Cement

Got the seam sealer in and I await the certifier to come and take a look again before i can start to put things back together. Will be installing wiring before the head liner goes in for a dash cam also.

Have been spending far too much time tooling around under the dash getting the Arduino and associated wiring sorted. Ended up making a few simple mistakes (soldering to the wrong pin, forgetting the ground pin on the radio PCB causing me to remake the resistor 5V feed wiring etc) and chasing my tail for a while but got there in the end. I've just got to work out one hex code so i can start / end phone calls else everything is working nicely. Terrible picture below of the Arduino and power converter on a little 3D printed bracket. The wiring within the wheel which I've buggered around with to give me all I need for the radio controls as well as the cruise control module which is still a work in progress.

I try to teach my kids about road safety when out on bikes but keep striking drivers who think they're doing you a favour by ignoring the rules and just sit there waiting for you to ignore that give way or stop sign you're waiting at and move on out. I just have to vigorously wave them on and explain to the kids some people can't follow the rules 🙄

So much work going into this !!! Respect.

Thanks, it's certainly at that point where I want it to be done and back together now !! For sure just sing out 👍 Any dual 300ml cartridges should work fine in it 👍

Finally the lid is back on the can !!! The Mad Max dual cartridge gun worked well but you'd be well served to be on a program of 'roids for a few weeks preceding to get the most out of it 😆 Taped all of the under sides to prevent any excess adhesive from dropping onto the seats etc All clamped down to cure. The sides were a good fit along the car body so didn't need to clamp them down. Tomorrow will get the clamps off and pop some seam sealer along over the top of the joints. Will be ready then for the second certification inspection which is holding up putting the head liner in, so i can get the B pillar's in, so i can get the rear door cards in, so i can get the back seat in etc etc

Finally got the rear speakers and parcel tray installed. Changed it from black to charcoal using the same Duplicolor Vinyl & Fabric as it's a better match for the re-trimmed A/B/C pillars. Looks worse in the picture than in the flesh but definitely has a coarse texture. The speakers fit snugly in the factory plastic baskets and I've secured them with some little printed plastic fittings. The covers go on and all looks OEM.

Getting the permanent solution wired up using an Arduino Nano. The other piece is a 'buck' DC-DC converter to give the Arduino a regulated 10V and protect it from the noise of the car wiring. The 1.5kohm resistors are inside the heat shrink. Have got a cable spliced into pin 27 on the lighting control module which will power this as well as provide the power for the lights in the button panels via a pin in the clock / volute spring.

Nice one and welcome ! There is a wealth of knowledge in the forum content and members to help you out 👍

If anybody needs it, this is the tyre bays email: [email protected] Got a price on some PS5's as below, fitted and balanced: 235/40/18 $319 255/35/18 $423

Got the PoC running nicely and have validated it against the head unit now Next up I will take a look at the cruise control side again and work out the wiring setup + where I will stash the Arduino to deal with the radio controls.

So a little bit of a change in plans based on some tooling around with the volt meter in the car. The radio controls circuit is fed 5V from the cruise control side and as mentioned is already a resistance ladder style ... so that makes it perfect out of the box for directly interfacing with the Arduino !! Score Got some help from a friendly person on an electronics forum (https://www.electro-tech-online.com/threads/simple-circuit-reverse-engineering-steering-wheel-radio-controls.165060/) and can now measure all of the button presses on the Arduino with some basic code. Will be parking my code here if anybody is interested: https://github.com/david-morton/E46-SteeringWheel-Controls/tree/main This is the setup as it stands: Next up will be: Add more code to actually detect the respective button presses Wire in the head unit to this PoC setup Test the internet sourced codes over the wire and see if the head unit does stuff (thanks @Karter16) Work out how I can get everything done with 5 cables total into the wheel via the clock spring taking into account what the cruise control side will need. May try and stash a super small micro controller within the wheel itself ... not sure yet This is the PoC circuit as it stands:

Love to see the DIY solutions !! Great concept you put together there @Karter16 👍 I got my creation complete today, just need to buy some dowel in case I need to get more travel out of mine after the gooping starts.

I copied this from a mailer a few months back ... seems like reasonable value to me and was going to check it out when the time comes.

