Department of Transport Modification Application

As I mentioned in the previous post I wanted this car to remain street legal and as a result I was going to have to get a Modification permit and approval for the level of modifications I was looking at. This means that all of my modifications were going to have to comply with the National Code of Practice for Light Vehicle Construction/Modification.

The initial stage of the process is to complete a Modification Application which outlined what I planned to do. This stage is relatively simple and is just so they can stop you from starting anything that they will reject straight away. All you get at the end of this stage is "in principal" approval to continue with your modifications. As an engineers report and thorough inspection are required to get the final approval.

I wanted to get this stage started as quickly as possible as it had to be submitted by mail so I knew the processing and response times would be slow. As a result I did some rather quick and high level research and started selecting parts that I may use in my build so that I could fill in the initial application. I would be able to change these parts later in the process and providing they were similar in function the "in principal" approval would still stand. I will also contact an Automotive Engineer to go through this process once I get "in principal" approval so then I can double check with them what will be allowable as I go through the build process.

To start off I completed the below application (has personal detailed redacted):
Modification Application

Then while that is being processed I will begin stripping the car and doing thorough research on each part before I go ahead with a purchase.

Comments

///M Clubsport Door Sills Search

Whilst starting the preparation and install for my Karbonius CSL Carbon Fibre Roof I started thinking about the final overall style of the car again. It particularly came to the front of my mind when a friend, who was working with me on the roof install, asked what the deal with the CS badge on the boot was. I realised tat whilst that choice had made sense to me it may not really land with others who are unfamiliar with BMWs and understand the history of the CS badging or the idea of what the Clubsport moniker encapsulates. From previous research and investigations into Clubsport branding from BMW that I could use to keep the style I knew of the somewhat rare E46 330i Clubsport so i thought I should take another look to see if there was anything from that that might help pull the theme together at all. It was at that point that I came across the ///M Clubsport door sills that are used on the E46 330i Clubsport. They struck me as perfect to help tie the theme together. They a...

Syncro Design Works RTAB Install

Now it was time to get around to trying to install my new Syncro Design Works RTAB's. As I had not borrowed the RTAB tool from Syncro Design Works I was going to have to try figure this out on my own. At first I attempted to rig up a press on the outer ring of the RTAB using my 3-jaw puller which was more complicated than you would think. This did work quite effectively but annoyingly there wasn't much space in the jaws for how deep the press was so I had to use a somewhat flimsy grease cap to try push on the outer ring. This worked for about half the press then it completely crushed itself so I aborted before any pressure was applied to the bearing's inner race. Unfortunately I didn't manage to snap any pictures during this operation so all I have is this photo of where I had to stop: Luckily I have a mate who has a bearing press anyway so I wasn't completely out of options. This was an easy option for me as my Rear Trailing Arm was out of the car as part ...

///M3 CS (ClubSport) Badging

As part of the overall theme of my car build I have wanted to set my car apart from other less modified or standard E46 M3s whilst staying true to a BMW styling. I wanted the car to look like it could have come off the factory floor as a BMW option package and drive well on the street, whilst also tearing up on the track. This is part of why for most of my build I have referred to it as a Clubsport build and this gave me the idea to try capture that naming and apply it to the theme of the car. There was never officially a BMW E46 M3 Clubsport as the BMW E46 M3 CS that Europe got was actually a Coupe Sport and obviously the CSL was the pinnacle model which as discussed previously I cannot really replicate from. So I started thinking about badging and labeling and was reminded of some of the M3Forum guys with Supercharged M3s who use a CSL badge but switch it around to give themselves a ///M3 sc which I always thought was kind of cool and set them apart without being too tacky. The use o...

WBM346Z Build Journal

Search This Blog