First step after removing all of the old interior and carpet was to get the black carpet and dash in:

I can now remove a dash in about 20 minutes...

Next step is pulling all the rotted soundproofing and putting in dynaliner. Also installing the seat heater retrofit harness as this will be for my daughter and she is incapable of generating heat on her own.

 

Jealous, wish we could have found a touring! They are so hard to find, not beat up. Would love a 330 version but hard to find in Canada. There are some people importing Alpina All-rads and Japan versions, but rarely come up. Congrats and good luck with it.
regards

 

If anyone is curious why you need a donor for an interior swap, here is the swap parts list:

Glove box - black
M3 steering wheel (an indulgence!)
Dashboard - black
Front door card left - black
Front door card right - black
Rear door card left - black
Rear door card right - black
B pillar cover lower left - black
B pillar cover lower right - black
Rear holder and bracket
Kick panel/dead panel - black
Kick panel right - black
Sill strip right - black
Sill strip left - black
Rear storing partition - black
Upper console - black
Console - black
Cup holder - black
Coin holder - black
Arm rest - black
Rear seat - black
Front carpet
Rear carpet

Wheel well carpet
Cargo area carpet - black
Battery cover - black
Floor cover - black
Cargo trim front left - black (carpet side)
Cargo trim front right - black (carpet side)
Cargo trim rear left - black (carpet side)
Cargo trim rear right - black (carpet side)
Seat belt trim left
Seat belt trim right
Speaker cover left - black
Speaker cover right - black
Base trim right near battery
Battery base - right
Base carrier left
Base carrier right
Cover left - black
Seat belt cover left - black
Seat belt cover right - black
Cover trim rear sill
Rear lighter - black
Hatch upper window trim - black
Isofix car seat connector door (4)
Seat belt cover trim left - black
Seat belt cover trim left - black
Hatch trim carpet panel - black
Hatch left window trim - black
Hatch right window trim - black
Hatch cover - black
Covering left - black
Covering right - black
Vent panel trim rear left - black
Vent panel trim rear right - black

Luggage strap keyhole (4)
Hatch small cover - black - catch bracket
Emergency brake boot
Shifter boot
Hatch window latch cover - black
Rear pillar covering cap
A Pillar airbag screw cover trim - black


Sport seat left front - black
Sport seat right front - black
Luggage cover

Hatch left window trim - black
Hatch right window trim - black
Hatch trim carpet panel - black
Tailgate trim - threshold
Cargo cover support left - black
Cargo cover support right - black
Hatch window latch cover - black


Not too bad, eh! I have all but about 8 pieces. Will put it all in after I get the seat heater harness and install it under the carpet

 

Anyone one the west coast that has front black sport heated seats let me know!

 

You're gonna have to start your own shop soon Archbid! :thumbup:

 

Don’t let my wife hear you say that...

 

A B30 and MT swap would be sweet in that wagon.

 

My daughter graduates in a little over a year then the S54 and 6-speed goes in.

For now I am playing around with the interior.

 

Found my seats! Great condition out of a ZHP - electric but no heat - $200.

Spent the weekend getting the interior sorted. Took out the rubber lining from the back seat - in shreds from moisture. Replaced it with Dynaliner. All the seats are in.

 

Progress! Interior almost complete.

• Installed the front seats
• Installed all trim and panels
• Replaced four floor plugs that were rotted or missing
• Ran wire for future heated seats
• Stripped and repainted steering wheel and all console parts
• Found Bluetooth TCU mic and antenna at a pick n pull ($15!) so installed that

 

Next up is the boring stuff - maintenance (boooo!)

1. Replace rotors and pads and flush
2. Refresh cooling system
3. Replace belts and pulleys
4. Plugs
5. Oil and filter

But...a new secret project is also in the works!

p.s. I have sold one of the verts to a buddy after a total intake/cooling/steering refresh and various other repairs. It***8217;s a beauty!

 

If anyone is contemplating this, I will give a few pieces of advice:

1. To remove rear seat bolsters, pull firmly out at the topmost edge until it separates. Then lift the bolster straight up to disengage the vertical pins. If you yank it out, you will break the pins (which the ***holes at the auto recycling place did when I bought them)
2. The trim from the rear seatbelt to the D-pillars is a 3D puzzle. Take pictures as you disassemble, and "dry-fit" all the pieces before re-assembling. Do not put the rear seatbelt cover trim (the outermost trim) on until everything is back in place.
3. The hatch window trim tabs are made of nothing more than the broken dreams of innocent children, and will fracture if you look at them wrong. be *very* gentle.
4. Touring/Wagon interior parts are very expensive and relatively scarce. Black parts (especially roof parts like grab handles) are virtually nonexistent.

 

Looking good, Arch! You've come a long way (baby).

For those who haven't rolled up their sleeves and refurbished an interior, it's a ton of painstaking frustrating work, in cramped quarters, breaking parts impossible to source, cutting your fingers, etc. But, so rewarding when you have the final product.

 

Looking good, Arch! You've cone a long way (baby).

For those who haven't rolled up their sleeves and refurbished an interior, it's a ton of painstaking frustrating work, in cramped quarters, breaking parts impossible to source, cutting your fingers, etc. But, so rewarding when you have the final product.

Thanks!

What makes you crazy is that in many cases you only learn how parts come together by breaking them... then it is obvious!

For the record, the best way to refinish black trim is to put it in the dishwasher for 10 minutes, remove then rub with your fingers. Repeat. Then spray with adhesion promoter and then LVP bmw black.

