Delsa Motorsports [eBay] Spoiler Install... LONG

[A4darkness]

** Warning. This post will be long, full of curse words and probably more info that you wanted. But it seems the B6 Forum has been dying a slow death and considering that no one will be doing much work the day after a three day weekend, well... here ya go. Enjoy. **

For starters, I should have bought an Ultrasport. Really. I'm a ****ing moron for not just ponying up the extra $3-5k. Why do I know this? Cause I'm in love with a spoiler. Yes kids, a spoiler. That's all it took to prove my love. But just this one piece of plastic has pretty much sealed my fate on the wagon to Mod-town. I'm done for. It's really begun now.

I never thought I'd actually start doing "show-no-go" mods like this but now that I have and been relatively successful, it's all downhill from here.

Needles to say, I finally got tired of seeing USPs and S4's with neat-o spoilers, awesome door blades and sic front ends dripping with coolness. Sitting in traffic with my naked, shameful unpainted lowers. [Yes Matt, they are shameful... at least for this guy.] So I pulled the trigger on a Delsa MS Spoiler from eBay to get things started. And more so to see if I could pull this one off w/out injuring myself or having to beg some body shop to fix my retarded eBay spoiler mishap.

About two weeks later, it showed up. It literally came on that fabled Slow Boat from China. Why do I know this? Cause it said Slow Boat Chinese Transport Co. LLC on the package. Then again, it was all in Chinese so maybe it was just the return address.

I went up to the street to the local wash-your-ride and wasted some hard earned meter money to remove the beach-funk / acid rain / El Nino stains. Side note, I'm going to steal their powerwasher. In 30 seconds it took all the grime off my car and frankly had me questioning why I didn't go there more often.



Next, it was back to the house to start on the spoiler tape. This stuff had to come off cause having a gap on a slightly ill-fitting spoiler would be just too annoying for me to handle. Maybe I need a vacation or some Xanax.



My handy exacto knife removal theory was about as effective as shooting a rubber band at a freight train so this was quickly abandoned and I went to the removal by hand method which was only effective in the removal of the flesh from my ****ing fingers. Awesome. I'm a finger-print-less cripple and haven't even started on the hard part. So I wrapped my fingers in medical tape circa Kevin Spacey in Seven and left to pick up more supplies.



So I rolled thru the parking lot of my local Dark Side Headquarters and got plenty of dirty looks from the BMW staff and customers. "How dare he drive an Audi onto our lot? Park in the back with the parts guys. Ewwww."

I'm sure you're wondering what the hell I was doing at South Bay BMW. Well, it wasn't to look at the new M3. But I did anyway. And it was awesome-glorious-sex-on-wheels. And I hated it. Even the rear view mirrors are still uber cool. Okay, more on that later.



Back to work on the tape. Strange that the introduction of my blood and flesh particles didn't eat the foam tape right off. But I know what will. Good old 3M Adhesive Remover... so potent, most major chains no longer carry it. You have to hit the old school mom n pop hardware stores to buy it so you can get high while removing pesky spoiler tape. Good technique here... fill the recess of the spoiler up with the 3M Remover and leave it be for a while. This fends off the dizziness and leaves time for more fun stuff.



At this point, I must have been high cause I decided to Plasti-Dip my license plate screws to kill time. Cause blacked out is evil. And evil is cool this week.



Here's why I went to BMW. It's called Betalink-K1 (BMW Part #: 82-69-9-408-866]. According to yee old internets, it's one of the best things you can buy for this application. After searching around for install tips, I kept finding myself back at the same post on BMW boards that's been rehashed 100x over. Apparently, BMW has this one on lock [link below]. Also pictured are two Giant Worthless Yet Cool Orange Clips that I saw a BMW guy using on his car which turned out to be, yes you guessed it... cool, but still worthless. And by worthless, I mean completely worthless for this install so don't buy em like I did. Our trunk is shaped differently and the spoiler is too small / sloped for these. However, DO NOT ATTEMPT THIS W/OUT THE SCOTCH TAPE. Sorry for shouting, but it's necessary if you go this route. Really. Think of the children and the ass end of your car. It's what everyone is looking at even if they say they aren't.

Anyway, the kit comes with the devil's auto epoxy, application tube [sounds dirty, eh?], spreader thingy [ehhh??], sandpaper, BetaClean [thank God] and instructions written in 28 different languages ensuring that no matter what land you reside in or what language you read, BMW can say that you alone jacked up your car with this ominous substance as they did their best to warn you... which they do. And it doesn't matter. Cause you're ****ing doomed.



