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Sprinter's Is200 Sport...


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We'll, I'm sure I'm thinking the exact same thing as everyone else was when starting their project thread..."I wish I'd started this when I got the car, not after 8months and a wallet full of mods" But then none of us start out planning to mod, but then you join a forum, and your done for! So here's what I've done to mine so far.

So here goes...

Picked up my 2003 IS200 Sport in Astral Black with 28k on the clock in August last year as a sort of birthday present to myself.

It started off life as most of them do looking like this

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The first thing to do, was sort out the wheels. Which although they wern't too bad, couldn't be allowed to stay as they were. So 5 of these were ordered from Pristine alloys on a wheel exchange program...

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And while I was fitting them I decided the calipers could do with a touch up too...

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As soon as I'd got the new wheels and tyres fitted, it went off to WIM for the special tyre saving geometry settings.

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Next lot of mods were all lighting related, I fitted 6000k HID main and dipped beams, and LED sidelight and foglight bulbs to match. This was then followed shortly by LED light panels for both the interior dome lights, and the boot light aswell. (I'll try to get pictures up of these soon) And after seeing a few of you who had changed your dash bulbs to blue I decided I liked the idea of doing it, but I went for white as I can't be bothered to change the heater console bulbs and the white doesn't look out of place with the orange. :)

After that I swapped the standard clear side repeater lenses for some smoked black ones (pictures to follow), and I put some chrome coated Silvatec bulbs in the rear indicators and also fitted some LED reversing bulbs too. I got some dual filament bulbs holders off eBay aswell, so I did the fog to side light mod while I was at it.

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Again no pictures for this but next was the GROM iPod gadget, with extra auxilary input which I thought would come in handy for my next mod...

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A fair bit more technical than the previous ones so I was a bit cautious about starting it, but very glad I did it. I managed to get hold of the 7" variant of the OEM Sat Nav housing, and went about fitting an aftermarket 7" LCD touchscreen inside it. And with a LOT of fiddling and removing connectors from the circuit board etc. I managed to get the screen running with 2 x Video inputs, 1 x VGA input, 1 x USB input (for touchscreen interface), 1 x Automatic video source switching input for reversing camera, and 1 x Audio Output. And linking in with my previous mod, the unit can now play its sound output through the GROM and into my factory stereo. :)

I wish I'd taken more pictures of the 'during' phase of this, but I was getting a bit pi$*£d off with it at times and wasn't really in the mood. lol But here's a picture of the unit in bits when I'd almost finished fitting the upgraded screen...

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And here's one of it fully fitted and displaying a VGA feed from my 10" ASUS Netbook which now lives in the glovebox and acts as my Car PC/Media Centre...(I had my chrome heater dials and clock surround at this point too)

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I managed to find myself a set of 18" Aero alloys on eBay, which I quickly snapped up and got sent off to Pristine alloys again...

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I also got myself a fantastic deal on a TTE bumper and rear lip from ACLex, so off to the sprayers they went. And when they came back my car looked like this...

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I'd heard good things about the K&N panel filter (mainly the noise) so I fitted one of those, maybe a VERY slight improvement in low down torque. But a definite increase in (audible) engine grunt after 3000rpm which I love, really enhances the sound of that amazing straight 6.

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By this point I'd already fitted a strut brace, but I thought it could do with a proper polish and a respray. So I took it off, sprayed the towers in Cusco blue, gave the bar itself a good polish and got myself a Cusco sticker from eBay to put on after I'd polished it. I went on a bit of a mission in the engine bay, also resprayer the radiator clamps in the same colour, sprayer the fuse/relay box covers gloss black and dotted around a few anodized blue bolts for good measure.

Towers after spraying...

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Complete strut brace after its refurb...

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And some of my shiny blue bolts...

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The whole engine bay with all its shiny bits...

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Gas bonnet lifters have also been fitted, and again, I'll add pictures for all the stuff I haven't done them for already, and I might update some of them with better ones when I have time. But I think thats pretty much it for now! At least it will be much easier to add single mods as and when I do them from now on. Phew.

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Well latest mod, bought a Modellista speedo off eBay for silly cheap money, the guy at the scrappers must have just thought it was a generic Altezza speedo!

Anyway, I wasted no time transfering my white SMD dash bulbs into it and this is what it looks like fitted and lit up, and also a short video of the false 10K RPM reading it gives due to coming off a 4 cylinder car :thumbup1:

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tDV-x1oqIYs

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Well thats 2 more mods on the list today. Finished my custom induction kit. (If you want to see how I made it click HERE) And also got my radiator panel fitted while I was at it.

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I've also got an IS300 air intake on the way to send air over towards the filter, and at some point I will be making a custom cold air box and engine cover too :)

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  • 11 months later...

Following my plans to make a DIY SC setup, I've swapped back from my induction kit to the OEM airbox/scoop so I have more room in the engine bay.

But I thought I would make it a little different, just because I can :)

So here's how I spent my afternoon, with a roll of aluminium heat reflective tape and my OEM airbox parts.

Preparation is your friend...

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Well today was another busy day, re-fitted the skirts and finally fitted the bumper at last!

Skirts on...(again)

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Bumper on...

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I had a slight issue where the edge of the bumper didn't line up with the arch liner, the TTE bumper has little metal bars that pull this sides in to fix this, so I made some of my own to do exactly the same thing.

Before...

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The brackets I made...

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And the nice snug fit after they were fitted...

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And a couple of pictures after it was all finished...

