Here is another update from over the last 3 weeks. First I started on my front passenger seat. Here is a pic of the old seat. Sure needs to be recovered. I will recondition the shocks, metal base and wasted foam pieces. Here is the headrest before and after in the black micro suede. Matches nice with the rear ones and very modern with no piping and french seams.


New one:

Here are a few pics of my homemade DIY smoke detector machine, and workd pretty well, from searching the web on how to make it. Found some on e46fanatics.com and composed my version.
Get a quart metal paint can, ~$2 at Lowes/Home depot. Then drilled a hole at bottom wide enought to fit the AC Delco glowing plug ~$9 at Autozone. Then bought a nut at Home Depot to fit threads on plug, metric size ~$1. Then JB weld it to the can. Used teflon pipe tape and screwed the plug in. I need to add more tape as I got some of the oil to leak, very little but still leaked. The plug uses batter charger, 12v 10amps to power it on. Use the postive on the lead and the negative on the base. Used alligator clips to be able to easily disconnect on of the leads to turn it off. I have to build legs for it but if you hang it or use 2 2x4 pieces on the edge, you dont disrupt the electrical connections. Fill can with unscented baby oil until half the plug is exposed. I then drilled 2 holes on the lid and JB Weld to air compressor hose fitting to it to easily attach a rubber hose to shoot the smoke and the other for the air compressor hose fitting which is my air source. Turn it on, regulater compressor to 2-3 psi and you have a smoke machine. Mineral oil or hobby train might work better to give a darker smoke but baby oil worked just fine. The using a funnel on one end of the rubber intake elbow you fire the smoke in. You can use the hose off the valve cover by the oil cap to see it. I have small leaks due cracked hoses by the couplers. Sure way better than paying a shop to do it or $1K for the machine. If anyone has questions, let me know.


Last week, closing the passenger door, I heard a clunk and door didnt close. The bottom hinge pin broke in half and now the door was not aligned to close. I order the BMW repair pin that comes with new pin, sleeve, washer, clip and bolt. Today I replaced it, took about an hour. I wanted to do it with the door on but being in the bottom, I couldnt get to it. If it was the top one, you can easily do it with door on. I had to take the door off and it was pretty simple. Did it by myselft but if you ahve another set of hands, the removing of the door and returning it on the pins makes it easier. No need to realign as the hinge on the chasis was not touched. Here are a few pics of process:
Here is pic of the pin broken:

Here is door removed:

Here is the broken piece coming out, used punch and hammer:

Here it all back together and good as new:
