Bronzit E30 - OBDII S52 shaved bay - weekend/autox toy - Journey

[Sh3rpak!ng]

Found some time for more updates.

So a little over a month ago I quit my job and started a new one. The new company wanted me to spend the first two months up north at their compay headquarters in Watsonville, so they rented me an apartment in Aptos, just outside of Santa Cruz. Beautiful location!

Since I didn't have the e30 around, I decided I ought to put some elbow grease into my daily, so I clay barred and waxed it. It looks halfway decent now.





I lost my IS lip a few weeks ago, so I bought a replacement and sprayed it with undercoating. I also flew back to LA and drove the e30 up north because I couldn't stand to be way for 2 months without it.





One of the little projects I've been looking forward to for quite a while is the seat delete. As per usual I decided to make it complicated. Started by drilling out all of the original seat brackets, top and bottom.





Here's my view while working. Got lucky with the apartment at the end of the complex having a much larger parking area than any of the others. Plenty of room for activities :D





I massaged the bottom part a bit more to get the fit right. Then scoped out where I could drill for rivnuts without drilling into the gas tank or any lines. Drilled, mounted the rivnuts and checked the fitment... it was spot on!





Next up was wrapping the board in foam backed suede courtesy of -ak. He came through with some very nice material! I've been excited to make this happen for a long time.

Coffee table doubles as a work station





Forgot to take pictures of any progress since I was working with glue, but it came out great!!





Next up was the seat back portion. So I originally had another piece of plywood already cut for this but it was short on one side which i thought would be ok to give clearance for the speaker wires. Then I decided that would look "lazy" but I didn't have a big enough piece of plywood leftover so I took the "test" bottom seat piece and cut it to shape.





Will post up the finished results when I have more time!

[Toodaloo]

Awesome work on the back seat delete! I've contemplated doing it myself for a little while, then decided to keep he rear seat. That fit looks puuuuurrrfect!

[Digitalwave]

Any tips for drilling out the rear seat mounting tabs? I'd like to do that before I paint my interior.

[2mAn]

Any tips for drilling out the rear seat mounting tabs? I'd like to do that before I paint my interior.

Best bet is a spot weld drill bit but you'd still need to grind down the leftover nub if you want it smooth.

I just drilled right through them and the back panel because I DGAF

[Sh3rpak!ng]

Awesome work on the back seat delete! I've contemplated doing it myself for a little while, then decided to keep he rear seat. That fit looks puuuuurrrfect!

Thanks! Lots of CAD went into those panels :p

Best bet is a spot weld drill bit but you'd still need to grind down the leftover nub if you want it smooth.

I just drilled right through them and the back panel because I DGAF

Any tips for drilling out the rear seat mounting tabs? I'd like to do that before I paint my interior.

What he said. I have an astro brand spot weld drilling kit off Amazon. Very effective and it's also been handy to have it around

[She loved E]

man this is such a great build.

[rzerob]

In my opinion your car really needs black carpet. This rear seat delete is awesome.

[Sh3rpak!ng]

man this is such a great build.

Thanks!

In my opinion your car really needs black carpet. This rear seat delete is awesome.

Yes, that's my opinion too. I actually got a grey carpet a few weeks ago, just need to get it cleaned and then I will dye it black (or maybe dark grey?) and install

[Sh3rpak!ng]

Finished the seat delete (mostly). This was actually A LOT more work than it looks to get all the measurements lined up perfectly, holes lined up, get it to sit flat and level etc. There was a lot of CAD templating. Most difficult part was finding the spots in the rear sheet metal that had enough clearance behind them to allow the rivnuts (since I still have the lukebox in there) but that would also be evenly spaced and enough to solidly mount the panel. Next, because the sheet metal isn't flat, I had to cut some pieces to make up the divots and level it out again so the piece mounted smoothly. I'd say the results were worth it though! And no, I am not even remotely a pro at wrapping stuff with fabric... literally had no idea what I was doing, but it came out well enough so I'm happy.









Next little project was spacing the steering wheel down. I had to do this after I finished seat position since the seat sits so low, I was having to reach up to grab the wheel. I think this is about 1" spaced down, might go a little lower. Next I need to either get a spacer to bring the wheel a little closer to me, or might get a quick disconnect to accomplish the same (since the wheel will also impede entering/exiting the car quite a bit).

[stonea]

The back seat delete looks great! I really love the way it turned out. Have you thought about wrapping the wheel arches and the pipe on the passenger side in the side in the same fabric?

[Sh3rpak!ng]

The back seat delete looks great! I really love the way it turned out. Have you thought about wrapping the wheel arches and the pipe on the passenger side in the side in the same fabric?

Thanks! And yes I planned to have plenty of leftover fabric to do just that.

[ak-]

Awh man that came out so cool and good. Love the wedge idea too. Swap that carpet in and with a matching headliner you're SET.

[1987E30project]

By any chance would you be going to Bimmerfest... I would love to see this car in person. So many good ideas

Sent from my SM-G920P using Tapatalk

[Sh3rpak!ng]

By any chance would you be going to Bimmerfest... I would love to see this car in person. So many good ideas

Sent from my SM-G920P using Tapatalk

Yes, Ill be there. Somewhere in the parking for the battle of the bimmers :)

[acolella76]

Those panels look great! How much do they weigh?