Harper

In a coupe you will almost certainly have to get it certed without the rear seat. 

The problems you run into is that the gap between the bucket seat and the B pillar has to be more than 300mm which it almost never is. My pole position ABE's on factory sedan sliders with Brey Krause brackets are barely 300mm if you are generous with the measurement. I don't know of a single aftermarket slider that has anywhere close to the same amount of travel as the factory sliders. 

The other issue is that even if you meet all those requirements if there is a seatbelt pass through as there is on pole positions, then the seatbelt obstructs the entrance to the back seat and would likely be deemed unreasonably difficult to get in and out.

In addition to that you need to have a way to release the seats from the back seats which would need to be made custom, most sliders/brackets don't have that functionality.

I think it might be possible to get it certed with the right seat (perhaps cobra nogaros since they don't have a seatbelt passthrough) on the right brackets such that there is a sufficient gap but when I talked to NZTA they pretty much told me it would come down the discretion of the certifier even then as to whether it was unreasonably difficult to get in or out of the backseat in an emergency. 

I was prepared to run the bucket seats with no cert in my E46 but my car actually had a pre-existing cert for bucket seats that were legal but doesn't specify so it still passes WOFs. 

One of the sexiest OEM wheels imo, I love mine 

I've been thinking of doing both solid subframe mounts and monoball rtabs as well next time I drop the subframe, glad to know they are worth while. I'll go with CMP for both since I'm lowered and have camber plates.

Love the colour of this, wish there were estoril m3s in nz.

On 12/20/2022 at 5:05 PM, Slammoth said:

Thanks mate, how much was it to get your sensor coded out and where did you get this done/what sort of places would do this?

Did it myself, loads of guides if you search for it. Takes a few minutes in NCSexpert and free, no cert required. Just need a laptop, K+DCAN cable and INPA/NCSexpert

Christmas came early

Already have a CSL airbox on my car but its the old V1 Geoff Steel box, so decided to bite the bullet and get the karbonius. The newer Geoff Steel box is okay and fine functionally but I wanted the best which seems to be karb by a long shot, snorkel piece is still on the way, won't arrive until next year. Cannot believe the quality of this thing. Everyone says they are perfect but photos don't do them justice, they are insane. Can't find a single imperfection in the weave or clear coat. Feels like it doesn't even belong on my old M3, looks like it belongs on a Ferrari with the quality of the carbon. Not a cheap exercise though... Ouch. 

Car got a much needed wash today too, still cleans up okay.

Plans for the car next year as of now are:

Brake upgrade - leaning towards 996 brakes all round, mostly cause I will enjoy the project of rebuilding them/painting them etc

Diff rebuild - Racing diffs has an interesting option which replaces the clutches and has a preload bevel washer to make the diff behave more like a mechanical diff and I've never rebuilt a diff so I think it would be fun.

Solid subframe bushings - I'd do this as the same time while the rear subframe is down. CMP auto engineering out of Aus have nicely made solid bushings that correct the roll center from the car being lower, at the same time would do a bit of a rear end bushing refresh, replace all ball joints and rubber. Considering getting a set of CMP's monoball RTA bushes as well. 

MK60 ABS conversion - This is pretty unlikely to happen since it's a big job and perhaps beyond my skillset with the amount of wiring involved but it's something I'd like to eventually tackle.

31 minutes ago, Slammoth said:

Is a bypass legal to do in nz? I have this problem and can’t get a wof but don’t want to spend $1000 to replace the mat. I read on another forum that a bypass is illegal but not sure if that’s factual.

Bypass has to be certed in NZ I believe. The occupancy sensor light can just be coded out, no bypass needed. That's what I have on my M3 since my bucket seats don't have an occupancy sensor. 

Anyone know a shop that will let me hire out their dyno. Planning to have my M3 remote tuned by one of the well regarded E46 M3 tuners but need a dyno to use.

Called around a couple of the shops like torque performance but they are not keen on letting me use the dyno unless they are the ones tuning it which is fair enough but I'd rather have someone with specific experience with the S54 doing it. 

Any reccomendations?

1 hour ago, E30 325i Rag-Top said:

There is some basic info on the NZTA web-site that gives broad colour breakdown of the cars registered in NZ (but only those that are set to public for the reg info).

Most of the colourful E9x M3s I see are the two door coupes, I think they were mostly limited edition versions. How set are you on the 4 doors?

Pretty set on an E90, I way prefer the shape and look of the sedan to the coupe. Probably wouldn't even consider a coupe since the E46 kind of already fills that niche. I'm also in no rush to buy but if the right car came up I would snag it. 

59 minutes ago, balancerider said:

If you include space grey and silverstone in the ‘silver’ category I’d say very few! Interlagos is a great colour for the E90, there is a pre-LCI I see in Welly in that colour that looks great (although I think it now has a Matt black wrap on it 🤮)

Probably would count those out, not cause they aren't nice colours, I actually love silver and like the look of Silverstone. But mainly since I already have my silver E46 M3 which is staying, would be nice to have something more colorful as well.

Probably a little too soon for me to buy just yet anyway otherwise I'd be seriously considering the interlagos one on trademe atm, just trying to get an idea of how many are floating around. 

Quietly hunting for an E90 M3 at the moment, curious how many there are that aren't silver, white or black. Additional side note, are there any in NZ with speed cloth interior? I don't think I've ever seen one.

There's a few for sale at the moment that interest me, notably the Melbourne red which I'm pretty sure is the only red 4dr in nz (although I'm not a huge red car guy either) and the interlagos one.

I'd consider either DCT or manual but probably prefer DCT. 

There was almost never a scenario where this warranty made sense for us in NZ. Shipping whatever you wanted the warranty on back to the states was usually more expensive than the item itself in almost every scenario.

Mostly boring stuff recently. But might as well add it to the log. Previously the car had a UUC evo3 short shifter. I hated it 90% of the time because the shift effort was way too high and made the gearbox feel like a pig to drive especially when cold. But admittedly it was super nice when driving the car closer to the limit since a lot of the resistance between gears disappears and you get a nice tactile short throw. Ultimately I opted to return to a fully OEM setup. I thought about going with the AS SSK with a OEM throw and just use their redesigned linkage but that would have cost something like $700 once shipped and everything and OEM was less than half that via Schmiedmann.

At the same time replaced every bushing and wear part in the linkage. What a huge upgrade. The throw feels like a perfect length, shift effort is perfect. Everyone who complains that these shifters are sloppy are wrong, the bushings are probably just knackered. The gear change is super tactile and I have zero complaints, other than the fact that the install is a nightmare and took me something ridiculous like 5-6 hours. 

Other job I finally crossed off the list was getting a second key. Since getting the car I have only had a single manual key. First tried through BMW but apparently they no longer stock remote keys for the E46 so I went via ebay and got a shell incl transponder and chip for $20. Once it got here I quickly realised that it wouldn't work since my car is a jap import with the dreaded IR key. I remember the IR on my old E46 sedan was horrible so I wasn't going to have that on this car and decided I would convert it to RF.

Picked up a 433mhz FZV antenna from a scrap car for 10 dollars with the connector needed and bought some additional wire to run to the GM5/fuse box.

Old Unit:

New unit:

Ran the new wire through to the GM5 and fusebox and tapped into the relevant lines. Wiring isn't really my thing but I tried to make it as tidy as possible and run it with all the existing loom. Photo below was just how I had it set up while I was testing to make sure I had the right wires, I did tidy it up after.

I did get stuck here for a couple hours when I couldn't get the key to pair but realised after banging my head against the wall that I had put one of the fuses in the wrong place so none of the central locking system was working at all. As soon as I put that fuse back it paired up no problem and the key was remotely locking/unlocking. Had the key cut locally and had Tom code it to the EWS. 

All in, I realised the car was IR on Saturday and by Monday I had a fully functional key so it is a pretty easy conversion and well worth it. Not to mention the key itself was $20 from ebay, AFZ antenna $10, wiring $10, and key cutting was $40. Grand total of $80 when the original quote from BMW that I got a year ago was $5XX or so. 

That last thing I've been doing recently is swapping the cheap mtexture door cards onto a clean set of vinyls. The originals were in rough condition with rips and scuffs all over them. They were probably repairable but I don't have a vinyl person I trust to do them properly and coupe doorcards are still relatively available. Found a good condition set from Brent at BM World which I'm using as donors. 

