[S65Hunter]

I spent over $300 on floor mats.....

[Efthreeoh]

Originally Posted by bluewater328

You have no idea how relevant that is to me right now. Came out this week to a hanging plate for no apparent reason.

I have my EasyPass mounted under my plate to the plate bracket, so I want to make sure the plate and bracket are going to stay in place.

[Vulcan50]

I relocated my start button and put a red face on it. When I got the car a few years back I modded the shifter so I can use any number of knobs.

[rick100]

Originally Posted by TheMidnightNarwhal

Yikes 500$ for a ceramic coating, unless you got a polish along with that you got shafted hard my dude.

well I thought it was general knowledge that the car paint always has to be prep for a ceramic coating

I don t think any professional shop is going to apply a ceramic coating that is supposed to last 3-5 years without doing a proper polish...

everybody knows that the hard part of a ceramic coating is not applying it , that is actually the easy part that ANYONE can do , the hard part is getting the paint near perfect condition before applying

500$ is cheap ...

Now days 500$ may get you a wash / clay / stage 1 polish and regular wax

the opti coating that was apply to my car was not even the one available to the public , only authorized dealers were able to buy it and apply it . That was back when opti coating was really good . Since then , they change their formula and now c quartz is the leader

My friend and I got it back in 2015 and both cars are still very shiny , you can see the coating after all these years ... people still ask me where i got the car polished , they dont even know that it was done in 2015

I do still apply reload once in a while , it sure helps

[colorado.e9x]

Originally Posted by AlpineE93

I spent over $300 on floor mats.....

yikes.. Weathertech?

[colorado.e9x]

Originally Posted by Vulcan50

I relocated my start button and put a red face on it. When I got the car a few years back I modded the shifter so I can use any number of knobs.

I've been thinking of relocating my gear selector lights to the head unit next to the row of buttons with the seat heaters so I can put a manual boot in

Interesting mod

[S65Hunter]

Originally Posted by colorado.e9x

yikes.. Weathertech?

Coco.

[mikeyoooooo]

Originally Posted by nsjames

I put metal threaded inserts in the HVAC filter panel.

because screws into plastic sucks.

Any addition info on this? One of mine are stripped and this sounds interesting.

[Vulcan50]

Originally Posted by colorado.e9x

I've been thinking of relocating my gear selector lights to the head unit next to the row of buttons with the seat heaters so I can put a manual boot in

Interesting mod

Why bother? Your selection shows on the dash. And drive is just all the way back, reverse is just one click.

[colorado.e9x]

Originally Posted by Vulcan50

Why bother? Your selection shows on the dash. And drive is just all the way back, reverse is just one click.

Because why not? I'm not the only one who drives my car, I'd prefer that someone didn't go into drive thinking its in reverse. Plus the automatic gear selector makes the car look dated

[porsche959]

Originally Posted by Vulcan50

I relocated my start button and put a red face on it. When I got the car a few years back I modded the shifter so I can use any number of knobs.

Interesting. What’s in the starter button area now?

[porsche959]

Originally Posted by Efthreeoh

My pointless mod was adding the OE BMW carbon fiber strut brace. The reason I did is it looks cool and it was on sale for a brief time about 8 years ago for $350 vs. the MSRP of $900. Does nothing but add under-hood bling.

Same. Except I went the cheaper route - Megan racing front strut bar. $80. Felt no difference. Wish it was black vs chrome.

Got pics of yours?

[Vulcan50]

Originally Posted by porsche959

Interesting. What’s in the starter button area now?

I filled it with epoxy, I'm going to skin the pieces with carbon fiber or go gloss black (I haven't decided)

[Vulcan50]

Originally Posted by colorado.e9x

Because why not? I'm not the only one who drives my car, I'd prefer that someone didn't go into drive thinking its in reverse. Plus the automatic gear selector makes the car look dated

I get that but moving it doesn't seem like it would make much difference in terms of out dated, since it's the same thing in a different spot. Just my thought.

[Vulcan50]

I also highjacked the wire to the vac solenoid for the exhaust flap, so I can open and close it at will!

[macheff03]

Originally Posted by Vulcan50

I relocated my start button and put a red face on it. When I got the car a few years back I modded the shifter so I can use any number of knobs.

Nice
How hard was it to relocate the button?

[King Rudi]

Oh my, where to begin....

