heinzboehmer's 2002 Topaz 6MT Coupe

[heinzboehmer]

I’d say drivers side is easier. One exception being the fog light harness. Wait, m3 has a different front harness. There is a large connector that unplugs and allows the harness to be separated from left to right if memory serves.

Pics are of the 330i with an extension to the coolant reservoir plug.

Nice, thanks for those pictures. Might as well rewrap the other side on my car then

[bigjae46]

Any reason you're not using the fabric tape? That holds up much better. Amazon - about $2 a roll.

[heinzboehmer]

Any reason you're not using the fabric tape? That holds up much better. Amazon - about $2 a roll.

Cause I wanted it to match the driver's side, since I wasn't planning on rewrapping it. But now I am...

Basically just cause I like to make myself to the same job three times.

[tlow98]

Basically just cause I like to make myself to the same job three times.

Welcome to my life as an amateur engjne rebuilder 🤣.

Excited to see the next iteration of the wrap! I bought real Tessa tape and it didn’t seem to work that well in the engine bay for me. Maybe the wrong application of that tape? I went back to my super 88.

[heinzboehmer]

Welcome to my life as an amateur engjne rebuilder 🤣.

Excited to see the next iteration of the wrap! I bought real Tessa tape and it didn’t seem to work that well in the engine bay for me. Maybe the wrong application of that tape? I went back to my super 88.

Ha, no I was mostly kidding. I'm not rerewrapping what I already rewrapped. I'll just do the other side in electrical tape as well.

There's two types of tesa tapes, fleece and cloth. The cloth one is rated for higher temps. I've used it in the engine bay and it seems to be holding up well. Haven't tried the fleece one in the engine bay though

[heinzboehmer]

Quick update on last week's Thunderhill track day.

Was an extra long day, so I packed both my mostly-used sets of track pads, my street pads and my street tires, since I was expecting to wear through both sets of track pads and the track tires.

Managed to get the street tires into the car by putting in three through the rear seat opening and the last one in between the front seats:



Honestly that sucked, not doing that again. I've been driving to and from the track on track tires and this experience made it very clear that I should keep doing that.

Swapping pads twice in the ~100F heat was also not super fun, but I'm very glad all my track pads for stock calipers are dead, since this will force me to finally get the 996 calipers installed.

I did accidentally touch one of the front rotors right after coming off the track (even though it was veery obvious that things were HOT). This is what the glove looks like now:



Extremely glad I was wearing the gloves. That would have been a really nasty burn.

But anyway, the track day was a ton of fun. First time in the open passing group and I realized it's not as scary as it seems. Was hilarious having actually fast cars blow past me.

I did have to sneak in some cool down laps every once in a while because the coolant temps started creeping towards the second dot. I was surprised by this because I've never had any coolant temp issues on track, but I realized the cause of this towards the end of the day. My AC panel will sometimes "reboot" and when it does, it goes back to some previous setting (seems like it chooses whatever was used the most recently). This means that it would turn the compressor back on on track and so the cooling system would have trouble doing its job. I think I might need to get a new AC panel to resolve this, but not entirely sure of the actual cause.

Also, when I got back home, I removed the passenger's seat, so that I could get the tires out of the back. With the seat out, I took the opportunity to loosen all the BK bracket bolts to try and get the rails to free up a bit. Then I did the same on the driver's side. They improved somewhat, but the rails still feel sticky. Biggest positive is that now the driver's seat bottoms out on the rails instead of hitting the transmission tunnel when moving it forward. Not entirely sure why, but I'm all for it. Makes getting into the back a lot easier.

Anyway, here's a short dump of track pics, including one where I was being chased down by 718 GT4 Clubsport MR that was stupid fast (dude was running 1:4x, IIRC) an a couple pics where I was being chased down by my friend in an S2K:

[heinzboehmer]

After the whole thing with the tires, I realized I don't really need the rear pass through, which was the biggest thing keeping e from installing my slon rear bulkhead brace. So I test fitted it again.

Removed the sound deadening that interferes with the adhesion surface:



Here's how it fits in relation to the front vince cups:



It seems like it just barely interferes, which is great! I'll strip everything else back and if it still interferes, I'll grind back a little bit off the top of the front cups.

Wating on the adhesive to arrive now before installing. Had some trouble getting it, so I have a feeling it's going to take a while.