For satin parts like the steering wheel do two light coats of matte clear coat.

 

One of the many small tasks - recovering the arm rest. New leather with extra padding!

 

Looks great! The black looks 10x better then dove grey.

I know your pain with the rear seat belt/ D-pillar trim. If you plan on replacing struts then you’ll be pulling it all apart again

These wagons seem to beg for attention eh? Only had mine for a couple months and already spent countless hours working on her.

Thanks for the parts list btw. It’d be awesomely find a black wagon parts car.

Cheers; E46Envyy


Sent from my iPhone using E46Fanatics

 

Dang! Should've done the shocks...

Car is perfect. Easy to park, fun to drive. Great-looking and useful.

Thinking of style 32 wheels. Opinions?

 

Putting in an M3 wheel. Starting the rewrap:

Also replaced the rear brakes and rotors. Pads were fine, rotors were shot. Don’t mind the rust spots. Rotors got wet earlier!

 

I have a suspicion this may have been a burning man car. Underside looked rusted, which doesn't happen out here. Took a brush to it and the "rust" turned out to be fine reddish sand mixed with oil. There was sand in the bottom of the air cleaner, and when I removed exterior trim, even more.

It was like cleaning a toddler after a day at the beach - sand in every crevice!

But she is looking fantastic and more to come!

 

Belts, cooling refresh, pulleys, new struts. Sounding and riding better!

And my final order of interior parts is on its way:

 

Big day! I hated the greige headliner and pillars, so I decided to go all-in Vader.

BM134 black headliner
VOL322 twill pillars

 

Big day! I hated the greige headliner and pillars, so I decided to go all-in Vader.

BM134 black headliner
VOL322 twill pillars

These look fantastic. What's the story on the headliner, did you recover it yourself or take it to an upholstery shop? It looks beautiful.

I dig the twill look on the pillars as well.

 

I am now absolutely convinced this car went to burning man. Took the trim off the hatch to run a backup camera and found this:

 

Nice progress and the headliner looks awesome. :thumbup:

The first was running but interior soaking wet and rear seat covered in mildew - 125k miles. This is for the daughter of a friend.

Second one has a perfect body and near-perfect interior. Had 12" of water in the trunk and didn't run. Fixed the roof tray drain and did a complete restore of the intake, brakes and electrical ($2,500 parts) now it runs absolutely perfect with near zero LTFT no codes. My buddy gets this one once we get title.

A blocked sunroof drain led to saturation of the carpet and a lot of "growth." Tore the entire interior out - I hate grey anyway. Btw if anyone wants grey parts for a touring, I'm your guy! Carpet went into the garbage, and everything else was washed with light bleach.

Please consider blasting the interior with ozone once you are done. Bleach is inadequate for remediating mold and the toxins that remain after the mold is killed are no joke.

 

Nice progress and the headliner looks awesome. :thumbup:

Please consider blasting the interior with ozone once you are done. Bleach is inadequate for remediating mold and the toxins that remain after the mold is killed are no joke.

Where does one go to blast with ozone?

Hey How did the steering wheel turn out? I have 1-2 that I want to re-wrap...

So slowly. If I had to do it again I would buy a rewrapped one!

 

Hey How did the steering wheel turn out? I have 1-2 that I want to re-wrap...

 

Aaaaand...

Here she is!

I am not going to say it was easy, as it was not. The actual sewing is not hard, but I did use padding, which took some time to get right and trim correctly.

The sewing was one of those tasks like changing a starter or removing a dash that is ridiculously hard first shot, then becomes pretty intuitive pretty quickly. I am very compulsive, and a bit ham-handed, so I had to do a few sections over a few times.

I think that when you add it up it is likely worth it to have someone do it. It took me about 4 hours, and I suspect I could do it in 1.5-2 now.

 

As an aside, I would strongly recommend against a black swap for a touring unless you have a complete set of parts. It is incredibly hard to find the parts used, and the new ones are very expensive. I have a guy who is disassembling a Wagon in England (they call it an "Estate") for me, and it has been a challenge. Especially the black roof parts.

But it is looking SOOOOO sweet. Pix to come.

I have also become a master at trim repair, mostly by necessity. The black trim piece tabs just disintegrate when you remove the parts, so building new tabs has become a forte of mine. I just rebuilt the cup holder for the back seat

Next up is the tranny flush, oil pan gasket and a complete rebuild of the suspension, including replacing the Kingpin and rear trailing arms with 330 components (and brakes). The current stuff is rusty, and it feels like a fun project.

Also looking for 17" style 72 or 73 wheels

 

Nice work on the steering wheel...How are you rebuilding tabs? epoxy? glue gun? I always hope I have enough tabs left to keep it secure.. just broke one of 4 tabs on my E53 seat switch cover.

 

I keep old trim, carefully cut tabs off and transplant them using epoxy. I am starting to learn how to build out of a plastic repair kit, but that is not going smoothly...

 

Progress! The headliner is in!

Also picked up a used shadowline trim set. Going to try to get it powder coated.

 

Looking really nice! I'm really enjoying the updates and can't wait to start making some progress of my own.

 

Picked up a set of Style 73s! Very excited to get rid of the insanely ugly Style 45s

Incredibly, I have had no time to get on this project - mostly because I have to fix a million things in the house that are intolerable now that we are locked-in! I spent all day fixing an in-wall coffeemaker.