On the E93 - wet sanded and polished that bish 3 times. It looked like a black mirror when I sold it. A ton of work that took forever, but so worth it in the end. People would always ask what I used for polish and it hadn't been waxed on months. Replaced the hood latches from factory to some pieces I had ordered through our MRO supplier at work, to lock them down tighter. When replacing the plugs/coils I broke 2 of the tabs on the plastic piece that routed the wires over the engine cover. Found a fix on here to install screws and wing-nuts to secure it in place. There were so many small/minor mods, I can't remember everything I did. This car was coded all to hell.

On the IS350 - recently bought a clutch pedal for a 2012 IS300 to put on the the emergency brake pedal so all my F Sport aluminum pedals would match. Vinyl wrap in inconspicuous places (under the tail lights, bumper reflectors, eyelids on the headlights, mirror caps, roof, lower area of grill on the bumper and various other accent locations) that no one ever notices, but all of them combined make the car look dark and evil. Took 3 times getting it right, but smoking the tail lights to just the right shade to match the vinyl smoked headlights. They are still red and not blacked out, but they pop and look like dark red candy. I tried smoking the tails with vinyl twice to no avail due to curves, lines, ridges 90's, etc. Paddle shifter extensions, although these do serve a purpose. These were also sanded down, painted and cleared with 2k to match the other accent interior pieces. Tinted the front grille emblem to knock down some the "crhomy-ness" along with a full chrome delete. The entire car, including wheels, got ceramic coated yesterday. I can't get over how damn "wet" this thing looks. It just draws your eyes to it. It's so damn shiny it's hard to make out what color it is because all you see are reflections.

[Vulcan50]

Originally Posted by macheff03

Nice
How hard was it to relocate the button?

I wouldn't say any of it was hard, just time consuming.

First you need to lengthen the ribbon wire.
Get a 14 conductor cable (I want to say it's 28ga), since I was reusing the connectors I didn't have to buy any. (I personally wanted new connectors but couldn't find the right ones, the pins are offset.)

Then make your harness, the distance between the car-fob slot connectors is the same. The distance between the start button- fob slot it longer (I think mine was 34").

If you want to put yours in the same spot as mine remove the selector indicator, and fill it with epoxy.

Then use a hole saw it was either 7/8" or 1". Then put a notch in the hole oriented toward the driver.

The final thing is that the button face has a peg the orients it, break that off and put the face on.

Done.

[BadContrakt]

Originally Posted by Vulcan50

I wouldn't say any of it was hard, just time consuming.

First you need to lengthen the ribbon wire.
Get a 14 conductor cable (I want to say it's 28ga), since I was reusing the connectors I didn't have to buy any. (I personally wanted new connectors but couldn't find the right ones, the pins are offset.)

Then make your harness, the distance between the car-fob slot connectors is the same. The distance between the start button- fob slot it longer (I think mine was 34").

If you want to put yours in the same spot as mine remove the selector indicator, and fill it with epoxy.

Then use a hole saw it was either 7/8" or 1". Then put a notch in the hole oriented toward the driver.

The final thing is that the button face has a peg the orients it, break that off and put the face on.

Done.

Pretty sweet mod lol very unique.

[colorado.e9x]

Originally Posted by Vulcan50

I get that but moving it doesn't seem like it would make much difference in terms of out dated, since it's the same thing in a different spot. Just my thought.

Its not the tiny piece of lights I don't like, it's the plastic surround around the entire gear selector

[nsjames]

Originally Posted by colorado.e9x

I've been thinking of relocating my gear selector lights to the head unit next to the row of buttons with the seat heaters so I can put a manual boot in

Interesting mod

why not simply delete them?

you've got the dash to tell you gear information.
I always thought the lights on the center console were incredibly redundant.

[nsjames]

as to threaded inserts.

I described the process in a few posts down, but it's not rocket science.
measure the depth of the holes, mark a bit that depth, hog out the holes to fi your inserts, glue inserts in.
I would not try to thread them in, as the cowling is fiber reinforced and it just doesn't work well.
I know because I tried, and I broke off two inserts that I then had to drill out again before I just epoxied them in place.
then you grab some short bolts and washers for your inserts. Washers probably aren't 100% needed, but now that you can actually tighten down a bolt they help a lot with keeping the tabs on the HVAC panel from getting mangled.

now go and enjoy your HVAC inlets that don't leak when you take it through an automatic car wash.

which is what prompted this fix originally.
auto car washes would literally lift the panel and pull the self tappers out because they were sooooooo sloppy.