bigcoupe.com

Thank you for replies.

Zircotec ceramic coating (in white, of course) comes in at an eye-watering £676.25 and is said to reduce under-bonnet temps by 33%.

Not sure if reservoir will fit other brake MC, sorry.

Whoa £676.25!... I think jet-hot in the US quoted me $250 to have mine done.

https://www.jet-hot.com/

CamCoat in Cheshire for ceramic coating?

Kev

My headers and collectors, HPC coated inside and out, including chemical stripping NZD 574, including GST.

Generally we're at the expensive end of the spectrum for anything and everything due to lack of competition.

rattusM6 wrote: ↑Fri Feb 09, 2018 6:03 pm CamCoat in Cheshire for ceramic coating?

Kev

I'll give them a ring, Kev: thanks

Right, heatshields!

The E34 has eaten into any spare funds, so any sort of ceramic coating a non-starter. Instead, made up a plinth from a sheet of stainless to attach to the existing heatshield mounts, to this I formed some cool heat shield stuff.

I got the steering box heat shield from an E34 to fit by welding on studs to the ends of the bolts and spacing them out to account for the differing layout of the E34 box. This also provides some protection to the steering knuckle.

Like the M30 system, the Fritz manifold is VERY close indeed to the steering box.
Also made a bracket to fit a decent fire extinguisher under the passenger seat.

Most pleasing!

Fire extinguisher fitted, yes - it's on the passenger side, but it is big enough to be useful and doesn't look too out of place, I hope! Luggage strap to hold it in place to follow.

Nice Recaro!

Well done on the heat shield - looks very neat, also fire extinguisher fits well - are these recommended on M6s?

Personally, I think a fire extinguisher should be standard equipment in all our vintage vehicles. It might be the difference between replacing a few hoses or wires, and disposing of a burnt out shell.

Swapped arbs back to original spec of 19mm front and 15.5 rear. Surprisingly noticeable in improved ride (road surfaces absolutely terrible in UK at the moment) and an increased lean into corners.

I was running the US M6 spec 22mm front and 16mm rear, which was nice and flat, but would lead to the bar clashing with the mount under hard braking due to the minimal amount of rubber used.

This does mean I will never, ever be fitting the 25mm front/18mm rear bars in the shed from an E28 M5 if anyone is interested.

Not sure how I missed this thread, but great job on all the work you have put in. Car is looking really nice. I hope to follow in your footsteps and get my M back on the road sometime this year.

Any more details on the heat shields? They look really nice.

Keep up the great work!

Eric

Thanks Eric!

That's really kind.

Heatshields are doing their job and basically just follow the shape of the original rhd shield. Fingers crossed that enough heat is being pushed down and out to give my brake MC an easier time of it, but all very positive at the moment.

I'm conscious that the lhd euro m88 "nest of snakes" headers don't have any heat shields, of course!

Pictures for insurance agreed valuation taken on misty morning here in the Cotswolds:

Added another shield directly under MC: after a spirited run the MC is barely warm to the touch, so am pleased to have sorted that worry.

Annoyingly, the rattle can repairs and touch ups done on various bits of the car - most noticeably around the rear screen and the bootlid lip - have faded to a different shade of black.

Am weighing up logistics and affordability of full respray in Diamond Schwartz Metallic. This would allow me to address a couple of concerns, such as the horrible headlining, the ropey rear screen and the dented bonnet, too!

I am determined to enjoy driving her this summer though.

It may be a big job to remove but you can kill two birds with one stone by Ceramic coating the headers for a vast reduction in ambient temperature in the bay, AND "may" be able to increase torque output by maintaining heat in the headers and keeping gas velocity high (helps clear out the exhaust port side and maintain cooler charge temp)..

Car is looking very nice..

I managed to lose loads of photos, but this one turned up of the Recaros before they were recoloured using the Furniture Clinic products. The recolouring was done back in 2011 and they have stood up very well indeed.
These seats were in my burgundy 6er before being transferred to the M; the M's buffalo sport seats' leather is awaiting recolouring back to anthracite from the patchy burgundy effected by a previous owner - the recolouring appearing to be painted on, which doesn't work with analine leather, of course.

MoT passed, no problem apart from throttle sticking slightly when tester left car idling for ages on ramp (under-bonnet heat is a problem that isn't going to go away with the Fritz headers). It's definitely the rose joints on the throttle mechanism that stick - I've tried loads of different lubricants, but I dare say the surfaces of the joints are a little compromised.

On a separate note, It looks like I'll be celebrating 100,000 miles on the clock before long: most likely when on the way to Ron's which will be quite fitting.

I've got no way of knowing if the mileage is genuine, given the absence of history with the car, but the MoT history checks out since 2002 and the amazing state of the engine's internals does back up lower mileage, with a reading of 94,067 in 2005. 265 miles out of this tankful, too!

Headers and downpipes being collected for ceramic coating today!

It transpires that it is a lot harder to remove them from the car than it is to assemble the engine on a stand and install it complete.

It also appears that the oil return pipe is leaking again, despite new gasket and o ring, so just as well I removed the headers!

Cheers,

Rob

I bet they'll look very nice - picture to follow I assume. I do think you should go back to the green interior...

They'll be a menacing satin black, inside and out, which happens to be the only colour they do.

Zircotec did offer to match the manifold colour to the pistachio seats, but I went with Camcoat instead - thanks to Kev for the heads up!

I'm thinking about installing the Fritz chip that's been sitting in the cupboard for three years now, too.

All Camcoated up!

Very, very pleased indeed with the results and the service could not have been better - extremely helpful and reassuring throughout.

First chance for a test drive today - one of the rubber hangars was past its best and had to get replacements from dealer (£5 each!), plus the oil return pipe leak had to be addressed etc.etc.

Anyway. Most obvious difference from the driver's seat is the massive reduction in heat soak through the transmission tunnel. Apart from that, there was no sticking from the throttle and a general sense of reassurance. The coating is amazing - the manifold is cool enough to touch when the cam cover is still scalding!

As mentioned, I had the "race-spec" coating inside and out on both manifolds and downpipes.

Pictures not giving much detail, but might be of interest.

I have reinstated the US M6-spec arbs - 22mm front and 16mm rear (as opposed to standard M635 UK spec of 19mm/15.5mm). The new engine mount as pictured, plus a bit of wriggling to reposition the downpipes has cured the clunking noise which I misdiagnosed as the minimal "meat" on the front ARB rubber causing the bar to interfere with its mounting. I much prefer the reduced roll with this set up.

In other news, I finally have my fourth RC009, so will be happily polishing up my matching set of four over the winter.

I do have also thicker arbs on my M635csi. Better handling with those. But mine has M5e34 references. I have also some other parts from E34 in alloy on my front setup as they are 100% compatibles with the e24.