Welp.


I don’t know if it was the thanksgiving turkey, divine intervention, or an alien abduction, but for some reason I bought another R53 (to my driveway’s dismay).

With Madeline pretty much done, I’d been checking the local auctions for next year’s project. I came across a local 2005 R53 with 118k miles and a salvage title for pretty cheap. I’m such a sucker for facelift Gen I.

I wanted my next project to be more fun and raw than how I’ve been restoring my current build.. something where I wouldn’t have to sweat the little stuff and a car that could wear a few battle scars proudly. I have my forever R53 in great condition already. This one can get down in the trenches.

The idea right now is a stripped out track build that’ll bring the raucous (having a “real” race car is still kind of a boyhood dream that I never grew out of). But it’s easy to say that now, I’ll just have fun and see where the project takes me.

Anyway, I saw this 05 slicktop in PW/B, listed as running and driving fine, albeit with a few bruises... A little over 1000 bucks later and she’s all mine.

It’s terrifying to buy a car sight unseen, and we’ll see in a few days if this was a bargain or a mistake when I get to inspect it with my own eyes. If it’s a total bucket of rusty bolts I might just resell it for what I paid. It’s worth at least that as a parts car.

Until I get my hands on it, here are a few pics. I’d love to hear your guys’ thoughts on the project ahead.




Stoked on this slicktop.








Needs some reshaping.








Sick tail lights bro.. . The rear hatch will definitely need some TLC too.


So that’s the starting point.

The two fears I have are frame rust and electrical mods by someone who didn’t know (or didn’t care about) what they were doing. Neither of those would be fun to overcome.

I’ll post more when I get it up on jack stands to look her over.

Much love,
Trag

 

Subscribed. This should be fun.

 

After a few delays, it looks like she’ll be delivered this Friday.

FWIW, I went through Montway Auto Transport, which has many good reviews from Facebook, eBay motors and the like.. Well my experience hasn’t been great. They’ve called every day this week to confirm pick up and delivery of the car will happen that day, then called a few hours later the same day to say their driver had to cancel.. and again.. Now it seems the delivery has been delayed until Friday, all the while I’m paying daily storage fees at the auction lot.

Not fun. And I’ll stay far away from Montway in the future. Maybe I just got a dud of an experience, but I’m done with them.

- - - - -

Anyway, in other news..

I’m posting the build sheet for later reference and also for anyone who’s interested.






As far as I can tell, this spec is possibly one of the lightest specs you could have gotten from the factory. (I’m pretty pleased about that, and it was a factor in the decision to buy this one in particular)

Slicktop, halogen lights, ASC, X-lites, upholstered seats etc.

Some of the few options it does have are OBC (which I welcome) and heated seats (which will probably eventually be replaced with lighter seats anyway).


EDIT:

She finally arrived on Friday.

 

I got the new coops up on jack stands for a bit today.

first of all, the battery was toast (but that was expected coming from an auction lot).

After checking vital fluids, I jumped it to see if the engine would run on its own. It started up reluctantly and with no signs of knock (phew), but 20 seconds of idling and a few wisps of smoke blew by the passenger window .

At least she starts! I can work with that. It would have been a hard pill to swallow if I needed to start pricing another engine.

Here’s a few snaps from an hour and a half this afternoon:




Well right away this wasn’t a good sign... Someone getting cute with performance wires and can’t even figure out the right length for each cylinder.




There’s your smoke! The belt was burned through. I figured this was as good a place as any to start the problem solving treasure hunt.




Disassembled the belt line to find out what killed the poor old belt.




Unrelated.. A shot front motor mount. (Again, to be expected)




The crankshaft pulley spun completely independently from the damper... so this was also toast. I have the OE damper from my other R53 in the shed and it’s still in great shape. I’ll swap it over for now before dumping money into another ATI unit.




The alternator was also completely seized. I couldn’t turn it at all by hand and I had a really good grip on it. I actually have a spare brand new alternator on the shelf, so I’ll also swap that over tomorrow.




The belt tensioner was just about shot. The strut had very little resistance, and I (again) had a new one in storage so I’ll replace this and the idler pulley.




