Wicks' E46 M3 Build. Hertz 3-Way Set from Tony D!

[Kyblack76]

AWESOME.... and WICKS my friend... I see what you did there..... sneaky sneak face.

Also,.. i can send you some smoke tubes. If you wanna doubt check flow on the fans. They are tubes, with not threatning chemicals. You SHAKE em some what hard, and they mix a chem, and put out smoke. Youll be able to see in come IN, and or LEAVE. know what i mean? We use them for PM (pre maintenance) on air flow systems.

anyway,.. im gonna sit and look at each pic for a bit...... damn, your making me late to get to the shed.....

[Wicks]

I'd like to see the fans video. I'm trying to come up with something myself for fresh air and exhaust air.

Nice work on the kerfing btw!

Thx.

It's a pretty simple kerf arc but it should work.

Now I'm just wondering how I'm going to cleanly wrap vinyl inside that amp framework piece.......?

The inside edges should be interesting.

[Wicks]

AWESOME.... and WICKS my friend... I see what you did there..... sneaky sneak face.

Also,.. i can send you some smoke tubes. If you wanna doubt check flow on the fans. They are tubes, with not threatning chemicals. You SHAKE em some what hard, and they mix a chem, and put out smoke. Youll be able to see in come IN, and or LEAVE. know what i mean? We use them for PM (pre maintenance) on air flow systems.

anyway,.. im gonna sit and look at each pic for a bit...... damn, your making me late to get to the shed.....

Thx for the smoke offer but it's a pretty simple setup so I shouldn't need to test anything.

The smoke would probably just go in circles.

Hmmm, might be interesting to see though..???

[scooter99]

Yeah I hear you. Those suck to do. But, if you're clean enough it should come out pretty easy. My advise would be, do a piece, tape it off, then do another piece and tape it off, etc. Only cause the glue gets everywhere. That's what I experienced when I did the last one. But I'm sure you'll figure it out. You're a smart guy!

Or you could plastidip it or bed line it.

[Wicks]

Yeah I hear you. Those suck to do. But, if you're clean enough it should come out pretty easy. My advise would be, do a piece, tape it off, then do another piece and tape it off, etc. Only cause the glue gets everywhere. That's what I experienced when I did the last one. But I'm sure you'll figure it out. You're a smart guy!

Or you could plastidip it or bed line it.

...dude, you have NO idea how tempting it is to just spray all of these pieces rather than wrap them...

BUT, that wouldn't fit the look that I'm going for in the trunk. You'll see as it progresses...if I ever get to that stage..

Heads up, I learned a new technique over the weekend. Update coming.

[Wicks]

Got something in the mail last week.

Never fiberglassed in my life so I had a crash course over the weekend.

I was really intrigued by this new product of Meade's since there's no mixing and it cures in the sun.

BUT, when you have a tiny one-stall garage that's full of stuff...and you're modifying your rear seat (something you can't remove to place it in the sun) and it was an interesting couple of days.

[Wicks]

Here was the current state of the front of my sub box

I needed a clean way of transitioning from the sub box to the rest of the car.

I thought about some custom wood pieces, plastic pieces, molded plastic, tightly stretched vinyl, automotive carpet, etc...

But I always came back to the realization that nothing would fit that area better than a good ol' molded fiberglass trim panel.

Only problem, I've never fiberglassed before and I wasn't sure that I could do it correctly.

After a good amount of digging around on the forum, I decided to try it, experience being the best teacher.

Since its my back seat area, I couldn't just "remove" it and place it in the sun for the SMD Sunflash to work properly, but I liked the concept that I didn't have to mess with measuring resin/hardener and be limited to a time frame when applying to the fiberglass cloth.

So I bought some anyway and figured I could cover most of the car with blankets to block the sun while I applied the resin and then remove them and let the sun in so that it can cure.

Well I got the Sunflash on Friday and figured I'd jump in and see what happened.........

I spent a good part of Saturday re-running some signal-control wires from my HU back to my trunk since I didn't like the crappy multi-conductor wire that I had.

That took a good chunk of the day. I also helped out "WastedTalent" install a new battery and fix some other install issues.

Here's the area all masked out with painters tape

Looking back at this pic...damn that was a lot of tape

My fingers hurt from peeling all that tape and applying it...not fun, but necessary.

Here's the first layer of fiberglass cloth

I bought a whole sheet of cloth rather than the usual strips of material because this application was vertical and somewhat complex.

Blankets in place, eye protection on, face mask covering the mouth...Here we go, time for the resin!

I was very worried halfway into applying the resin that this process wouldn't work.

The thin material was moving around and bubbling a bit. Some of it wasn't holding its shape properly.

It was a battle that's for sure, but after some wrestling, I got it laid out.

Blankets off, I tried to give it as much sun as possible for it to cure up, but since it was in the back of a coupe, there wasn't much direct sun available.

After an hour or so it did cure up and was ready for application #2.

This time it was much easier since the previous application was still tacky which helped hold the 2nd layer in place.

Resin coat #2

Cloth application #3

Resin coat #3

To my udder enjoyment, when the 3rd application was sufficiently dry, I gave the edges a tug and the whole piece popped out with no major issues or leaks onto the car's material.

Here's the piece out of the car and finally getting some full sun

After another hour, I peeled some of the initial tape off of the back of the panel.

Pulled out the Dremel to trim off some rough edge pieces so that I could test fit the panel back in the car and see how the seat interacted with it

The trimmed up panel "clicks" right into place

Sure, there a few air bubbles and its definitely not perfect by any means, there are a few areas that need to be cleaned up and adjusted, but overall not too bad for a first attempt at fiberglassing.

Now the fun part....body filler, sanding, more sanding, even more sanding, vinyl wrap, hope like crazy that it fits!

[WastedTalent]

Haha wow Wicks. That looks... intense. No doubt. Still feel bad that you didn't let me bring some food or somethin. Hell, Look at what I interrupted... lmfao. But, I'm sure after more sanding and all that jazz, it'll come out good. As you say, experience is the best teacher. First few tries may work but not be that perfect look, so may require few tries but... knowing you, I know you'll get it, for sure.

[sphinxbccp]

Looks great dude!!!

[JasonJones]

Dude that came out awesome for your first glass attempt! Keep the updates coming!