With this in mind, I covered the slit I made in a layer of POR15. I'll grind this back before bonding the brace in place:



After that, I had to redo the rear dashcam (twice). I originally used a micro USB cable with just the GND and power wires, but it turned out that the parking mode wasn't activated correctly this way (in retrospect, this is very obvious). I then spliced a micro USB cable that also had an ID wire into the output of the one parking mode hardware module I had installed in the car.

I assumed the ID wire was just used as a signal for ignition on/ignition off, buuut turns out there's actual communication happening across it. Or at least it seems like it because the cameras would freak out when plugged in.

Final iteration involved two parking mode hardware modules and a couple connectors to make things easier to service:



(I made the E82's harness at the same time. M3 on the left E82 on the right)


Feeding it through the headliner was super easy. Just taped it to the existing harness and pulled it through:




Parking mode works as expected now!

[heinzboehmer]

Oh also, washed the car after a long time without being washed (two track days ago). Man, I can't get over how good this engine bay looks:

[bigjae46]

Awesome! Glad the car did well. That engine bay is nice looking! Do you have PPF? I'd have a hard time putting such a nice looking car on track.

I keep going back and forth between my caged track car and a dual purpose car. I love the idea of not having to load/unload the car, drag the trailer, put the trailer in storage, and being able to drive the car on the street to test things out with no fear of the cops. Then I remember having to load all this crap in the car so I can be sure to get home.

First world problems.

[heinzboehmer]

No PPF! Paint on the front end is actually kinda shitty. This is a CO car that was driven year round, so the entire front is pretty rock chipped (CO uses a lot of gravel during the winter). Paint looks fine from afar, but it's just bad enough that I don't care about putting it on track, which is awesome.

I really enjoy the dual purpose car, with the exception of packing tires into it. Without the tires, I can pack for the track in 5-10 min, which is why I'm never packing tires again. Track prep (pads, brake ducts, pre track inspection, etc.) does take and hour or two, so it probably is close to the amount of time needed to get your track car on a trailer.

[heinzboehmer]

Oh! I forgot to mention.

I disabled m track mode before this past track day because I found it annoying that I had to hold the button down to get traction to go fully off. I do not miss it at all.

If I ever get a ZCP MK60 module, I'll reenable m track mode, as that module allows for one-click traction control off with the center console button. For now, m track mode is staying disabled.

[heinzboehmer]

Caught the car in some good lighting a couple days ago:



Also, I weighed my car this past weekend with Bry5on's help. All figures are with a 1/4 tank of gas indicated on the gauge (OBC hidden menu thing said there were 16.7 L in the tank). Add 20-25 lbs to the figures below to get to the typical half tank weight.

Just the car:




With me in the car:




Pretty happy with the weight, especially cause my car still has a sunroof. Need to do a bit of corner balancing, though. Will calculate the thickness for the spring pad I need for the rear and swap that out.

I was planning on going to the gas station and filling the tank up to double check how much gas was in it, but I completely forgot. Guess I'll have to just trust the 16.7 L figure.

[SeñorEnglish]

Engine bay looks amazing

[heinzboehmer]

Engine bay looks amazing

Thanks!


It's finally time to get the slon rear brace wall bulkhead thing installed.

I previously test fit it and found that it fits prety much perfectly even with the vince front cups in the car, only a small amount of material will need to be ground off.

But before doing that, I went in and removed all the remaining sound deadening and seam sealer that was still in the way:




Here's how the brace fits in now:





And some pretty terrible pictures of the fitment from behind:





It's still not 100% flush, as there's some small welds and bumps in the panels that I need to grind down, but it's pretty close. Next steps are grinding (paint, vince cups and panel imperfections), cleaning and then bonding this thing in. Think I'll be able to find time to do all that in the next couple days.

[heinzboehmer]

Getting close to bonding this thing in. Progress has been kinda slow, but I want to make sure prep is done correctly.

Started by making myself a cocoon of drop cloths. I knew I was going to be grinding a lot, so I just went ahead and masked everything:




Looking towards the front:



Kind of a pain to get in and out of, but I was in there for a few hours yesterday and it looks like no part of my interior got dirty (even though I ended up disgusting). Worth it. Grinding is done, but still some work to go. Next, I need to do a final pass with 220 grit and then prep the surfaces for bonding

Also, these paper drop cloths are awesome. I had only ever bought plastic ones in the past, but I definitely prefer these. They keep their shape better and are nowhere near as hot. Plus, I won't feel as bad when I go to throw them away.