The power steering fan is in rough shape. Pretty gritty feeling bearings. The pump doesn’t look too bad though.




Hard to see but I have some coolant dripping from the oil pan. Of course I thought expansion tank right away, but the tank looked fine with no signs of leak.. I didn’t have the daylight to find the source today, but I’m hoping it’s a thermostat housing issue and not a head gasket.

Plenty of grime to add to the coolant though. Obviously I expect to replace pretty much every oil o-ring in the car. Possibly a valve cover leak as well.




This is.. peculiar... What causes someone to duct tape the starter motor? I do not know. I’m a little scared to find out. I’ll save it for another day. Lol




Front LCA bushings are D O N E.




The state of the suspension and frame were as expected from a salt belt car. Plenty of surface rust and pitting. Thanks to the first build, I’m used to taking extra time to assess structural integrity of fasteners and components as I go. This will be no different. (The sunlight makes the rust a little more orange than reality)




Looks like she might have steamrolled a raccoon or something, the cat heat shield has some deformities and the center heat shield is MIA. Or maybe the nuts just corroded off any the PO said f it. Either way, I’m not interested in having a heated gear shift lol, so I’ll be replacing that.




A general shot of the driver side.




Hmm, a new CV boot on an old axel. I’d have just replaced the axel if it were me but at least the PO did something. Also, not sure if that wet strut is from a leaky shock or splatter from the old CV leak yet.



So that’s all for today. Hope to get another hour in tomorrow dropping the engine mounts and fixing up the belt line.

 

That’s a major project and lots of rust.

 

HA yes it is and yes it is. Thanks for the vote of confidence my guy.

It’s a little less undercarriage rust than my last build to honest. Rebuilt/rebuilding the entire front and rear subframes and suspension on that one.

 

I’m down for tearing an r53 apart, but rust makes me cringe.

 

Thats a lot of rust indeed, good luck buddy

 

how do the rear brake lines look? they rust out pretty quick too

from what I saw most of the rust was on the crappy stamped parts, pretty common thankfully they are cheap on ebay

 

Got a few minutes of sunshine today while repairing the belt line and ignition components.

Not pictured, but I had my battery charger repairing the dead battery this car came with for over 16 hours. It took a long time, but “repair mode” was able to bring it back from the grave. I’m happy I didn’t have to drop another dime for a new battery.

Oh and ​​​​​​@MrBlah, The hard lines on this car look fair to decent. I actually replaced rear driver side hard line on my other build due to corrosion. It wasn’t a bad job.



Before starting, I pulled any standing codes. (Just with my cheapie wifi OBD reader)

To the best of my knowledge the P0036 and P0138 are likely a faulty post-cat O2 sensor. P1688 is a crankshaft pulley, which I knew about, and the P2300 surprised me but a new coil pack should fix.




Off to the spare parts stash to rustle up some goodies




I had air filters, alternator, idler pulley, crankshaft damper and a new coil pack and plug wires “in stock”




First up, pulling the busted damper. I chuckle every time I use these god awful homemade washers. So crude but strong as hell.




Welp. There’s yer problem.




Baking the spare OE damper for 10min at 200F should expand the socket enough to make install a little easier




While I had the spare damper baking, I pulled off the crash tubes and radiator support forward to remove the seized alternator. The crash tubes hadn’t been off in a long time (if ever) judging by the amount of crust I knocked off them.




So shiny and new.




Finished up the new damper, idler pulley, alternator and belt tensioner. The old AC compressor clutch and bearings were fine.




New coil pack to hopefully alleviate our P2300. Stainless M6x1.00 55mm fasteners fit aftermarket coil packs btw. I got these and some blue vibration dampening grommets from McMaster Carr.




New plugs and plug wires.




Carbon build up on the old plugs... Could be from fueling issues caused by the bad O2 sensor, or dirty air, or crappy gas, or all of the above.




I did cylinder 1 last and wasn’t expecting this haha. The plug well had a ton of oil sitting down there, so I’ll be ordering new valve cover and plug tube gaskets.




Looking like a respectable engine again.



