Audi B7 A4 Avant Build - Senior Project - Accuair Air Ride

[Solarsuplex]

This car is perfect to me. Aggressive and low, but not excessive and still very much usable/practical. Can't wait to see the final product.

However, don't wrap it! The black paint looks awesome. Just give it a solid detail and call it a day!

This is what I was thinking. Wrap is no good. Unless it's matte white and temporary.

[Audi_509]

Hey everyone, I've been super busy with finishing up finals and everything else required to graduate this Sunday so I haven't made too much progress on the car. However, tomorrow AM I'm presenting my senior project to the Board of Technology so I did a little wash and wax to take a few final photos for my presentation so I figured I'd at least share those.

Wish me luck tomorrow! Haha, jk.

In-case your Board of Technology do not understand how awesome your work is they need to check out the positive comments in this thread. Then they can followed up with slapping an A+ sticker on your windshield.
Good luck!

[7speed]

Great build.I might steal your idea of the tub in the spare tire well. I'm low_enforcement on instagram.

[m3fuz]

Wow - this is a build thread! Very nice write up and the car looks great. Congrats!

[Yogie]

Pretty much everything you did is what I wish I had the money to do to my wagon. I am going to attempt the b7 to b8 front. How do you feel about the way the bumpers meet where you cut them? I followed felons conversion, yours, and another ziner who did it and am pretty confident about it. How do the lines flow together where the cut of the old and new meet? All of the ones I've seen from pictures have a harsh angle change near the wheel wells.

[#Avantbuild]

Great build.I might steal your idea of the tub in the spare tire well. I'm low_enforcement on instagram.

Oh right on, how you doing man? Sweet deal! I want to see progress pics of that!

Wow - this is a build thread! Very nice write up and the car looks great. Congrats!

Thank you sir! I've neglected it the last two months, but hopefully I'll have a few more things to share in the next little bit. Glad you like the car.

Pretty much everything you did is what I wish I had the money to do to my wagon. I am going to attempt the b7 to b8 front. How do you feel about the way the bumpers meet where you cut them? I followed felons conversion, yours, and another ziner who did it and am pretty confident about it. How do the lines flow together where the cut of the old and new meet? All of the ones I've seen from pictures have a harsh angle change near the wheel wells.

Thanks homie, I appreciate the love. I'll try to take some picture of the bumper finished and close up so you can see the body lines. I thought Felons was really pretty great, but what he did that I didn't like was that he left that hard body line right where the two meet, and to me that wasn't quite OEM enough. I ended up smoothing that completely out so it's flush. It probably took 3x as long because I had to apply filler 15+ times to get it right. It's not "perfect" but it's pretty close, and I've seen some really confused people look at the bumper because its clearly not a bodykit, but it's not a B8 either... :D Which is exactly the reaction I wanted haha. I took it down to Accuair last week in San Luis Obispo and it was really fun to meet their team and talk shop for a couple hours. Reno's S7 is on point, I absolutely love that car. But anyways, I'll try to hook you up with some close up pics of the body line so you can have an idea of what I did. Shoot me a pm and I'll hit you up.

[#Avantbuild]

Hey all, I apologize for the lack of posting, but with college graduation and a few family trips pre-planned it's not really been a consistent schedule finishing up the front bumper, but I do have some updates for you that I want to share. First of all, I did pass the senior project with flying colors so I'm happy about that! I have my degree in hand so I'm happy about that too. Unfortunately, it's been harder to find a job, so at this point I'm still looking and if nothing comes up I'm potentially thinking about going back to school.. so there's an update about that. If you know any custom shops in the PNW or Cali area looking to hire someone with a great work ethic, un-afraid to do custom work, but has little job experience, let me know! lol


BUMPER: Part 3

So at this point I had most of the blending done and I starting worrying about the front grill. I love the way the RS6 grill looks, especially the badgeless one from Nick's Car Blog. Here's a link to his site and some of the most popular DIY's: http://nickscarblog.com/diy/how-to-f...o-filler-plate

So I sourced an aftermarket RS6 all mesh grill from eBay. From the factory an OEM one was >$700 and I knew I was just going to cut it up and repaint it so I went with an aftermarket one which I got out of NY for <$200. Here's the all mesh RS6 grill before I cut it up.



I used an air saw to slice through the plastic mesh along the grill trim which worked very nicely.







I also cut out my OEM grill so I could mesh the badgeless RS6 one into it.



Here's the all mesh RS6 grill laying on top of my OEM B7 non-sline grill.





Here I've trimmed the bottom of the RS6 grill. It's approximately 2" taller than the OEM B7 non-sline grille frame.





I next took epoxy and used that to adhere the trimmed RS6 grill into my OEM B7 grille frame. I also painted the chrome grille surround flat black to give it a more stealthy look. Here's the whole thing test fitted in the frankenstein B7/B8 front bumper.





