E86 Front Triangulation Braces Retrofit

[George Hill]

I’ll report back as soon as possible, looks rad though

[heinzboehmer]

Weighed the final parts today. Here's where we landed at:



(sorry if it's a bit hard to read, I think I tried to stuff too much info into this table)

I unfortunately do not have my stock cabin air filter housing anymore (I chopped it up), so I can't weigh that. Going off of the RealOEM value makes it look like this project results in a net decrease in weight. Excellent!

Can someone help me by weighing their stock housing? Here's a comprehensive list of the components that I put on the scale. Would be great to do the same with the stock part for max apples-to-apples-ness:

- Housing
- Hood gasket
- Both water drain boots
- Air filter
- Filter cover
- Half of cable tray attached to housing
- Half of cable tray that snaps on
- T30 screws

[heinzboehmer]

Got the braces and brackets back from cerakote today, which means this project is officially finished!

Here's some engine bay shots:





Only thing missing from the documentation is the weight of the stock cabin air filter housing. Hoping someone can help out here, for completeness. Maybe George Hill or karter16?

[0-60motorsports]

Looks amazing and stock

[Cubieman]

Nice! I would love to do this someday.

I keep forgetting to weigh that that stuff, was going to do that, do you think a regular bathroom scale is accurate enough?

Maybe stand on the scale then hold the item? Sometimes I wonder if those scales are less accurate at the bottom end of their range.

[Will]

Amazing work, it looks fantastic - looks OE! Thanks for documenting and sharing with everyone.

[heinzboehmer]

Thanks all, hoping the documentation helps drive adoption of similar modifications on more cars!

Nice! I would love to do this someday.

I keep forgetting to weigh that that stuff, was going to do that, do you think a regular bathroom scale is accurate enough?

Maybe stand on the scale then hold the item? Sometimes I wonder if those scales are less accurate at the bottom end of their range.

I weighed everything with a kitchen/coffee scale to get precision down to within a gram. A bit tricky to balance everything on it, but doable. Shipping scale is by far the easiest and most reliable tool for the job though.

Don't think your typical bathroom scale will work well here. I'm expecting the weight of the part to be in the 2-3 kg range, which is likely within the real world tolerance range of that type of scale (unless you have some fancy, high precision bathroom scale ).

[bigjae46]

Nice! I would love to do this someday.

I keep forgetting to weigh that that stuff, was going to do that, do you think a regular bathroom scale is accurate enough?

Maybe stand on the scale then hold the item? Sometimes I wonder if those scales are less accurate at the bottom end of their range.

Bathroom scale is accurate enough. I use one of those hanging scales and it is consistent with the bathroom scale.

[karter16]

Question - what is it about these nuts that make them not work with the press-in studs until you've run the tap through them?

[heinzboehmer]

Question - what is it about these nuts that make them not work with the press-in studs until you've run the tap through them?

The thread profile geometry is slightly different between the stock and replacement studs.

Stock nuts are designed for rolled thread studs and the threads on the press in studs are cut.

Some discussion on that topic here: https://nam3forum.com/forums/forum/m...288#post312288

[karter16]

Thank you!!!

[karter16]

Just a note for anyone else international doing this project. I'm having significant trouble finding a source for the press in studs. The best option I've got so far is to purchase from the same place Heinz did and pay a $250USD minimum + ~$400USD international shipping. Which obviously I'm not going to do.

I'm wondering if my best option is to modify the firewall bracket components to take captive bolts, and use bolts instead of press in studs for the E86 brace attachment points on the strut brackets.

[Bry5on]

Maybe try forward2me.com - that’s what I use for euro shipments when I can’t find another option.

[heinzboehmer]

Just a note for anyone else international doing this project. I'm having significant trouble finding a source for the press in studs. The best option I've got so far is to purchase from the same place Heinz did and pay a $250USD minimum + ~$400USD international shipping. Which obviously I'm not going to do.

I'm wondering if my best option is to modify the firewall bracket components to take captive bolts, and use bolts instead of press in studs for the E86 brace attachment points on the strut brackets.

Woah, that's not great. Hit me up and I'll ship some to you. I have extras since they're only sold in packs of many.

Otherwise, yes, captive bolts are the solution. Could argue that that's how I should have designed the E86 attachment point from the start. There's more than enough room in there, but machining a hexagonal bore is not an easy task. I think a round bore with a key + a 3D printed/laser cut insert is a probably the best way to go about it. The bores are at an angle, so you might even be able to get away without the key and just have the geometry of the insert keep it from spinning when it's bolted up to the windshield mount.

As designed, a super low profile socket head bolt (e.g. McMaster 91223A462) with a 3D printed insert would fit, but it's not ideal:






Seems like a bit of a hack vs just modifying the design to fit a hex bolt with a retainer prior to getting it machined.

Unfortunately, there is simply no room under the modified strut tower brackets for anything except the press in studs.

[Bry5on]

Why not just tap and put a helicoil in then thread a cap head bolt into the hole with some loctite. Seems easy enough if there’s enough depth in the counterbore.