[Isaiah5411]

...along with the most extravagant mod to date in Project Sapphire.

Cheapest: A round piece of matte black vinyl placed on top of the iDrive controller to disguise it a bit...help it blend in with the aluminum parts*. Plus, it matches the AC knobs (matte black centers and black rubber ring).

Got the vinyl for free and took me 10 minutes and three attempts to cut a perfect circle. Pretty dang cheap mod, eh? I used the same vinyl that was used to black out my window trim. I also used it to cover the white iPhone dock trim in my Spec Dock. Cool stuff....very thin. (But sorry for the crappy iPhone pics. Better pics coming soon in full photo shoot.)

*I have swapped out most of the chrome for aluminum (perlglanz chrom) and am still thinking about what to do with the iDrive, either the LCI upgrade or custom finishing of the existing knob (which is a new $20 piece, after sacrificing the original to see what made it tick. BTW: The new one is so much more silver; the older one had gotten kinda gold-ish in color.)





Most Extravagant: I paid $70 to get a new start engine button with the upgraded, thinner aluminum (perlglanz chrom) trim ring, replacing the wider chrome one. Crazy? Maybe, but...I do like seeing it through the new M Sport wheel with aluminum paddles (from the X6). Hmmm...now that I think about it, maybe the paddles were the most extravagant mod to date.



Before these two mods:, showing the aluminum pieces I've replaced (paddles, step shifter, M3 speaker covers and door pulls, cup holder trim and M3 ashtray cover...all with aluminum look). Black ambient lighting strip trim goes in on Thursday. Decided that would look best with the carbon leather trim.

So...would it be worth nearly $300 to swap out the AC controller just to get perlglanz chrom knobs??? Not quite that crazy...yet. LOL)

[MiKc]

man that cf panel looks so good.
i wanna do it too but dunno how lol

[edirtaynine]

damn u only have 16k miles on your 08??? i have almost double that

[chrisE92]

I'm a huge fan of your interior. Love the black accents throughout the cabin! I see that you've replaced plenty of things on the door panel.. may I ask how much everything cost?

[Isaiah5411]

Originally Posted by MiKc

man that cf panel looks so good.
i wanna do it too but dunno how lol

Thanks! The carbon leather trim is the real stuff out of an M3. I traded my Performance carbon fiber for it with another guy on the forum. I like the carbon leather much better with my interior.

[Isaiah5411]

Originally Posted by edirtaynine

damn u only have 16k miles on your 08??? i have almost double that

I bought it in February with only 5k!

[Isaiah5411]

Originally Posted by chrisE92

I'm a huge fan of your interior. Love the black accents throughout the cabin! I see that you've replaced plenty of things on the door panel.. may I ask how much everything cost?

Thanks! I hate to think about the total, but...I finally have it where I want it and it was definitely worth it. I've planned it for quite sometime, long before I bought the car, knowing that I might get Montego with creme. Then she showed up in podunk Louisiana with only 5k and I pulled the trigger.

I will be posting the parts list and prices when I do the final thread on the project, which will happen after I do the ambient lighting strips black (this weekend, hopefully) and the when the rims finally come in (2 weeks?).

I'd love to do all black carpets but I kinda like being able to alternate between black and beige floor mats...depending on whether I'm going to the beach or not.

If you need any info before then, feel free to PM me.

[remmib]

Cool cheap mods.

[Saigon]

really nice, love what you did with replacing the beige cupholders to black ones. nice wrap as well, really clean!

[inabis]

Do you have the OEM black carpets? They look darker than the OEM ones

[Isaiah5411]

Originally Posted by remmib

Cool cheap mods.

Thanks! I'm obviously waaaay too much into this whole thing now.

Originally Posted by Saigon

really nice, love what you did with replacing the beige cupholders to black ones. nice wrap as well, really clean!

Thanks! I thought about doing the trim around the cup holder trim black as well...like in the M3s with....but decided to just have these accent pieces, which flow with the key slot and light control switch. It's all about feng shui.

The "wrap" is actually real carbon leather from an M3 while the center console was wrapped in black leather by the same guy who did the tops of front doors. The guy is incredibly talented and his shop is a stones throw from my office.

I'll be joining you in CSLs (Alufelgens) before too long (I hope). Your pier photo shoot was set of the pictures that convinced me to put them on my E93. (I have VB3s on on my E46 -altho not in my sig - and was looking for a little something different but decided why mess with perfection. )

[Isaiah5411]

Originally Posted by inabis

Do you have the OEM black carpets? They look darker than the OEM ones

They are BMW floor mats, which were given to me when I bought the car. They knew what was coming and helped me out with my first mod. (The original beige ones are a much thicker pile, tho, than these black ones. Does BMW make more than one grade of floor mats?)

[BoogeyMan'sBMW]

loooks good!

[jb's335]

Originally Posted by HiHoAg

I will be posting the parts list and prices when I do the final thread on the project, which will happen after I do the ambient lighting strips black (this weekend, hopefully) and the when the rims finally come in (2 weeks?).

How difficult is it to swap out the ambient lighting strips?

Great looking interior btw, I was actually kinda digging the white light strips! I thought they all came in black...

[chrisE92]

Originally Posted by HiHoAg

Thanks! I hate to think about the total, but...I finally have it where I want it and it was definitely worth it. I've planned it for quite sometime, long before I bought the car, knowing that I might get Montego with creme. Then she showed up in podunk Louisiana with only 5k and I pulled the trigger.

