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Finally got round to fitting Sat Nav to my Z4 this week. The most worrying part of course is cutting a large hole in the dashboard of a 18 month old car.

First Mistake.

I used masking tape on the inside of the template, reason being I didnt want it to mark the dash or pull any of the matt finish off. Problem being that after you cut the dash the template falls off and you cant see where you actually cut. So re fix template with tape on outside after testing in obscure area, and re cut.



Peel of top layer to revel dense brittle foam, tried picking this off but wanst going to be easy. Found best idea was to go round the edge with knife ensuring foam cut down to plastic underdeath and then scrap off using 1/2" chisel, this took around 5 mins and was very easy




From other members fitting of Sat Nav there appeared to be two options for the next stage, use a Pad Saw (PVR) or Dremel (DHK), I chose the dremel option as the thought of taking 5 hours to cut the hole wasnt appealling. First cut along bottom edge near air vents was easy but side were difficult as body of dremel was getting in the way. Answer was to use a flexible drive. In total using bits 426 and a High speed router type cutter it took around 2 hours to complete. Better than PVR's but not as neat as DHKs.



Finished result with change of Dash trim to Carbon Fibre Leather.



I havent written anything about mounting the drive, as a number of members have already written about removing the rear panel. I would point out there is no need to remove the centre console to run the loom though, as although I took mine out to change the trim, I forgot to put the loom in before I put the console and rear panel back. You just need to remove the 3 fising screws on the left hand side of the console and run the cable above.

Very nice, I wonder if you know of any other self contained unit that might take the place of the OEM, there seems to be slot fo room for the device

Rasalon wrote:Very nice, I wonder if you know of any other self contained unit that might take the place of the OEM, there seems to be slot fo room for the device

The only option as I see it would be a single Din unit with flip out screen in place of the headunit

Good job there... is there some leaway in the cutting? It looks from first impressions like all 3 cut outs I have seen so far are slightly different in how they line up with the front of the dash.

Nice job Not sure I would have the nerve to do that.
I take it you didn’t drink all that beer before you started.

Good job there

There is very, very little room for error. What is not shown on the pictures is that some of the soft material needs to be removed so that the screen lays flat on the dash. You can not put the screen in the hole shown above as that would mean it would be floating about 2 mm above the dash.

pvr wrote:There is very, very little room for error. What is not shown on the pictures is that some of the soft material needs to be removed so that the screen lays flat on the dash. You can not put the screen in the hole shown above as that would mean it would be floating about 2 mm above the dash.

PVR not sure what you mean, but the unit does sit flat according to the last picture

On the sides, there is a small edge on the monitor that has a ridge. If the ridge is on the soft material, the unit will be lifted. I had to remove a small strip around the hole of just the top layer otherwise the screen would be elevated.

Do you have a picture of the side of the screen on the dash?

Unless you removed more of the dash so it is only resting on the 2 mm strip? I had mine resting on the main plastic, and removed only the soft material to make it flush.

Will this do you.

I might make a adjustment later as there is a small gap at the very front which means removing material at the back to push the unit back. When I do this I can mask the area and draw round the screen when in place, this will then show you how much overlap there is, but as PVR said it's not much.

I'm also happy to report my new CD Head unit plays MP3 CD's which I didnt think it would (Not that I need it with the ipod)

Looks good, love the carbon leather

Srhutch, ok, that is clear to me how you did it then. You did indeed cut out more then I did as I let the screen rest on an edge of about 10 mm all around the screen, but with 8 mm of the soft section removed to get it flush.

On hindsight, I think your approach is probably quicker to do as the screen just falls into the gap, just covering the edges and supported by the two mounting points at the front of the screen and the two screws at the back of the unit.

I bet you find the experience of having the unit in the car as having a new car It sure will make it an awful lot easier to sell if/when you decide to.

Uh oh... I feel a mod coming on... must...stay....away...from...e...b...a...y.....

sp3ctre, srhutch has a spare CID for sale