First, two full cans of engine degreaser to clean up the mess under the hood. Started with "maximum strength" degreaser and then rinsed (low pressure water, just barely dripping out the hose). Sacrificed a couple of towels to wipe down all the surfaces I could reach, getting them pretty presentable (there really was painted metal under that layer of grease!). Followed that up with a full can of "regular" degreaser (the foaming kind). Followed up again with drizzle from the hose and the sacrifice of a few more towels. The results were impressive - much much nicer than before. Not quite a concourse car, but for a week of ownership and 110,000 miles in the company of someone else, not too bad.

I cleaned the inside of the car (vacuumed floors, wiped windows, stripped old stickers & gunk, armor-all dash, etc), as well as gave the outside a wash and wax, plus hitting the chrome with polish and the trim with black restorer. Also cleaned the wheels and shined the tires.

So with a mostly-clean, pretty decent looking $3000 new-to-me '87 528e sitting in my driveway, I figured I better start on making it faster ;)

First, the badge came off the back. I like the clean, symetrical look without the model number distinction. And it's faster without the weight ;) Hair driver to heat the glue holding on the numbers and letter, and dental floss (in a sawing motion behind the numbers) to remove. No problem. Reside removed with goof-off. There is a little discoloration where the numbers used to be, but I can live with it I guess. Maybe I'll put them back on if I decide not to repaint :)

I also took off a little two-tone pinstipe running the length of both sides. Man was that a PITA. Goof-off to loosen, then pull it up, then two doses of goof-off to remove the adhesive. Took at least an hour, but I like the clean german look without the stripe.

On to the good stuff: I ordered the K&N cone filter & intake and TMS/Conforti Chip from the good guys at TMS earlier in the week. Everything arrived as expected, well packaged and on-time.

Instructions were provided with both items, which were clear and to the point. The intake instructions could have been a little more detailed, but they worked OK. A better picture could have saved some time and confusion, but no harm done.

Intake was first. With the newly-cleaned engine bay, the new parts wouldn't stand out too bad. Removal of the factory airbox was a snap. Found a crack in my intake hose just beyond the factory airbox. Repaired it with a nice slap of Racer Tape, until I can get a new hose. The bracket for the intake is well-built and solid. Everything matched up well and bolted up easily. The intake hose didn't quite seem to fit exactly perfectly with the new setup, but it seems to be snug enough. Once i replace the hose with a newer (non-cracked) hose, I'll evaluate again.

The cone filter is pre-oiled and fits right on the new assembly. No problems here - plenty of clearance in every direction.

Overall, install was about an hour. Nothing big at all. If it wasn't my first time under the hood of the e28, it probably could have been accomplished in thirty minutes.

After the intake was installed and double-checked, I took it for a spin around the neighboorhood. Cool open-air intake sound under acceleration? Check. Acceptable (almost imperceptable) noise levels with regular driving? Check. Noticable increase in acceleration? Check. Of course, just sealing the crack in the intake could have helped there. But I was happy with the money spent on the intake.

It would be really nice to get a heatshield around the intake, something to at least shield it from the motor itself. I'll try to fabricate something down the line, but for now it didn't seem to run hot at all after preliminary testing.

Pulling the ECU was not a problem. Getting the ECU uncovered proved to be a nightmare. The little screws holding the ECU cover didn't want to give up without stripping out the heads. Against my better judgement I took out a hammer and pounded a short phillips into the center of the stuck screws, getting just enough traction to remove them all. Once the cover was out of the way, the printed circut board had the same problems - two of the screws holding it down were the same soft phillips head. One came out with the hammer trick. One required the use of an electric screwdriver, destroying the screw in the process.

Once the ECU was finally opened, chip replacement was about 5 minutes. Prying the factory chip out was a breeze. The new chip was too wide to go straight in, so I carefully bent the pins into the proper width and snapped in the chip.

Re-install ECU, 2 minutes, and hop out for a drive.

One word: WOW!

The difference is amazing. The car is almost peppy now. It's certainly "torquey". First gear has some definate pep. The power point for each gear has definately shifted down - before it was hard to get power out of the enigine below 3500 RPMs. Now it would pull from about 2800 in every gear. Not very strongly, but it would pull. Running up to redline wasn't as neccesary, and certainly didn't seem to be putting such a stress on the engine. The intake and the chip seemed to match up very well. A very significant increase in performance. I can see this is money well spent - the car will be easier and more fun to drive, no question. Much easier to get around, and the car is not so dependant upon being in the lowest possible gear.

I fully recommend both products to anyone interested. The biggest jump came from the chip, no question. I do like the intake and was willing to take the chance. The bang-for-the-buck is definately in the chip, though. But both seem to compliment each other very well.

What's in store for the etaBeast? Floormats, for one - the stock mats are stained and shot. Weathertek seems like the best bet.
I also want to do something about the seats - the leather is terribly cracked. Either I'll resurface them myself, or pay someone locally to do so, or I might just go with seatcovers and forget about it.

I will likely get new wheels and tires - probabably 16", possibly 17", in a classic 5-spoke (like the Racing Dynamics RGS) with some decent wet-weather tires. Nothing expensive. Primarily for the purpose of being able to mount some excellent snow tires on my factory rims for easy changeover come winter.

I'll likely replace the missing chome strips around the windows, per Jeff D.'s excellent post below mine.

A paint job is a possibility - a local guy can do everything for $600 at a big step up from Maaco, if I do the prep-work. The paint is pretty far gone in several places - hood, roof mostly.

I'll likely start attacking all the usual maintenance items. Fluids, hoses, belts being good culprits.

My driver's side high-beam is cracked (still functional, but taking on water). I'll replace it, but might step up to the Euro setup instead of direct replacement.

The car already has an in-dash CD, but I'll likely put some work into the sound system (new head unit, eq, amplifiers x2, mids in kick-panels on the floor, tweets in the factory location, a single sub in the back) plua an alarm. If this is going to be a regular daily driver for the next few years (as I'm expecting) and not just a winter beater, I'd like to have a decent sound system. Nothing big, nothing fancy. Almost all either second-hand or already-owned-sitting-on-a-shelf equiptment. Mostly just wiring and time needed :)

The car soon will go into the local CCA member & expert mechanic for a full once-over, just to ensure that I didn't miss anything.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this car yet. I'm in the process of buying a 1995 M3 as my fun car and track car. The 528e will definatley be the winter car, and will probably be a daily driver to keep the miles off the M3. Especially as the M3 gets more and more "track prepared". the M3 might even turn into a club racer at some point next year. I might keep the 528e for a long time. Or I might put a little work into it and move on next year. We'll see! :)

Pictures to come. My digicam is out on loan.

~jedinite
bmw.jedinite.com