Gary's Avus Blau 3.0CS rebuild

m5bb

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Finally going to start a rebuild page.
It will be 3 years next month since I started this.
The car had a lot of rust, so nothing new there.
It spent 1 year in the metal shop.
I totally stripped it to a bare metal car and soda blasted.
I think I was W&N's best customer for a few months. Ha!
New rockers, all three pieces plus the structural pieces at the A and B posts. Frames were welded into car so body would not move when each rocker side was done independently of the other. One at a time.
All the floors front and back.
Replaced RF fender with a decent used one and all the interior pieces I could get and what we didn't get we made from scratch. All the interior of the LF fender.
Luckily the rear of the car was pretty good except for the spare tire well. I got one of those from a friends track car that would no longer need a spare.
Even the nose piece was replaced with a new one. Lot of drilling out to put back.
Then it went to the body shop. Hammered, filled and block sanded at least twice and some areas 3 times.
All the under body was painted with product like a truck bed liner spray. It has a texture to it and is a medium gray. I didn't want black because all the beautiful suspension that is all black powder coated would not show.

Body was painted Avus Blau. A popular M3, M5 color in the early 90's. I like blue and I like metallic paints and had seen a sports car in the past that was blue with biscuit color leather. OMG I was in love.
So now you know the interior color was changed from boring blue to all leather biscuit brown leather.
I am an accomplished wood worker and did my dash and door panels in Etimoe a South American exotic wood. It's one continuous piece from left to right or was it right to left. I wanted a color that went with the brown leather but not too exotic. I have Scheel seats so they were recovered too.
Even the Nardi Orange steering wheel was stripped (don't ask how I did that) and was bleached and then tinted to match my dash wood.
Complete interior was sprayed with Lizard skin sound and heat abatement material. Two separate coats. Probably about 6-8 mils of material.
It will have key-less entry and a nice stereo system with a small sub under the rear seat.
All the windows and headlights have been upgraded with relays.
It's all about the details isn't it?
There will be lots of personal touches I will reveal later on.

Brakes will be powered by a Hydraboost system from Hydratech Braking. It's similar to the BMW system in the E28/24 line but not near as complicated. Runs off of power steering pressure. I have a pump from an M5 which has 10 Bar more pressure than a stock pump.
Calipers are stock but I have rebuilt them a couple years ago and had the calipers cadmium plated.
I built the motor in 2014 and added some more powder coated pieces to it while it was out.
M30 3.5 lit motor that was bored for 94mm custom 10.5:1 pistons. The rods were all lightened and complete crank, flywheel/harmonic balancer were balanced and a B35 head was used with slightly bigger valves and a custom N-31 cam. The head was ported and the headers were port matched. All the rocker arms were gone over and all slag removed which is where potential failures could occur. It has double valve springs and titanium retainers. It easily revs to 6500 RPM.
It's running triple sidedraft Weber 45's and a 123 Electronic ignition.
It's broken in as I drove it from Atlanta to Ofest in Colorado in 2014. Over 5000 miles.
Yes, the glass is all new from W&N and has a German (Huber Optik) 10% tint on all the glass. Saves a huge amount on greenhouse heat gain. It's going to be an ice box in there.
So that's the basics and now I just need to keep my sanity while I put it back together.
I do all this work my self except the painting and metal work. I can't weld?
I'm retired and work on it just about every day.
More to come.
 

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Gary Knox

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Very Nice Gary. Going to be gorgeous.

I would, however make a small wager with you regarding the 'icebox' interior. In the latter '70's, I drove a 3.0 CS with factory AC throughout much of NC, SC, and GA. With tie on and coat in the passenger seat and AC full blast, there was still a fair bit of perspiration from mid-June through early September!! However, I HOPE your experience will be different (better).
 

Ajay

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Finally going to start a rebuild page.
It will be 3 years next month since I started this.
The car had a lot of rust, so nothing new there.
It spent 1 year in the metal shop.
It was totally stripped to a bare metal car and soda blasted. It worked so don't start telling me I should have done something else. It's over..............
I think I was W&N's best customer for a few months. Ha!
New rockers, all three pieces plus the structural pieces at the A and B posts. Frames were welded into car so body would not move when each rocker side was done independently of the other. One at a time.
All the floors front and back.
Replaced RF fender with a decent used one and all the interior pieces I could get and what we didn't get we made from scratch. All the interior of the LF fender.
Luckily the rear of the car was pretty good except for the spare tire well. I got one of those from a friends track car that would no longer need a spare.
Even the nose piece was replaced with a new one. Lot of drilling out to put back.
Then it went to the body shop. Hammered, filled and block sanded at least twice and some areas 3 times.
All the under body was painted with product like a truck bed liner spray. It has a texture to it and is a medium gray. I didn't want black because all the beautiful suspension that is all black powder coated would not show.

