1983 Henna Red 323i

[Japandrew73]

Basically when you're driving at night the mirror 'darkens' so headlights behind you don't dazzle you. It replaces the little lever you have at the bottom of your mirror to manually do it for you.

The little dot is the light sensor for the mirror.

wow that's awesome!

[Japandrew73]

updates?

[kdevitt]

updates?

Not much in the way of updates I'm afraid!!

Heres the latest -

The car had a clean cloth interior, but I managed to pick up a very tidy sports leather a few weeks back for small money. There were no rips or tears, but the leather was cracking and in need of some work.

I bought a leather restoration kit from Dynamix Dyes (www.dynamixdyes.com) - they have a full selection of colours available, thankfully black is as straightforward as it gets. The kit arrived quickly - and contains a leather cleaner, a conditioner, the dye, an applicator sponge and a leather scented air freshener.

Heres a few pics of the seats before any work was done -

The interior needs to be cleaned thoroughly using the supplied cleaner, after which I gave it a wipe down with methylated spirits to remove any remnants of waxes or grease. I then gave the seats a sanding with 600 grit paper to remove major cracking. Probably could have done with sanding down a bit further, but I didn't fancy doing any significant damage.

I cut the supplied sponge into three sections and used it to apply very thin coats of the dye. Within about two coats the seats looked significantly better, the amount of dye supplied allowed me to do 6 coats on the full interior. I still need to apply the conditioner to the leather - the seats have to be left for two days before its done.

Heres the finished pictures -

Am delighted with the results - the interior looked worse to begin with than the pictures show, and it came up amazing. Its obviously not like a brand new interior - the cracking can still be seen, but its well worth spending the money on the kit if your interior is a bit tired looking.

I'm collecting an order on Saturday with all the trim pieces for the front and rear bumpers and a few other bits, hopefully the car is being collected afterwards for a full proper respray. Just can't get the finish the car deserves myself!

Not sure if I posted this before - but am also sorting out my brothers 1983 320i - so my time is taken up quite a bit at the moment!

[Japandrew73]

project thread for the 320i too!

[kdevitt]

project thread for the 320i too!

Added :D

[kdevitt]

Well the car got collected today and taken away for its paint job. Its having a full glass out respray and getting new brake lines put in too - hopefully the new ones won't squirt brake fluid everywhere :D

Should have it back in 6 weeks or so!! They're taking their time with the prep work and doing it as a side job, which suits me fine - gives me longer to earn the money to pay for it! I think they'll be taking some progress shots, so I'll post them if I get any.

[Court M3]

can't wait to see it done

[Jean]

Nice! IT's going to look awesome I am so jealous of you guys with mtechnic I kits! :)

[kdevitt]

Had to drop a few parts over today to the lads - work has begun anyway!

[kdevitt]

A few more updates from the workshop

[oldskool3]

Looks awesome! Can't wait to see the finished product

[kdevitt]

Glad this was caught at this stage - one of the bodyshops who quoted for the job said there was absolutely no need for the screens to come out!!

[machined]

I liked the pin stripes. WHats up with the queer corners on your other car?

Those corner lights are factory... I'm more happy than anything that you're doing painted bumpers. Very happy.

[kdevitt]

I'm more happy than anything that you're doing painted bumpers. Very happy.

Haha - yeah, once the tec 1 kit was going on, the painted bumpers was a given. The chrome bumper with tec 1 valances looks a bit off to me!!

I did the sanding myself on them, but am a bit concerned they may peel in future, so am looking at having them acid dipped to properly remove all the chrome. Am picking up all new window rubbers and trim tomorrow too - so its eventually coming together!

Will be over with the car tomorrow and will collect some more trim bits off the old bumpers - I know theres been a lot of interest in buying them, so I'll stick up another for sale advert when I have them. S

[FredK]

Wow. That cowl vent panel is in bad shape!

Awesome project!