'Upping my Green Credentials' - Meergrün E36 328i Trio
Discussion
Yeah I'm thinking of M-tech rear bumper plus 'twisted' skirts but leaving the standard bumper up front. However I'm starting to get a bit concerned at the speed the bubbling round the arch is spreading and so I think the next outlay is going to be a trip to the body shop to nip that in the bud ASAP!
vsonix said:
Yeah I'm thinking of M-tech rear bumper plus 'twisted' skirts but leaving the standard bumper up front. However I'm starting to get a bit concerned at the speed the bubbling round the arch is spreading and so I think the next outlay is going to be a trip to the body shop to nip that in the bud ASAP!
Tink that looks good, doing the sides and back but not front. It muscles the car up subtly, without trying to pass it off as an m3.VinceFox said:
vsonix said:
Yeah I'm thinking of M-tech rear bumper plus 'twisted' skirts but leaving the standard bumper up front. However I'm starting to get a bit concerned at the speed the bubbling round the arch is spreading and so I think the next outlay is going to be a trip to the body shop to nip that in the bud ASAP!
Tink that looks good, doing the sides and back but not front. It muscles the car up subtly, without trying to pass it off as an m3.
I think the twisted skirts are a must though as they improve the lines of the car a lot.
vsonix said:
VinceFox said:
vsonix said:
Yeah I'm thinking of M-tech rear bumper plus 'twisted' skirts but leaving the standard bumper up front. However I'm starting to get a bit concerned at the speed the bubbling round the arch is spreading and so I think the next outlay is going to be a trip to the body shop to nip that in the bud ASAP!
Tink that looks good, doing the sides and back but not front. It muscles the car up subtly, without trying to pass it off as an m3.I think the twisted skirts are a must though as they improve the lines of the car a lot.
So, been a turbulent week for The Osprey, knocked back on the MOT because of excessive brake line corrosion - turns out the expensive 'brake line replacement' mentioned in the service history (after failing for the same reason 2-3 years ago) was a bodge job as they had merely replaced a section, rather than the whole brake lines and now the remains of the old pipe is in a terrible state. So looks like a previous owner got stung by their garage.
Anyway I'm taking the opportunity to upgrade all the rubber flexi brake hoses to braided stainless ones. If at all possible I prefer to squeeze in the odd performance enhancement on top of essential maintenance, I feel it lessens the sting of the garage bill when you can feel an improvement afterwards!
Also I took the opportunity to refurb the wing mirror bases - from
(the other one was actually worse, 90% of its paint had flaked - but I didn't get a picture of it) to:
they were so badly gone they were leaving streaky marks down the sides of the car whenever it rained! I'm 90% happy with how hey came out - they could have been a little bit smoother in places but I missed a couple of spots when I was sanding them back. No matter, they're a massive improvement and can always be redone later if need be and I'm keeping an eye open for some ACS or Hartge mirrors anyway.
Today's job: re-dye the parcel shelf. My lavender shelf is making my car's bum look big.
Anyway I'm taking the opportunity to upgrade all the rubber flexi brake hoses to braided stainless ones. If at all possible I prefer to squeeze in the odd performance enhancement on top of essential maintenance, I feel it lessens the sting of the garage bill when you can feel an improvement afterwards!
Also I took the opportunity to refurb the wing mirror bases - from
(the other one was actually worse, 90% of its paint had flaked - but I didn't get a picture of it) to:
they were so badly gone they were leaving streaky marks down the sides of the car whenever it rained! I'm 90% happy with how hey came out - they could have been a little bit smoother in places but I missed a couple of spots when I was sanding them back. No matter, they're a massive improvement and can always be redone later if need be and I'm keeping an eye open for some ACS or Hartge mirrors anyway.
Today's job: re-dye the parcel shelf. My lavender shelf is making my car's bum look big.
vsonix said:
Yeah I'm thinking of M-tech rear bumper plus 'twisted' skirts but leaving the standard bumper up front. However I'm starting to get a bit concerned at the speed the bubbling round the arch is spreading and so I think the next outlay is going to be a trip to the body shop to nip that in the bud ASAP!
It's a shame you aren't near me, my last 328 got vandalised and as a result another PHer kindly let me have a rear M3 bumper, which is just sat on my floor at the moment.Ah shame! I occasionally head past the Midlands but no plans for going that way for a month or two.
Actually I have bought a M-style rear diffuser that clips in place of the wonky valance pictured earlier in the thread, although it annoyingly won't clip in because a) it arrived undrilled which is annoying and b) I haven't got round to acquiring the relevant trim clips yet. Although I'm not 100% sure if I want to fit it yet as I dunno if it looks quite right when in situ.
