GETTING A BIT TOO FAR OVER THE SKIS

I try, sometimes successfully, to have a theme for every post here. The last post, When good enough isn’t good enough, was about re-repairing things in anticipation of Legends of the Autobahn 2024 and also bringing the restoration up to a new standard. In doing so, it seems, I got a bit ahead of my skis.

Getting ahead of my skis is something I try not to do. And usually it’s easy to accomplish: just don’t write about anything until it’s finished, after I know the full arc of the story. But I violated that rule last month when I wrote, among other things, about the fix to the flickering oil pressure gauge and having the body shop replace the transmission speedo gear so I’d have a functioning speedometer and fixing the previously addressed rust in the frame-rail. None of those worked out as planned and the story arc changed things in big and small ways.

Even though I had dropped the Alpina off at the body shop well in advance of LoTA they didn’t have time to fix the frame-rail. And that was disappointing but understandable: they had at least one other car in there being prepped for LoTA and several, you know, getting repaired. Conversely, the frame-rail was an optional project, not nearly as mission critical as other things on their plate, like trying to get another very nice e21 323i together for Monterey.

Oliver's 323i at the body shop with mine in the background under plastic

Although this is not the body shop’s fault, the first thing I noticed upon driving it home was that the speedo gear change did not fix the non-functioning speedometer. I spent the drive strategizing how to fix that and the stumbling on acceleration. Before this revelation I planned to ship the car to my new home in New York and, over the winter, becoming proficient enough in K-Jet fuel injection to fix the stumbling/lean running myself. I unsuccessfully tried this in the 1990s when I owned my first e21 323i but was determined to do better this time. The transmission, however, added a new wrinkle. So, I hatched a new plan to take the car to Sacramento and have Stu, who worked on the transmission before it was put in, fix the speedo drive. And he also happens to be the best person I knew for fine tuning the K-Jet. To make things even better, another friend drilled and tapped a spare fuel pressure regulator to make it adjustable. A phone call to Stu and a plan was made.

Once I got the car home, my first mission was to change the oil pressure sender. You may recall, I figured out that I had put in a 80 PSI sender in the car but was using a 150 PSI gauge. I put the new 150 PSI gauge in but noticed, when taking the old one out, that it was not an 80 PSI sender, but the same as the new one I was installing. To add insult to injury, once the oil was warm, the idiot light still flickered. Also, the pressure never gets above 60 PSI when cold or 45 when warm. All this isn’t dangerous—more just annoying and perplexing, as ever M10 I’ve built hovers around 60 PSI when warm and 90 when cold. I’ll get to the bottom of this but will wait to explain the fix (or should I say anticipated fix) because I don’t want to again get too far over my skis.

Other than the lack of speedo and flickering oil pressure light, the drive to and from Legends was uneventful and the show was a lot of fun. I spent most my time talking to folks. I knew several of the participants, some who were pretty good friends, and walked around socializing most of the day. I saw Julius who owns a e21 B6 (but not running well enough to bring to Legends), Ricardo who is restoring and modifying his e21 (and got to meet his son who is going to my alma mater), Rob who owns several 2002s but was having his 2002tii with many Alpina bits (including an A4 injection system) judged in the concourse, and many 2002 friends (Jan, Bart, Delia, etc.) and some new friends. And, of course, the Alpina crowd, too. Because of all the socializing I didn’t really have a chance to take many—ok, any—pictures but I was able to harvest a few cool ones from the BMWCCA Golden Gate chapter FaceBook page and other such places. It was a bitter-sweet Legends for me, given that I’m moving away: It was great to see so many folks I know, some well and others car acquaintances. But I worried about how long it would take to make the same sort of connections on the east coast. Of course, I could always avoid the August humidity of the east coast and make Legends an annual trip to California….

Our hero

The "other" 323i, a very nice example.

After a day of rest, I got up early Saturday morning to take the Alpina up to Sacramento. By the time I got to San Francisco, where I stopped to fill the car up with gas, it was drizzling. Apparently, the tires didn’t like that as I accelerated up the cloverleaf back onto the highway and the rear end came around. In the spin, the car jumped a curb. After the visual inspection everything seemed fine and I was back on my way. A few miles later, however, some unusual noise was coming from the front and steering required more effort. I got off the highway and confirmed my suspicions: a flat tire. Luckly, I recently got a used wheel with decent looked rubber. I called AAA; there was a truck minutes away, the spare was installed, and I was back on my way!

The flat on the Alpina wheel

At least for a while. About 50 miles later some weird thumps could be heard. I wondered if it was the pavement and changed lanes. It would go away for a bit but came back. And got worse. Soon it was bad enough that I pulled over and saw that the spare was disintegrating.

Not so good rubber on the spare

 Apparently, the good rubber was really old and rotten. With no usable spare, I called AAA; almost 90 minutes later, the truck showed up and towed me to the shop. Stu then took me to the train, which I took home. I wasn’t happy about how the trip turned out but I was thankful that I didn’t have a blow out with the disintegrating spare and that the spin didn’t appear to cause any more damage than a flat tire.

Finally making it to Sacramento

So, the car is in Sacramento, back in Stu’s hands. When I get it shipped east I’m hopeful that the speedo will work and the fuel injection is dialed-in. And I’ll work on the that flickering oil pressure light. But I won’t get out over my skis and declare any of these things fixed!