Interlagos Blue E92 M3 - Modification Journal

[Kev]

Originally Posted by Kev

Teaser of the roof after getting the 3M Di-Noc car skin installed, waiting to get the shark fin painted Jet Black to match:



I'll be doing the OSS headlights and get my front bumper refinished this week. That would pretty much sums up the exterior mods for a while until I find a front end solution that I like.

Next few projects on the block are:

1. To continue working to transfer the seat occupancy sensor from the US-spec seat cushion to the Euro-spec cushion and work on getting the seat covers to replace the US-spec seat bottoms to Euro-spec.

2. Thinking about a BBK upgrade with the summer wheels, possibly doing the GT4 brake ducts upgrade too.

Car is dropped off for front bumper repair and to paint the shark fin Jet Black

Just bought a replacement headlight on the Bay last night and will send my driver side headlight back out to Luis @ OSS to have angel eyes transferred over to the hew headlight. Since Luis is pretty busy, it probably won't come back until the week after next though, which I'm ok with since I might have some idea about a front end upgrade at that time.

[Kev]

I was a little bored tonight and snapped this:



It's really beautiful when they do light up:



Waiting for the driver side to be re-done so I can put them on my car.

Here's the full list of my front lighting mod:

1. D1S - stock Osram Sylvania 4300K D1S (reverted from Philips Ultinon 6000K)
2. H3 - PIAA Southern Star 5100K H3 (planning to try some LED and see if that would throw code not)
3. H8 - no longer present, had been replaced by the OSS angel eyes.
4. PY24W - still no replacement available at present, might have to paint them with the reflective paint to get rid of the "fried egg" look.
5. Tint film / protection - will do a really light smoke on the headlights to serve as protection. They looked great on Johnny's car, but I'm going for a slightly less dark tint to match my tails.

[Kev]

I also started making some progress with respect to the Euro seat bottom projects that I have put on hold for a long while. The major hold up in the uncertainty surrounding the seat occupancy sensor in the passenger seat. The OC3 seat occupancy sensor used in the US-spec M3 is different from what they use in EU-spec cars. When you buy a EU-spec seat bottom, it only comes with the cushion, whereas in the US, when you buy a seat cushion, it comes with this black thing that seems to double as a seat heating element as well as the occupancy sensor. You can see the difference in this pic below:



The one on your left side is the US-spec M3 seat bottom, and the one on your right is the Euro-spec M3 seat bottom.

I started working on the US spec cushion today. I found that the sensor is held onto the seat by just double-sided tape, glue, and two metal guide rods. It was really easy to peel off the sensor. I'm going to work on transferring it over to the Euro spec cushion today:



You can see the Euro-spec cushion on top of the now naked US-spec cushion, and the sensor on the floor.

In case you are wondering how different the two seat cushions are, here is a side profile of both:



The top one is Euro-spec and the bottom one is US-spec. You can see that the Euro-spec seat cushion has a higher side / lateral projection than the US-spec seat cushion, which is literally the Sport seats (ZSP) on the regular 3-series.

If you are not well versed about the difference between Euro-spec and US-spec differences, here are some pics for comparison:

Euro-spec:







US-spec:







You can see how flat the US-spec seat cushion is compared to the Euro-spec one.

[Mike@F1 Autohaüs]

Nice stuff Kevin.

H3 LED right here -> http://www.e90post.com/forums/attach...1&d=1256408128

[Kev]

Originally Posted by Mike@F1 Autohaüs

Nice stuff Kevin.

H3 LED right here -> http://www.e90post.com/forums/attach...1&d=1256408128

Mike, that looks awesome. Do you need to run resistors or not?

[hl0m4n]

hey kev great project. looking forward to seeing if these oc3 sensors can be moved to the perf or any aftermarket seat you would be a savior to us all .

the black pad are they flexible, do they bend a bit?

so the only way we will know if these will work on bmw perf seats is if someone opens it up and sees if the oc3 sensors fits on the pad?

do you know if heated seats are built in the cushion or is it on the black part as well cause i know the bmw perf seats have a heated seat function on them.

