1991 318is Restoration Project...Now with some Air!

[Brezzi]

loving this thread great work shes gunna look awesome.. are you keeping the wheels gold?

[Tuee]

loving this thread great work shes gunna look awesome.. are you keeping the wheels gold?

Thanks man, the wheels will remain gold with polished lip.

[Tuee]

Another update,

Rear Aftermarket Valence Mounting,
So I used the same brackets that I used for the front mtech valence, but this time I only flattened two of the brackets instead of all four.


Top View


Flattened one,



Fiberglassed,



This one is the middle two brackets, secured from underneath the car,


The side one pops out in the trunk,


Installing sides,



Side skirts are just mounted with some bolts and nuts,



Done for the night, finally everything is actually mounted and not just held in with clamps.

[johnwoo]

awesome thread do you have close ups of the sides on the front between the bumper and the valence. i want to see if the valence flairs out and the gap

[Butler]

wow

[Tuee]

awesome thread do you have close ups of the sides on the front between the bumper and the valence. i want to see if the valence flairs out and the gap

Thanks, I'll get some pics for you soon, but ya on one side it does stick out a bit and the other side is kinda sticking out. My guess is that the rep mtech valence is wider than the original one. I wonder if they even used the original valence to create a master mould. I'll also get you the pics of the flaws I see in the kit.

wow

Thanks.

[Simon S]

This idea goes to a forum member who did it and I thought I'd give it a try

Ha !
Hope that worked out for you - I'm loving how subtle it is..

Shit man - been a while since I checked your thread. You've been busy !!
Holy crap, that's a lot of work. Props.

[Tuee]

Ha !
Hope that worked out for you - I'm loving how subtle it is..

Shit man - been a while since I checked your thread. You've been busy !!
Holy crap, that's a lot of work. Props.

Ha, I remember reading what you did in your thread but didn't remember who though, thanks for the idea and the tail lights turned out great, I'll post some day pics later. I don't think I've been as busy as you, I've been actually slacking lately, its either too cold, wet or too hot, lol. Never a perfect day. Hopefully the car will be sealed, primed and ready for paint soon.

[Tuee]

awesome thread do you have close ups of the sides on the front between the bumper and the valence. i want to see if the valence flairs out and the gap

Hope these help,





The flair is pretty bad, I'm not sure at this point what I'm gonna do. I might just leave it or try to fix it later with some sort of adjusting nut/bolt on the back.

[Tuee]

Not to much has happened recently, just shopping around for paint so car should be getting paint soon. Some goodies came in recently,

steering wheel was missing the badge,


new e-brake boot,


new knob and boot,

[johnwoo]

thanks helps alot

[Tuee]

Small update,
I've always wanted one of those illuminated shift knobs but didn't want to fork out the $100 or so for one. So the plan was to make one, I think I saw a write up for one as well some where. But here's how i did mine.

Here's the knob in question, I was quite nervous cause this was a brand new knob that I ordered from BimmerBum.


Popped the top off with my fingernails, pretty much a weak adhesive,


Removed the adhesive pad from the cap,


Here's what I used to scratch out the letters/numbers,


DO NOT SCRATCH OUT THE M like I did, the reason is that the led will be directly below the ///M, and it will show up as a hot spot. The paint on the cap is very thin, enough for the light to shine through.


Next was to put a hold through the knob for the wiring, I used a drill for this,



I taped the whole knob off, just to be safe.

Next you need to carve out the space in the knob, ideally you want this to be the width to be the distance from the R to the 5, and the height to be from the top of the R, 1, 3, 5 and to the bottom of 2 and 4.


The tool that I used was a dremel,



Next up the led, I ordered like a 100 for 4 bucks (although the seller only sent 50),
I had some old resisters lying around so I gave it a shot,


Heat shrunk,


Now this step is important if you want to avoid any hot spots,
I used the dremel and just flattened the top of the led,


I forgot to take a pic of the led in the knob, but try to keep the led as far away from the top, so the lower it is in the knob the better at avoiding hot spots.

I also ended up painting a very thin layer over the M,


End result,


I have this out of the car for now, as the cars going to paint. The plan is to wire it to the light associated with the cigarette lighter. Hope this helps someone.

[blalor]

nicely done!

[Tuee]

Finally the car is off to paint soon, either tomorrow or the 25th. Trying to get the car done in time for the bimmerfest in august.

Car is stripped and each part will be painted individually off the car.






Everything stashed inside the car,

[johnwoo]

nice. did you ever come up with a solution to the valence? just curious if you were able to solve that