Obioban's 2004 JR/Black M3 Wagon

[Obioban]

Had the windshield replaced, and I'm not the most impressed I've ever been. Used a new shop that's near where I live now (moved recently)...
Finger prints on the mirror
tape left at the top of the windshield
V1 installed like this:



And glue left on the A pillar...

[Obioban]

Picked up Vox Populi's stock seats from his M3. Heated/lumbar/width adjustment/correct color/5 minutes away





Not hating these wheels



Vacuum and leatheriquing the seats....
(this is a before picture, it's soaking in now)

Put in one of the two M3 seats. Was shooting for both, but it took longer than expected. Next one should go faster, as I have a technique now

[Obioban]

This is paid for and in the mail minus the headliner (going to have mine rewrapped locally, as shipping is stupid):



And I picked these up last night for it:







Wheels are on. Too crappy of a day to take any real pictures.



^wheels somehow don't need hub centric rings. I'm excited about that as all previous sets of RG-Rs I've had, had required rings and/or spacers! These are just a straight bolt on.

[Obioban]

I bought Kaiv's first mechanically/electronically M3 converted e46 touring, and drove it home from CA to PA. Not many other people I'd trust to buy a completely swapped car from, and then immediately drive it across the entire country! Right off the bat, my opinion of the car is this: from there drivers seat, there is ZERO indication that you're not driving a stock e46 M3 coupe. It's really wonderful, and exactly what i was hoping the car would be! This car is going to be my new daily, moving my wife to the e39 M5 as her daily, and will be selling the e91.

Car can be seen getting built, in posts 1-400: http://www.m3forum.net/m3forum/showthread.php?t=540964

Cliffs, as I picked it up:
Touring body
M3 engine
M3 trans
M3 diff
M3 subframes
M3 control arms
M3 bushings
M3 brakes
M3 mounts
M3 cluster/ecu
M3 headers/section 1/section 2
Chrome trim turned black
black dashboard, carpet, center console

Fresh OE/Lemforder bushings everywhere as he was building it, as well as the full Beisan VANOS treatment, subframe foam (4x), new clutch/flywheel/pressure plate, and new WPC treat rod bearings.

In terms of "mods" at time of pickup (interesting term when every major mechanical component in not original, but....), it has
Eibach coilovers
Eibach sways
not very good performance friction street pads (why can't PF make a decent street pad?!?!)
Stromung customer muffler (e46 chassis mount points, M3 pipe ID and section 2 mating)

My immediate plans for the car:
-Black leather door cards/back seats
-Black M3 front seats
-M3 steering wheel
-M3 MK60 retrofit
-new OE US headers (I suspect one of the cats is gone in these)
-bunch of NCS expert stuff (quad highs ASAP... forgot how useless stock e46 headlights are)
-upgrade projectors (see above)
-two OE resonated section 1 pipes in the section 1 (kill the rest of the rasp
-M sport interior (anthracite (black) A/B/C/D pillars, headliner, and misc stuff (handles, sun visors, motion sensor covers)
-swap out the trunk area for black parts
-new wind shield (cracked it on the way home)
-intravee
-light weight forged wheels of some sort
-raise the ride height a bit
-do something about the interior trim-- not sure what yet, but I am sure that wood is not for me
-roof rack delete
-snow tires on the wheels that are on the car now.
-get the car aligned
-add a windshield washer fluid tank
-clear tails

Here is the car, as we first saw it (lower than it really is, as our junk is in the trunk and my wife is sitting in the back seat):



And the part everyone wants to see:



And driving out of Kaiv's life, leaving him in despair until he built another one the following week:



And 15 minutes later, my first ever tire blow out. Good thing I was 15 minutes into owning my first ever car with a spare tire, since I still had 2700 miles to drive in 2.5 days....



Which was a pretty severe blow out. Was going ~110 when it happened:



So then we went to the Peterson, because it's awesome:




















After that we really hit the road. We saw very little traffic for pretty much the entire country-- rarely had to go under 100 mph for all 2700 miles, and sometimes roof for well above. There's some pretty epic scenery as you cross the country. Didn't really have time to get out an take real pictures, so all we have is in car shots as we rolled through:



This gas station somehow had the land burned all around it (seriously, all sides, including some of the trees in it's parking lot), but the station itself was untouched. Crazy











Scary looking sky in kansas:





shot through the sunroof:




And home: