[Socket]

Installing a lithium battery pack so I dont run the main battery down while playing the stereo with the engine off.

Battery pack and bars being supplied by a local car audio enthusiast

I like what he did with the engraving

[JB4-335]

Good to see SPCGRY still going with mods.

[Socket]

Originally Posted by JB4-335

Good to see SPCGRY still going with mods.

Nice to see you still around JB. What new with you?

[JB4-335]

Originally Posted by Socket

Nice to see you still around JB. What new with you?

I'll always be around Socks. I've been busy with a muscle car of late. Been tinkering with the wife's G20 330i but think I might get myself a 335i to play with on the side as they are so cheap now. Would have to go big single though.

[Socket]

Originally Posted by JB4-335

I'll always be around Socks. I've been busy with a muscle car of late. Been tinkering with the wife's G20 330i but think I might get myself a 335i to play with on the side as they are so cheap now. Would have to go big single though.

Muscle car, awesome, got any pics you can share? Don't be tempted back to the 335 dark side mate

[vtl]

More progress on the single turbo manifold

The link pipe from the manifold to the turbo has been fully welded on. Ended up welding the inside of the divider and porting it out with a die grinder to ensure a smoother transition of the exhaust gasses. The manifold will still need the external wastegate added but that will be later once the downpipe and other parts have been made

For now the bracket for the mockup of the turbo can be removed and the turbo is now held on by the manifold only

[vtl]

One of the parts that doesn't get much info or attention is the water pipe, which can be a tricky part to make. None of the off the shelf alternatives suit RHD low mount fitment so a custom one needs to be made. This pipe also needs to have a fitting for the water feed for the turbo, and also the water feed for the auto/dct heat exchanger portion of the main radiator (not needed for manual cars).

You can buy N54 water flanges off ebay but found the flange is quite thick and results in clearance issues with the turbo once you take into account the head of the bolt. First step was to counterbore the M6 screw holes in the flange to gain some space. The turbo is mounted as close as possible to the engine block in this RHD low mount.

For the pipe itself, I 3D printed some clamps to hold it all into place while trialling fitment. One of the things to keep into account is the clearance to the downpipe Vband and ensuring theres enough space to actually fit the clamp. Making sure it doesn't interfere with the frame rail is also important (only a problem on bigger turbos) and ensuring it still mates up to the water pump without interfering with the thermostat

Luckily the part itself did not need many crazy bends or a really complex routing to work. Only required 90 and 45 degree aluminium elbows, although these were tweaked on the vice and bent to the precise angles needed to get the part perfect

Additionally some 3D printed fittings were made so the whole thing could be pressurized and tested with some soapy water to check for leaks. It is quite easy for pinhole leaks to form on aluminum welds. There was a few spots on the flange which needed to be corrected but all the butt welds of the pipes were ok

[vtl]

After having a look at the routing of the downpipe, it looks like the downpipe cannot be routed downwards even with the tightest bends available with the stock engine bracket in the way. This was going to be the preferred route to allow enough space for the wastegate recirculation pipe along with a flex joint, and also making the downpipe fairly simple to make

It is also possible to route the downpipe rearwards on top of the engine bracket, but having chosen this route previously this resulted in a downpipe that was much harder to make and a design which was not that easy to fit without following an exact sequence

So a custom engine bracket will be done to allow adequate clearance for an easy to make downpipe. A 3D design will be done and most of it will just be laser cut steel plate, so should not be too difficult to make

A jig to hold the subframe was made, and measurements were taken from the engine block of where the bracket will mount. Two of these holes are not used by the original engine mounts and only used on other chassis (like E6x/E7x models. A 3D design was made for the bracket that mounts to the engine block, then some cardboard was used to get a rough idea of the shape required for the downpipe routing. The cardboard was then translated back into the design drawing and some 3D prints will be made to verify the design

[kookie]

I can't wait to see this complete. vtl I hope it wont be a one of one kit

[Socket]

MOD 136 - Yinlong Lithium LTO battery pack

While the low mount turbo mod is being worked on (mod 135) I've been looking into increasing the battery capacity in spcgry to prevent the battery from going flat every time I do a audio tuning session. One option is to install a second battery, but space is an issue as is stuffing around with managing two batteries. Another option which is popular in the car audio scene, is to do a battery delete and replace the stock battery with a lithium battery pack. The battery pack I am looking at is one of the new tech Lithium LTO packs from Yinlong. There are 12 cells (35Ah, 2.3v per cell) configured into a bank of 2x6 cells. The resulting battery pack provides an output of 13.8v with 70Ah capacity, meaning I can run the audio with the car turned off for 24 hrs before needing a charge. The alternator charges at 14.8V which is well below the 16.2V that is considered the max for these cells. Unlike other lithium battery packs, the LTO cells are not flammable as they do not use carbon based anodes but use lithium nano particles instead. So they are apparently very safe to run, particularly at the lower voltages on the 3 series platform. Jury is still out if this will work, but will give it a try and report back EDIT.... after discussing with Vtl, seems this probably wont give the results im expecting. The battery pack is only 70aH which is less then my current AGM. So if anything this will be a step backwards....

