Atacama Yellow 35is build thread

[B21]

That's pretty much exactly what I'd end up with if I built a garage. No need to actually go back into the house at all

It’s a long dark cold winter up here..so best to get dug in well

[B21]

Alignment part 4..

After having fitted a variety of suspension / steering parts..Ohlins R+t, M3 steering linkages, monoball steering bushes, M3 trailing arm bushes, H&R ARBs, Meyle HD steering arms, Powerflex rear camber arms, front camber plates, I've had the guys fitting them re-align things, but not very well..the last guys got the ride height fairly well but I could see visually the rear wheel cambers were off.

They were so bad in the end I used a spirit level against the tyre wall and an iphone app to try and get them closer to OE spec.

Having failed locally to find anyone up to it /willing I was recommended Automek in East Kilbride.

Had a happy morning there today..top notch folks with state of the art kit and very very knowledgeable.

As you can see (although the red colour is not necessarily an overall indicator) the front cambers were different, the front LHS toe was out not in and the rear LHS toe was massively out.

Despite lots of adjustablity from the parts I fitted, we couldn't get the rear camber in on both sides without assymetrical rear toes..so we agreed to focus on rear toe and let the camber come out a bit.

Have to say the drive back from East Kilbride down to Moffat and then past Marys Loch was sooo much better..

I'll return next year to have adjustable toe plates fitted to bring it all into my line /liking..

[Busterboo]

Ah, the joys of a yellow car and a yellow flag. NOT.

[B21]

Given the price of electricity now and lacking the desire to use an open flame type heating device I’ve bit the bullet and bought an integrated ie no separate condenser wall hung air source heat pump / air conditioner…

With temperatures here is the winter at freezing or below and with several big overhaul / upgrade projects on the Yellow Peril the prospect of snapping plastics and fingers in the cold weather was too much.

Plus on the 5 days of the year where the temp here goes above 30c then it would make a nice place to chill.

Bought this unit for £775..I’m not able to cope with connecting a unit that has a separate condenser so too the risk on this baby.

For around 800 watts of power it generates a theoretical 2.8 k watts of heat..

I have to stay with the outside at -11c and the inside starting at -7c it seemed to take quite a while to warm up..but with 24 sq metres of concrete and over 60 cubic metre of space I guess that would be a challenge.

Today at -2c and with a run at it we hit 11c after 3 hours which felt positively toasty.

Quite noisy from the fans..so the music needs a couple of notches up….

[B21]

Scissor lift part deux..

I bought a scissor lift a few months ago and have been using it now for a while..so time for some post purchase evaluation…

So the good bits…

It’s very sturdy and works pretty well…access to front and rear wheel arches is great and any work in and around the arches is easy and unfettered. Similarly the front and rear access is good..in my case with limited roof height I have to resort to sitting on a small Hilka wheeled seat to work comfortably.

What’s not so good is accessing anything in the centre of the car over quite a wide area…which I was well l aware off prior to purchase..however, what I didn’t realise till I started reading the instructions for many of the overhaul / update programs I had was the phrase ‘ remove the complete exhaust system’ which is a no no with this system

So..

I’ve made 4 very chunky wheel supports, the idea being to lift the car on its jacking points, then place the wheel supports in place, lower the car down do the wheels rest on the supports, then continue to lower the car scissor lift to the floor.

I’ve made out of marine ply a new floor to rest on top of the scissor lift so I then have a reasonable amount of space to work under the car to get the exhaust system off.

Then the car can be lifted to work on say the turbos or fuel tank…if the worse comes to the worse then I just have to work in a prone position but I’m not pinned in and it’s warm an d flat on the thick marine ply board.

Here’s the video..

https://youtu.be/IYvJ1I7Z1ZU

[Silverstar]

Given the price of electricity now and lacking the desire to use an open flame type heating device I’ve bit the bullet and bought an integrated ie no separate condenser wall hung air source heat pump / air conditioner…

With temperatures here is the winter at freezing or below and with several big overhaul / upgrade projects on the Yellow Peril the prospect of snapping plastics and fingers in the cold weather was too much.

Plus on the 5 days of the year where the temp here goes above 30c then it would make a nice place to chill.

Bought this unit for £775..I’m not able to cope with connecting a unit that has a separate condenser so too the risk on this baby.

For around 800 watts of power it generates a theoretical 2.8 k watts of heat..

I have to stay with the outside at -11c and the inside starting at -7c it seemed to take quite a while to warm up..but with 24 sq metres of concrete and over 60 cubic metre of space I guess that would be a challenge.

