Thanks! That is really good to hear, now I can use the car without worry. I bought it needing work, but have been hesistant to drive it alot.
I don't know if the waterpump has been replaced or not. It seems to be ok, I replaced radiator hoses and flushed the coolant system. I was thinking about replacing the waterpump, but I'll wait for now. I am still only using the car locally until I get some more miles on it, but so far it is doing great. The guy I bought it from only had it a short time and put about 20 miles on it, he said the guy he bought it from said it was sitting about a year and a half. The car is rust free and in overall good shape, was in a couple accidents early on in it's life. Actually has one of the best condition interiors I've seen, but it's blue (nearly crack free dash) It is going to be a daily driver, I've taken some parts from the red car to get the white one in better shape, LCA, rear shock mounts, sway bar links, tires. It has new shocks - Sensatracs on all 4 corners, nothing fancy but got it useable again. It already had new front and rear brakes when I bought it. The red one is my baby, she is undergoing heavy maintenace and getting performance parts in place of all the robbed parts.
Just today I swapped tops. The white cars top (blue) was in sorta bad shape, rear window fogged up and stitching shot, leaking etc... The black top is about 3yrs old, and did leak on the red car, but seals much better on the white car, hoping for no leaks! (why I get annoyed at using either e30 as a daily driver) Once the red car is driving again, she'll get a brand new top. At some point, the cars are going to get a bumper swap, the red car is my baby, the white one will be a daily driver.
The white car is in overall good shape, some stuff is worn but I replaced alot of stuff too, it's just a driver tho so I am not going for perfection - a very fun driver that gets 30+ mpg. The Jeep gets 15-16mpg, all the time (unless off-road when it got as low as 3.8 - 12 hours at 5mph or less does that) The M42 is a really fun engine for putting around town, rev-happy (chipped) + manual trans + 4.27 gears makes it fun to dart around in.
red car is an early (no airbag) 1990 325i named Noelle, white car is the 1992 318i named Ashleigh, the Jeep is just...Jeep.
Here she was the night she came to a good home. The TJ was loaded twice it's rated towing capacity (due to wheelbase, not mechanics, aftermarket bumper w/ receiver is rated for it tho) but made the 2hr trip home on the interstate, thru downtown ATL traffic fine.
Before top swap:
After:
Noelle got a new heavy duty tarp to go over the full car cover to keep her dry. It'll be a while til shes done. As crazy as it sounds, part of the reason why I bought Ashleigh was because I was itching to drive an e30 again and it would have been quicker to buy another one then Noelle would be driving again. Shes been down since April! I wanted an M42 daily driver tho, but preferably 2 or 4 door hardtop and not another ragtop, but this one came along at such a good price.
Thank yous very much for the advice! That was bugging the heck outta me since I got the car, atleast I don't have to worry about it anymore.
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That is good to hear. From what I can see, the valvetrain looks fine and the tensioner is new. Next oil change I'll drop the pan and see if there is any new plastic/nylon pieces in there. If so, I'll have to dig deeper, but if not, I'll take it as normal higher mileage/older age M42 noise. Other then an intermittent stumble she runs good though, dosen't complain shifting at 7,000RPM or anything. 
