The quick turnaround

[Lee46]

You either get lucky with the screen replacement or you don't. The ends of the zip are open with no starter like on clothing. The ends fray, you have to get the 2 sides aligned on the right teeth and it can pull apart as you go round a corner. The roof may be shrunk and difficult to tuck under the piping. The stitching can need doing on the roof.

That said others will tell you they have done it successfully and are happy with the result.

Plus with a new roof you get the rear bulkhead professionally sealed up from leaks and a spanking new roof. And if you have a headlining it can go moldy under there so that gets a refresh too.

And you get to spend 2-3 hours in Swansea . I recommend the Potters Wheel Wetherspoons with the old blokes supping their pints. Proper Welsh folk Of which I'm not one but as you'll see from my location I spend half my week living there.

Thanks for the info pal, have just been out to take the parcel shelf carpet out as it’s quite damp after yesterday’s downpour. I think it’s safe to say that the roof may have shrunk in the bottom two corners of the screen so it looks like i’ll be booking in for a replacement roof and screen as I can’t really see that just a screen will do the job. With the difference being a couple of hundred quid it’s not worth the hassle.

Will give them a call and try to get booked in, if your going to be around swansea around the time the milky bars are on me! Thanks again.

 

[mrscalex]

At this time of year you might be able to go straight in. He has a waiting list of weeks to months in the summer.

And yes, might be around to say hello.

 

[Shelly]

Hi and welcome to ZroadSter
Great write-up

 

[Mint]

Hi @Lee46, to the forum from me too in Staffordshire. Nothing but praise for Jack Smith's, I had a new roof from him last year on my 3.0. Good luck with whatever you decide to do

 

[Slam]

Hi and welcome from London, great turn around on your car.

 

[Lee46]

@mrscalex roof all booked in for mid December even at this time of year a Saturday booking with jack smith’s would mean waiting untill January so booked a day off in the week. More pics to follow......

 

[Lee46]

So a little time has passed since the last update and with that the wallet has become a little lighter.

The roof has been sorted thanks to Jack Smith’s of which I highly recommend, for the decent price he charges and the time it takes if your roof has any sort of leak there should be no questions about wether or not to invest in a new roof. To have a roof with no leaks is priceless! Just need the weather to brighten up so i can get it down.

Wheel spacers on the rear have finally filled the awkward gap on the rear although this has left me wondering if to fit some kind of spacer on the the front axles to complete with wider look. The rears look great and certainly improve the look of the car from behind.

Next up was to improve the interior and most importantly the overall feel from the driving seat so took the leap and bought a couple of sport seats. Now this wasn’t a cheap mod but probably one of the most important. The seats provide so much support and really are a huge improvement over the standard one’s plus a little less blue in the interior cannot be a bad thing!

Apart from that the headlights have been polished up. As always there are a few more jobs to be done yet but we’ll get there hopefully before the summer eventually arrives.

Cheers

 

[hard top]

Looking good @Lee46

 

[spurs fan in a coupe]

Same seats as in my old coupe, sooooo comfy

 

[Nodzed]

How did I miss this??
Looks like a great job done well

 

[mrscalex]

Best non-M seats to have in my view. The leather is very tough. Chameleon is pretty but the embossing wears badly.

And yes, you will be very lucky to ever get a pair of Sport seats cheap. Mostly folk have to pay the going rate as they are so in demand.

 

[Lee46]

Anyone have any idea’s about what these seats are from? Took her out for a good 200 mile drive and i must say they are alot more supportive than the base model seat’s. By far the best mod yet

cheers

 

[mrscalex]

There's essentially 3 types of Z3 seat:

1. Non-Sport
2. Sport
3. M

You've gone from 1 to 2. There are 2 types of Sport seat:

1. With codpiece
2. Without codpiece.

Your's are Sport without codpiece 2.2. I'm sure internally in BMW they have more elegant names than with or without codpiece but that's how I refer to them.

The Sport seat with codpiece only comes with embossed leather options - Oregon (pimples) or Chamelon (snake skin, well chameleon skin I guess). The embossing eventually wears. These are typically but not always 2-tone. The Oregon comes in various colours. The Chameleon in Lotus White, red/black, black or blue/black. The Chameleon seats look fantastic but as mentioned do wear and the leather is not obtainable. The Oregon is. There's at least 1 upholsterer in Poland who has access to it.

Here's a Lotus White Chameleon seat with codpiece.

I had this fellow in mind when I named it thus.

The Sport seat without codpiece only (mostly true) comes in Classic leather. This is more plainly embossed and is lovely thick leather. It too will eventually wear although more often than not only because the metal frame underneath starts poking through the foam cushion. The vast majority of this type come in black only and fantastic they look too. But I did see a beige pair recently and there's a very rare Impala Brown version (probably non-UK). There is also a Nappa (smooth) leather version for the Coupe in various colours. And a faux leather and cloth version which is rare and to be honest a bit of an oddity.

To complicate things further all non-M seats come on 2 bases - pre-facelift and facelift and the wiring connectors are totally different on each. In fact I think there many be further variations within the production run of each.

 

[mrscalex]

And to answer your question they would have come from a facelift Sport model. Sport seats are standard on all facelift Sport models.

 

[Lee46]

@mrscalex looks like you certainly know your seats! Thank you for getting back to us with where the seats are from, it’s just a shame all Z3’s didn’t come with them standard and i can now see why they demand such a premium