Craig's 328i Sport - e36 Track Car Build Thread

[s.mac]

looking good

[northernjim]

Is red your favourite colour???









seriously tho it looks great, I love the red stitching on the wheel too

[Craig]

Funnily enough, no word of a lie, I hate red... yet the Ducati is red too!!!

My only concern with the interior is the 'chav' seats, its crying out for a nice set of Recaro Pole Positions but I'm also at the point where I look and think how much exactly do you spend on a 328i before you draw the line.

[Craig]

Well the tin worm finally chomped though enough of my drivers’ front wing that I decided to bite the bullet and get the car painted. Below is attached a picture of the front wing, it’s amazing how corroded it is compared to the rest of the shell is near on perfect.



I figured if you’re going to do a job, you might as well do it right so I decided that I’d get all the other body imperfections sorted at the same time. The list of work whilst the car is in the body shop is as follows;

- Replace front drivers’ side wing.
- Paint full front end to eradicate stone chips.
- Paint lower drivers’ side door, two stone chips were slowly bubbling the paint front underneath.
- Remove small dent from underneath the rear light.
- Remove scuff marks from rear bumper.
- Replace plastic wiper panel.
- Replace cracked wind screen.
- Protect rear arches; very small trace of bubbling on the inner arch lip which I may as well nip in the bud now before it spreads.

My only problem was finding a body shop who’d let me strip the car down, and oversee certain aspects of the work. Fortunately a guy who I work with has his own spray shop and came recommended, he was willing to take on the work and let me work alongside him too!

Here’s some pictures of the work so far;















Even Chris, the painter was surprised how strong the shell is; there are no signs of corrosion on the floor pan or behind the wings, even behind the rear bumper and lights was spotless! When we attacked the arches there was barely any corrosion, just light surface corrosion which had started to bubble the paint.

Hopefully will have more of a progress update in a week or two’s time.

[sailorbaz]

Another top update mate, good stuff. Coming along nicely. Keep up with the updates.

[Craig]

Quick update on what’s been happening the last few weeks;

A tin of this...



Plus a bit of skill and talent...



Equals a shiny, stone chip free, hellrot red BMW!!





As you can see the rotten wing has been replaced (Big thanks to RobBMW for the wing!), and the whole front end looks like new once again. I’m really happy with how the whole job has come out and the paint match is 100% perfect, which is pretty good considering it’s a thirteen year old solid coloured car on 182,000 miles!

There have been a few other little cosmetic add-ons that have been made, more on this within the next few weeks, but here’s a sneak peek;



The car is due to be photographed by Total BMW magazine on the 18th of June, once they have got their pictures I’ll release the final snaps I have of the car, all I can say for now is WOW... I am really impressed with the final outcome the whole car has come together over the last few weeks perfectly, I couldn’t have wished for a better result.

It was also that time of year where I check the whole car out and give it a good going over before I start hitting the track once more, first up on the planned maintenance was to remove all the arch liners, clean off all the road silt and give the wheels a good scrub too.











Next up is to fully strip and rebuild the brakes, run some fresh fluid through there and check all the bushes and ball joints, the suspension is also going to be replaced with a new set, once I’ve decided on what set to go for!!

As well as the above the car will be treated to new oil, filter, coolant, gearbox oil, differential oil and maybe even a viscous fan delete... the plan with the fan delete is to utilise BMW parts across the range i.e 316i lower temperature thermostat and fan switch plus the air conditioning electric fan, I don’t want to run any external non-OEM wiring or parts if I don’t have to.

I can’t wait to post the final pictures of the complete car, as soon as I’ve got some that I’m happy with I’ll get them posted.

[Craig]

The cleaning didn’t stop with the last update, next the brakes were fully stripped, cleaned and rebuilt along with the disc centres painted silver to tidy up the wheel area a little bit more.





Then various bits of trim were removed and all rubber seals taped up to stop polish residue tarnishing them.







Over the next few days the car was treated to the following processes;

- Pre-Cleaned with PH Neutral Snow Foam
- Cleaned with PH Neutral Shampoo
- Clayed with Sonus Green Clay & Meguiars Quick Detailer Spray
- Polished with Meguiars #83 Dual Action Polish & Red Meguiars Pad
- Finished with Meguiars #80 Speed Glaze & Yellow Meguiars Pad
- Waxed with two coats of Dodo Juice Purple Haze

Here are the final results...











Just need to treat and re-fit the black trim and the car is just about done, I’ll worry about sorting the service, viscous fan delete and new semi-slick tyres after the weekend!

[Craig]

The final touch to the interior arrived today, this was one item that took a lot of finding / research but it’s defiantly been worth it... it is a genuine BMW badge which I cross referenced as been the right size after hours of trawling t’interweb it’s not a cheap replica badge that never looks right, it’s the read deal!!

[Bounce]

Originally Posted by Craig

The final touch to the interior arrived today, this was one item that took a lot of finding / research but it’s defiantly been worth it... it is a genuine BMW badge which I cross referenced as been the right size after hours of trawling t’interweb it’s not a cheap replica badge that never looks right, it’s the read deal!!

Looking good.

[Craig]

Aye, last few touches are just going on its nei on complete and is looking awesome!