MadaboutKitcars

Beautiful paint job.

Agreed - great looking work.

If I ever get a Kobra I am leaning towards good old black. Something alone the lines of the 289 street car look.

Two cars for the price of one is superb

Really DO NOT GO FOR BLACK

My car is amazing but a bastard to create or maintain Go for Silver

Thanks for your advice - it's going to be a long time till I get the funds (and more importantly space to work in). So I will change my mind over and over again by then

Dave

Nearly finished!

Well that works for me ....love the sticky out spinners on the narrow tucked in wires ...

Look bl@@dy excellent - my compliments to all involved

Dave

Amazing - well done Richard and team

'kin excellent....

Busy day today Andy's Kalifornia off to paint in a very special custom paint, brushed aluminium effect. Very excited, and apprehensive at the same time, to see how it turns out.

Workshop is very busy at the moment too. What you can't see in this picture is a Koupe starting construction and half a dozen Z3 donor cars. As I have a show coming up I have to finish my interior on the red Kali. Im on it all day tomorrow so there should be several updates in the interior thread. 7 months since it was started, put a battery on it and she fired first time...you've got to love these Z3's!

The drophead looks much better in black than I would have thought. Weirdly, with an adjustment in ride height, it looks quite at home on those alloys, too. This body conversion seems to be very aesthetically sensitive to offset.

This sounds interesting Richard. Is the effect caused by the paint itself, or by abrading the paint finish after spraying? Looking forward to seeing the finished job.
Steve

Im interested to see how the brushed paint looks.

There is a V10 M3 locally that has been wrapped, it looks great and the finish really adds a purposeful look.

But the owner said it gets marked quite easily, hopefully the paint will not share this trait.

https://youtu.be/_Cwr3uMmTBI

Hi
We have never used this paint effect before, as its new on the market from America. Even the company that supplies it has no pictures (which is worrying) It has to be painted gloss black first then the aluminium paint goes on in layers till the correct effect is achieved. Then several coats of 2K lacquer to seal it in so it should be very durable. However touching up if it gets scratched would be tricky!
Should be back in about 4 weeks
(worried of Reading)

I am really eager to see the final result of this paint finish. If it looks anything like this, then it will be an awesome choice.

painted gloss black first then the aluminium paint goes on in layers till the correct effect is achieved.

I watched a YouTube about bronzed chrome effect paint for wheels which did something similar

Haha, it's not going to get scratched as it will be encased in a vacuum glass garage structure on my front lawn!

.......well either that or no parking within door opening distance of any other car, and/or getting really good at touch up with brushed effect and/or applying lots of vintage stickers and/or applying lots of protective coats to the overall finish, specifically around the front end, oh and driving like a Sunday driver everywhere.

If you get a scratch just put a little of this on it and call it patina

http://www.sprayonrustpaint.co.uk/

Good afternoon Richard , could you answer a question ref the SWB you have just completed , could there be a problem at MOT team with the amount that the spinners on the rear axle protrude outside the line of the bodywork? secondly one for the owner with the removal of the rear silencer does the resultant sound level become tiresome on a long run? (this one for my own benefit!) thanks Geoff .

Hi Geoff
Ive never had a problem with MOT yet but it depends on the tester. I can direct you to the one we use who understands in reality these are not dangerous. If we needed IVA they definitely would not pass.

To the question of noise. I can only speak from my opinion and what I have observed by others. The interesting thing about these BMW sixes is that the sound loud going through the gears or accelerating but when cruising seem almost quiet. Andy (ericholm) was on the fence about building a kit till he followed me in my Kali and he said thats what sold it to him. Incidentally I'm going for a louder, new full stainless, straight through exhaust upgrade on my car at Longlife in a weeks time. I currently have two silencers (if you can call them that).
Bryn Webber, the owner of the grey Koupe, loves his sound so much he just drives it around just to listen to the sound. It's intoxicating. If fact he said his stereo fuse has blown and he has not bothered to replace it! Bless.

It's all very well altering the boxes for appearance and/or audio, but at what effect to the performance or emissions? Back pressure in an exhaust system can be quite critical, so what effect do the silencer changes have - or is it not really critical (is the cat upstream of all this?)

We always leave the cat on and build the exhaust from there backwards. It only has an oxygen sensor before the cat with an analogue signal to the ECU. Some vehicles have a post cat sensor to tell the ECU what is happening after the cat which is a digital system. No Z3's have the post cat fitted. Smaller engine cars rely on back pressure which is basically a sound wave which is bounced back by the silencer to help boost the power. However on larger engined cars it is better if there is no back pressure and you are getting rid of the exhaust gases as unrestricted and quick as possible.
Dragsters have unsilenced, short, huge bore (a pidgeon could nest in) exhausts for this reason.

My Z300S has a large bore stainless steel pipe from the rear of the centre silencer to the wheel arch.



For commuting I have fitted a baffle (4 perforated plates) which does affect performance but makes it more liveable with. Flooring the throttle produces a hiss like a leaking exhaust. There is still a lovely crackle on the overrun however. I usually remove the baffle for shows... I've not used the stereo since I fitted that pipe.

Hi,

With the hood down the noise it great, nice pitch and roar when you need it and not intrusive.

With hood up at certain revs (lower) for me there is an annoying drone (must be a frequency thing), however at cruising revs this isn't present, luckily, else I agree it would be difficult. Also with stereo 'on' the exhaust noise at cruising is pretty much reduced to a background noise, with a reasonable volume level engaged on the stereo.

Its personal taste I guess and I want the noise, I want to hear it and have the experience it gives so it feels like I'm driving an old car with a big engine!

Cheers