I reset the ECU and started her up. It took a couple minutes of rough idle but it seemed to dust out a few cobwebs and the engine is running mostly smoothly again.

I hear a bit of a timing chain chatter, and the valve train doesn’t sound quite as buttery as my other R53, but then again it’s been who knows how long since this engine had oil properly circulated through it.


That’s all for now. Progress at least.

 

Nice work man, keep on going!

 

Just a small update while I wait for parts to arrive. I pulled the valve cover today because I’m impatient while all my gaskets are in the mail.

While I had the top engine mount off the other day I pulled the crank position sensor and thought I smelled burnt oil on it. Sniffing the oil fill cap smelled fine though, and the oil on the dipstick was a nice honey color so I wanted to see what was up.




Great news, nothing alarming here. No burnt oil smell or deposits. The valve rockers all still had very tight tolerances. Timing chain and guides looked fine and the tensioner didn’t have any slack. I’d be wise to do timing maintenance anyway, but at least there’s no imminent danger lurking .

(Ignore the tragic state of the stater motor heat shield. The 10mm bolt is missing and the shield itself is a little mangled from the last guy who was in here. I straightened it back out. )




The blown valve cover gasket is letting all kinds of crud through.




I thought for a second I had a cracked valve cover. It’s just a weird blemish from the injection molding process when it was made. The texture from manufacturing this valve cover is a lot rougher than my other car’s.





All degreased and shined up. Looks like new.



I didn’t take any pics, but I also replaced the power steering pump fan and started the tedious process of breaking free, wire brushing and anti-seizing select fasteners all around the engine bay and front subframe. (Salt belt folks know the deal) It’ll save a bunch of time to do this now all at once before parts arrive. Plus I’ll know which replacements I need if any are rounded off or missing and I can get them ordered before I’m stuck in the middle of an actual job.

I did this for my other build and it’s like being spoiled when I have to take anything apart now. I don’t have to worry about anything seizing and I know it’s all torqued to spec. It’s makes for a much more enjoyable time under the car.

 

Ow that looks weird, looks absolutely broken from the pics

 

Today I found some time to test the cylinder compression on the track build. Honestly I was expecting the worst with the other signs of neglect in the belt line I already fixed.

It didn’t seem outlandish to think whoever ran it to the point of the crank pulley exploding probably didn’t know what happened and drove it home with no water pump, no alternator, killing the battery, overheating and whatever else.. A blown head gasket was a very real possibility in my mind, but so far, no signs of that.

Engine health is an important investigation in determining if this car is worth the time and money to build.. or if I should flip it and hope for better luck on the next one. Slicktop facelift R53s are pretty hard to find around here though, so I’ll keep this one for now.


A quick how-to recap on the compression test procedure for anyone else reading who is interested:

1. Warm engine up to operating temp (do not skip this)
2. Pull all 4 spark plugs out
3. Disconnect main coil pack connector
4. Remove fuel pump fuse from driver footwell (20A)
5. Connect battery charger/assist (if you have one)
6. Turn over engine 10-15 sec to empty fuel rail
7. Install compression gauge to cylinder #1 (Size M14)
8. Crank engine for 6 cycles (important)
9. Record psi and release pressure from gauge
10. Repeat steps 7-9 for the remaining cylinders



Here are my compression results:
(2005 R53 w/ 118k miles)

Cyl 1 - 149psi
Cyl 2 - 147psi
Cyl 3 - 151psi
Cyl 4 - 152psi

I tested each cylinder twice and my cheapie harbor freight compression kit was surprisingly accurate, within 1-2 psi on the same cylinder, which is scientific enough for me




As you can imagine, it’s a pretty stressful test for an unassisted battery, so I hooked up my charger and set it to Start Assist mode for each time I tested a cylinder.




A shot of each cylinder result (labeled with cylinder number)


I ended up with good absolute pressure results and good variance as well. I’m a happy camper today.

 

OK so I'll admit I'm new to forums. I actually mostly hate technology in general. But how the H*** did I not see you bought a second R53??!! I need to take a "how to use forums" tutorial...

