4 Days to Bimmerfest

It is only 4 days to Bimmerfest and I can't wait to be there.

Nate@IND; thanks for all your help. You guys have really helped us a lot, not only on this project but throughout the years. I only hope that we had been an instrumental part your business as well.

Now, back to Project 1....

Today, I am going to share with you, some of the smaller parts that went into the car (literally smaller). The wheels, exhaust and aero drastically change the way the car looks to the naked eye. Some of the products I will share with you may lack similar effects but it really adds to the total bad-assness (made this word up) of the car!

Pivot 3-drive Flat Throttle Controller


The Pivot 3-Drive Flat Throttle Controller is the first of its kind and the only one in the market. There are a few different throttle controllers for the modern throttle by wire cars. Most of these systems only "boost" the throttle response of the car, much like the "Sport" setting on a lot of the BMW's with sport packages.

However, the Pivot 3-Drive Flat Throttle Controller has 12 different modes: 7 in the "sport" mode and 5 in the "Eco" mode. Settings in the sport mode really allows you to fine tune the amount of throttle response that you are happy with. The Eco mode allows you to lag or retard the throttle response. Why would you want to do that? Well, I have a couple of reasons: when i give me moded 135i to the Valet and when (god forbid) ever need to lend the car to some one else.

Installation is also really easy. Pivot has really created an innovative product by allowing this to be a plug and play solution with simple installation through the OBD port.

Pivot Hybrid Triple Gauge System

We have been supplying and selling the 3D Design Gauge pods for the BMW cars for quite some time. We also supply them with top of the line STACK Gauges. However, this set up is not an easy one. The oil pressure / Oil temperature / exhaust temperature as well the water temperature gauges need to be tapped into the respective sources to function and they are often expensive with labor for installation being not very "DIY" for the average Joe.



Again, Pivot just made this a non-issue with their triple gauge system for the BMW 135/335 cars. The gauges read boost / water temp / exhaust temp. Boost reading is done by "T" connection to the vacuum line on the diverter valve side and the temp gauges obtain accurate readins from connecting to the OBD ports. That is simple and fun. The only downside, if any is that they read in kPA and degree celsius, which I really like as it makes the car unique.

3D Design Gauge Pod

The quality of the construction of the 3D Design products are out of this world. This gauge pod fit perfectly and was flawless.

So, how do we tie in 2 components to 1 OBD Port? Well Pivot had a solution for that too. A simple plug in adapater that will allow you to run 2 Pivot OBD compliant products.



Here is a picture of the entire set up (parts only) laid out...


Bellof Sirius LED Ring for BMW
Bellof is a very well known Japanese bulb and lighting solutions company. They are very well known for making high quality HID solutions as well as LED bulbs for automotive applications.

Amongst the many brands of Angel Eye upgrade bulbs, we have decided to go with the Bellof Sirius LED Rings. Bellof has 2 distintive features: the bulb brightness remains steady even through ignition process, proprietary circuitry to stabilize current into the bulb and most importantly features 4 LED bulbs to increase the brightness while positioning them strategically, so that they travel through the entire figure 8 of the Angel eyes.

Again, the connection and installation was top notch and everything fit easily and quickly.



ARC Power Brace
It was also time to stiffen the car a little bit, with the power that is going in. I had always wanted to put a nice shiny strut bar in the car. Give the car a little bit of a flashy look to the engine bay while stiffening up the car a tad bit. Of course, we decided to source only the best for this job. We opted for ARC Power Brace to handle this task.





The ARC Power Brace was just an amazing piece of piece. It was well made, precision crafted from Aluminum and steel. the cross bar is aluminum while the mounting points were made of steel.

ARC also makes a really nice brace for the rear struts but we did not want to go overboard, this time. They also have these braces in a combination of Aluminum and carbon fiber, which we didn't opt for as we had no other carbon fiber pieces on our car.

CPM Lower Reinforcement.
I was not sure what to make of this product at first. But, when our friends in Japan told us that this is the hottest item for BMW in the market right now, we had to try it.



What does it do?

It goes in place of your lower brace (not replacing it) but under the panel to hold the car together. It is supposed to really add rigidity to the car. I don't know if it did, but it sure was a nice piece and we had to put it on.

Well, this is it for this edition. Again, no pictures of the products mounted on the car itself. You will get to see them at Bimmerfest when we unveil the car!