First OEM insert removed:

And here it is in place on the new donor vinyl section:

Super time consuming drilling out the plastic welds and fixing the panel in place but easy enough and I'm happy with the results. These are in good enough condition that I'll probably end up using them instead of the ones in my car. 

I've seen a few sets in e46s around the Auckland pickapart/zebra yards. Most of them pretty average condition but you can probably piece together one decent condition set.

5 hours ago, M3_Power said:

Armstrong in East Tamaki can cut them

it’s considered a 4 side cut so expect to pay 4x the cost of a normal key.

I have blanks and chips if you need them.

Thanks Tom, have one ordered from ebay but I'll let you know if all else fails and I'll buy one off you

Called BMW a couple weeks ago trying to source a remote key for my M3 since I currently only have a manual one. The remote keys are no longer available apparently. Seems like you can by the diamond key blanks with the chip in it but it needs to be coded/cut. The coding I can do but does anyone know a place that can cut the key to match the manual one I have? 

3 hours ago, Driftit said:

Japan can be an issue and expensive unless it is a car/boat etc.
As Julian said you are best to try all the freight forwarders.

Bummer, yep have a few pending quotes from different forwarders. Will see what comes back, thanks. 

1 minute ago, Driftit said:

Where from?

Japan

What is the best way to get oversize heavy/bulky items shipped here internationally at the moment? Don't really care if it takes forever to arrive just looking for an option that isn't a few grand for a 60kg package. 

Put the car back together a couple weeks ago with all new power steering parts. New high pressure lines, reservoir, fluid etc. Also pulled the second hand pump that I got off trademe for cheap apart and it was perfect inside. Got very lucky with that being for sale at exactly the same time as my car decided to fry one.

Checked all the internals

Also decided that while I had the pump apart I would modify the pressure regulator by stacking the old shim with the new one and reduce the power steering assistance by an additional 12.5% according to forums. Supposedly this would also help to keep temps slightly lower, whether or not that is true I have no idea.

Reassembled pressure regulator with the stacked shims:

Fully re-assembled pump, looked like brand new:

I didn't take any photos of all the refreshed power steering lines but it is nice to have all those finally replaced. They had been weeping since I had bought the car and probably long before. 

Decided I would re-dye the parcel shelf as a saw a few others do on this forum since mine was that typical faded purple that all E46's seem to get. I totally forgot to take before photos but the after is infinitely better than before. Very happy.

Everything back together:

Also decided I would buy the m-texture door cards Tom has had for sale for a while now. I really didn't need them but I couldn't resist. I was prepared to get some really beat up manky door cards but they were in much better condition than I initially thought and couldn't believe how well they cleaned up. Considering they were $100 for the full set front and rear I'm stoked. 

Once I cleaned the alcantara part of the door card up they were in super good condition. Best $100 dollars I've spent in recent memory, even though these are pretty much just going to go into storage. The vinyl on them is pretty beat up so eventually I'll either have it repaired or swap the inserts into a cleaner set of vinyl cards.

Couple close-up shots comparing the reproduction fabric from my bucket seats to OEM:

Not sure what it is about the fabric but I just have an obsession for it. Has to be one of BMW's coolest interior options imo.

According to the vin this car is a non-sunroof version. It's just a lazy ad by a guy trying to flip it to make money. Sunroof delete would usually mean the sunroof has been replaced by a fixed panel to save weight.

1 hour ago, Neil McCauley said:

With the way the E46 roof is constructed, it would be easier to peel the whole skin off and replace it with a slick top skin, but if you're going to that much trouble, a carbon panel would have been the way to go surely. 

That's not true at all. There are loads of sunroof delete panels which are significantly cheaper and easier than a full slicktop conversion.

Not very familiar with these so maybe it's common but damn that alcantara interior is super cool. 

I've been itching for one of these recently... I way prefer the 4 door to the coupe

All those parts including bolts are available from schmiedmann for a reasonable price except #12 which is pretty expensive. Buying stuff like that hurts when it's available at a scrapyard for dirt cheap though. There's 4 or 5 at the auckland scrapyards that all have those bits. 

Agreed, OE is the way to go where possible. Will be like a new car when done!

Who's doing the upholstery work?