Anyway, this is sweet. I'm a huge fan of slick top cars. And ignore anyone that says its too rusty if they don't live in the crusty north. If your a southerner your not allowed to comment on the state of oxidation of any metal on a northern car lol. This car is not bad at all given its age and mileage! Rock on my friend!

 

Following. This should be an entertaining build.

FWIW, I just snagged a mint rear subframe off of Allmag, along with a R56 trailing arm conversion. If you're interested in my old rear subframe (which isn't in terrible shape at all, I'm just OCD) - would be a good project for a little wirebrushing/sandblasting and some fresh paint.

 

Haha @JerBear yeah I was torn between keeping track of both cars in the same thread.. but considering the fact they are nearly identical R53s (same gen, same color), it would be best to track both separately.

Thanks though man, looking forward to posting progress soon. I have to swap out the power steering pump on this one and fix up the fender bender in order to get it registered and insured for a proper test drive before going ham. I've got shelves full of parts waiting though


Thanks @Zillon I just might take you up on that. I've also got two R56 trailing arm conversions and a new subframe on the shelf already lol! We must be like souls. But the rear subframe on both of my R53s could use some TLC. If anything is catastrophic, I'll come knocking.

 

Oh how time changes with a toddler at home. Been about 2 years since I posted anything here but over those two years the build has been slowly progressing.

Have patience while I dig through photos along the way, but picking up where I left off…



The body rear had typical rusty spots for a salt belt car, so ordered several cans of pepper white and 2k clear coat to stave off further damage.



The passenger front fender was bent enough to justify an eBay replacement for under a hundred bucks.



Both strut towers were mushroomed with cracked crowns. Ordered a set of custom BC Racing coil overs as a replacement.



New fender arrived.




New unit installed. Panel gaps look good, and thankfully no warping on the mounting points.

 

On to the rusty booty:



Sanded down to remove all rust. I didn’t grab a pic of the fiberglass and filler steps, but turned out okay for not having tons of experience at body work.



Clear coat #1



And #2



Moved on to the hatch rust next. Same process and again not terrible results. Looks fine from a few feet away.



Final result with new tail lights, hatch handle trim, and new MINI emblem. (The other ones were atrocious). Just need to cut and polish to blend the clear coats.

 

Spent some time deep cleaning the interior.



Found this gem in the CD player from the previous owner. Not mad about this one



Replacing the el cheapo eBay shift **** with a proper one.



I thought about restoring the original halogen headlights, but with a substantial crack in the passenger lens, replacement ended up being the best option.



Wiring up the new headlights.



Wires tied and tucked.



Figment looks good. Testing the wiring.



End result looks much better. She’s starting to clean up nicely.

 

The power steering was completely dead when she arrived. Testing the pump with a multimeter showed no signs of life, so a brand new Bosch unit was ordered. $$$

(New lower engine mount and black series Powerflex bushings also pictured)



In addition to a new pump the high and low pressure lines and reservoir were also replaced.



All buttoned up.



Bleeding the new power steering system. Feels like new.

 

Next up… the thermostat housing gasket was blown. She was dribbling blue all over the driveway, but not a surprise for a neglected 1st gen.



A new aluminum housing, gasket, and thermostat fixed it.

 

AutomotiveTouchup.com for the win!!! Love their products. The 1K and 2K clear is some of the best rattle can clear coat I've ever used! I've had really good luck with their factory base coat colors matching too. They cant account for sun fade but on a driver or track car its a really hard product to beat for the price.

Awesome progress man!

 

@JerBear Thanks man, yeah they make great stuff. Thanks for still being subscribed too.

 

Farewell interior. (I still have much of the interior in storage so anyone in the Philly / South Jersey area who wants to pick up pieces for a very reasonable price, DM me. It’s space gray / black cloth)



Ready for the dirty task of removing sound deadening.



Driver floor pan had some surface rust from wet/salty shoes. This is after wire wheel to remove all rust and a few coats of POR-15



Passenger side was much better.


prepping to weld in foot plates for the Safety Devices rear cage.



Foot plates welded in and primed. More masking progress before painting the interior.



Plugged as many holes as I could (white dots) before painting. Purely aesthetic but it should help keep the interior lines clean.