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Cement

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Everything posted by Cement

  1. No progress on the coilover install and in general lately as I've been doing a bit of renovation work at home ... and consequently the garage is also chocka full of junk. Should be all done with the renno's in a few weeks 🤞 I have been planning out a full revamp of all the bespoke electronics so it's all really tidy and ultra serviceable. Will basically make an easily removable 'module' which will house all of the components under behind the glove box: Arduino Mega in screw terminal breakout (CAN interfaces, fan control, data transmit for custom display etc) Arduino Mega in screw terminal breakout (future project not committed to yet) Arduino Nano (steering wheel audio controls) Orange Pi (drives 7.9" display via HDMI ) Smart power board (will trigger Orange Pi to shutdown gracefully on ign off) Power distribution for 5V (sensors), 8V (Arduinos) and 12V power Nice plugs for interfacing with the car wiring so I can remove the whole module easily Might look at some sort of HDMI switching so I can display front / rear cameras on the screen On the way through I'll get the touch functionality working on my screen so I can flip between different data displays or something fun.
  2. I wonder if BMW New Zealand would see an opportunity here to pick up the hosting cost (sponsorship) and provide an easy mechanism plus sharp pricing on parts for members ? When asked I got some not shocking prices out of them and was easy enough to deal with. I think they are missing an opportunity in the parts space. Plenty of nerds here that could do the admin / infra management. 🤔
  3. Cement

    Quick rant thread.

    That is potentially the worst looking vehicle I've laid eyes upon.
  4. Looking super haaaaawt !! Must be awesome to have it driving Is the donor car heading to the wreckers once done with ? I need to hack at one as per my thread:
  5. A weird request, but I'm looking for a cut out section of E46 roof which contains the gutter trim mounting 'prong'. When doing my carbon roof I dispose of all mine and now need to recreate them so I can install the gutter trims with the OEM clips. I might be able to take a hole saw to pick a part and bore a big section out but unsure of this?!
  6. Looking for a good condition rear M-Tech 2 bumper for my E46 coupe to replace the value line item on there at present. Am based in Auckland. Happy to pickup etc.
  7. Got the new coilovers today 😍, usual story of bumbling around at FedEx East Tamaki for longer than they took to get here from Australia. Super impressed with the packaging, look and quality of everything I've seen so far !! Will be a few weeks at least until I can get them installed. Likely will do an oil change at the same time and try some 5w40 (which i see is on special at the moment) to get a few more psi of oil pressure at idle.
  8. I totally get it, back of the napkin says I'm at about 2100% of purchase price 🤣 We're very fortunate that we can mess with such things in the pursuit of enjoyment and satisfaction for sure. I think too many people are obsessed with the 'and then' mentality where you're always chasing that next then that's going to unlock some magical level of happiness ... waiting to retire to take that holiday and then we'll be happy ... slaving for that promotion and then i'll be satisfied ... etc. Full disclosure: Not saying I'm any different and I probably say this to justify my own spending habits hah
  9. Yuuuur great pics !!
  10. Interesting thanks @Eagle, us Aucklanders only get to drive hard enough to notice such things when on a dedicated outing so might leave it until the next major piece of work You coming up to the coffee and cars ? Got the new front bumper and it looks fairly descent ... hopefully it fits nicely. The original bumper has seen some action and is crazy cracked in a few places etc.
  11. @Vass I'd tend to go back to LVVTA and see what recourse you may have to get some action, they may have some internal standards / targets they can give the certifier a reminder about ? Ultimately it does reflect on them directly so you'd hope they have some motivation to ensure the process is working well. Alternately you could see if there are others in the same boat by posting on the forum ? https://lvvta.proboards.com/ ... I've posted a number of times and always gotten replies from an actual LVVTA person within a few days 👍
  12. Negative, went with the Powerflex bushings all round. Are the mono balls supposed to offer some big advantage ? Thankyou for the kind words I used to be a design / mechanical engineer many years ago and have always been into things mechanical / technical / hands on ... whether that is playing with cars or designing / building a deck etc. I'm in the tech game now and have been for some time so this project ticks a lot of boxes for me and the things I enjoy doing 👍
  13. Very cool milestone !! Looking forward to the next updates 👍
  14. Cement

    Quick rant thread.

    One for the ute files 😂 Literally every car in the car park bar maybe 3...
  15. Damn brother, not wasting any time getting stuck in 😅
  16. Yea I've got to be honest I had never heard of them either but was initially looking to get Shockworks items and they are held in the same regard, and are both Australian companies (MCA also being AU made I believe). By all accounts they really know their stuff and make a very very good product. I assume the rear rates are high due to being a divorced setup and the additional leverage the design has on the spring ? Was considering the Pro Comfort's but decided to go for the additional lowering range of the Sport's. Apparently still very street happy 🤞
  17. Well I am yet to sort out my gauge bezel rings BUT I have gone and splurged on some MCA Pro Sport coilovers 😍 !! I've never had some really nice suspension so this will be firmly in the luxury camp for me and can't wait. Also have a M3 style front bumper to pickup to replace the rather used M-Tech 2 which is on there. Might be a good excuse to paint the stone chipped bonnet and guards etc also 🤔
  18. Cement

    Quick rant thread.

    The struggle is real, I think they update their stock levels once a month 😆
  19. Cement

    Miss BM V.3

    Sorry to hijack the thread, where are the details for this cruise / meet up ?
  20. I've got all of the OEM audio pulled out of mine, you're welcome to the stacker if it's useful to you. Worked fine 👍
  21. The annoying part was there was no obvious damage, the needles just didn't move at all or were sporadic ... I believe the internal gears get damaged or bent ? The speedo zero position was a bit of a trick, if you look at the new gauge face you can see it's actually not quite the same as the original where 0 is the same offset as the other increments. Hence the needle pointing to nothing at rest. The speed signal is coming from the ABS module (I'm just doing RPM and temp via Arduino, plus things like over temp and check light) but I do believe you can adjust it via some coding if needed ? I did indeed remove the rings not thinking / knowing I could just swap the entire bezel 😂 Oh how I wish I'd simply done this hah
  22. Got the new gauge face today, well packaged and overall I'm really impressed with the quality !! I got the face fitted today but not after some drama, which I could have probably avoided if I'd read a bit more before starting. Minor issue: I'd got some chrome bezels from a 330 cluster some time back and was waiting for this job to install them. Didn't realise they were only held in with some mastic it seems so need to source some to fit them permanently. No biggie. Major issue: Managed to break 3 out of the 5 stepper motors when removing / installing the needles 😭 After much researching it seemed this was a common issue and I just needed to be more careful with the removal / install. Conveniently I have 2 spare clusters (one from the bezels and one for my CAN development) to rob parts from !! I tested the one which was still complete and all motors worked well ... considered using that whole cluster and doing the EEPROM plus coding thing, but that seemed like another layer of drama I'd prefer to avoid, and I still needed to remove / install the needles. What I ended up doing was removing all 5 stepper motors from the good cluster and swapping them into my otherwise good board. Turned out to be incredibly easy and everything is working perfectly again !!! Top tip was to use compressed air to blast out the liquid solder instead of using a wick or sucker. General & pics: As I'm driving the tacho via my Arduino it was relatively simple to re-calibrate this to suit the new RPM range. I also fixed up the left hand stalk which has never clicked 👍
  23. Not sure what flavour green this is but just spotted at BMW North Shore.
  24. Congrats, a milestone for sure !! I'm just going through my second cert (1st update) now and WoF set to expire the day after my booking this coming week at BMW 😕 At this point I just tell my cert guy I'll see him next time 😅
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