how much of the e46 fits into my e36

[bbroony]

well its been a long project with a few pics posted here and there so i thought it was time to give you guys a full thread on this, a few who visit e36coupe.com will be familiar with this but here goes.
this is how my 328 vert used to look like on the inside

[bbroony]

this isnt the exact interior from my car as i have no pics, these are from some salvage pics but you get the idea, nice trim but i always wanted more, something different, then along came these on ebay, e46 m3 coupe sports electric seats!

[bbroony]

so i started to work on them back in september to make them fit the e36, the idea was to use the fronts only and get them trimmed to match with silver/grey leather, that idea went pretty much out the window with the help of the e36coupe.com forum, a guy on there was fitting the same interior to his m3 coupe along with the door panels and dash and quickly convinced me to fit the rear seats too heres a few progress pics.
the fronts are pretty easy, you just need to open the holes up on the seat frames to match the e36 floor mount pattern, make up a small harness for the electrics and bolt them in

[bbroony]

then the fun started, i wanted all the rears in, including the armrest.
problem is, the coupe rears are solid backed as they fold down in the e46 coupe, the verts are moulded onto a frame system like the base so a little modding was called for.
i wanted to sell the old interior to recover some cost so i couldnt use the e36 framework, i had to make my own copy in the end

[bbroony]

then i had to make all this fit, as you can see, the leather has seen better days, i was starting to take to the red but it was beyond repair.

[bbroony]

after a lot of trimming foam and fitting then more trimming and fitting i managed to create these

[bbroony]

then it was time to fill the gaps and make it fit into the car

[bbroony]

the decision was made to change the colour scheme from silver/grey to cornsilk(creme leather)and black leather.
the seats and doorpanel inserts will be cornsilk and the doorpanels, carpet trims and dash will be black nappa leather.
i sent the seats to sleeper(john)at bespoke leathering and this is what i collected a few weeks later.....

[Jimmie Jazz]

That came out very nice!

[amancuso]

nice!

[lseguy]

I want to go on record as saying they look VERY nice.

But may I ask..what benefits do the E46 seats have over the E36 seats..and is the difference significant?

[bbroony]

I want to go on record as saying they look VERY nice.

But may I ask..what benefits do the E46 seats have over the E36 seats..and is the difference significant?

the e46 seats are electric and heated(heaters nots wired yet!)
they are far more supportive than the e36(fronts that is),the difference is like day and night. even better than e36 sports seats but dont look out of place in the vert.they also sit slightly lower.
the rears just look good and follow the front stitch pattern with the exclusive addition of a folding armrest compared to the spongy bung the e36 has.they are just as useless as the e36 versions for a vert, slightly more supportive with a higher section over the tunnel and a more wrap around bolster but this sint standard e46, it was built up like this by me using the e46 as a base and adding foam to just fit the e36 body.

the e46 dash is also going in, i have a few pics of the progress to follow and the e46 front armrest has also been fitted along with e46 crystal interior lights ,front and rear.

heres a pic of the rears fitted into MY car, the pic above is in johns(the trimmer)car as he also has a 328 vert with the same colour leather on e36 seats, thats where i got the idea for this colour

[ZUUD BYE]

Looks like it really came out nice and your happy with them! I'll bet it was a pile of work, how long from start to finish? Approx man-hours?

Let's see the pics for the dash work- I would love to get rid of the billion buttons on the E36 ///M3 dash!!!!!

[millertimebmw03]

I saw this on the ther forum and it convinced me to sell my seats and to also buy some heated power e46 sport seats also, I was under the assumption that you needed to change th foam in the front seats aswell as they are wider??? is this true?? Thanks a million! LOOKS AWSOME!

[palomino]

it looks really nice, but i beg to differ as far as the fronts being more supportive. i have a few friends with e46 m3's and i dont find them to be all that much more supportive unless you get the width and lumbar adjustable ones.

[jasontn]

Very impressive....great job.

[bbroony]

I saw this on the ther forum and it convinced me to sell my seats and to also buy some heated power e46 sport seats also, I was under the assumption that you needed to change th foam in the front seats aswell as they are wider??? is this true?? Thanks a million! LOOKS AWSOME!

the rear seats are wider, the foam for the rear seat base needed to be cut down, the fronts go straight in after the holes are opened out.

[bbroony]

it looks really nice, but i beg to differ as far as the fronts being more supportive. i have a few friends with e46 m3's and i dont find them to be all that much more supportive unless you get the width and lumbar adjustable ones.

the sport seats have the lumbar and width adjuster, these are the sports versions in mine.

[bbroony]

Looks like it really came out nice and your happy with them! I'll bet it was a pile of work, how long from start to finish? Approx man-hours?

Let's see the pics for the dash work- I would love to get rid of the billion buttons on the E36 ///M3 dash!!!!!

although i started this project back in september, i didnt really get that much time to just work on them.
the fronts are easy, a couple of hours will see them in.
the rears are a lot more work, about 6 weeks of working evenings due to drying time on the adhesive for the foam and fitting,removing and fitting and removing just to get the size right, 3-4 hrs a night and most of the weekend when i had a chance.the base it reasonably easy but the seat back was harder due to the framework required, this had to fitted and removed a lot to get it all the same shape and size then fit the bars for the leather to be fastened to.
the dash has been the hardest by far, 6 weeks solid evenings of about 6 hours per night and all weekend! yet again due to fitting and removing and fibreglass drying time, could probably do one in a week, maybe 2 now.
heres the 2 dash boards for comparison

[bbroony]

once you chop about an inch or so from the ends of the dash and about 4 inches from near the screen you can just say squeeze the dash in to the e36

[bbroony]

then you start to find what gets in the way of the new dash.
the steering column support brace for starters needs to be cut , seemed like a good idea to add a few mounts for the e46 dash to it too

[bbroony]

after sourcing a few more parts for the dash, like the vents, trims and glovebox, you then learn how much shorter the dash actually is, the passenger vent shas been moved in on these pics but the trim hasnt been cut yet

[German Pride 10]

Well done quality job! I could never be bothered to do something like that though

[bbroony]

long way to go yet.
i wanted to keep the dash as factory as possible so custom vents and switches was out the question.
i had to move the vents and LCM (light control module on the e46) inwards so the ends looked factory, then build them up later.
the ducts aslo needed to be modded to meet the new vents, needed to get the end vents working mainly.
the e36 clocks are very similar to the e46 ones except the e46 has the obc built into the bottom of the clocks making them deeper so the e36 clocks in the e46 pod leaves a gap at the top, i will run with these for a while till i can sort something out, wiring e46 clocks into the e36 harness is a MAJOR pain.

cutting the dash trims was relatively straight forward except for the drivers side, i wanted it to follow the LCM like the e46 as much as possible, this entailed cutting both ends and keeping the trim shape around the LCM but required new mounts to be located so the trim still has the push fit feature.

[bbroony]

still more work