Rebody Z3 Based Ferrari 250 California Build

[t-tony]

Red seat tuck & roll, black seat sewn pleat

Huge difference, The "Tuck and Roll" looks quality.

Tony.

 

[MisterP007]

Huge difference, The "Tuck and Roll" looks quality.

Tony.

It does look much better in "tuck and roll" I will need to call Yvonne this week to order and to find out the difference in cost.

 

[Duncodin]

Huge difference, The "Tuck and Roll" looks quality.

Tony.

Yes. 'Period/Premium' so probably pretty close to the originals. Money well spent IMO.

 

[gookah]

Red seat tuck & roll, black seat sewn pleat

Tuck and pleat looks more up market.

or roll and sewn, which is the other selection from each,........

 

[jaguartvr]

Hi Gookah, glad you replied to Sandy's thread, that way I don't feel so bad about asking you about another electrickery question.

I am hoping to replace the existing BMW hazard switch with the one pictured above. When this one is turned on all 3 terminals are connected, there is also an earth terminal connected to the shaft which can just be seen in the 11 o'clock position. The switch is illuminated.
Any ideas on what to connect to this switch coming from the original hazard switch?

Many thanks

Steve

 

[MisterP007]

Finally got the dash in, hooray! But I think it may need to come out again.

To say this was a PITA is an understatement, all I can say is, it’s parents were not married!!!

I had to cut back the vent tube that supplies the side demist vent in the Z3 and remake this in a low profile so the windscreen demist still has air supply (I hope it has enough).

This needed aluminium profiles made to re-shape the vent supply where it joins the main supply. With all this glued and taped in place it was time to try the dash fit.

Without the Z3 circuit board the dash drops in effortlessly, with it it becomes damn near impossible. I finally managed to lay it behind the tubular cross member horizontally (ish) with the display facing down and the sockets upwards.

The cabling is just (4-5mm just long enough) to reach the instrument furthest to the left. An extra foot on the cable would have made this so much easier.

Bolted in, plug headlight switch back in and lights up. Looks bright in the photos but is actually borderline too dim even in a dark workshop with all the lights off.

I will be having a long discussion with Justin at Grassbank as this could be so much easier with a longer loom, this would provide options for positioning the circuit board behind the dash passenger side where there is a huge space previously occupied by the airbag, or down in drivers side knee panel which would allow for very easy access ( true mileage display for MOT and access for repairs and to the connectors).

All I can say is, i hope the hell these do not go wrong.

I am still tempted to extend all the wiring and place the circuit board behind the knee panel for future access.

What a waste of time, it would have been faster with ETB instruments and I thought that took a while on the 250SWB.

 

[Duncodin]

@MisterP007. Can I ask about placing the circuit board at the drivers side knee panel. For easy access to true mileage for MOT.

Do you mean that the new speedo dials etc are not necessarily showing the true mileage and/or that the MOT test person is likely to want access to the original z3 dash?

I'd have thought that the new dial/dash would have the original z3 mileage 'dialed' in and the the MOT guy only sees that. Telling him that there's 'another' mileage might just make a jobsworth sharpen his pencil and start picking holes.

Or have I misunderstood something.

 

[t-tony]

Is the original vehicle mileage even relevant? You could have fitted a new set of clocks with zero miles recorded. All a Tester has to record is the mileage shown at the time of the test.

Tony.

 

[MisterP007]

Is the original vehicle mileage even relevant? You could have fitted a new set of clocks with zero miles recorded. All a Tester has to record is the mileage shown at the time of the test.

Tony.

Hi all @t-tony is bang on.

MOT just records the mileage shown on the speedo, real mileage irrelevant. My 250 SWB currently shows 3440 miles (plus the 108k I bought the car with for real mileage).

The Grassbank speedo is an hour meter (as per a boat) and does not record mileage at all (no idea why). I would still like to know true mileage for my info and for future re-sale.

The Grassbank set-up has the original Z3 display in place but now stuffed up behind the dash and nearly impossible to see. This is why I would like the circuit board in an accessible place (amongst other reasons).

Grrrrr........

 

[t-tony]

Agricultural vehicles also record their usage in hours too.

Tony.

 

[MisterP007]

Agricultural vehicles also record their usage in hours too.

Tony.

Forgot that my lawn tractor has an hour meter!

