g.jpg]](http://i.imgur.com/bWHB27g.jpg)
But bro, but no really, bro
Step 2: Transport S50 to your apartment front door. This step can allow for many variations and largely depends on your facilities. We tried many methods, some unmentionable for reasons, but we found one method prevailed. Start by finding the nearest handicap ramp entrance to the sidewalk....or lawn area. Access this area slowly making sure not tip the S50 out of the open hatch. Slow definitely wins the race in this instance. Again, depending on facilities many options can work for you, I'll share both our failed and successful method. First we took the P5 directly to the back door going with the front of the car first. However, we encountered what was apparently a steep ass fucking hill in our backyard and couldn't catch grip in the front. Having madtuck severely affects front traction. So you can back the car out, andthenbackitbackin only to find out there is no way to get enough angle to the hoist without rolling the car down the side of the fucking mountain covered in wet grass ending in a rampaging river. Never knew my backyard was this wild
This a long step, i know.
So if you're back door isn't accommodating what you can do is take it to the front door and hop all your neighbors walk ways til you've arrived at your own.
Cautions: Your clutch will fucking hate you for trying to move 600lbs+ in wet grass up a hill and over small curbs.
Step 3: Remove S50 from P5. Hold.
Note, chip disappeared earlier and magically reappeared here So for this step you will need 5 men, 4 traffic cones, a jack and two shoes. Two men, preferably your largest, will stand on and hold back the hoist from sliding under the car. Place traffic cones, shoes and two legs under the wheels of the hoist to also try and prevent rolling. Two men must operate the lift and pull the engine simultaneously. The two weight men will also need to pull the hoist. The 5th man will operate the jack to give the engine hoist clearance under the car. Carefully maneuver the hoist and engine until the engine is hanging. At this point the 5th man will lower jack and roll the car away from the engine and off the curb and into a parking spot. If you do it right, it should feel like a well oiled machine orchestrated by god himself. It's magical. Hold engine here for the next step by chocking the hoist with the traffic cones.
Step 4: Borrow grocery device. Just kindly ask.
Step 5: Place S50 into grocery device. This will allow you to move the engine through the doorway and hold the engine long enough for you to tear down and reassemble engine hoist inside the apartment.
Cautions: Lol don't release your grip on the shopping cart, when it starts to roll, IT FUCKING GOES, and if and when it starts to tip, you better be ready cause that sumbitch is over 600lbs. The best solution is to move quickly and muster up all your strength and body to grab the fucking cart, prop a knee under the tipping side and hold that like it's your hopes and dreams about to spill all over your damn front yard. Shhhiiiiiiiittttttttt. Also when the engine falls deeper into the cart and the walls of the cart begin to flex, stay calm, it settles. The cart will re-assume it's shape once you lift the engine back out. No really, it will trust me.
Step 6: Remove S50 from grocery device, place in a corner.
Step 7: Return the shopping cart to nice lady.
Next up?
-Remove everything else and sell it all! I need to either sell it all as its pulled or find somewhere to store it but i'm running out of space in the apt.
-Do the same thing to the E30
-Retrieve parts necessary for the swap (junkyard, facebook/bimmerforums WTB's, push comes to shove buy something new *cringe*)
-Source exhaust fab
-I'd like to get the oil pan baffled since it will already be off and i think people desire that, right?
-Read, read, read, there's plenty more I need to address. But one step at a time, can't let myself get too overwhelmed.
PROGRESS!! :thumbup: :thumbup:
I still can't believe what went down tonight, oh my goodness :lol: :lol: