Karter16's Silbergrau E46 M3 Journal

[karter16]

It's been a busy few months at work, but I've done a few tiny bits and pieces here and there - quick summary below:

Replaced the broken clamp on the negative battery cable which broke - replacement thanks to a member on the NZ forum.




I also noticed that when I'd installed the new gas struts on the boot, I'd installed them upside down 🤦♂️ so quickly sorted that:




Also realised I didn't update on adjusting the xtrons headunit to fit the dash trim properly. It turned out it needed to be adjusted a lot - more than could be achieved with a file - photo shows how far out it is:




Next up will be getting a chance to get some decent photos of the xtrons and then will write up my thoughts on it now that I've owned it for 6 months or so.

Also waiting for the Yurkan 6 point brace to arrive, it's currently somewhere between Germany and here.

[robgill]

Another little side project I've been working on is this:

As time goes on my collection of spare/new parts continues to increase to the point that it's challenging to keep track in a spreadsheet of what I've purchased/fitted/quantities remaining, etc. I also want to be able to more easily plan out future projects and map that back to parts I have/need to get.

To this end I've setup an inventree instance and loaded into it the complete list of part numbers for my specific VIN. Now that I've got this base setup I can go through my parts shelves, load in the quantities etc. and then I have an easy view of what I've got without having to dig through boxes. When I fit parts I can decrease the stock on hand, etc. I can also make use of some of inventree's other features to build BOMs for projects, track what parts I need to order, etc.

Is this overkill? absolutely, 100%. But it will make things a bit easier for me, plus it's cool to have a complete list of part numbers for reference.

My method is searching email for the part # to see if I already ordered it. Then hunting around my shop for the part I already ordered 😂.

[karter16]

You’re the man, thanks.

Also that’s rad that you’ve got your own inventory tool! Now I’m curious how you got a file that contains your car’s full bill of materials..

I was reading something last night that suggested there's a way of enabling wifi ADB via terminal without root, so I might give that a go when I get a chance.

There's no magic way I got the file unfortunately - it was old-school scrapey scrape (which I left running overnight at a slow pace to not annoy anyone too much).

[Bry5on]

I had a further look into this this evening. Building out the boot animation is easy - here is one attached for 1280x480 screen res: [ATTACH]n263171[/ATTACH]

I installed ADB and enabled developer tools on the Xtrons unit. Unfortunately it seems that the unit doesn't have an option to use wireless debugging. USB is indeed an option, however I don't have any USB headers installed at present, so any further work on this will need to wait until a future point in time.

If anyone else wants to give it a go you're welcome to use the attached file. If you do then let me know how you get on!

You’re the man, thanks.

Also that’s rad that you’ve got your own inventory tool! Now I’m curious how you got a file that contains your car’s full bill of materials..

[karter16]

Another little side project I've been working on is this:



As time goes on my collection of spare/new parts continues to increase to the point that it's challenging to keep track in a spreadsheet of what I've purchased/fitted/quantities remaining, etc. I also want to be able to more easily plan out future projects and map that back to parts I have/need to get.

To this end I've setup an inventree instance and loaded into it the complete list of part numbers for my specific VIN. Now that I've got this base setup I can go through my parts shelves, load in the quantities etc. and then I have an easy view of what I've got without having to dig through boxes. When I fit parts I can decrease the stock on hand, etc. I can also make use of some of inventree's other features to build BOMs for projects, track what parts I need to order, etc.

Is this overkill? absolutely, 100%. But it will make things a bit easier for me, plus it's cool to have a complete list of part numbers for reference.

[karter16]

Jumping back to this but taking it to 10/10.

There’s a boot animation that happens after the splash screen that says “powered by android” and it also appears to be customizable. It seems like the boot animation is fundamentally just PNG files zipped up. Did you consider also replacing the boot animation so it stays consistent with the stock boot up?

background on compiling a custom boot animation: https://emteria.com/blog/custom-boot...id?hs_amp=true

I’ll note that you made the right call with the Xtrons. It’s leaps and bounds ahead of the Avin unit that crapped out on me after two years. I should have switched earlier.

