William's 330Ci ZHP Maintenance and Project Thread

[fredo]

I like the update ! But what do u plan to do about LED bulbs ?

[BMWCurves]

I just put the factory bulbs back in. Not sure what I'm going to do with the LED bulbs. They were only $16 so I'm not much out of pocket. In the mean time I'm going to look for some shorter 7440 LED amber bulbs.

[BMWCurves]

Today I took another step in completing my E46 M3 interior swap: installing the passenger side door panel. It was all pretty straight forward, just took a little time, but didn't take any pictures . I plan to take some when I do the driver's side door panel as a part of my "E46 Coupe Interior Swap and Sound Deadening DIY" guide that I'll post later.

I won't go into too many details until I do the driver's side, but a basic overview:

1. Look up a ton of guides on removing a coupe's door panels. Settle on one that seems decent enough: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1Ksw1Ryamo
2. Remove three T20 screws from underneath the armrest.
3. Remove "airbag" cap above the arm rest and remove T20 screw
4. Remove the cap inside the door handle (quite a bitch, you need a good blade to fit in between there) and remove the T20 screw.
5. Using a trim removal tool, work your way around popping out the panel clips, starting from the outermost top and going clockwise.
6. Lock the door so the panel has room to move, and then pull the panel up and away from the door to release the panel from the door.
7. Disconnect the door handle release and wiring harnesses to the mid/tweeter speakers and the bass speaker.
8. Discover that whoever was in there last smashed two of the door clips on the bottom and that may be why there was some of a rattle
9. Realize that 90% of the door clips have the foam washers already, as compared to the M3 panel which none of the door clips have the foam washer despite being from a newer car.
10. Install new door clips (51418224768 and 51418224781) into the M3 panel. Realize that the "rubber" that is supposed to be on 51418224781 is in fact foam, so the only discernible difference between the two clips is the color of the clip. Weird. Installed three 51418224781 along the vertical bracket spots closest to where the door hinge will be.
11. Transfer over the speakers from the ZHP panel to the M3 panel. My car's speakers are ~8 months older, but have only seen 54k miles and 49k of those miles were a very quiet couple who I doubt were blasting the speakers very loud. That is opposed to the M3 which was owned by a young guy. I don't trust young guys. We love our music too loud, for the most part. Was simple enough to do, just a few philips and T20 screws.
12. Transferred arm rests to opposite door panels - I wanted to keep my black cube trim. Easy enough as well, just 6 T20 screws. Hardest part was transferring the arm rest leather pads. Ended up snapping one of the pins from the leather pad that went into my car, but it sits securely so I'm not worried about it. Will detail it more later. Screwed the arm rest back into the door panel.
13. Installed sound deadening - I pulled back some of the vapor barrier and started applying 4-9 inch² pieces along the larger parts of the door and the door panel. I had purchased sound deadening by Noico (more details later) on Amazon, one a butyl type, another a foam type. I did the butyl first, then covered it up with foam strips. Once I was done, I pushed the vapor barrier back down on the adhesive.
14. I reinstalled the door panel. This part was hard to do to get all the door clips to align properly, but I managed to do it without snapping more than one door clip.

Overall the door panel looks great and I'm looking forward to getting the rest of my swap done. The door itself is marginally quieter and thicker sounding when I close it, but I'm hoping it will mitigate some road noise. I realized that I am missing the center arm rest from an M3, but I'm not
too bothered by that right now.

[anandoc]

Awesome! Look forward to the pics.

After posting my last message on your thread, I realized that you have a coupe - so the LED lights you are using for your turn signals wont work on mine. I am sure you will find shorter ones which would work with your car.

[johnrando]

Good stuff

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[BMWCurves]

Back in February I purchased a relatively complete Black Nappa leather interior (N5SW) pulled from a 2006 E46 Laguna Seca Blue M3. The purchase did not include the center armrest, center console trim, or the three dash trim pieces. This was not a big deal to me as I wanted to keep my black cube trim that came with the car, and I won't mind the difference in leather between the center armrest and the rest of the car. The M3 trim I did have was Brushed Aluminum Shadow trim (737). Below is the installation order of the parts:

02/08/16 (53,365 miles) - Installed front seats from an E46 M3. This went well and was not hard to do. The downside is that I discovered that both the side bolster adjustment and the seat heating element were not functioning in the passenger seat, despite what the seller had said.