Actually I have bought a M-style rear diffuser that clips in place of the wonky valance pictured earlier in the thread, although it annoyingly won't clip in because a) it arrived undrilled which is annoying and b) I haven't got round to acquiring the relevant trim clips yet. Although I'm not 100% sure if I want to fit it yet as I dunno if it looks quite right when in situ.
vsonix said:
Ah shame! I occasionally head past the Midlands but no plans for going that way for a month or two.
Actually I have bought a M-style rear diffuser that clips in place of the wonky valance pictured earlier in the thread, although it annoyingly won't clip in because a) it arrived undrilled which is annoying and b) I haven't got round to acquiring the relevant trim clips yet. Although I'm not 100% sure if I want to fit it yet as I dunno if it looks quite right when in situ.
Oddly enough, it was the diffuser part of my old 328 bumper that got ripped off (snapping off all the mounts with it), along with all the M-tec trims Actually I have bought a M-style rear diffuser that clips in place of the wonky valance pictured earlier in the thread, although it annoyingly won't clip in because a) it arrived undrilled which is annoying and b) I haven't got round to acquiring the relevant trim clips yet. Although I'm not 100% sure if I want to fit it yet as I dunno if it looks quite right when in situ.
getawayturtle said:
Oddly enough, it was the diffuser part of my old 328 bumper that got ripped off (snapping off all the mounts with it), along with all the M-tec trims
hmm! I might just get a new standard one, I'm still not too sure the M-look diffuser really suits the regular bumper anyway. Perhaps if I painted it it might look better. Speaking of painting, the parcel shelf has now been sprayed black, the whole car looks better as a result. Faded parcel shelf has a very subtle yet very horrible effect on the overall appearance of the car. Getting it out was a bit of a faff though, I ended up having to snip the heads off the plastic rivets as they were in ridiculously tight. Trying to work out what the part number is for new ones... looked on realoem.com but I haven't found them yet...
anonymous said:
[redacted]
I believe I've seen your car before whilst trawling around the forums and is one of the cars that decided me to keep with the "SE+" look rather than going down the 'too many M' bits route. You've got more drop going on than me and in some ways I'd have liked to go a smidge lower in the front, but I thought long and hard about the practicality issue and decided the 40/15 drop offered by the H&R Sport setup was enough. Firstly I drive a lot of rutted B-roads, and also I occasionally need to carry passengers plus luggage, my 318ti was dropped 60/40 and it really suffered driving around parts of London with speed mountains and I couldn't face going through that again! If I was planning on spending more time on the track then it'd be a no-brainer, but as it stands, day-to-day usability is paramount. As regards the SE vs M bits I tend to agree with you although I really prefer the twisted skirt as I feel it enhances the rake and poise, slims the car's bum a bit (although the parcel shelf re-dye really helped this) and generally makes the lines of the car a bit more pleasing without adding 'beef'. I've seen one on the net in this colour with M3 bumpers and I didn't get that worked up by it. It's not like I can't put the old stuff back on again, anyway! I'll be keeping hold of it of course.
Speaking of other cars the same colour as mine, there was a 323i 'vert at the garage when I collected the car from having her MOT done! I couldn't resist a couple of snaps:
It's amazing how much 'bigger' my car looks riding on 17"s
I'm glad I decided to take them because as I was doing so the owner of the other one came up and did a massive double-take (he saw mine first!) - he must have thought the garage had done something very odd to his car, haha!
Paul S4 said:
"Also I took the opportunity to refurb the wing mirror bases "
I would be interested in how you did those; mine will need doing soon. Did you take them off the car ? They look very well done by the way !
Yeah, they came off the car but removing them takes all of five minutes and is very easy. There's plenty of DIYs out there but it's basically remove trim covers from inside, unplug the little wiring harness, remove 3x bolts with 10mm (iirc) socket being careful not to let mirror drop when removing last one - but if yours are like mine were they'll be held on with gunk - and pop out the rubber waterproofing grommet and you're all done, easy. You'll probably need another set of hands to hold the mirror while you're doing the process in reverse otherwise popping the grommet in again while not dropping the mirror will be possible but annoying. I would be interested in how you did those; mine will need doing soon. Did you take them off the car ? They look very well done by the way !
The existing paint was in very bad shape so removing it wasn't too hard. Totally dismantling the mirrors seemed like a massive faff so once I'd persuaded as much of the loose stuff to fall off as possible I used masking tape to cover and protect the main body of the mirror, the rubber parts, wiring, plug etc. I then used a wire brush to persuade more flakes out from along the joins, making sure to fold the mirrors so I could properly access everywhere and make sure everything was properly masked. Then I used sanding sponges from medium to very fine grade to remove all the oxidisation and get the bases as smooth as possible. After that, 3-4 coats Matt Grey primer and another 3-4 coats of Satin Black paint courtesy of the local Halfrauds. Mirrors were off the car for about 36 hours total. Could have been quicker but since she was waiting for MOT work I wasn't in any rush.
Edited by vsonix on Friday 15th March 15:03
Edited by vsonix on Friday 15th March 17:36
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