[Socket]

MOD 137 - Rear speakers

Installing a set of rear speakers to set up deferential rear fill. Was planning to install them on the C pillars, but there simply is not enough clearance when the seat folds down. Fortunately the rear parcel shelf has cut outs for rear speakers, so it was a pretty simple job to bond in some mounting rings, run some wires and screw in the drivers. Only one problem, the cone on the speaker was touching the speaker grilles, so I had to do a hack job and cut a hole in them. Will def need to get another set and fix them up, but it will do for the moment. In case anyone is wondering the speakers are Hybrid Audio X3 widebands

[Socket]

Car needs a wash but I havn't posted a pic for a while, so here you go

[Socket]

Oh no

[TSilver335i]

Originally Posted by Socket

Oh no

Ouch!

Just seen your system setup vid aswell. Must sound amazing IRL! This system is a huge effort! Props mate

[Socket]

Originally Posted by TSilver335i

Ouch!

Just seen your system setup vid aswell. Must sound amazing IRL! This system is a huge effort! Props mate

thanks mate

[Socket]

MOD 138 - Front Sub
Finally got a spare weekend to start on the final part of the current audio build, installing a front sub. I planned to build a simple box in the passenger footwell, but realised that would not work after pulling up the carpet. A box in the footwell would have covered up the IB midbass in the kicks. So the only option left was to put the sub in the dash where the glove box is

The speaker of choice is the SB acoustics SW26DAC76-4, a shallow, dual aluminum cone, 10" subwoofer, specially designed for small sealed boxes. The build the box, I had to remove the glove box and cut away parts of the dash, to give as much space as possible. Because the blower motor and fuse box is behind the glove box, I couldn't go back to far. I bolted a backing plate to a steel bar running along the top of the glove box, to give me a structure to secure the sub box to. Then I had to design a box that would give the maximum volume without protruding to far into the cabin.

In the end the box had to be designed around the face plate (where the speaker is screwed to). The face plate had to be a set dimension (big enough to house the 10" sub woofer and wide enough to cover the gap in the dash. I stuffed around for hours trying to work out how to make it fit, angled too steep and it hit the back plate, angled too shallow and it got in the way of the passengers legs, too far forward and it would be impossible to blend into the dash.

Eventually I settled on the final design, almost flush with the dash and angled back towards the firewall, to allow the passenger to sit comfortably.

A day and half of trial and error before I finished the box. Then had to seal all the joins with fiberfill to make it airtight. Finally, install the wiring, bolt onto the back plate and screw in the speaker.

Looks butt ugly at the moment, looks like it was chucked together by an amateur (oh hang on is was lol). Still lots of work to do before its, finished. Need to make the beauty panels and trim it in leather to match the dash. build a proper speaker ring and grille. But it works and sounds nice even without a tune

[jzx_andy]

Holy shit, a front sub. This is going to sound insane

[Socket]

Originally Posted by jzx_andy

Holy shit, a front sub. This is going to sound insane

Atm is like someone glued a shoe box to the dash !!!! Gonna take a bunch of work to get this to look half decent

On the upside, I have a spare dash I can always throw in, if I change my mind

[Socket]

Called in some help to get Gary ready for a car audio meet on the weekend, including Jay, Coen and Peter Steinbacher from PSSOUND

Peter and Coen worked on finishing and trimming the front sub, while Jay and I tidied up the wiring and installed an anderson plug to plug the lithium back up battery

[Socket]

Also while in Australia, Peter tuned the audio system, the demo below speaks for itself.... the guy is an absolute car audio master

[Socket]

System review with Peter from PSSOUND

[Socket]

C Pillar for rear fill speakers

Fabricating pillars for speaker installs is a slow time consuming task, but pretty easy to do once you get the hang of it.

It is important to remove any fabric from the pillar first using heat or Xylene to dissolve the glue. Is a massive pinta but it is a necessary step

The most difficult is getting the speaker ring positioned correctly and matching on each side. I find using a small screw to mount the ring on the pillar is the easiest method (especially if you dont have someone to help)

Next is building up the structure using ply strips or in my case ice cream sticks and hot melt glue

Then drill holes and coat the outside using fiberfill (Upol Fibral) to form the shape you want and once set. Make sure you drill lots of holes for the fiberfill to squeeze though to bond the structure to the pillar

Next coat the inside with a hard setting resin to strengthen everything

After the fiberfill and resin is set, use 40 grit and then 80 grit sandpaper to sand everything smooth, before applying a fine filler (Upol dolphin glaze) to fill any rough spots and dips. Allow to dry before sanding with 80 grit and 120 grit.

Mark any imperfections with a sharpie and apply fine filler to those spots, before allowing to dry and sanding again.

Trimming pillars with headliner material or speaker cloth is a bit of an artform that I am yet to master, so I take mine to a professional such as Tim at Sew Fine in Melbs

Pics below

Pic 1 Time to make some pillars
Pic 2 Removing the fabric from the pillars is a pinta
Pic 3 Nice and clean
Pic 4 Positioning the speaker rings (only took 2 hrs and 25 attempts)
Pic 5 Building a structure from sticks and hot melt glue
Pic 6 Drill holes to bond the structure to the pillar
Pic 7 Fiberfill complete
Pic 8 Fine filler sanded and imperfections marked up
Pic 9 Touch up and 120 grit sanding complete
Pic 10 Finished pillars ready for trimming