I spent hours block sanding the bumper to get it ready for primer. I decided to go with a urethane primer because it's pretty thick, and 2-3 coats was all it took to fill any of the sanding marks and gave me enough material to wet sand it afterwards to prep for base coat.



Next it was time to fix a mistake I made while rolling the front fenders. I did both driver and passenger side front fenders first without really knowing what I was doing and I don't think I used enough heat. On top of that, there was a little tab that stuck out on the underside of the fender right at the peak of the curve and it make an indentation in the body line that I just couldn't get used too.... so here's the filler applied after we hammered it out and grinded the fender down to base metal.



Here the primer is going on.





At the same time I primed the bumper. Now it's finally starting to look like it's actually a one piece!



Here I've masked up the car, ready to shoot the base color on the two fenders, front bumper, and lower front bumper valence.



In the paint booth.



My good friend Randy helped me shoot the primers, color, and clear.





After letting it bake in the heated booth I loaded her up in the trunk and we went home! I then set it in the sun for two days to cure a little more before I put any stress/flex in it during install.

[#Avantbuild]

BUMPER: Finished

And here it is! Finished. (Because of the B7 intercoolers the B8 fog lights don't fit, which I knew would happen.. It just means that I'll need to get a FMIC so I can put some fogs in there)





Sitting at ride height.













Let me know what you think! I'm extremely happy with it, and I've gotten some curious looks driving by from (it would appear) people that know that bumper and headlight configuration don't come together.. so that's super fun. My goal was to make an OEM looking front bumper that fits a B7 with the B8 flare, and it's REALLY close to achieving that. It's not perfect, but it's pretty close, and I'm very happy with it.

[SykoraA4]

killer work man. that thing looks stellar.

[Kal_el]

Awesome journal. You're a talent. The avant came out looking official.

[c@@kieMonsta]

Wow! I'm so glad that you chose to do this to an avant. Mad respect.

[leftovers]

I know a lot of work went into that bumper. I love how it turned out. You should be proud. Awesome.

[ShadowGLI]

I love this thread, love the updates... do you have any extra mesh? maybe try to put some in the bottom most insert? sick either way

[Lexxielex]

Immaculate!

[Lucian189]

Super nice finish with that bumper!!
amazing work..
whats the name of the songs you use in your clip?

[Shimmy]

very nice!!!

[SykoraA4]

any more pics of this thing?

[ultraleggera a4]

If you were to start producing this custom bumper, much would you sell them for?

[seanentrust]

beautiful car! did I see it parked on hawthorne in Portland a few weeks back?

[seal66]

Damn amazing work!!! Great skill buddy. The whole fit and finish of the car is amazing. I do agree with some on the air ride arrow buttons maybe being something like the old allroad. The fog lights are going to finish the front end off once you get that fmic and can plug them in

[ericpaulyoung]

Will the chrome rings pop out of your stock grill and fit the aftermarket one? It looks like it is missing in the pictures.

[Mister W]

Just find that thread
I am speechless

[geebus]

I love this car

[drumnjuny]

forgot about this for a while.

[Jsivadas]

Wow great job man! Keep up the good work!!

[geebus]

Moar pics!!!

[canadianA4B7]

Wow awesome work. I really like that look of the front bumper. Wish there were more scrap yards around my area that actually got newer audi's so I could put something like that together. My non slime body is very plain. But then again I do want to look as stock as possible. But you definitely are pulling off a very stock look with yours. Sent to a friend looking to buy an avant. His first comment was "whatever I buy it has to have that front bumper" told him he's gonna pay a lot more cuz he'll need to buy a newer model yer alltogether. Nice work. Produce a few more of them you've got 2 buyers in Canada if you do!!

Keep up the work great ideas nicely put together

[#Avantbuild]

Wow awesome work. I really like that look of the front bumper. Wish there were more scrap yards around my area that actually got newer audi's so I could put something like that together. My non slime body is very plain. But then again I do want to look as stock as possible. But you definitely are pulling off a very stock look with yours. Sent to a friend looking to buy an avant. His first comment was "whatever I buy it has to have that front bumper" told him he's gonna pay a lot more cuz he'll need to buy a newer model yer alltogether. Nice work. Produce a few more of them you've got 2 buyers in Canada if you do!!

Keep up the work great ideas nicely put together

Thanks very much canadiana4! I actually ordered a used B8 front bumper that had been wrecked and "fixed" by some shop in Minnesota or something like that. Super sketchy, but I knew I was going to chop it up anyways so I didn't care. The cost is really in the labor. Materials wise the conversion costed me $800 after all the SEM products and paint, but the time it took to mold all three together was ridiculous and unless I made a mold of this and did it out of fiberglass I'm not sure it'll ever be financially worth it to reproduce. BUT, if that ever happens I'll definitely let you know! Cheers

[curti869]

Did you keep that big plastic piece that came out of the back, the tire cover part... I really need one and by the way sweet wagon man. Also are you happy with the muffler delete, I want to do it but kinda scared it will be too loud