3000 then 8000 sand then polish and it's looking pretty good. Still some fine sanding marks remain but at this stage i think it can be bonded on and will see about some more work on it later. Top priority now is making the Mad Max caulking gun

Slow progress still, but progress none the less !! Got 4 additional coats of clear on the roof last weekend which was great, less orange peel than last time and no new fish eyes thanks to triple cleaning with wax n grease remover. However did manage to get a lot more dust and crap in it 😂 So back onto the sanding (hence the 4 coats) ... this time have gone for 800 hand then 1200, 3000 (pictured) and then 8000 machine before polish. Biggest issue at the moment is getting a hold of a dual cartridge caulking gun that can take the BMW (SikaForce 7888) adhesive ... the one I got from RA Johnston can't deal with the girth of the thing. Short of getting a gun from over seas at great expense for a one off job I will have to make something ... that's the weekend project, so I can bond the thing on finally !!

Not much to report here, got some good photos which i will use to draw up the PCB shape. Have been tooling around with EasyEDA, an online circuit designer / layout tool ... it's definitely a whole new world to learn !! Just for interest sake here is the rear side of the OEM boards. The radio PCB is actually a resistance ladder circuit which is read by the 'master' over on the cruise control side:

Awesome thanks so much!!

Rightio, have started a dedicated thread for the steering wheel controls ... tune on in if interested

The Car: For this project the relevant parts are that it's an E46 with Nissan VQ37 engine swap (running OEM ECM) and Alpine head unit. I need to interface with both of these things with the steering wheel controls, and neither of them speak BMW. The Plan: Make custom PCB's to replace the OEM units which will interface natively with the headunit and ECM respectively. Complete OEM look and feel but otherwise totally bespoke. Will likely use an Arduino for the radio controls, hopefully I can stash this some place well out of the way. It turns out the Alpine (and other brands I believe) use the same signals as the IR remote sends but simply over the wired interface. As for the Nissan cruise control settings, they are based on a resistance ladder which is documented in the service manual. So the cruise functionality (actually used for changing maps in the ECM) will be all passive and the radio will be a little more involved. So Far: Have taken the OEM items out of the wheel so I can replicate the PCB's physical layout including fixed items like switch pads + lights.

So I've discovered there are two additional pins that are plumbed into my volute / clock spring. This will be super handy when doing my custom PCB steering wheel control jiggery. However, no cable populated in my E46 steering wheel ... anybody know what this little connector is normally used for so I can obtain the cable on both sides ? Just want the plugs essentially then I'm away laughing with 5 pins total i can use 👍 For reference the green plug is the 'regular' one with the airbag, horn and 3 wires for OEM steering wheel controls.

Looking sweet, not too late to go for the Speedflow custom colour anodised fittings... Just sayin 🤣

I have a 4 stage dry sump pump so no stand alone vacuum pump as such ... tis one pressure and three scavenge stages.

I think it's fairly common to have some issues on the dyno, I guess it's a concentrator and highlighter of things that might not show on the street given the nature of it !! Also relatively low power and no power adder makes it more relaxed Bit of an update to the steering wheel control stuff, turns out the Alpine head unit doesn't use a resistance ladder for it's input ... that was just my naive assumption it seems Instead it apparently uses the same signal as the infrared remote !! There is some scattered info on the net about it at least so will get an IR receiver and transmitter for Arduino and see if I can capture from the remote then replay over the wire as a first experiment. The cruise control side of things it seems will be easier in that i will just replicate the Nissan spec on a new / custom PCB and wire it through.

Back into the main project thread with another side project, might start a dedicated thread in case its of use for folks at some point. I will have a crack at making custom PCB's / circuits for the steering wheel controls. Both sides of it for: Cruise control buttons which will go to the Nissan ECU which expects a resistance ladder. BMW has some data based solution. Radio control buttons to go to the Alpine head unit, which also expects a resistance ladder. Can't see the point in trying to use some 3rd party adapter box when I will be messing with the cruise side anyways. Early days but will get the OEM boards out of the wheel this weekend so i can model the shape and button locations. Picture is of starting to look at the cruise signals ... but making some micro controller to take these signals and then some how output a varied resistance / voltage would be somewhat silly.