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nice one Sprinter!! you really good with the tools and creative aswell :winky: ... really loved the pull of IS200 with the Greddy Ti-C noticed power really kicked in at 0:10 !! looks like you will be keeping this one for a while ....really like it not over the top with your mods!!

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awesome topic! love that sat nav screen mate! how hard actually was it? so keen to give it a bash!

It depends what you want to do, if all you want it to put a newer sat nav in there, like a TomTom or something it really easy.

The touchscreen I fitted was slightly harder, but only because I had to find a way of getting all the wires for the USB, screen and sound etc. through a small hole in the end of the unit so it can rotate freely around the cables.

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I like what you did with the original fogs with the sidelight mod, i have no electrical knowledge whatsoever, what amount of wiring is involved and what were the dual filiment bulb holders you mentioned?

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I like what you did with the original fogs with the sidelight mod, i have no electrical knowledge whatsoever, what amount of wiring is involved and what were the dual filiment bulb holders you mentioned?

It's such an easy mod to do! You basically just get a set of dual filament bulb holder (the same style as in the brake lights) you wire the the 21w part back into the foglight circuit as it was before. And then just take a feed from the number plate lights to link into the 5w part of the bulb and it's done! Took me about 15 minutes.

The hardest part is getting the little plastic clips out that hold the boot trim in. lol

EDIT: There is a guide on here somewhere about how to do it in more detail.

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  • 2 months later...

Right, got my latest mod done this evening. Took me a couple of hours after work to get it done but I'm already feeling the benefits...

Started off with stock calipers, on stock brackets, on stock discs, like this...

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First step is to undo the slide pin bolts using a 14mm spanner on the back, and a 17mm on the pin itself to stop it rotating. You may not need the 17mm spanner, but if you plan to re-use the dust boots it's better to use it anyway or you risk tearing them...

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Then put the caliper out of the way on an axle stand for now...

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Once they are off, you can remove the caliper brackets. This is super easy as all you have to do is undo the two 17mm bolts that hold the caliper bracket onto the hub.

With the old bracket off, you can start assembling the new brackets, the first thing I did was to press the new dust boots in. Simply slot a socket over the top of the rubber boot so it rests on the metal collar, and either tap it in with a hammer, or squeeze it in with a vice like I did...

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I then removed the slide pins, changed the rubber bush on the pin, greased it up and put it into the corresponding hole on the new bracket (make sure they go in the right hole as they are different!)

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I then removed, and refitted the pad retaining/slide clips into the new brackets and greased them up too...

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Next job was the dust shields, most people just cut these off completely. But being an engineer that seemed too simple, plus I wanted to keep the cooling effects of the air duct at the front of the shield. You can also just bend them back out of the way but that seemed too ghetto and again, too easy.

So I put slots all the way along the sections of the dust shield which overhang the top and bottom of the old disc like this...

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I then bent them upwards, chopped them off and smoothed off the edge so I was now left with this perfectly fitting and still fully functioning air duct/dust shield...

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With the discs now able to fit properly and the mounting hardware transferred onto the new brackets I slid the discs on, put the new pads into the brackets and remounted them over the disc onto the hub...

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The only job left then was to press the pistons back into the calipers and bolt them back onto the brackets, forget to take a picture of them without the wheel, and then have to take a crappy picture through a very dirty wheel...

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I've only put about 20 miles through them so far but I'm already finding myself stopping short at junctions and slowing down too much coming into corners, so I can't wait to see how they perform once they are properly bedded in!

And just for comparison so you can see the difference in size between the old and new here's a gif I made to show the two sizes...

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Another little addition turned up this morning, it's new version GROM unit which is compatible with USB/Android/iPod/AUX/Bluetooth (as long as you have the corresponding cable) I'll be using the Android/AUX functions, as GROM have developed an app so you have proper control via USB with an Android phone.

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Will be getting this fitted tonight along the the O2 simulator I bought from Stav about a year ago! :whistling:

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  • 1 month later...

I discovered that despite my best efforts with the 3M tape, the back end of my TRD skirts has come away from the body...

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So I had a little workshop session and made myself some 'Ormi Clips' named as such because he did a little DIY when he made his.

First thing was to cut the correct shape out of some 3mm Aluminium out of the scrap bin...

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I then marked and drilled a 6.5mm hole in each one...

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Leaving me with these...

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I then realised that the inside surface behind the arch lip isn't actually flat, so I put a fold in each one so it still sits flat where the screws go through...

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And my nice shiny clips ready to be fitted...

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I haven't put them on yet, but once they are on they should hold the skirts nice and flush like this...

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I've actually got a tube of tigerseal, but I was doing it on my own and to use tigerseal you have to be able to keep the two surfaces pressed together until it fully cures. And I just didn't have enough time or spare hands for that. lol

I've decided to do a few smaller jobs for now, so I've just bought myself an electronic exhaust control valve so I can make the car a bit quieter for 'normal' driving, and then open it up for tunnel runs or if I just want to make a bit of noise :)

I'll get my local powerflow to shorten the midpipe to allow for the thickness of the ECV, but I'll also get them to shorten it a bit more just so the tip doesn't stick out quite as much, as the Greddy Ti-C I've got is designed for the deeper USDM bumpers.

Here's a video of what I've bought...

http://vimeo.com/2242560

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Couple of packages arrived today :)

First up was my Clifford 507M Tilt/Vibration Sensor...

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And also my electronic exhaust control valve...

It's much chunkier that I expected, and comes with a pair of gaskets and some nice thick stainless flanges to weld onto your pipes after you chop out a section for the ECV, including the flanges it weighs 1.2kg!

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And here's a video I took when I tested it earlier...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bua1w2f0y08

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