California Roundie Revival - an unusual perspective

[CubbyChowder]

Oh here you are!

haha sorry, what?

[Deutschman]

You have the same build thread on Stance Works dont'cha?

[CubbyChowder]

Yes I do! I'm a big fan of StanceWorks.

[CubbyChowder]

Another small update. Didn't get too much done yesterday, started BBQing with some friends and called it a day.

Dropped the rear subframe. I ordered a bunch of new OEM rubber bushings for the suspension to freshen things up (thanks for the good deal Blunt!). Decided to go OEM rubber over urethane just because this car is going to be a comfortable daily driver, and didn't feel urethane was necessary. I also ordered 4 new CV boot kits as the current ones are starting to crack and are on their way out. Just waiting for everything to come in the mail!

I was a bit nervous dropping the subframe by myself, didn't really know what to expect when lowering it down but it went smoothly:

Both rear subframe mounts are lookin' kinda sad, these will be replaced:

All the trailing arm bushings are shot, they all look like the one pictured. These will all be replaced as well:

These bushings still look good, won't be replacing them.

Needs a good cleaning!

Also received this in the mail, a new carpet kit made by Esty!:

All black, the whole set isn't pictured, just to get an idea of what it looks like. My cat was all over it, he thinks it's a quality set:

[CubbyChowder]

Just a small update. Received my 4 new CV boot kits in the mail. Got most of the rust in the trunk area taken care of (didn't take any pictures yet) and started taking apart the rear suspension so I can clean and replace things.

And this is random but I thought it was rad. I turn 22 on Monday and my girlfriend made this bench for me for my birthday, she's awesome.

Time for some tacky display-new-parts-on-a-towel pictures:

Just received my package from BluntTech which consists of a bunch of genuine BMW goodies. Included was:

First picture:

(2) inner control arm bushings

(2) outer control arm bushings

(2) compliance bushings

(4) trailing arm bushings

(2) rear subframe mounts

Second picture:

(1) trunk seal

(2) black "Turbo" windshield locking strips

(2) quarter window seals (driver and passenger side)

[CubbyChowder]

Got back to work today. I'll just explain as I go, I take a lot of pictures...

Got this out:

Took it to this (trailing arm bushing):

Which led to this:

And I ended up with this:

All out:

Pressing the new bushing in:

And there we have it:

So since the car has previously been in an accident on the left side, the left trailing arm mounts were a little bent up, pictured is the outermost mount. It had previously been fixed (kind of), and I decided to weld two thick washers on either side to close up and reinforce the metal. I measured where the bolt should be and welded everything up. Beware, the final product looks a bit ugly, I'm still getting used to welding. For some reason my wire feeder kept seizing up and would stop feeding wire while I was welding which was really messing me up. I didn't realize this until I was about done with this mount, so the welds look pretty terrible, but I figured it's not in a visual spot and I still penetrated the metal a good amount, so I'm confident that it will hold up. Like I said, it's not the prettiest thing in the world...

Before:

After:

Then I started on my CV boots. I noticed that one of my CV joints is different than the other three, must've been wrecked in the accident and replaced. Not sure whether it's aftermarket or OEM, but it seems to be working just fine.

I took the joint all apart and cleaned everything real good:

Put everything back together, greased it all up...

All sealed up and ready to go. A comparison shot with the other axle.

Going back tomorrow to finish up the other 3 CV boots and finish up the rear suspension rehab. Hope you all enjoy! Peace

[Manuel]

Thanks for posting! This will come in handy sometime soon. Keep up the good work.

M

[323IJOE]

how come you put the bushing in before repainting the subframes? or are you not gonna do that?

[CubbyChowder]

how come you put the bushing in before repainting the subframes? or are you not gonna do that?

I decided I'm not going to repaint the subframe/trailing arms, at least not right now. As much as I'd like to do a complete overhaul and go through everything, there are a few things that I'm going to skip that aren't totally necessary. I just don't have the money for that, I have a pretty set budget for this car and have pretty much everything mapped out and planned (except for a few unexpected surprises that I'm sure will happen). I just want to make sure everything mechanical is functioning properly so I can daily drive the car.