[Kev]

Originally Posted by hl0m4n

hey kev great project. looking forward to seeing if these oc3 sensors can be moved to the perf or any aftermarket seat you would be a savior to us all .

the black pad are they flexible, do they bend a bit?

so the only way we will know if these will work on bmw perf seats is if someone opens it up and sees if the oc3 sensors fits on the pad?

do you know if heated seats are built in the cushion or is it on the black part as well cause i know the bmw perf seats have a heated seat function on them.

The black pad is flexible. I'm not exactly sure what function it serves other than being the seat occupancy sensor. I'll have to test it out when I get the Euro-spec seat covers in.

[Kev]

Just got the car back from the body shop and a couple more teaser shots of the roof:







I think everything came out nicely. What do you think?

[BMW_03]

Nice looking... Now you can have the best of both, CF and Sunroof... I miss my sunroof sometimes...

[Kev]

Originally Posted by ElBolo

Nice looking... Now you can have the best of both, CF and Sunroof... I miss my sunroof sometimes...

That's just a Di-Noc wrap, so it's not real CF. I'm still waiting for someone to create a real CF roof for the sun-roof optioned car.

[Trier Germany]

Awesome,


keep us informed with your progress on the OC3 passenger seat sensor

[PYSpeed.com]

The 3M Di-Noc Wrap looks Awesome. Enough Teasing.... close up shots! =)

[KANdaddy]

Originally Posted by Kev

That's just a Di-Noc wrap, so it's not real CF. I'm still waiting for someone to create a real CF roof for the sun-roof optioned car.

I'm pretty sure I read a while back that either V-steiner or IND have a cf roof for e90 w/ sunroof

EDIT - yup...I was right - http://www.m3post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=313777

http://www.m3post.com/forums/showthr...31#post6083431

[Kev]

Originally Posted by Eric@PYSpeed.com

The 3M Di-Noc Wrap looks Awesome. Enough Teasing.... close up shots! =)

Eric, you know how bad our weather has been lately? I'll have to wait for the sky to clear up before I head out for some official shots.

Originally Posted by KANdaddy

I'm pretty sure I read a while back that either V-steiner or IND have a cf roof for e90 w/ sunroof

EDIT - yup...I was right - http://www.m3post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=313777

http://www.m3post.com/forums/showthr...31#post6083431

Thanks for the info. Both Vorsteiner and IND have CF roofs for the E90 but nothing for the E92 with sunroof yet, so I'm still patiently waiting. It's probably because there are a lot of E92 with the factory CF roof already. However, they are ignoring a potential market from the regular E92 owners, IMHO.

[lazyassand1balla24]

nice ride

[Kev]

Rainy day here again in the Emerald City, so I was stuck at home and decided to finish transferring the seat occupancy sensor over to the Euro-spec seat cushion. Here's the end result:



I think it's time to order up the seat bottom covers and move on with the rest of retrofit project

[leemik]

wow lovin' the roof.. good job kev!!

[Westman_Ume]

Your M3 looks amazing in Interlagos Blue love the work you have put down on it.

[M GmbH]

You mentioned that the EU seat cushions are the same as the Sport seats (ZSP) on the regular 3-series. Do you need to order EU seat bottoms or just ZSP's?

[Kev]

Originally Posted by M GmbH

You mentioned that the EU seat cushions are the same as the Sport seats (ZSP) on the regular 3-series. Do you need to order EU seat bottoms or just ZSP's?

I think you misunderstood what I meant.

The US-spec M3 seat bottom is the same as the regular 3-series seat bottom with Sport Package (ZSP)

The EU-spec M3 seat bottom is different.

[TLud]

Kev, I assume that changing out the seat bottoms requires changing out the leather covers also. Did those come with the seats bottoms? How much did it all run you? Very cool project.

I'm also looking forward to seeing the OSS lights finished and on your car.

[Kev]

Originally Posted by TLud

Kev, I assume that changing out the seat bottoms requires changing out the leather covers also. Did those come with the seats bottoms? How much did it all run you? Very cool project.

I'm also looking forward to seeing the OSS lights finished and on your car.

The seat covers are extra and with the current exchange rate, they'll add another 12-1400 to the cost of the project.