New 105mm bcd flange next to the 110mm bcd flange.


Throw out bearing and clutch fork installed. Next up was to put the transmission in the car.


Putting the transmission in wasn't as bad as pulling the autobox out but it did require some patience. Torqued everything down to spec and then installed the UUC short shift kit.

 

Update:

Put the manual transmission in, along with all the other parts. Sorry, no photos. Had a slave cylinder blow out because I bled the slave cylinder with the piston extended and not pushed in like it should have been. Fortunately had another slave cylinder kicking around and used that one instead. The new one is put back together now and is available if anyone feels like they want a deal on a slave cylinder. Must say that everything went back together pretty smoothly...except that that part number 5 (below image) is oriented backwards in the photo. The notch that looks like it should be facing forward actually needs to face towards the rear of the car:



Took the car off the cribbing blocks and took it for a test drive while running with reduced power (still need to do coding). The clutch feels and sounds great- very grabby and quiet. The car sounds different too when going through the gears. Sounds like a manual. The rear differential that comes with the automatic cars is geared lower (3.38:1) than the differential that comes with manual transmission cars (2.93:1) and the combination of the automatic rear differential with the manual transmission feels great!! Highly recommend fitting a 3.38 rear diff to your manual/smg car. The rear differentials are going for around $450 on ebay and the drive shafts between $150-$200. In fact, I'll sell my driveshaft for less.

 

This is pornographic. You're making the 550i I always wanted. If you ever drive it to the SF Bay Area, lemme know and give me a ride.

Now you need that carbon fiber drive shaft.

 

Funny guy. Will let you know if we head down there for the next road rally.

Drove the car 70 miles to it's current resting point where it will have its interior re-installed, get coded, and sit for the winter. Car seemed to stay together during the drive so it's probably safe to say the mechanical portion of the retrofit was a success.

 

That's awesome! Please update us once you get the coding done. I would love to convert my car to manual.

 

Will do. Ordered the cable yesterday. Hopefully it is not coming from China, but if it is it might take a few weeks to arrive. Will keep you posted.

 

Update: Still waiting for cable to arrive...

In other news, the car was used as a test bed for some security research (Password: hitag2):

 

That's pretty awesome.

 

Yeah. That video is good stuff.

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Auto-to-Manual Transmission Update:

The INPA cable and DME showed up today. May make an attempt at updating the VO sometime this weekend to change the transmission option to manual.

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Side Project:

The DME came with all the good stuff.


Ended up cracking the DME open (gently) with a screwdriver and desoldering the MPC555 processor as seen here. Not the best de-soldering job but I've done worse.

 

Please elaborate on the side project? Is this needed in order to do the auto to manual swap?