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Carbon Project Belgium

982K views 2K replies 456 participants last post by  robolop 
#1 ·
Friend of mine is very handy with Carbon Fibre.
Don't know him too well, but what i've seen, he's amazing with CF...

now that he bought an E46 Coupé, I'd like to share it with you guys.

pic of the car:

 
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#1,489 ·
This is the first part of the engine bay that is looking quite finished. And with that I mean, ready for the last fase.
When you see it, it's not so big, and it looks quite simple...but that wasn't the case...




This is the left-side I started. 4 layers of polyester.





What I'm planning of doing with this, I'm about 80 percent sure. What I am 100% sure about, it that it'll take again many many hours of hard work...pfff


I also made some quick abrading-blocks. You can't have enough of those, and they are quite easy to make:
saw some wood into blocks.
Take some sanding paper, and pull a fine layer of filler over it, and then push the block back in.









Once this is dry, you cut it out with a stanley knife.



I find this very handy to abrade with. These are just some normal aluminium laths, where I also taped some sanding-paper on.




When I've got a block where the sanding paper is worn-out, I throw this in a seperate box.
Once this is full, I do the same process on the other side, so you can use them 2 or 4 times.
Why not glue the sanding paper..? simple, when you are working with filler, you almost always make too much...so use it for that.
 
#1,497 ·
I'm getting a lot of questions about the cooling of the engine. When I had the idea, I did some good thinking first. I worked out my plans, and asked the advice of some people.
A friend of mine, who worked at a BMW Dealership for over 14 years, told me (without hesitating) I shouldn't be worried about that.
Another friend who audits and revises engines for over 35 years also said it won't causes any problems.
As long as I don't cover up the radiator, and I mount the plastic cap for the airsupply towards the airfilter, there won't be any problem. These are the things that still original, only that I covered the airbox and supply.

About the left and right cover, they will get a better flow now it's all closed. There won't be any turbulence between parts who are underneath. Also these aren't any parts who get warm or so.
What I will do is mount a flexibel pipe onto the whole that's in my front bumper. I'll mount this so, that the air will blow towards the manifold.
If this will help a lot, I'm not sure, but all the bits help...And so there's a use for the whole in the bumper too :)
I also removed the big rubbers on top of my headlights. These were there to create a nice closing between the lights and the hood once it was closed.
I now took a much smaller rubber so there's room for air to pass there too, something that was not possible before.
Do not underestimate this, at BMW Performance you can buy an extra airfilterhousing witch end up there. So I'm guessing that BMW did some thinking and testing before producing that.
Here's a picture, the extra piece is marking with red.



And if it's does get to hot under the hood, the I'll take my disc, and put a hole in the hood...I'll invent something in carbon fibre to finish it off.
I wasn't serious at the last sentence ... or was I ?
:thanks::thanks::thanks::thanks::thanks::thanks:
 
#1,499 · (Edited)
I made another grill for the BMW, with a lore modern touch.



Here a little spypicture of the things to follow...



What I meant of working on a couple of weeks, turned out in a few months :)
I'm in a fase now that every idea I get, gets better every day. The bar is raised every day, and with few inches at a time, and it gets cooler and especially more difficult every time...But for me that's a good thing, that's how I know I'm getting towards my limits. I LOVE IT.
In the meanwhile I went driving with the car (with a capital D :) ), and made some pitstops to see if there are some problems...
There is one place where it gets pretty hot, and that the place where the front manifold is placed.
Underneath the polyester it gets pretty hot.
In the meanwhile I found a solution for that problem, and it'll look cool too :)
I'll give an update on that shortly.
 
#1,501 ·
After the many mill-work lately, it felt good to get started with the upper-mill again. Did some drawing first, and made me a mold in MDF. This should be the molding.










I taped on a piece of aluminium from 6mm thick, and held it against the copy-mill...with this as result.










The reason why I took 6mm thick alu, is that now, my screws are sunken in.





The screws are from FOCAL, and you can see that clearly.
You can even see their name is carved in




OOOOO yeah !
 
#1,512 ·
I forgot to take a picture of how the little lever was originally. But to make it like it looks now, took many hours of hard work.


sick dude, it's all in the small details


It may look tiny, but for me it had to happen to get it all nice and tight.
Once it finished, I'll explain what the big disadvantage of the lever was if I had left it in it original state.


:thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:
 
#1,508 ·
after a useless day in Essen Motorshow (germany) (serliously, there was nothing to see there, pfff, waste of money), I pulled out the piece that I made a mold off.
On the foreground you can see what I broke, but that's not a big deal.

This is the mold I need to make my fiberglass grill
 
#1,513 ·
You'll surely noticed it's been very quiet in this topic.
Well, my mother passed away.
She reached the age of 81. In 6 years time I lost both of my parents, and my brother.
It took me about 5 years untill I could give those deaths a place...
It's all different now....
Her bed stays empty. The chair she always smoked her cigaret in, stays empty.
Her place at the table, where she sat on for 50 years, stays empty.
My wife and I took care of her in the last hours of her life, but that's all we could do.
The works on the bimmer will surely go on, but for the moment I don't feel like it. I'll have a lot on my mind the next few weeks.
see you all soon
 
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