I had a further look into this this evening. Building out the boot animation is easy - here is one attached for 1280x480 screen res: bootanimation.zip
I installed ADB and enabled developer tools on the Xtrons unit. Unfortunately it seems that the unit doesn't have an option to use wireless debugging. USB is indeed an option, however I don't have any USB headers installed at present, so any further work on this will need to wait until a future point in time.

If anyone else wants to give it a go you're welcome to use the attached file. If you do then let me know how you get on!

[karter16]

Checked today and in fact there doesn't appear to be an option to turn off the boot animation. So I still have no idea why I don't see the animation under normal conditions. I confirmed this morning (driving car for first time in several days) that when I turn on/start the car the unit screen turns on, immediately showing the custom boot screen (BMW logo) from there as soon as the logo stops being displayed I'm straight into the home screen of the head unit...

[karter16]

Actually - thinking about this further - I think there's an option to turn off the boot animation that appears after the splash screen (it just shows the splash screen for longer instead) which would explain why I don't see it. Let me double check tomorrow when I'm in the car.

[karter16]

Jumping back to this but taking it to 10/10.

There’s a boot animation that happens after the splash screen that says “powered by android” and it also appears to be customizable. It seems like the boot animation is fundamentally just PNG files zipped up. Did you consider also replacing the boot animation so it stays consistent with the stock boot up?

background on compiling a custom boot animation: https://emteria.com/blog/custom-boot...id?hs_amp=true

I’ll note that you made the right call with the Xtrons. It’s leaps and bounds ahead of the Avin unit that crapped out on me after two years. I should have switched earlier.

Yeah interesting - several people have mentioned the boot animation. I'm not sure why but I don't see it on my unit under normal operation. The only time I ever see it is if I've disconnected the battery and the unit is doing a cold boot, or if I intentionally restart the unit (which I haven't had to do since first setting it up). Under these scenarios the boot animation shows BEFORE the splash screen, I don't see anything appear after the splash screen, it goes straight to the Home Screen/interface. Because of this I haven't made it a priority to look into further, but given a few people have mentioned this I'll give it a go when I get a chance!

Re the Xtrons - I have to say I'm pretty happy with it so far - I've been meaning to write up a bit of a more detailed review of my experience but need to get some time to get some decent photos to go along with the writeup - will try to get that done soon.

[Bry5on]

Nice one - I've very happy with it so far - better than I was expecting for sure.

FWIW he's a copy of the splash screen sized to fit that unit.

Jumping back to this but taking it to 10/10.

There’s a boot animation that happens after the splash screen that says “powered by android” and it also appears to be customizable. It seems like the boot animation is fundamentally just PNG files zipped up. Did you consider also replacing the boot animation so it stays consistent with the stock boot up?

background on compiling a custom boot animation: https://emteria.com/blog/custom-boot...id?hs_amp=true

I’ll note that you made the right call with the Xtrons. It’s leaps and bounds ahead of the Avin unit that crapped out on me after two years. I should have switched earlier.

[karter16]

Read through all of it, amazing work! and I hope everyone is in good health.

Thanks I really appreciate that - we've had a few months of relative calm on the health front which is fantastic and I'm enjoying every moment of it!


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[karter16]

Awesome build. Just picked up a silver grey! Cant wait to start a build thread soon

Thank you! Silver grey is a great colour (if I say so myself!) looking forward to following your build!


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[bavarian3]

Read through all of it, amazing work! and I hope everyone is in good health.

[M3_mann]

Awesome build. Just picked up a silver grey! Cant wait to start a build thread soon

[karter16]

At last I got the final version of the top amp bracket sorted and Dad printed it and dropped it off yesterday. I fitted it today - all looking good!



Next up is to clean up the bay properly and then bundle up the un-needed wiring on the loom and secure it.

I also took the opportunity to re-familiarise myself with exactly how the structural foam has been done on the rear RACP mounts on my car as I start preparing for the installation of the 6 point brace when it arrives later in the year. I also checked the welds in the trunk to ensure that they're all still good - keep an eye on this just in case.