BMW M328i, Binning The Box

Well, the time has come. I’m keeping the BMW for the foreseeable future, so the only logical next step was to drop some dead weight, and pull out the subs.

The decision to keep the BMW wasn’t one I took lightly, but I’m not sad or disappointed to be stuck with it. I actually quite like the car.

There are a few things that didn’t suit me about the car though, and having a bunch of useless weight sitting over the rear axle is one of those things. The boot install looked nice, but it really killed my enjoyment of the car. It sounded bad, and had been hastily thrown into the car.

The main issue was that the capacitor on the driver’s side wasn’t actually secured by anything and was just sitting on top of the battery. This meant that every time I cornered hard (like an M3 should), the damn thing would fall over and go for a scoot along the boot floor, until the power wires restrained it.

It was sitting on a block of wood

So out it all comes. I’ll tell you what, getting the sub box out was a mission. First out comes the floor panel and amp from the spare wheel well.

Then the side amp, and capacitor come out. This gives enough room to shoehorn the rest of the trim and the box out of the boot opening. Turns out the box wasn’t secured at all and was held in with hopes and dreams.

It’s a big box, that’s for sure. I forgot how big a coupe boot actually is!

In goes the carpet from Pick A Part, after a quick vacuum

Even though this spare wheel doesn’t hold air (buckled and leaks at the bead), I still put it in the boot as it helps to hold the carpet up, and also helps with weight balance. I need to find another wheel at some point. The wheel and tire weigh about the same as the amp that was in there, it was a beast.

The previous owner butchered all the standard wiring for the speakers, so unless I want to run a whole lot of new wiring, I’m stuck with running the speaker amp. Thankfully I actually like this one as it looks cool, and doesn’t take up too much space. Even the wiring going to this is a mess though. Yes, that is the pair of RCA connectors (usually used as one pair for front, and one pair for rear), split out to fill all four channels, front and rear. I’ll rejig the RCA cables that went to the sub amp, and use them for the rear speakers so fronts and rears are split properly.

The final result isn’t perfect. The carpet needs some fettling to tidy it up, and the battery is the wrong size so the plastic cover on it doesn’t quite fit properly, but otherwise, it’s now a fully functional boot.

Driving the car to work yesterday and the lack of weight is noticeable. It’s not major, but it doesn’t feel like you’re dragging the backside around anymore. I would’ve pulled a good 20-30kg out.

The next steps for the car are in motion. I have a set of BC Gold adjustable coilovers to go in, and a nice Purple Tag E46 steering rack to replace the horrible 3.0 M3 rack, which is the dumpster fire of steering racks. I’ll also be rebuilding the vanos, since I already have the parts to do it, just need the time.