Chris and Mike's Polaris E3

[GolfBavaria]

Chris & Mike:

I don't know who is more excited, you two or me that you guys bought a bitchin E3. Granted it is not a GOLF (sarc LOL) but it is a great find. It's funny, I have taken a mini break from looking at SOCAL Craigslist ads since being laid off. You would think the opposite since I have all this free time. Well, not really, looking for work turned into more of a full time job than my other job. I had all kinds of free time at my old job to peruse for hours on Ebay and Craigslist (maybe that is why I got laid off!). No it was a company wide layoff, 15 out of 30 people. But you two snagged it and as they say, "it was meant to be." Anyhow, great find and I saw you already registered on E3 Registry. I wonder if we can get a tab at top of page some day like the CS Registry? Especially now that you have one.... LOL. Anyhow, can't wait to see it, hope the engine un-seizes (is that a word?), you have the resources I'm sure you will get it to come around. Looking forward to the build thread, I know you guys will do it justice. Once my Bav is back one of the first things I'll do is come check it out if OK with you guys.

Cheers,

-Shane

 

[Bwana]

What's a "GOLF" (besides something from VW :lol: )

 

[Stevehose]

Golf = the color = bright yellow/greenish

What's a "GOLF" (besides something from VW :lol: )

 

[OCCoupe]

Thanks Shane! Sorry to hear about the layoff. The 2800 was a really cool find and I am happy that we are able to give her a good home. We haven't had much time to work on her, Chris is away on a trip and I have my priorities set on finishing my coupe; but this doesn't mean that we haven't played a little.

So far we've dumped a ****tail of stuff in the engine to try and free it up; so far no good. We don't know why it was parked and what happened to it back in 1981 that the owner decided to park it in his garage and leave it alone. The plugs are clean which indicates that none of the cylinders got wet from a failed head gasket, we hope. Their isn't any external evidence of a head gasket failure; so for now we are doing the basics to try to get it to turn.

The rear doors were completely stuck and refused to open. After a lot of penetrating oil and some gentle coaxing we were able to open the rear doors. After that we carefully removed the door panels so that we could soak the door mechanisms in penetrating oil. The doors hadn't been opened in so long that the grease in the mechanisms had solidified and turned in to glue. After a good dousing of oil and working the latch the mechanism freed up and the doors open and close as they should.

That is all we have done at this point other than stand there in awe out how nice and original everything is. The scent of the leather is quite nice and things that are normally discolored and worn look like new including the headliner. We are going to take some pictures and post in a new thread when Chris comes back. As for now our plan is to preserve and keep the car as original as possible.

 

[dave v. in nc]

2800 capsule

I'm so happy for you guys, it couldn't have found a better place to land. If it was parked for not apparent reason, and the back doors were stuck, you might check under the rear seat to make sure there is nothing, or no one untoward there Looking forward to following the car's new life...and watching the spike of e3 lovers and wanter's...better buy'em now folks, prices are headed north...

 

[GolfBavaria]

Sounds like your doing everything right and hopefully the penetrating fluid and patience will pay off on the engine as it did on the doors. Yes leather would be nice. I remember how sticky our vinyl seats on the Bavaria I grew up in got on a hot day. My mom ended up putting sheep skin covers on them and where that isn't the sportiest look, they work really well. I loved them as a kid. I am thinking of getting some myself and just take them off at the shows. I can't wait to see the car. Not sure when mine will be done but shouldn't be more than a month away at the most. Get the Bavaria kids together...LOL. Good luck with coupe can't wait to see that too!

 

[OCCoupe]

Fred Larimer took some pictures of the 2800 last Sunday. Why Fred do you ask? Because I have **** for skills when operating a sophisticated piece of equipment like a camera.

The idea is to create a record of the condition of this car since it is so well preserved.

Going on the tow truck, most of the exterior looks like this. The bumpers are straight and the chrome is shiny. Pretty much all the anodized trim looks to be in excellent shape. You can see that the early cars came with gray headlight grills. The paint on the hood failed and there is light rust coming up. Fortunately this and the battery tray are the only rust that we've found on the car.




Remember this is a 45 year old interior with original leather.

 

[bmwmadman]

time capsule for sure

 

[iconoclast6]

Congrats Chris and Mike!!

Will be interesting to see what you plan for this....

Chuck

 

[restart]

Wow, nice interior! I like the styling difference of the car compared to the bav.
I am sure it will purring soon.

 

[wkohler]

I'm surprised at how nice that headliner looks. No c-pillar discoloration or anything.

What's the plan for the hood being a single stage metallic?

 

[HB Chris]

The whole car will need a repaint, we will keep engine bay original. When was the clear coat added to the metallic paints?

 

[wkohler]

Glasurit 54 line was the first I believe and it came out in 1964.

Polaris (060) started in 1963, was horrible quality and then Polaris NEU came out in 1966 with another variation of that noted with a /2 for 1969 which what is likely on this car. In 1971, they dropped the neu, and I think went to PVC-Frei as that was supposedly the issue with the clears. After a while that just became Polaris. That's at least what I learned trying to get the right shades for my E28 and E12.

 

[Stevehose]

my '72 has original decal and it says polaris neu

 

[wkohler]

I'm just going off of the info I found through Glasurit. I never saw a mention of the color without clear, but that is likely because everything was translated to 55-line.

Also possible i'm just wrong since I'm sitting at a railroad crossing doing this from memory.

 

[OCCoupe]

Clear or no clear

Initially we were not sure if the car had a clear coat or not. Visually it seemed to have no clear. We cleaned a section of paint and polished it. The paint shined up but left the pad a dark shade of gray. We repeated the same process inside the rear door on the rear wheel arch. Again the pad came out a dark gray. I called several people that have been in the bmw world a lot longer than I have and no one could give me a definitive answer and the internet left us in the dark... Our old service manager who retired almost 5 years ago worked for Roy Carver RR, Bentley and BMW as their service manager from the late 60's until Roy sold the business in '85. He was positive that in 1970 Polaris did not have a clear coat and that BMW didn't start using 2 stage paints until late '70 or early '71. This car is a 1/70 build.

So based on the fact that paint came off on the buffer pad in 2 sections, no one in the enthusiast community had a definitive answer and the only answer that I could rely on is from someone that dealt with these cars when they were new on the dealer level, the conclusion is that this car has no factory clear coat.

 

[wkohler]

It's possible that it might just have something to do with what Hoffman ordered, too. Some of the anectdotes about quality I found were from people in Europe. I find it hard to believe that the clear would fall of that car and the interior would look like that.

 

[OCCoupe]

I should add that no where on this car is there any form of clear coat failure. I would think that if this car had a clear coat that it would show the typical signs of failure. There isn't a single indicator.

 

[ahab]

Really sharp car Mike. Congrats on a great score. That interior is something to behold. I can't bear to even look at my vinyl any more.

 

[jefftepper]

On the clear coat portion of this thread, I have some anecdotal observations to add. In 1971 my dad bought a new Volvo 164 with the gold clear coat paint and my uncle bought one in the silver blue color. Apparently Volvo hadn't sorted out the clear coat paint at that point and both cars freckled all over the top surfaces. Volvo stood behind their cars and repainted both of them. The explanation at the time was that the clear expanded and contracted at a different rate than the color (base) coats and as a result the clear eventually developed small fissures which allowed moisture in and the clear cooked like a poached egg.

Fast forward to a couple of years ago and my son's hot rod (painted with base/clear in the early 1990's) was parked outside under a car cover for an extended period and the humidity under the cover eventually cooked the clear right off the horizontal surfaces.