I purchased a new side bolster switch (52102695396). When I installed the new side bolster adjustment switch in March, it would fill the bolsters, but not release them, indicating a stuck valve. I dropped the car off at my mechanic to have it inspected. He diagnosed it as a failing solenoid in the lumbar valve unit (part no. 67668385631). He jerry rigged a setup so that the fill and empty valve worked through just the fill valve so I could get by while the part arrived from Germany. Brought it back to the mechanic when the valve arrived in June. He installed it, but then the air pump that feeds both the lumbar support and the side bolster support seized. I left the car with him to replace the air pump (52107902273). When I finally picked the car back up in early July, he had installed the pump and also fixed the heat function on the passenger seat.

Despite the involved process, the front seats from the M3 have been thoroughly worth it. The Nappa leather is definitely a step up in quality than the Montana leather, IMO. It's more supple and has a nicer touch. The lumbar support and side bolster support are exactly what I was looking for, especially since my factory seats did not have lumbar support. I'm a very skinny guy so the added side support has been great in the bends.

07/10/2016 (54,992 miles) - Installed the passenger's side door card, added Noico-branded sound deadening material I had purchased through Amazon, and swapped over the speakers and black cube trim from my door to the M3 door card. Installed two types of door clips with foam washers to minimize door rattle: 51418224768 and 51418224781.

07/11/2016 (55,010 miles) - Installed the driver's side door card, added Noico-branded sound deadening material I had purchased through Amazon, and swapped over the speakers and black cube trim from my door to the M3 door card. Installed two types of door clips with foam washers to minimize door rattle: 51418224768 and 51418224781.

07/13/2016 (55,044 miles) - Installed rear interior including headrests, rear "door" cards, rear side bolsters, rear seat backs, and rear seat bottom. Swapped over the speakers from my rear "door" cards to the M3 "door" cards.

Overall I am pleased with the new interior so far. Two issues:

1. I lost the pin for cover that goes over the rear side bolster to lock the cover in place (52207001301). Not a big issue, but I'll purchase one soon to replace it.
2. In installing the rear seat bottom I thought I was being careful by wrapping the metal loops in towels, but they still managed to cause some minor scratches to the rear armrest trim and gouge a pretty significant cut in the non-leather part of the passenger rear "door" card. Really annoyed about that one. I'm going to just live with it for now, but I plan to have it taken to this leather guy to see what he can do to clean it up.

My DIY thread on the interior swap has more details on the procedure and can be found here

[san]

Off topic but you said your new black interior came from 2006 Laguna seca blue M3, but wasn't that color only available pre (facelift) 2004? Or was it an individual option?


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[johnrando]

Good stuff!

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[BMWCurves]

Gave the car a quick two-bucket wash today.

Off topic but you said your new black interior came from 2006 Laguna seca blue M3, but wasn't that color only available pre (facelift) 2004? Or was it an individual option?

I believe LSB was discontinued in 09/04, which should be good for MY 2005 I think. The photos the seller showed me of his car were of a LSB E46 M3 with LED tails and said it was an '06. Maybe he was mistaken.

Good stuff!

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Thanks!

[BMWCurves]

Mileage: 55,511

Put my car into storage while I'm away in DC for 4.5 months. Stored it in a friend's family's large barn with the help of his dad. I did the following in prep:

• Washed the car this morning. Wish I could have waxed it but didn't have the time.
• Swapped my APEX ARC-8 wheels with Conti tires w/ my Style 135s wrapped in old Toyo tires. I doubt I'll use those tires often so even if they get a flat spot on them, they're tires I care less about.
• Pumped up the tires' pressure to ~48 psi on all corners
• Parked the car on wood so hopefully that'll compress a little and be easier on the tires.
• Filled the gas tank just shy of full
• Poured in ~6 oz of Sta-Bil fuel stabilizer into the gas tank and ran the car for ~5 minutes to try and get some of the mixture to be sent through the fuel lines and injectors.
• Plugged the battery into a trickle charger with a cycling feature. It is plugged in at the battery terminals rather than the terminals in the engine compartment.
• Stuck dryer sheets throughout the car (trunk, interior, engine compartment, tailpipe around the car) to fend off mice.
• Placed mothballs around the engine compartment as well as the car and in the tailpipe (I put a ball of them into a dryer sheet and shoved that up in there).
• Parked the car in gear but with the parking brake down.
• Covered the car with a large sheet, but will most likely replace that with a car cover in the near future.

Was so hard to let it go