I will be posting the parts list and prices when I do the final thread on the project, which will happen after I do the ambient lighting strips black (this weekend, hopefully) and the when the rims finally come in (2 weeks?).

I'd love to do all black carpets but I kinda like being able to alternate between black and beige floor mats...depending on whether I'm going to the beach or not.

If you need any info before then, feel free to PM me.

Looking forward to the part list! I'm pretty much done with my car, so this will be a nice project. Thanks!

[Isaiah5411]

Originally Posted by jb's335

How difficult is it to swap out the ambient lighting strips?

Great looking interior btw, I was actually kinda digging the white light strips! I thought they all came in black...

NOW you say that! I just swapped 'em out this afternoon!!! LOL

But seriously, thanks for the compliment.

Swapping out the ambient lighting strips is only hard the FIRST time, which I had done when they covered the tops of my front doors with black Dakota leatherette. The upholstery shop had to use a soldering iron to melt the original attachments/welds where the lighting strips were attached to the inside of the door panel.

The new lighting strips are then attached by using an axial type clip (round with teeth) slipped over the posts of the new strips after they are inserted into the door panel through the holes left by the removal of the originals. There are ten of these attachments on each of the front doors.

So...this afternoon, all I had to do was remove the the door panels (which I'm getting really good at ), cut the clips and slide them off the posts, remove the lighting strip (with the fiberoptic light inside), take out the fiberoptic element (which is easy), and reinstall everything with the different strips. Took me an hour total to do both doors.

But again, it will take much longer the first time because you have to melt the original attachments. I was not there to see that done.

I opted to go to black strips when I finally decided that the carbon leather was a keeper (I had aluminum trim, which looked best with the original creme beige lighting strips) AND I saw an E93 with oyster interior this last weekend, which had the black ambient strips. Looked great! Plus, the creme beige plastic really does look pretty cheap while the matte black strips actually match the carbon leather very nicely.

Now, the black tops of the doors are significantly wider than the carbon leather trim piece, which seems to make sense and match the dash better. Again, feng shui.

But...all that being said, I also liked it the way it was. Hey, it can always be changed back.

[Isaiah5411]

Originally Posted by chrisE92

Looking forward to the part list! I'm pretty much done with my car, so this will be a nice project. Thanks!

Just keep in mind that this was all done on an E93, which is quite a bit different from the coupe.

With the convertible, the tops of the lateral panels of the rear seat are separate from the lower half and therefore interchangeable. In the E92, they are one piece. In the E93, the separation is just above the ambient lighting strip. So...all I had to do in the rear was order the top part in black from BMW and replace the ambient lighting strips.

In the front, I had the door tops custom covered in black Dakota leatherette. The E92 owner would have to custom cover the tops of the front doors and the tops of the rear lateral trim panels.

But, I'm afraid it gets even more complicated for the E92 owner. All I had to do was order a new "package tray" (the big plastic piece on the trunk lid) and two small pieces between it and lateral trim panels (which are part of the roof mechanism) and I was done. Took no time to swap out these parts with the roof down. But...the E92 person would have to swap out the rear deck trim from the inside, which is not that hard to do but a bit more involved than what I was faced with since you have to deal with speakers, get into the trunk, etc.

Plus, I'm not sure how it would look in a creme beige interior without a black headliner, but...it might be just fine. Other than my original interior being a beige blur (and being much less masculine-looking than I was used to in my all black interior E46), the black headliner seemed very lonely, begging or more black inside when the top was up.

The original car had two very different personalities - top up and top down. Now it is a lot less schizo.

[Isaiah5411]

Here are some links to the parts on RealOEM.com (with MSRPs***):

(***My dealer gave me 10% off of everything I ordered and Evan@Tischer helped A LOT, too!)

Project E93 -
1) Lateral trim panels - http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts...52&hg=51&fg=50

2) Front door panels - http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts...93&hg=51&fg=50

3) Package tray - http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts...56&hg=51&fg=80

For E92 -
1) Lateral trim panels - http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts...95&hg=51&fg=50

2) Front door panels - http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts...93&hg=51&fg=50

3) Rear deck- http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts...42&hg=51&fg=40

Hope this helps!

[E90E]

How hard was it to replace you start/stop trim and do you still have the button?

Thanks

[Isaiah5411]

Originally Posted by E90E

How hard was it to replace you start/stop trim and do you still have the button?

Thanks

Very simple. The dash trim pulls right out with your fingers. Starting at the passenger end is easiest. Just wedge your fingers between the trim and dash pull straight out. The dash trim is attached by about 6 or 8 stainless steel pins ("nails") and once you get it started, it pops right off.

The start stop button in removed by disconnecting the electrical connection (pull the connector straight out the back) and then squeezing the sides on the inside of the button's housing. It slides right out the front of the trim.

Since I've removed my dash trim so many times, I tried to just pull the left end with the start button out without removing the whole dash piece to get to the button, but...I kept hitting the windshield washer level. I had my top down at the time so it was really annoying. So, I went ahead and removed the whole dash trim, which ended up taking less time.

Putting the dash trim back in is also simple. Start at the left end (near start button) and align the pins and then center AC vents and work your way toward the passenger end, pressing in the pins as you go. Really easy...especially once you done it a time or six.

Oh...and yes, I still have the original button. New button part number was 61319154945 .

[ibeclueless]

looks nice