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One side of the headers are completely mocked up now, managed to get the lengths the same to less than half a mm which is a good result. Modeled them up so I have a long term record but will need some tweaking due to errors introduced going from plastic to digital. Will likely build off the glued up plastic tubes making jigs to support the tubes at key locations.

You might need to let us know what area you are in!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kug2uVRbte4 This guy did a reasonable job photoshopping the car to at least look a bit better, still a dorky thing but considerably better than the actual car. Just shows how misguided the designers at BMW are when an internet Photoshop guy can find so many flaws in their actual design and improve them.

Just because BMW call it a Sequential Manual Gearbox does not make it a sequential gearbox. It is a conventional manual synchromesh gearbox with an electro-hydraulic system to change the gears in a Steptronic fashion. A true sequential box (dog box) is a totally different animal, and I am not aware of a dog box ever being sold in a standard production car. As explained in this video, a true sequential gearbox is a specialised tool for racing, and although superior to a synchromesh box in virtually every way, the noise of straight cut gears and the abrupt shifts are not suited to production car use. A dog box does not need the incredibly complex control and operating system of the SMG or DCT, but the latter certainly appears to have achieved a performance level that keeps M car drivers happy I looked long and hard at getting a sequential box for a previous car, but considering the cost and the fact that the car was not a dedicated race car, I gave the idea away. For an average punter such as myself who does not do track days, a Steptronic auto with a flash is plenty good enough !!! Cheers...

Hmm, I take mine to Whangarei regularly, I should probably expect to get pulled over for the same reason!!

@Palazzo it'd pay for itself in saved fuel after a week or so.

Suppose when all the Japanese performance cars go up people also have to look elsewhere. Along with the fact they dont make them any more, so the supply is going down rather than up. Here's a Japanese sedan, nothing super flash just a nice tidy one

Agree, disgusting. Its like the designers are all racing each other to implement their vision of the future. Seems a lot of their vision caters to the super rich who are real keen to make sure everyone knows it.

Similar to housing market I guess. Supply, demand, hype, FOMO and cheap money. Add a bit of nostalgia into the mix, and that these people have a bit of coin (or equity) now. I do get it for a mint Tech1/2, but ridiculous when every man and his dog think their scruffy, neglected 318i sedan is now a gold mine. It’s happening to any other desirable jap performance car from the 90s as bad or worse. $40k for a 1JZGTE chaser, anyone?

Some really fun work lately with basic assembly of some major pieces to get things looking like a car again. Installed the flywheel and clutch, funnily enough these were one of the first things purchased almost a year ago now !! Pulled the front struts apart to give everything a good clean and install new bump stops / dust boots. Unfortunately the left side is completely rooted but will get the car mobile for the time being, will not go through certification and WOF however so will likely have to do something suspension wise later on. Lower control arms with new Powerflex bushes installed, 330 knuckles and guard liners cleaned / painted along with the wheel wells. Just a fun shot of the under body with new oil pan installed. The next and probably most involved part of the build has slowly begun ... making the headers !! Designed up the flanges and had them laser cut however will probably change approach here and go with completely individual tubes / mini flanges to allow them to be 'threaded' into position into the car and fixed into a slip joint collector ... or something Got some pool vacuum hose I will be using to mock things up roughly, will probably get a bunch of profiles laser cut at the proposed mandrel bend radius to support the pool hose in place then fill with some sort of expanding rigid foam. Looking pretty cool now, side skirts back on ... FINALLY installed the front EBC rotors !!! Could not help myself mocking up the interior a little bit and I'm loving the low key look it should have !!