Today at -2c and with a run at it we hit 11c after 3 hours which felt positively toasty.

Quite noisy from the fans..so the music needs a couple of notches up….

Maybe a second unit will help get the temperatures up higher.

[B21]

Given the price of electricity now and lacking the desire to use an open flame type heating device I’ve bit the bullet and bought an integrated ie no separate condenser wall hung air source heat pump / air conditioner…

With temperatures here is the winter at freezing or below and with several big overhaul / upgrade projects on the Yellow Peril the prospect of snapping plastics and fingers in the cold weather was too much.

Plus on the 5 days of the year where the temp here goes above 30c then it would make a nice place to chill.

Bought this unit for £775..I’m not able to cope with connecting a unit that has a separate condenser so too the risk on this baby.

For around 800 watts of power it generates a theoretical 2.8 k watts of heat..

I have to stay with the outside at -11c and the inside starting at -7c it seemed to take quite a while to warm up..but with 24 sq metres of concrete and over 60 cubic metre of space I guess that would be a challenge.

Today at -2c and with a run at it we hit 11c after 3 hours which felt positively toasty.

Quite noisy from the fans..so the music needs a couple of notches up….

Maybe a second unit will help get the temperatures up higher.

I’ll try it again now it’s warmer outside…I suspect it was a very demanding case..the efficiency drops off quickly as they pass 0c…

It’s an awful better than no garage….

[Beeacon]

Did you put insulation underneath your ground slab? That concrete base you poured will behave as a big heatsink, and will take a while to heat up to a decent ambient temperature.

[B21]

Did you put insulation underneath your ground slab? That concrete base you poured will behave as a big heatsink, and will take a while to heat up to a decent ambient temperature.

No I didn’t…in part because I didn’t really think about it and in part because I pondered fitting a 2 post or 1 post lift and there were dire warnings about structural integrity of the concrete for bolting said devices down….so it’s severely addressed that issue …8” plus concrete RC30 plus 2 layers of mesh…

I did think about an under floor heating system driven off an air source heat pump…but with the budget if it ever existed busted and SWMBO increasingly suspicious she’d ever see me through the whole winter I passed.

Have to say the floor feels super dry and doesn’t ‘feel’ cold, but as you say nearly 8 cubic metres of concrete will take some heating..

[The.Analyst]

So when is the actual work on the car going to start?

Looks like a great workshop

[B21]

So when is the actual work on the car going to start?

Looks like a great workshop

Today is the day

[B21]

Following on from various musings on age and effectiveness of the the boot rear has struts, as an easy intro to getting on with more challenging matters like the replacement turbos I thought I’d tackle an easier task to get settled in.

So bought some front and rear gas struts which are allegedly BMW ones minus the BMW logo..

So it’s another one if those be brave matters..a flat bladed screwdriver levered against the hinge and out pops the strut end.

Bit of a shock on how the lid suddenly felt very heavy with one of the old struts removed.

Put the new strut in and when replacing the second no such drama…I assume the new strut had more resistance than the old one.

So with two new struts the boot definitely is less likely to ‘flop down’..but as it goes over centre it still will drop down hard..not just as fast or hard as before..

So yes it’s an improvement but not a night n day event..

Decided to quit whilst ahead on the front struts as they are slightly more involved with a plastic shield on one side and plumbing for the windscreen jets.

TBH the front doesn’t feel like it needs changing but since I’ve started I’ll finish..

[B21]

Started work on doors…two jobs…fit Audison uprated 100mm drivers in doors with matching tweeters and…

Get door pulls skinned in carbon fibre to match the rest of the upgraded interior…

[B21]

Bit of a shock, couldn’t find the Audison door speakers for love or money….turns out I bought some Audiotec Fischer versions instead…

These puppies have some very large cross over filters..not sure how they are going to fit inside the door panels…I’ll cross that bridge later when the door handles come back from being carbon fibre’s…

Designed to be used with stock systems or DSP aftermarket you have to change some jumpers on the board for DSP use plus setting the level on the front switch to 0db…

[B21]

Getting ready to fit the new Audiotec Fischer Helix 6.6 in woofers in the footwells…

Interesting that the 677 woofers turn out to be the same as the 676 woofers..unlike the 100mm speakers which are definitely nastier on the 676 compared to the 677.

Slight issue is that the new woofers outer rim just kisses the screw holes in the plywood adapters we have made to allow normal round speakers to fit in the odd shaped BMW speaker recesses…

So just had the screw holes counter sunk and now will have to fit the plywood former first to the bulkhead then screw the speaker onto the former..fiddly..