W&N panel fitment issues...
-continued-
Pic 233452 with floor panel temporarily in place, located with the 2 M8 bolts from the rear subframe. Then, to my surprise i noticed that the curves (close to my thumb) don't line up.
The curve in the tunnel (green line) next to the centre bearing support is about 10 mm 'lower' in this picture compared to the matching fold (red line) on the floor panel. Red and green lines should line up.
Pic 221302 Shows the fitment at the front of the panel; a massive mismatch with the end of the frame rails.
This seemed to indicate that the thrust rod had moved in rearward direction causing the floor panel to be 10 mm to far rearward.
...with my entire subframe....
Now how did that happen?
A lot went through my mind... did the body really twist, eventhough I built half a roll cage?
So, pull out the tape measure and start checking things...
I figured out after a while what the rootcause was:
If you compare the measurements of the original and the replacement panel,
then you'll notice that they are ~10 mm different.
pic 00845 with both panels side by side
pic 001049 & 001107 showing the measurement and the W&N panel at 35,5 cm
Pic 001220 showing the same measurement at 36,5 cm.
Glad I found out that the W&N part is way off.
At least it means that I wasn't hacking to coupe into pieces and making a mess of it.
I am actually quite surprised by this. My car looks original there. No previous owner weldmarks.
The W&N dimensions are not just 1 or 2 mm's off, its in the order of 10mm. That's not what I expect of German quality.
Is perhaps the body of the 2000CS and the E9 diferent; 10 mm longer, in this specific area?
Were these panels also streched by the BMW engineers when they Barba Pappa-ed the 2000CS into the E9? (like the sills?)
and did W&N choose to tool one panel with dimension that 'fit' both 2000cs and E9?
Am I missing something? Anyway it makes me wonder how the other panels of W&N will turn out.
Keep Calm and weld on!
Then a choice was made: I went for a correct M8 Bolt hole positions, as those nuts more or less locate the rear subframe.
As driving thrills should be THE feature of the car, I thought it would be good if at least the rear axle is somewhat aligned under the car.
I choose a somewhat goofy visual mismatch with the front frame rails as the best option.
Later I thought that I might have better just relocated the M8 Bolt holes. Cut the nuts out, weld the 2 holes shut, and relocate them to a place i could accept; 10 mm further backward.
A thing that helped me a lot during this puzzle was one lucky choice; i marked the relative position of the 2 M8 nuts of the original panel while still in the car with a steel 90 degree angle square on the inner sill. (pic 233309-01, at the intersection of the orange lines)
This gave me the possibility to identify exactly where the bolt holes needed to be.
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