[CubbyChowder]

Haven't made much progress on the car lately, we had a very unfortunate event. My best friend since first grade passed away on Saturday after a hectic year-long battle with cancer. He was such an awesome dude, and I'm going to miss him so much. He died much too young at the age of 21. The past couple of days have been really cool though, hanging with his family and all of our friends a bunch has been great help in dealing with the whole situation. Rest in Peace David King!

Got a chance to finish up the other 3 CV boots, so the axles are ready to go:

And also received all of my stereo stuff. I'm not really an extremist when it comes to car audio, so I bought some pretty basic stuff. I based all my purchases off reading product reviews, and tons of people were really happy with these speakers and receiver so I figured I'd go for it. Spent a little under $300 for everything and I feel it will perform perfectly fine for my standards. I'd like to focus more of my money on different aspects of this build:

I also bought a set of wheels! After spending HOURS (seriously, HOURS) researching what wheels I want, I could not come to a conclusion. I'm going for a certain look, and being very picky on sizes and fitment, so there really weren't many options for me. I got a PM on VWvortex for a set of wheels which I was considering for a price I couldn't refuse, so I jumped on it. They are coming from Northern Europe, so shipping is going to take a while. 15" BBS RM's:

I told myself I didn't want BBS RM/RS', because they are simply everywhere. However, I much prefer RM's over RS' and I like that I can build them how I want, so they are going to be wide. Probably along the lines of 15x8.5 up front and 15x9.5 out back. I am going to refinish them myself to save on cost and they are going to look almost exactly like these:

That's it for today. I will be going up on Friday hopefully to work on the car, I feel like it's been forever.

[bricklayer]

you gonna run the black on black??

[323IJOE]

Lately I've been giving alot more though to bbs rims too, I just don't like how they are everywhere you look now, but they suite our cars perfectly. And those black on black are awesome, I actually spent my 45 minute drive home from school the other day dreaming up a flared Sahara 02 slammed on blacked out bbs rms. so your car should look pretty hot if you ask me lol

[CubbyChowder]

yes I will be doing black on black with silver bolts, just like the picture above. Only difference with mine will be all matte black instead of having gloss black lips.

I'm not usually a fan of all black wheels, but they've been growing on me and I think all black especially looks good with a really deep dish, which my RM's will have so I think it will look cool.

[CubbyChowder]

alright time for another update. Haven't been working on it as much as I'd like to, but I've been spending a lot of time with friends and family which is always good too. Let's see where we're at...

Got the rear subframe all back together and back on the car. Some might wonder why I didn't repaint the whole thing and make it look all fresh, but I decided against it. I just didn't feel it was totally necessary:

Then I started getting at the point in my build which I've secretly been dreading: body work. I decided to start with the worst section first, which would be the driver's side quarter panel. I knew there was gobs of body filler and boy was I right. It's almost a half inch thick in some spots. It's interesting to me that whoever owned the car while it was repaired, they cut out the wrecked quarter panel, and replaced it with a pretty trashed quarter panel. There are dents everywhere all over it, and the more I grind away, the more body filler and dents I find. Kind of discouraging but whatever:

Had my first go at "shaving", looks pretty haggard, but everything is sealed:

Also started doing all the trim holes:

Then there's this whole area. Basically everywhere you see bare metal was previously covered in 1/4"-1/2" of body filler. Pretty bummed on how beat up this whole area is, it's going to be hard to make it look perfect again. It doesn't look nearly as bad in the picture as it does in real life:

On a lighter note, my 7" crosshairs came in. Pretty excited on them, I think they'll look really cool. Love them on MK1's and MK2's:

[heist]

looking so good! great progress. The body work is going to be deadly, but just keep pushing forward it will all pay off in the end.

Love the cross hairs I was looking into putting them on mine if I didn't do the projector route. Does the black bracket pictured attach to the original holes?