325ic Calypso Euro Conversion - Houndstooth & dbilas now, MT1 & MM 3.2 stroker coming

[bradnic]

Your top well is completely different from my 7/87 built. I don't have that center pivot or either of the 2 black plates. Makes me think your car was from a transitional phase. Could it have been converted to mechanical ?

Actually the center pivot isn't there on my car (the top lid motor needs it to open and close the lid). but if you look closely on the deck lid you'll see a square hole that accepts a bracket with the center pivot - so it's "electric top compatible". agree a 7/90 car is definitely transitional as august is usually shutdown month for car factories in europe and 10/90 was the first electric top.

Car is not converted from electric - the oblong hole for the top motor is not stamped out. You can clearly see an outline for it though, which is not present on earlier DB verts. That outline is there because the stamping tooling was modified with an insert. Once they started punching the holes for 10/90 they added the punch to the tool and voila. In the interim period (maybe a few months?) they kept producing the tonneau base with the punch for the hole to accommodate top cover motor removed.

some more pics with details. If I got anything wrong I'll update them.

a 1/88 DB vert (same one I did the plastic bumper swap on - see my sig)


mine


driver side on an electric top car - note the large pad. not present in my car, no evidence it was ever there

[jeffnhiscars]

parking this here. as a 7/90 build this car came with a mechanical convertible top. if you look at the stamping though, all the holes are there to mount the electric top gear. I do have to cut out the top motor area on the pass side, but you can see where a die insert was placed in the stamping press.


and here's an electric top car, similar view


I even have the installation guide here

So no way I can resist a conversion, and I already have most everything including the electric top frame and canvass, harness, motors, cables and control boxes. The top even supports a zip out window but it's missing the plastic window. It's not in terrific shape though so I'm looking into getting an OEM top. If I can find a reasonably priced aftermarket zip in window I may go that route for a while to just to get the project going.

Your top well is completely different from my 7/87 built. I don't have that center pivot or either of the 2 black plates. Makes me think your car was from a transitional phase. Could it have been converted to mechanical ?

[bradnic]

If you can extract the clip from the insert in the body they can be reattached to the trim and reused. If you look at my build thread (and a post I made in the convertible subforum about this exact part) I came to the same unfortunate conclusions as did you.

I ended up buying new trim because the channel for the other clips got brittle and broke but those end clips can be reused. They just cannot be bought on their own.

Yeah thanks for the confirmation Patrick. I'm gonna try to warm the channels up a bit before attempting to reinsert the clips. Had I known they were there and how they were attached to the body I would have removed them differently... no way to know that from realoem though since as you said it doesn't even show up in the catalog :-)

live and learn

[bradnic]

parking this here. as a 7/90 build this car came with a mechanical convertible top. if you look at the stamping though, all the holes are there to mount the electric top gear. I do have to cut out the top motor area on the pass side, but you can see where a die insert was placed in the stamping press.



and here's an electric top car, similar view


EDIT looking for PDF hosting
I even have the installation guide here

So no way I can resist a conversion, and I already have most everything including the electric top frame and canvass, harness, motors, cables and control boxes. The top even supports a zip out window but it's missing the plastic window. It's not in terrific shape though so I'm looking into getting an OEM top. If I can find a reasonably priced aftermarket zip in window I may go that route for a while to just to get the project going.

[bradnic]

Nice work on the interior color match and great to see your mtech parts getting close.

thanks! lots of work but really satisfying for my wife and I. btw @dahows love the early model euro in your sig!!

Driver's side with the rocker molding and rear quarter molding trial fitted. Hardware for the quarter should be here soon. Hate to drill a hole in the quarter but it's always hidden and I'll POR it for now.


still need to paint the pass side window trim and the rocker areas, adjust windows and top, then assemble the interior and swap the trunk lid.

Wife is really liking the shadowline. Will trial fit the painted bumpers soon. Mtech 1 will hopefully be done in time for assembly next weekend, but I won't have the angled Strömung exhaust until end of the month. So I probably can't mount the rear until I replace the cat back.

[dahows]

Nice work on the interior color match and great to see your mtech parts getting close.

[bradnic]

not happy with the paint work on these but they're good enough for now.


body shop took some license and basically focused only on the tops of the bumpers, since they figured the mtech1 kit would hide the rest anyway. that's not for them to decide dammit. anyway they only prepped the top so these will have to be done again.

i want to swap between 3 setups
1) stock bright trim, chrome euro bumpers and jimmy hill, coupe deck lid no spoiler
2) same as (1) but shadowline and body color bumpers
3) full mtech1 with coupe decklid and mtech1 spoiler

[bradnic]

Ha awesome. Hit 411 (Barron) up for repro mtech1 side skirts. They're not urethane but they're very accurate fiberglass copies.. even have the part number on the ends.