 

[t-tony]

I started out working as an Apprenticed Agricultural Engineer back in 1972. It gave me a good grounding of repairing rather than throw away and renew as is mostly the case these days. Probably even in the Agric. Industry.

Tony.

 

[MisterP007]

@t-tony

I think the agri industry still fixes stuff, nice big lumps of metal to weld, not too bothered about a mirror finish on the paint, chunky brackets to fabricate, big hammer to make adjustments, job done!

My son is getting the message (age29) that things can be fixed and improved with some skill and ingenuity (upscaled they call it now - muppets).

 

[Pingu]

@t-tony is it MOT legal to run with just an hour meter on a Class 4, or do they need an odometer?

@MisterP007 - I'd have extended the Greenbank wires and the Z3 wires so they reached the airbag void. I can't understand why you didn't. As you say, there is plenty of space above the glovebox after the airbag has been removed. You could even add a window in the roof of the glovebox to see mileage and service indicator.

Did you keep the BMW dash (hidden) in your 250SWB?

I'm not bothered about losing the odometer, as the ETB speedometer just starts again from zero. I did try to save the service indicator, but the circuitry was too fine for me to work with. I can plug my BMW dash console into the X16, X17 and X271 connectors, but only temporarily (for the same reason you struggled). In a perfect world, I'd have moved the odometer/SI module to somewhere and kept it under a covered flap.

 

[Pingu]

I considered starting to build plug 'n' play dashboards, but I think the cost would be outside most people's budgets.

I've just sold a BMW 330 for a less than my dashboard cost to build .

 

[Duncodin]

My only concern would be if the original dash had warning, abs or airbag lights on (because you've disconnected wires, airbags etc) then if the MOT guy spotted them he'd put his 'jobsworth' hat on. So I'd hide it somewhere where he won't see it and certainly wouldn't point it out to him.

As far as 'Hours' vs 'miles' is concerned I wouldn't mention that to an MOT guy either.

 

[t-tony]

There has to be an odometer. It is one of first parts of doing a test to note down the reading. Even if it displayed the same reading as the previous test it doesn’t matter. If you were given the previous test certificate showing the same mileage all a tester could do is advise it.

Tony.

 

[MisterP007]

@t-tony is it MOT legal to run with just an hour meter on a Class 4, or do they need an odometer?

@MisterP007 - I'd have extended the Greenbank wires and the Z3 wires so they reached the airbag void. I can't understand why you didn't. As you say, there is plenty of space above the glovebox after the airbag has been removed. You could even add a window in the roof of the glovebox to see mileage and service indicator.

Did you keep the BMW dash (hidden) in your 250SWB?

I'm not bothered about losing the odometer, as the ETB speedometer just starts again from zero. I did try to save the service indicator, but the circuitry was too fine for me to work with. I can plug my BMW dash console into the X16, X17 and X271 connectors, but only temporarily (for the same reason you struggled). In a perfect world, I'd have moved the odometer/SI module to somewhere and kept it under a covered flap.

Hey Pingu

I still may take the dash back out and extend the wiring. I did not want to do it from a pig-headed viewpoint (should have been long enough in the first place at the price (£1795 although I paid a lot less as these were trial sets). I hate things not being right (must be OCD).

Debating whether to take it out and start extending the wires tonight?

The dash from the Z3 is cut back to fit the Tribute dash on top as you know, if you mean was the Z3 instrument circuit board kept in the 250SWB, answer is no as I used ETB instruments.

 

[MisterP007]

My thoughts on ETB vs Grassbank Instruments:

