E46 Subframe Overhaul (Any cracks) - Condor Speed Shop Bushing Install!
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TechTranscript
00:00On this episode of Project BMW, Jekyll and Hyde, we remove the subframe from Dr. Jekyll
00:16and install some Condor Speed Shop bushings.
00:19And we find out if I have any of the infamous subframe tearing.
00:22But first things first, this place is a disaster, right?
00:25That's what happens when you pull an engine.
00:27So I'm going to clean it up.
00:34Alright, we removed the driveshaft.
00:53Now I'm going to remove the brake lines and the wheel speed sensor attachments, which
00:57is actually pretty easy.
00:58We're going to remove the handbrake cable so that we can, uh, there it goes.
01:06Boom.
01:07Now what?
01:08The cable comes.
01:09You just literally pull it straight through?
01:10Yeah, it's just a line with a threaded piece on the end.
01:11We're going to remove the subframe and everything attached to it all at once, there's a couple
01:34different ways of doing this.
01:37The way that we're going to do it is we are going to, I disconnected the brake lines.
01:42I disconnected the wheel speed sensor wires, I'll show you down there in a minute.
01:49Remove the shocks, the rear shocks, what else did I do?
01:53I don't know.
01:54And there's four main bolts that hold the whole subframe assembly onto the bottom of
01:57the car.
01:58Okay, so we're going to support it first with a jack.
01:59Okay, so I'm going to be really careful of when you have the car up on four jack stands
02:02like this, sometimes the balance isn't perfect, right?
02:05I hope it is before you crawl under it.
02:07Always protect yourself with extra supports or don't do this at all so that I don't get
02:11in trouble.
02:12And then when you start to jack up the subframe and put any pressure on it, you can actually
02:14tilt it forward, especially if the engine's still in the car, which you would normally
02:17do.
02:18It's easy for the car to actually tilt up on the front jack stands.
02:22You don't want it to do that and then roll off the jack stands, that would be incredibly
02:26dangerous.
02:27So the engine's out of mine, so I've actually prepped the car so the front's a little bit
02:31higher so the weight's more to the back so I can put a little bit of pressure on the
02:33subframe so when I go to drop it down, when I lift it up so that I can support it, it's
02:38not going to pick my car up on the jack stands.
02:44Going for a ride.
02:45All right, now you also need to remove the rear trailing arm attachments, but before
02:50you do that, sketch the outline of where it attaches onto the body.
02:55These are the rear trailing arm bolts that you need to remove, okay, so these three get
03:00removed and etch an outline around that so that you can put it back in the same spot
03:04as best you can.
03:05Otherwise, your alignment will be completely off and then always take your car right to
03:09an alignment shop right after you do this.
03:35There's a pole here.
03:36What?
03:37There's a pole here.
03:38Yeah, don't let it come out.
03:39Ladies and gents, that is the subframe of the E46.
03:51All right, we are going to...
03:54I'm chuckling to myself in the editing studio because I just made that look way easier to
03:59remove on video than it was in real life.
04:01Remove the drive shafts, remove the differential, remove the sway bar, and then we're going
04:08to wire wheel this up, and we're going to repaint it, and we're going to put some Condor
04:15Speed Shop bushings in it.
04:173.15, that's the ratio of the differential.
04:21I'm upside down.
04:233.15 is the ratio of the diff, all right, so I have a 3.46 in the drift car.
04:32I think I might keep the 3.15 on this because I was getting some weird gearing last year
04:36at Cayuga that I didn't like, so I'm going to try that for a season and see how I like
04:41it, or maybe I'll swap halfway through.
04:43I don't know.
04:44All right, let's take a look underneath here.
04:47Subframe's completely gone and off.
04:50Okay, I just took a look here a second ago.
04:53This is where your subframe cracking issues happen more often than not.
04:58The subframe torques on this giant bolt, okay?
05:02Mine are a bit rusted, but I do not have any subframe cracks whatsoever, okay, which is
05:08pretty amazing.
05:10I'm just going to brush that up a little bit, and I'm going to make it look a little bit
05:14prettier, but otherwise, I do not have any what you would call subframe damage whatsoever,
05:24and this 3.25 has 400,000 kilometers on it, okay?
05:30However, I'm about 99% positive that somebody did a manual swap at some point, so it probably
05:37spent its life as an automatic, so no one was doing any hard launches or any harsh engagements
05:43to the drivetrain, so that's probably one of the reasons why this isn't happening.
05:45Now, what I'm going to do is I'm going to not reinforce these, okay?
05:49I'm going to not reinforce my subframes.
05:52Two reasons.
05:53One, I don't have the tools here to do it.
05:54I don't have the time, and two, for your entertainment, what I'm going to do is I'm going to just
05:59install some solid bushings, some Condor Speed Shop bushings, and I'm going to drive this
06:02car hard, very, very hard, and we're going to see how this holds up over the next couple
06:07years, all right?
06:08This will be a long-term experiment for us, but otherwise, I'm going to now ... I'm going
06:15to hold this camera in a spot where you can actually see me.
06:19I'm going to clean this up, and I'm going to remove the bushings, and I'm going to do
06:22the subframe, dismantle everything, rebuild everything, make sure this car is clean and
06:26good because I'm going to be carrying a lot of speed on the track with it, and I want
06:29to make sure that it's done properly and it's safe.
06:32All right, now, the proper way to do this is to actually ... You don't burn the bushing
06:41out.
06:42You want to actually heat the outside of where the bushing sits, and the purpose of this
06:46is not to burn the bushing.