Just finished prepping the 6 trim pieces I didn't buy in shadowline. After about 6 tries they're just about perfect now :-) also painting the front door window trim and leading edge of the quarter window. Using SEM 39143 Trim Black, which is great stuff but getting everything prepped and painted has taken close to 8 hours. Pics up tomorrow along with a test mount of the painted bumpers.

[e30rapidic]

I'll be mounting up the painted bumpers this weekend. Andre can take a look and decide then ha

I've got my buddys shop lined up and ready to go. I'm also hunting for some mtec side skirts.....



you're a bad influence lol :devil:

[phenryiv1]

DAMN. clip is part of the trim piece, so I either get it back in or buy replacement trim. part numbers 51131932803 and 51131932804

If you can extract the clip from the insert in the body they can be reattached to the trim and reused. If you look at my build thread (and a post I made in the convertible subforum about this exact part) I came to the same unfortunate conclusions as did you.

I ended up buying new trim because the channel for the other clips got brittle and broke but those end clips can be reused. They just cannot be bought on their own.

[bradnic]

I'm thinking about stripping/painting my chrome bumpers to body color soon. Let me know how it goes.

Stop thinking about it and do it!

Ha he'll have pics soon to check em out up close :-)

I'll be mounting up the painted bumpers this weekend. Andre can take a look and decide then ha

[bradnic]

Still some surface prep to go on both MT1 front and rear parts, but should have the covers next week.

MT1 front still in prep. They did a wonderful job cutting the fog light holes! i gouged some of the urethane on the slots.. pain to deal with but the body shop is on it. Great urethane repair work, just as flexible as the original part


MT1 rear had some riveted aluminum repairs. All that was removed and properly repaired.



rest of the parts including the coupe deck lid have been sprayed and cleared but not wet sanded. They also need to hit the MT1 spoiler painted section again due to some primer issues.


I'll assemble everything and then get the car back to the shop for wet sanding.

Couldn't resist a quick trial fit of a side skirt


Keep in mind I still haven't stripped and repainted the whole car. Everything will come apart next year or the following for a full respray. Looks great for now!

[bradnic]

here's the driver front fender area. does anyone know the part number of the circled clip? can't find it on realoem.

DAMN. clip is part of the trim piece, so I either get it back in or buy replacement trim. part numbers 51131932803 and 51131932804

[bradnic]

forgot to post an install pic. waiting on fasteners for the quarter trim. need to paint the window trim - you can see how much it's faded by looking at the driver mirror mount area.



also just remembered the new deck lid won't have the stripes on them. buddy knows a guy so..

[bradnic]

No word from the body shop yet. Will post as soon as I have something I can show, hopefully next couple of days.

Had to order new euro fog lenses - both were cracked! got one season out of them. Learned my lesson and ordered some yellow lamin-x for the new lenses plus clear for the euro headlights.


Spent the weekend on disassembly and prep. Here's a pretty good pic of the natur trim and shadowline on the top lid.


Happy with the results, but at some point I'll respray with leatherique color matched dye. Also you can't see them in the pic but the map pockets are still slightly off compared to the other painted trim despite two coats. will hit them a couple more times, possibly spraying some white paint or primer first.

I have to repaint 4 of the shadowine trim parts, and 4 additional pieces I hadn't painted yet (long rocker trim pieces, step trim on top of the rockers). I didn't like how the surface finish came out on the knee height door moldings. Also need to replace some of the clips so the trim's not all ready to mount yet anyway.

This is what it looked like under the trim.. glad I cleaned it up to avoid problems later


here's the driver front fender area. does anyone know the part number of the circled clip? can't find it on realoem.


good pic of the dyed carpet and floor mats. nice to see all that dirt removed under the trim


Interesting fact: shadow line rear quarter trim for convertibles mounts differently than their black+chrome versions of the same piece. the hole near the rear wheel arch is only used with the stock trim that includes the chrome strip. I have to drill a hole on each side just ahead of that hole. I had to order new fastener hardware too. Double checked on realoem and it's true - the rear quarter shadowline trim is not convertible-specific, but the stock trim is.

will need to paint the rockers and the existing shadowline window frames. keep in mind the whole car will be stripped at some point for a bare metal respray. this is just to get things matching and presentable until I finally pull the trigger on that.