• Initial Cost - ETB win hands down £1300 vs £1795 Grassbank (you can add £60-100 to that also, as you cannot sell the Z3 Cluster).
• Appearance - Similar and some will prefer one over the other. ETB warm glow when lit, Grassbank LED white light (a bit dim and cannot be controlled by Z3 lightswitch dimmer). Grassbank has a crisper appearance and has an analogue odometer (more on this in a bit) the ETB is digital LCD (not exactly period looking).
• Fitting - ETB is complex and you need to be good with a Multi-Meter and a soldering iron or crimp tool. Grassbank is theoretically plug and play and initially appears to be much faster and simpler.
• Usefulness/Accuracy - this is where it gets interesting.
  • ETB gauges are all wired and driven from the correct sources
  • Oil Pressure is actual oil pressure taken from a sender which needs to be fitted and wired in
  • Water Temp is from a sensor and accurate but has no high temp light (I have a nose though so I can smell hot anti-freeze)
  • Fuel needs a resistor wired into the circuit to read correctly and is still not accurate (except at full and empty spookily!). Has no low fuel light.
  • Voltmeter works perfectly and also needs wired back to under-bonnet
  • Speedo is accurate once set up
  • Tacho also accurate
  • Clock - it's a clock what can I say!
  • Tell-tales for indicators, beam, low oil pressure, brakes, lights etc. all need to be individually wired back to the correct Z3 cable so loads of testing with a Multimeter and individual connectors/soldering needed. A lot of people simply leave them off.
• Grassbank Instruments are wired to the Z3 original cluster therefore:
  • Speedo works
  • Tacho works
  • Fuel gauge works and has a low level tell-tale
  • Water temp works and has tell-tale overheat light
  • Odometer which is nice to look at and analogue is not an odometer at all, but an hour meter as per a boat or tractor. If you need the real mileage for some reason it is on the original Z3 display stuffed out of sight behind the dash!
  • Tell-tales for indicators, brakes, low oil pressure, beam, lights, asc, abs etc. all work as per Z3 as they are part of the plug and play (sort off. )One issue with these is fiddly:
    • The bulbs for the tell-tales are not pre-fitted and wired back to the plug, this means they have to be twisted into place (very tight) and are directly connected to the loom rather than via a connector. If the instruments need to come out, each bulb will need to be untwisted before the main connector is unplugged.
  • Oil pressure is not oil pressure at all as the Z3 did not have this, the gauge is basically a pretty fake (like my car) driven by a voltage source from who knows where. Nice to look at but completely useless.
  • Oil Temp same as above.

I have a few suggestions for Justin at Grassbank to make sure the experience for new customers is good:

• The loom is way too short and needs a good 24-30" added to each item to allow for:
  • positioning of the Z3 circuit board in multiple possible locations ( passenger airbag void, driver's knee panel, behind centre console etc.) depending on which dash is being used (DNA, Tribute 1, Tribute 2, Grassbank, homemade). This will enable users to see the original service indicator and mileage relatively easily.
  • Instruments will be easier to remove and re-fit.
• The tell-tales lights need to be pre-fitted to the instrument body and joined to the instrument connectors making each instrument actually plug and play (one plug for each instrument). They are going to be a pig to replace otherwise.
• Illumination is a tad dim for most people and probably needs lifting a bit (i actually like it as my eyes are sensitive at night)
• Power to the circuit board is accessible from the Blue and White Z3 plugs which therefore means it must be accessible from the circuit board itself removing the need for a power cable (I appreciate this one may be impossible/impractical as it probably involves soldering to a PCB track (not easy)).
• A few simple instructions regarding wiring may be useful (where to wire the power connector to and what the accessory cable is useful for, for example.
• Supply the mating halves of the power connector and accessory connector with 3 feet of trailing lead on each
• The cabling coming out of the circuit board has stress relief cable ties on the solder points but needs strong stress relief on the cable bundles (i have used tie bases and ties) to avoid pulling the wiring out when fitting.

As my old electrician told me when I asked him why he "wasted" 6-feet of cable on every downlight and socket he was going to fit (looked like spaghetti hanging from the ceiling): "better looking at it than looking for it mate".

This may all sound super critical but it is intended to be constructive and to save future trouble. The Grassbank Instruments as plug & play is a fantastic idea and should be a massive time-saver. Once the teething problems above are sorted they will mean someone with absolutely no idea of vehicle electrics (most of us) will actually be able to cut 7 holes, screw the instruments in place, shove the circuit board in an accessible place (maybe even fixed to a known Z3 bracket), plug in 7 leads to the instruments (click), plug in 3 colour coded leads to the circuit board and voila working instruments.

Comparison Pics

ETB

Grassbank

#

 

[MisterP007]

My only concern would be if the original dash had warning, abs or airbag lights on (because you've disconnected wires, airbags etc) then if the MOT guy spotted them he'd put his 'jobsworth' hat on. So I'd hide it somewhere where he won't see it and certainly wouldn't point it out to him.

As far as 'Hours' vs 'miles' is concerned I wouldn't mention that to an MOT guy either.

I was more concerned about me/prospective buyer being able to see the true mileage if i ever wanted to sell. Anybody know if the ECU can be interrogated by a code reader to pick up the mileage?