Body was painted Avus Blau. A popular M3,M5 color in the early 90's. I like blue and I like metallic paints and had seen a sports car in the past that was blue with biscuit color leather. OMG I was in love.
So now you know the interior color was changed from boring blue to all leather biscuit brown leather.
I am an accomplished wood worker and did my dash and door panels in Etimoe a South American exotic wood. It's one continuous piece from left to right or was it right to left. I wanted a color that went with the brown leather but not too exotic. I had Scheel seats so they were recovered too.
Even the Nardi Orange steering wheel was stripped (don't ask how I did that) and was bleached and then tinted to match my dash wood. It's all about the details isn't it?
There will be lots of personal touches I will reveal later on.
I built the motor in 2014 and added some more powder coated pieces to it while it was out.
M30 3.5 lit motor that was bored for 94mm custom pistons. The rods were all lightened and balanced and a B35 head was used with slightly bigger valves and a custom N-31 cam. The head was ported slighlty and the headers were port matched. All the rocker arms were gone over and all slag removed which is where potential failures could occur. It has double valve springs and titanium retainers.
It's running triple sidedraft Weber 45's and a 123 Electronic ignition.
It's broken in as I drove it from Atlanta to Ofest in Colorado in 2014. Over 5000 miles.
Yes, the glass is all new from W&N and has a German 10% tint on all the glass. Saves a huge amount on greenhouse heat gain. It's going to be an ice box in there.
So that's the basics and now I just need to keep my sanity while I put it back together.
I do all this work my self except the painting and metal work. I can't weld?
I'm retired and work on it just about every day.
More to come.

That color is STUNNING
 

rsporsche

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guys, i saw this car right after metal work while it was on a rotisserie and all of the blocking and sanding was being done. i have seen the finished paint while helping Gary do a few things, this is a very interesting color. He's got some interesting updates in the works, some of which you can see in the pics like the hydro boost brakes. There is a tremendous amount of attention to detail. keep it going Gary + call when you need more help
 

m5bb

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Very Nice Gary. Going to be gorgeous.

I would, however make a small wager with you regarding the 'icebox' interior. In the latter '70's, I drove a 3.0 CS with factory AC throughout much of NC, SC, and GA. With tie on and coat in the passenger seat and AC full blast, there was still a fair bit of perspiration from mid-June through early September!! However, I HOPE your experience will be different (better).
Thanks Gary,
You made me remember the Lizard Skin heat and sound abatement material (2 separate coatings) that was installed in the completed interior and trunk. That should help. I'll add that to above.
 
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Gransin

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Gary, your coupe was a very good looking coupe before all this, now I'm sure it's going to be absolutely stunning!
Lot's of work and many nerv-racking moments putting them back together, but fun at the same time. Keep it up!
 

craterface

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Gary, you are a bad ass. So impressed. I remember coveting an Avus blue 1995 e36 M3 back when I was a starving student.
 

autokunst

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What a gorgeous car - the hard work that led to this point is evident. Thank you for sharing pics, and I can't wait to see more! Just beautiful.
 

m5bb

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Nice work.....I know what you have gone through with metal fab work (750 hrs for me) and painters (300 hrs).....well done:)
I think my metal fab was about 400 hours and the painting a little less. I got a great deal with the metal fab guy but probably why it took a year.
 

autokunst

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That makes the result that much more rewarding. You saved this car from an eventual death - now it will live on for decades, rock solid!
 

rsporsche

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Markos, just think of it as an investment - the parts aren't getting any more prevalent for many things ... and the prices surely aren't going down.
 

autokunst

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I’ll just pretend that I didn’t see these pics and continue buying nonessentials for my rusty coupe project.
That's right - because buying parts is a lot easier than doing 400 or 500 hours of metal fabrication for us "do-it-yourselfers". We can fill a warehouse full of parts without much effort, whereas the other work is a whole different discipline. :D
 
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