F07 aesthetic horse power?

[Kopfjaeger]

So, as my other 'project' is on hold atm, I decided to do something more aesthetic, than functional. I decided to 'colour' the braces in front of the radiator and change the chrome grilles for black glossy versions. Initially, I went down the route of brace covers, courtesy of Temu, but the 'Blue' versions that duly arrived were not the shade of blue expected. So I gave up on the easy option and decided to make it hard. So I bought some rattle cans in Estoril Blue and a couple of new supports from the local dealer. So for the paint and supports about £75 and £40 for a pair of black grilles.

Before shot:

so after loads of shaking, I sprayed the new supports in my paint work shop 🤣

Here you can see the colour and the single coat, air dried.

Luckily no dust or runs, besides, they'll not be visible, close up anyway😊.

So, in order to swap out the supports, it's a bumper off job. This also makes it easier to swap the grilles. The last time I did this, I took the front wheels off, to make access to the front wheel arch front liners easier to to remove.This time decided to do it without the wheels off. The online guide suggest just releasing the roadside 3 pins and bending the cover out to undo the bolts on the sides that hold the bumper to the wings. With puny arms and 20" rims, that doesn't work, so the arch front liner was removed, on both sides.

It's far more fiddly with the wheels on, because the limited access.

Then all the bolts have to be removed, top and bottom to remove the bumper, plus disconnect a couple of connectors for the fog lights and Parking sensors.

So with the bumper off:

To remove the supports, you need to undo 3 bolts (T30, torque to 19Nm).

These bolts are readily accessible. With the bolts out, you can simply slide the old supports out.

you can just see the openings in the rubber cover at the centre of the main structural brace.

The supports are handed and just slide in:

You can see the contrast with the blue:

So with the supports in place, bolts are finger tightened before torquing.

As part of reassembling the bumper, I then noticed this:

I had a 'broken' OS corner undertray replaced by the garage at the point of purchase. I didn't realise that they had an issue and bodged. Basically the screw didn't want to come out. You can see the thread here of the screw inside the aluminium support.

It took an hour to sort. About 20 minutes to find a long flat blade screw driver to use as a lever against the screw, as it was unscrewed. Eventually success:

With that sorted, I could refit the bumper and wheel arch liners🙄.

A close up with the finished black grilles and the blue brace behind.....

The black grilles doesn't look very black, here, but I'll add a better photo, when I get the time and better light.

[Kopfjaeger]

So have some more bits arriving.....

Just waiting now for the GT badge and wing msport badges to arrive.

Pity I can't get the letters for Land Yacht 😊

[Steve84N]

@Kopfjaeger what colour is your car? 

[Kopfjaeger]

A52 Grey

[Steve84N]

As long as it's not black! 😅

I don't understand/like blacking everything out but black as a contrast colour is alright. 

The previous owner of my last car had this badge on it. 

[Kopfjaeger]

My F07 has the option 760, Black Chrome. So to me, it makes sense to have more black chrome than silver chrome.

I'm not considering blacked out lights, or tinted windows.

So the standard items that are 'Silver' were the Kidney grilles, bonnet and boot badges, wing ornaments (indicators on pre-LCI models) and model badges (GT, 535i, msport). Plus the chrome inlay on the door handles.

The kidney grilles are now black. I've got or ordered the 535i, GT and msport badges, which may be changed. I'll be keeping the bonnet and boot badges and door handle chrome inlays.

[Kopfjaeger]

So now the other badges have arrived....

[Kopfjaeger]

So just offered up for a comparison:

So fas so good. However, not so good with the GT badge....

its far too small. So I'll need to find a larger replacement.🙄😊

[skyjawa]

I think that looks fine tbh!

[Kopfjaeger]

So I've now taken the wing chrome inserts out and given them a BMW 668 colour upgrade.....

so 2 coats of grey primer, 2 coats of 668 paint and two coats of lacquer.

So they've now gone on the car.

I haven't changed the OEM msport badge for the black version yet.....

[Shakeel.j]

The black insert looks much better than the chrome. It's a shame the LCI models have that gap for no reason.

[Steve84N]

The reason is cost, BMW didn't want to make tooling for new wings... 

[Kopfjaeger]

@Steve84N, I would agree about the cost, but not for tooling reasons. The wing shapes on the LCI and pre-LCI are identical. Forming the aperture is an extra step, involving cutting. So its easily accommodated, to omit the cutting out of the aperture. It doesnt take extra tooling, its a line of code to delete or make an option. Its more likely to do with inventory control. As in they don't want to stock two types of wing. 

However, it is required, I think for those F07s that have parking assist:

It's not an issue on the 6GT.....☺️

[Kopfjaeger]

So whilst picking up my navigation order, I queried the cost of the badging for my car. The GT and 535i badges are £35.30 each plus VAT. The 'msport' wing badges are £45.09+VAT each!🤣🤣🤣🤣

I've not found an aftermarket GT badge of the right size yet. But currently not mad enough to spend £42.36 to buy an OEM one and spray it.....

Mind you, if I get an unexpected refund on my navigation order, I might reconsider....

I'll have to see whether sense, or my OCD wins out.😊🤔