06:47It's to actually boil the rubber in the bushing.
06:50You break it down, and then it loosens up, and it comes right out.
06:52I've got all these out so far, so I'm going to do this last one here and show you what
06:56I mean.
07:20All right, so we have ... The proper way to do this is to sandblast it and get it powder
07:28coated, but I'm cheap and lazy at the same time, and when that happens, you end up with
07:33trim clad paint, which will probably come off eventually, but I can't imagine that I'm
07:36going to be racing this car for a couple years and not have this whole thing come down again
07:40at some point anyway.
07:41This will do for now.
07:42I'm not too worried, but that's okay.
07:45This car's never going to be seen another winter.
07:56I'm going to get a spray paint.
08:00All right, following Condor's instructions to put these bushings in, I want to keep them
08:04nice and white.
08:05They're getting dirty already.
08:06All right, install bushing with smaller tubes in the rear.
08:11That's these.
08:12There's a washer that goes on this side, so the counterbore is on the bottom.
08:16Okay, so I hammered that one in.
08:18Just tapped it with a mallet.
08:22I'm going to put this guy in here.
08:26That was easy.
08:27I figured you'd want to be here, but there's not much work into it.
08:30No, I did the fun part.
08:31This is the boring part.
08:32This is the fun part.
08:33This is the final stages.
08:34This is the boring part.
08:35The boring part was smacking stuff.
08:38Whoa, are you smacking stuff?
08:39Yeah.
08:40I'm interested again.
08:42Oh, look at that.
08:50All right, there they are.
08:54Subframe is done.
08:57Okay, they're a little bit dirty.
08:59I'm hammering, and the fact that I didn't let the paint dry because I'm impatient.
09:02But other than that, the subframe is ready to go back in the car with all the stuff attached
09:06to it.
09:07Let's do it.
09:08All right, I'm doing the rear trailing arm bushings here at the same time.
09:11This is the carrier, right?
09:14And then we're going to get this bushing out.
09:17So I've done this before on my drift car.
09:20The way to do this is to...
09:23Well, we're going to try.
09:24It doesn't always work.
09:25I'm going to drill some holes through the bushing, and then we're going to take a ball
09:28joint press, and we're going to press it out.
09:30That is my plan for this one.
09:31I know this looks like a mess down here, but that's just the way it works.
09:41And we're just going to cut through the metal down to don't hit the casing of the bushing.
10:03Be really careful.
10:04Wear protection.
10:11There we go.
10:13Which...
10:16Is there a way to do this?
10:38And that is a nice snug fit.
10:41Well designed.
10:42Look at that.
10:48As they always say, installation is the reverse of removal.
10:52Couple of tips, though.
10:53Don't forget to install the lower control arms before you bolt the diff in place.
10:57And tighten the two rear diff bolts before the big front one.
11:01That's easier.
11:10Let's do that next part again.
11:12Alright, 66 foot-pounds for those rear ones, so we will do that now.
11:34There's a camera up here.
11:35Look over here.
11:4257 there.
11:45I don't know if you can see that.
11:49There are...
11:50This looks weird, but I guess that's the way that's supposed to be.
11:52Also, I hammered that.
11:53That's why that's bent.
11:55There's the rest of the subframe.
11:58I don't know if this is focusing or not for you, but there it is.
12:01It was a lot cleaner and greener when I was putting it up, but the process of putting up a subframe is a lot of work.
12:07I am going to have to come back and torque all of these.
12:12Because I couldn't do it when it was on the ground.
12:14I'm really careful with those.
12:15I almost stripped that one there, so you can see that.
12:21Diff bushing is torqued.
12:22Everything is torqued.
12:23Mounts are torqued.
12:25And it's good to go.
12:27Alright, everyone.
12:28That's all for today.
12:30I have the rear subframe back up and installed with Condor Speed Shop bushings.
12:34That's going to massively harden the way that the car feels on the road and on the track.
12:39And I've been told by Condor that those bushings are compliant enough that you can drive with them daily.
12:45And they're not so stiff that they will cause a lot of NVH.
12:49So, we're done for now.
12:51I have...
12:53What else am I doing?
12:54Oh, yeah.
12:55I'm going to move all the HSD coilovers from Mr. Hyde over to Dr. Jekyll.
12:59Sorry, I haven't been doing much with Mr. Hyde lately.
13:01I just got to get this built and out of here.
13:05So then I can really focus on the drift car.
13:07Next step is fixing up the engine and getting the engine back in Dr. Jekyll.
13:13So that it is ready to start up.
13:15I'm going to get a tune.
13:16Headers are going on.
13:18It's going to be a full...
13:19I'm super excited to drive this car.
13:21It's going to be light.
13:22It's going to be rock solid.
13:23It's going to be a pretty formidable track car.
13:25Kevin, if you're watching...
13:27Kevin was the guy that was here before.
13:28He has the Honda S2000.
13:29And I fought against him last year in Ontario Time Attack.
13:32Kevin, I'm coming for you.
13:34Be prepared.
13:35Anyway, subscribe and turn on notifications.
13:37So that you don't miss any of Project BMW, Jekyll and Hyde.
13:41There's tons of stuff.
13:42I'm basically showing you, at some point, how to do almost every single thing.
13:46That you need to do on this car to prep it for the track.
13:50And even if you're not an E46 BMW person, you can still watch.
13:54Because at the end, we're going to be doing some Time Attack.
13:56We're going to be doing some drifting.
13:57We're going to be doing some proper hooliganism.
14:00So tune in.
14:01See you next time.