I’ve been battling a slowly dying factory under-tray over the years. Autocross, hpde’s, and wintercross had taken its toll on my under-tray. I guess I hit a lot of cones. Mounting points were breaking left and right. Zip ties and Gorilla Glue tape were becoming the norm to hold my tray together. Last April I decided to make the leap on a CS under-tray. A broken foot delayed the CS trays install until recently. It’s a nice piece. I won’t go into the installation so much. CS provides detailed instructions. Pretty solid and straight forward. I will share my experience installing and a pointer or two.
Overall, impressed with the kit. Comes with everything to install. It’s a stout piece. Newer version is a 2-piece design. Small piece bumper to radiator support Andy large piece radiator support all the way back to cross member. Hopefully, the CS will provide some additional structural support for the front bumper as well. Had a few snags installing but nothing major. Pics below.
Old tray. So many busted up attachment points. Tape and zip ties were starting to become too common place.
One of the radiator support u-bolts broke off some time ago. I cut a piece off a small L-bracket and screwed it in. The u-bolt slipped right over it.
One issue I ran into is that the CS kit comes with 6mm bolts to connect to the radiator support u-bolts. For some reason my car has 8mm u-bolts attached to the radiator support. Circled below in white. I had some 6mm u-bolts laying around and swapped them in. No biggie. I wish the four bolts CS supplied to mount the side of the tray (green circles at rear) were a tad bit longer. I really had to push the CS tray up to connect to the wheel well linings. I might Home Depot some longer bolts in the future.
Radiator support oem u-bolt on left. CS supplied u-bolt on the right.
One tip I’d seriously recommend before installing is to make sure you can thread the bolts into the 4 connecting points on the subframe. Exposed to the elements, they had some rust build up. Not terrible. Depending on where you live and the age of your speed3 I’d imagine the threaded holes could be a clusterfuck. You could use a chaser. Mine weren’t too bad. I used some liquid wrench and slowly screwed the bolts in and out. Two of the bolts took a bit to work in and out. I used an impact and throttled the trigger. Three of the mounting points are in the pic. One more is to the right. Pretty much the only four spots to screw a bolt into on the cross member. The CS instructions points them out.
Test fitted to mark the holes for the Damond catch cans. Not perfect but close enough. For some reason I didn’t snap a pic fully installed but the front piece went on in a snap.
Overall I’m happy with the CS under-tray. Comes well packaged and has great instructions. I’d recommend it to anyone. I know a lot of folks tend to leave them off but if you’re looking to replace it with an upgraded version. Check it out.
Overall, impressed with the kit. Comes with everything to install. It’s a stout piece. Newer version is a 2-piece design. Small piece bumper to radiator support Andy large piece radiator support all the way back to cross member. Hopefully, the CS will provide some additional structural support for the front bumper as well. Had a few snags installing but nothing major. Pics below.
Old tray. So many busted up attachment points. Tape and zip ties were starting to become too common place.
One of the radiator support u-bolts broke off some time ago. I cut a piece off a small L-bracket and screwed it in. The u-bolt slipped right over it.
One issue I ran into is that the CS kit comes with 6mm bolts to connect to the radiator support u-bolts. For some reason my car has 8mm u-bolts attached to the radiator support. Circled below in white. I had some 6mm u-bolts laying around and swapped them in. No biggie. I wish the four bolts CS supplied to mount the side of the tray (green circles at rear) were a tad bit longer. I really had to push the CS tray up to connect to the wheel well linings. I might Home Depot some longer bolts in the future.
Radiator support oem u-bolt on left. CS supplied u-bolt on the right.
One tip I’d seriously recommend before installing is to make sure you can thread the bolts into the 4 connecting points on the subframe. Exposed to the elements, they had some rust build up. Not terrible. Depending on where you live and the age of your speed3 I’d imagine the threaded holes could be a clusterfuck. You could use a chaser. Mine weren’t too bad. I used some liquid wrench and slowly screwed the bolts in and out. Two of the bolts took a bit to work in and out. I used an impact and throttled the trigger. Three of the mounting points are in the pic. One more is to the right. Pretty much the only four spots to screw a bolt into on the cross member. The CS instructions points them out.
Test fitted to mark the holes for the Damond catch cans. Not perfect but close enough. For some reason I didn’t snap a pic fully installed but the front piece went on in a snap.
Overall I’m happy with the CS under-tray. Comes well packaged and has great instructions. I’d recommend it to anyone. I know a lot of folks tend to leave them off but if you’re looking to replace it with an upgraded version. Check it out.
