Jump to content
WI BIMMERS - Wisconsin's BMW Community

Alpine e30 progress/build thread


m42b32

Recommended Posts

12 hours ago, P_Roloff said:

That is awesome. I figured this post would be about the headers and I was pleasantly surprised! We’re down on FI e30s right now so this should reset the balance quite nicely

A very convenient coincidence! They should play quite nicely together. Picnic 2045 or bust!

 

3 hours ago, YoungCR said:

Nice score!

Thanks!
 

19 minutes ago, GunMetalGrey said:

I have to you snagged that one after it had been floating around for a bit on FB. I'm glad someone I know snapped it up as I was contemplating it myself, twin screws satisfy most of my desires when it comes to power additions. 

I'm looking forward to seeing more about it!

I've always thought one of these ESS TS2 kits would be my ideal setup if I could ever find one. After staring at the ad and contemplating for like a week I figured how often would one actually pop up locally in good shape for a good price. I'm excited to dig into it!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...

160k

After much thinking and hunting around I finally came up with a solution to put 5x7 speakers in the rear parcel shelf without cutting big holes or looking like someone landed a UFO back there.

 

Before I did anything with the speakers themselves I figured now's the time to refresh the parcel shelf itself. I had a spare standard speaker parcel shelf so I used the markings on the back and opened up the speaker cutouts and moved the mounting clips to the premium speaker layout. Since every parcel shelf is now faded to a lovely shade of light blurple I gave it a couple coats of black duplicolor vinyl/fabric dye and cleaned up all the plastic parts.

52940876521_c0095b6b53_c.jpg

 

Once that was done (and after letting it dry for about 3-4 months), I got into swapping things out. With the old parcel shelf out, I added some sound deadening over any holes in the sheet metal and a few spots that made a lot of noise  when tapping on it. My thinking on doing this was it should help the speakers perform better/keep more sound in the cabin/maybe reduce some road noise bleeding through from the trunk.

52940860106_9e59502de6_c.jpg

 

Side note: I've always hated the tan rear seat in my car ever since I put it in. Its in really good shape and the original plan was to dye it eventually, but I realized I have a perfectly good black sedan back seat sitting in my basement. My car is a coupe so the seat isn't a perfect fit, but I also happen to have the rear carpet section from that sedan so I swapped that in as well to get everything looking as factory as possible. While it still isn't blue, it looks so much better. 

52941320878_e11e38b7a3_c.jpg

 

Back to the speakers. After much hunting around and thinking, I came across these speaker grills from a 90's ford van/ranger/etc. that had an identical grille pattern to the kick panel speakers in the front. I found someone selling NOS ones and ordered a pair. With the new decklid in place, and the grill/speaker (Polk audio DB+ 5x7 coaxial) in hand, I designed and 3d printed the adapter to make it all work. 

52941006609_eacccec52a_c.jpg

 

The adapter has slotted holes to screw into the factory e30 parcel shelf premium speaker clips so you can shift them around and maximize speaker clearance, matches the profile of the ford speaker grilles, and spaces the speaker up high enough to require no hammering/cutting of the sheet metal underneath. It is printed in ASA which is UV stable and should have zero issues dealing with the heat inside a car parked in the sun. To finalize the fit and finish, I screwed the speaker grille to the adapter and sanded the outer profile as a unit to get rid of layer lines and align everything perfectly. 

52940859906_e3e8da7be8_c.jpg

 

I obviously didn't want a gray speaker cover, so that got scuffed up and sprayed black with adhesion promoter and SEM trim paint. The adapter was then sprayed with adhesion promoter and filler primer, sanded smooth, then another coat of adhesion promoter to re-coat any exposed plastic, textured black paint, and a final top coat of SEM trim black. I did this same process on the tweeter pods and it's held up perfectly so far. 

 

With everything painted it was time to mount it all up! Here is the adapter mounted to the parcel shelf: 

52940859226_b2cc5c6170_c.jpg

 

Then the speaker gets mounted to the underside of the ford speaker grille. To fit the speaker I did have to remove a trim ring/spacer from the top side of the speaker and use a tin snips to remove the outer mounting tabs/trim a bit of excess material on the other mounting tabs. Also, because of the placement of the wire connections, I bent the connectors outwards 90 degrees so that they would clear the parcel shelf without having to cut a notch in it. 

52941006284_3ded71e374_c.jpg

 

I then mounted the speaker assembly to the adapter in the car and went back and did the whole thing a second time!

52941248420_7be159fd4a_c.jpg

 

Couldn't be more stoked on the end result! It looks very factory and the sound improvement over the previous 5 1/4" coaxial speakers is huge. 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 minutes ago, SteelBlue said:

Speakers look good.

I need to do that with my parcel shelf this summer as mine is also a nice grey/purple.

Are these running off the stock amp?

Thanks! And nope, my car had the base sound system so I didn't have a factory amp at all. I used a Sony XMS400D amp inline with the speaker wiring. It basically takes the 4 speaker level inputs from the headunit and puts out 45watts RMS to each speaker.   

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, P_Roloff said:

Looks awesome, love the creative use of the 3D printer. I’m sure the sound improvement is awesome, and it really does look very OEM. Great work!

Thanks! Having a 3d printer that can print in durable materials has opened up a lot of possibilities for all kinds of fun stuff. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

So I was working on my basement over the weekend and went to move the original seats from this car. As I carried them across the basement at an awkward angle a coin fell out from somewhere deep in the seat and went pinging across the floor. I figured it was a quarter or something. Nope. It's a 1988 Austrian 1 schilling coin. 

53069803592_61c7aef168_c.jpg

 

I did some googling and Austria switched to the euro at the start of 2002... so either someone went on a European vacation and lost a coin when they got home, it's been in the seat since the car was built, or the car spent some time in Europe. Either way it's pretty neat. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use.