Thread: BMW e36 328i Sport Coupe

Status:
Just in the process of ordering kit and planning the wiring. I have the next week and a half off work and will be doing the wiring over the weekend and the beginning of the week.

I will be taking photo's as I go along to show you what is going on.

The Car


Hardware:

Up front

• The bezel - http://www.mybimmer.net/e36carpclcd.htm
  Lilliput 619GL touchscreen - http://www.carcomputer.co.uk/shop/mo...screen-monitor
  USB Tiny Thumbpad Keyboard - http://linitx.com/viewproduct.php?prodid=10779

PC

• M350 Universal Mini-ITX Enclosure - http://linitx.com/viewproduct.php?prodid=12488
  M1-ATX - 90W Intelligent Car PSU - http://linitx.com/viewproduct.php?prodid=10598
  ZOTAC IONITX Intel Atom N330 Dual - http://linitx.com/viewproduct.php?prodid=12478
  Kingston 1GB 800Mhz DDR2 DIMM - http://linitx.com/viewproduct.php?prodid=12224
  Seagate Momentus 5400.6 320GB SATA - http://linitx.com/viewproduct.php?prodid=12541

Extras

• GlobalSat BU-353 WaterProof USB GPS Receiver - http://www.expansys.com/d.aspx?i=140985
  USB Radio (silabs chipset) - http://usb.brando.com/usb-radio_p00136c035d015.html

While yes I understand that the spec is overkill for what is required at the moment... The Atom processors are quite energy efficient and will draw less wattage from the engine/battery, also the ION chipset will give me playback of HD video smoothly (most of my videos are 720p/1080p mkv's due to the setup of my living room frontend) even if I cant play them at HD resolution at the moment.... but the HD projector out of the boot wont be far behind!

There are some more custom bits that I will be doing to finish off the install (rotory control system, front & rear cameras with recording, internal camera....)

Day 1

Okay so day 1 has gone quite well... much better than I thought it would have...

I have removed the front passenger seat and the back bench..



Removed the centre console and the shift surround..


Found my cable run....


Down this run I have ran

• 2 x USB
  2 x 3.5mm audio Jack
  1 x VGA Cable
  10 x wires for the headunit

My only snagging point at the moment and am awaiting a reply from en4cer about is.... how do I EASILY remove the Stereo and CC holder as pictured below...


There seem to be 4 screws holding in, but they are on the reverse side and I dont seem to be able to get a screwdriver and and my fat fingers in there at the same time!!! lol

Day 2 to Day 32

Okay so bit of a BIG jump between posts, I do apologise. Had so much stuff on I havent found the time... but now I can finally show you some more photos.

Sooo things went pretty much like this... I finally got the plastic out of the frame... with a lil bit of force, but in the end it wasnt that bad The next bit I really dont have that many photos of as I was running towards the end of my week off work, the Bezel had turned up from the USA and the display arrived at about the same time..



That shot was at the end of the day, and I must admit it was quite easy to fit the screen... the Bezel was as good as I expected, with the screw holes and holders in the right places for the lilliput screen... well almost, it is possible to get a lil play in the screen around it, but its easily solved however I will admit that behind that lovely screen, its not all pretty.. but its sturdy!

I must admit upfront I have made on lil booboo and that was when I was relocating the AC unit... I will admit right now that my hacksawing skills are pretty dismal (and not looking at en4cers photos properly), so when cutting the sunglasses holder I cut the wrong bit at the bottom and also cut it badly! however it works and it fits right at the moment... tho I have brought another sunglasses holder from these guys Shropshire BMW Parts for £5 (They are based in Telford, but do mail order parts and are on ebay)

More of the screen and upfront to come..... next up is the PC



Heres a few photos of the PC, the all on one CPU/GPU and mobo combination of the board is fantastic in many ways, nVidia ION chipset for some outstanding graphics from a small machine, Dual-Core CPU for anything that can be off loaded to the GPU, mini-PCI Wifi card, HDMI, DVI & VGA out (great for some expandability... see Phase 2), Digital audio out (Alpine do a Digital Audio adapter.. will solve some of the some slight interference problems) and quite frankly.. a fair few USB ports... 6 on the back and 2 lots of headers on board.



Combine this board with the universal case and you have a nice lil setup. I chose this case over a vroom case is the expansions on the front and the lightness of it. You can also buy from LinITX various extras for mounting the case how you want.

The PC obviously needs to be powered some how and that is with the M1-ATX... its quite simple... you use some jumpers to set how long it will stay on for when ignition (or switch) is turned off, it will keep a 5v line to the PC for a set period of time ( for quicker restarts) and then fully power down. The M1-ATX will also monitor the battery and fully shutdown if the current from the battery drops to a low level.



All of this will be mounted in the boot, above the battery where the First Aid kit would have been, what you can see below is just a mock up (notice the m not a c) I made out of some plywood and off cuts I had. I must say it fits quite well and the principal is sound so I will be off to get some MDF and re do it to a better finish ( including covers and carpeting) also located here I don't loose much boot space and is conveniently just above the battery and right next to the end of my cable run.




So now back to the front, here are a few snaps of the system working about 80% fully.. right now the radio doesnt get a good signal and I dont have Phoco installed for the phone section, but it plays music, plays videos, shows me where to go and keeps me amused




I did make a royal cock up of trying to wire up the antenna upto the USB radio, some thing went POP and I lost all windows, sunroof and internal lights... this was easy to solve.. replaced fuses... however the ignition/accessory line to the radio doesnt work any more.. so until I fix this i have fitted a switch on the cig lighter panels to signal ignition or not.

More to come on the interface later and the next phase of the install...

Lucan