Damian's Manuals! (archive)

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I am happy to see the "review" of the manuals. I have personally ordered a set of the manuals as well and I am looking forward to recieving them.

First, having put manuals such as these together before, I think (based on your description) the $75 is more than fair. There is a material cost as well as Damian's time involved. Since there seems to be such a scarcity of real documentable information on the car, anything we can get our hands on is a plus.

Second, I fear the day I would have to pull the engine and disassemble it. I have restored two musclecars from the frame rails up, including full engine rebuilds, but I feel I have as much business taking a BMW V12 engine apart as I do taking apart my Dad's Rolex. Some things are best left to the experts and that's just a place I don't want to go. On the other hand, it would be nice to have some pictures so one could what the hell is going on in there.

There is always a lot of discussion on the board as far as lighting in the instrument panel, how to take apart the rear end, headlight adjustment, and so many more topics that I can't list them all. None of us are experts and the beauty of the board is for all of us to share our trials and errors with the car and help our peers from making the same mistakes. Now that a few of us will have the manuals, it will make some of us have a clearer picture of the the inner workings of the car and give the others a clearer more concise answer when asked. It will benefit us all.

Finally, I plan to keep my 850 for a long time. I plan to acquire as much information as possible so that I eventuallly know the beast from front to back and left to right, and everything in between. For that reason I have purchased Lez'z manuals as well as the parts CD's too. It seems you just can't know too much about the car, especially if you love it!!

So, Damian... Thanks in advance for what appears to be a valuable service to those of us who need it. You need not woory as I will be sure to send payment your way. After all, I would hate to have your relatives in Newport Beach beating on my door collecting for you. :)

P.S. For what it is worth, I have the factory E31 Electrical/Wiring manual with complete schematics of the entire car. If there is enough interest, I can scan the book (I have a HP scanner with a document feeder, so it is pretty easy) and save it as an Adobe PDF file. It would be really easy to e-mail to anyone and could then be printed on your laser printer. Anyone interested??

Damian,
Yes, people have been talking...appreciatively via posts here on this board about your announcement of having these sought after manuals, or should I say 'copied information' from the original manual! However, regardeless of whether the information is original or an original copy, it is nonetheless very appreciated and highly desired by all of us who need one, belive me I and others thank you very much!!!
I am just doing what you asked me to do, check the manuals over and report to you and all those here on the board with an honest description.

It is important that you don't misunderstand that your gesture of offering these manuals to us is not appreciated, it is and I for one believe that your intentions are honorable and good. However, that being said, the manual does not have the inner engine repair instructions etc. except for the removal of the engine and the left head. This is not something that you would knowingly present to me on purpose, however it is still missing and that is a concern for those who want a complete manual. About 1/3 of all those who buy one are going to be specifically interested in that particular area of the manual and without it, the manual loses it's main focus, even though it still has other very good information.

It is very helpful when you type out a list of what is listed in the index, however, as I found when I looked, there was no 'engine' information other than removal and perifery or outside the engine scenarios, nothing of the innerworkings. Therefore when you post again that the index is saying that it covers the "engine", it makes one afraid that perhaps if it says engine and most of the inner engine is not there, that therefore perhaps even though it says electrical or clutch or rear axel or lights etc. that they also might not be complete.

So, since I didn't have time tonight, nor will I have the time for most of tomorrow, I will hopefully have some time tomorrow night to more closely examine the contents to make sure that they are all there. Hopefully everything else will be there. Also perhaps we will discover as I said before that the inner engine instructions are not even included in the original that this was copied from and therefore perhaps you could then look around and find the pages of the inner engine instructions and include it in what you are offering so that those buying will know that they are getting complete instructions.

It doesn't sound like a big problem, just something that needs to be done and I would like to repeat to all who care to know, that you
(Damian) have been a perfect gentleman, you sent me the two manuals for me to examine 'before' you asked for payment and you couldn't have been nicer or more expeditious in honoring your promises. I also am doing what you asked me to do, check out the manuals and let you and the board know what I found.

Hopefully, some of the others out there who have the original manuals can verify to us if the inner engine instructions are also missing in the originals and I can check to see if all the rest is here that is in the index and then we may discover that they are indeed an exact replica of the original......or not!

Lets hope that someone can help us out here, perhaps Lez or???? anyway, I will let you know what I find in a day or so.
Thanks, Kurt

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