Martlet The Gray 330i ZHP

[danewilson77]

Mmph. Nice work

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[Tatarin]

Hello and welcome to another installment of my beer fueled engineering.

To start off, who pays $200+ dollars for the E46 roof racks?
Not this drunken lunatic wielding power tools.
If your girlfriend is begging you to go shred the mountain snow, and you are handy, this build is for you.
This is version 2. I had built a different version of the DIY roof racks that I will post below. This version is like building out of legos - extremely easy.
Please note, you do have to spring for SS M6 bolts and galvanized unistrut. Otherwise depending on the amount of exposure - rust.
Here is a list of what you will need to build your own function-over-form roof racks:

1. 4 3/8" and 1/4" opening 2" unistrut right angles
2. 82 inches of skinny 1/2" unistrut
3. 4 ninety degree 3/8" swivel bolts
4. 4 1-1/4" M6 Bolts (Stainless steel or galvanized)
5. 12 3/8" washers
6. 4 crush washers
7. 4 1" long 3/8" bolts
8. 4 3/8" lock nuts
9. 4 1-1/2" by 1-1/2" crush foam pads to avoid wrecking the paint.
10. Paint of your choosing

Taking a look at the pictures, you see that the assembly is self explanatory.
Starting from the bottom and working your way up:

1. Place the crush foam under the unistrut right angles on the 1/4" opening side. (glue to your liking, I didn't)
2. Push the 1-1/4" M6 Bolts through the crush foam and through the 1/4" opening of your right angles
3. Attach the M6 bolted assemblies in the receiving channels under the trim on the roof of your BMW
4. Cut the 82 inches of skinny 1/2" unistrut in half to get two 42" pieces of uni
5. Attach the swivel bolt end to the right angle of the roof rack assembly bolted to the car in step 3 with a washer and a lock nut (loosely - tighten at the end)
6. Place your cut 42" unistrut on top of the right angle pieces
7. Attach the 42" uni to the top opening of the swivel bolt with a 3/8" bolt with a washer and a crush washer.
8. Tighten the bolts at the connections starting with the m6 and working your way up
9. Paint to your liking

As you see, in the back you clear the roof by about 1/8" so don't haul anything heavy up there. This design is intended to hold a pair of skis and a snow board. As always - don't be stupid and try to sue me when this thing flies off your roof. You should not transport anything on your roof racks or drive around the city or at freeway speeds with them attached to your vehicle. If you catch my drift.




Gap in the back:

Hardware:


Version 1 requires more hardware. Take a look at the pictures below:

1. You will need all of the above materials sans the swivel bolts.
2. 4 3/8" opening 2" unistrut right angles
3. 62" of unistrut cut in half
4. 4 1-1/2" long 3/8" bolts
5. 4 unistrut channel lock nuts or
6. 4 3/8" nuts
7. 4 lock nuts with washers
8. 4 crush washers
9. Welder. I would definitely weld the vertical brackets before they slide off and scratch the paint.

As always, mix and match approaches. Don't be an and you will make it to the mountains with no problems.
I intend to ziptie my snowboard and skis to the unistrut, it has the handy dandy openings to help me with that.

[danewilson77]

Perfect! Looks OEM!



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[johnrando]

Awesome!

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