Turns out soaking the foam tape in 3M worked like a charm. Came right off with some scrubbing. Sanded and washed the spoiler and was ready to start the install. I have no pictures from this point forward for a bit. Things went a bit sideways. I'll summarize the next five minutes as best I can... so read fast.

My plan was to put the spoiler on the trunk, mark it with tape etc. but you really don't need to do this cause you'll need to bow / bend the spoiler into place. I was thinking the Giant Worthless Yet Cool Orange Clips would work but that's where the Scotch Tape should be used. Have a few strips ready before you open the Betalink. And a tee-shirt / scraps of fabric / anything that won't leave threads behind for mid-install cleanup of excess K1. Prop the trunk open first. And of course, keep in mind you won't have time to go run over to the hardware store during this mod. Once you start, there's no beer break.

This "K1 Betalink" aka black-death-goo starts to congeal once you cut the top off and start spreading it on the sanded parts of the spoiler. The problem was that the stuff is black... like, exactly the same color as the back of the spoiler so it's kinda hard to see how much you just lathered on there. [Plus, there's a little recess there so you need to have enough to seal it... granted it's very slight. And this stuff dries fast... so don't screw around.

I got the Betalink spread, and suddenly, it's everywhere... like, all over my hands. AHH! The squeeze tube doesn't fit well into the applicator and it went all over the place [it's on the floor looking like Black Licorice Toothpaste that revolted and came out the side on it's own].

So I get as much as I can off my hands, get the spoiler up and on to the car, grab a Giant Worthless Yet Cool Orange Clip and get the left side attached and go for the right. The spoiler is so far off it's smeared a MASSIVE amount of the K1 across the right end of the trunk. ****!

I get the second Giant Worthless Yet Cool Orange Clip attached and to my horror, the left one is now sliding off! **** BALLS!

Now, more K1 is being smeared across the trunk. And, wait... all over me?? Didn't I just wipe this stuff off?? No, I just relocated it for later use. Did I mention this stuff pretty much adheres to your flesh? Well, it does. And oh yeah, I don't have any flesh on my fingers anymore... now they're just black-goo-hands.

I finally get them both stable and grab the BetaClean and go to work. It smells like 3M Adhesive Remover and Kerosine. First, I shower in it to get it off my fleshless meaty fingers... and for some reason start to wonder if the license plate screws need another coat of Plasti-Dip.

Shaking the fog from my head, I look over at the car and the clips are stable but it's the spoiler that's starting to slide. The Giant Worthless Yet Cool Orange Clips are mocking me with their suddenly efficient orange-ness. So I hose down a rag with the BetaClean, push the spoiler into place and start trying to mop up the oozing K1... which now has the consistency of peanut butter. Cold black peanut butter, that is. And I'm starting to sweat. At this point my buddy, who lives a few houses down, casually strolls into the carport and in his Oklahoman-drawl says, "You know, that tape might come in kinda handy right now."

Note to self, always have your friend who's an engineer around when attempting installs of anything... just in case you start to lose your common sense. Or forget about the roll of tape sitting right in front of you.



With huge strips of tape holding the spoiler firmly in place, the rest became surprising easy. Soak a spot on a rag w/BetaClean, wrap backside of the spreader thingy and run it up and down the spoiler removing the excess K1. It kinda peels off like wood using a chisle. This lasted a while but I'm sure that by using the proper amount of K1 and scotch tape to hold the spoiler in place the cleanup would have been far easier.



At this point, I got out a portable over head light to check the paint for smears of K1... the whole black on black thing did not help. But, there is little to zero gap across the entire spoiler and the black of the K1 helped this a lot.



And here it is. All in all, I am very pleased with this mod. Total time was under 2 hours... but I did some extra work in here. Sticking the spoiler on as is would have been infinitely easier, but I knew the gap left by the foam would have bugged and frankly I didn't trust the adhesive from the foam to the car anyway. And, had I went for the scotch tape first, there would have been far less cleanup... lesson learned.

Hope you guys found it amusing... my friend sure did. ["Um, what the hell is that black stuufff all over yer hands man? And why do you smell like Kerosine?"]

As for looks, it's pretty damn good. The paint match is right on and unless you're closer than two feet away, you can't tell it's not perfectly aligned with the sides of the trunk... and that's maybe only .25-.5 mm at best.

So, winner me but loser me cause now I want door blades... and an USP front. And of course some painted lowers.

Damn you wonderful spoiler. Damn you all to hell.

[nvr_follow]

[GDawgA4]

[Tgr_Clw]

[GDawgA4]

[Tgr_Clw]

One of these days ;-)

[A4darkness]

[A4darkness]

[A4darkness]

[sNoSTaRR]

Nice write up. I sort of wish I went the same route.