Windshield surround cross section

[RPGs818SNA]

I want to fish rear view camera wires through the windshield surround. I expected a cross section of the surround at the top would look like this.

Windshield surround cross section.jpg

When I began drilling a small hole in the bottom, I hit aluminum. I thought I'd stop and check to see if anyone else had run wires through the surround successfully before I proceeded. If so, how much room is there in the sides and corners? Thanks!

[Bicyclops]

I drilled a hole at top center and pushed a flexible fiberglass wire pull through. Be careful not to drill into the glass. I think there was a layer of steel under the fiberglass. I was careful to ease pressure before breaking through so as to not blast right on through the front. I had previously pushed the wire pull up from the bottom and heard it scratching at the top so I knew it would go through. I pulled a pair of wires up and covered them where they came out the bottom with some split cable loom and secured it under the dash. Mine will be for a radar detector.

Rear view camera I would probably put on the roll bar. From the windscreen, your view might be partially blocked by the roll bar. Garmin makes a tiny rear view camera that I could display on my Zumo XT2, which by the way, is a really good navigator for my S. Visible in bright sunlight, touchscreen that works with gloves on, and you can tell it to look for the adventurous (twisty) route.

Ed

[RPGs818SNA]

Thanks Ed! That's just what I needed to know. Mine is not magnetic, so probably aluminum. I'll drill it with a tube over the bit so it only sticks out an eighth inch or so.

I meant to say I'm mounting a rear view display that acts like a rear view mirror with the camera mounted on the rear, although mounting it on the roll bar might get it out of following headlight glare. Thanks for the Zumo XT2 recommendation. Sounds perfect for an S.

RPG

[Jetfuel]

In my case there was plenty of room between glass and frame, be it front or back and side to side.
I drilled at the left lower corner where the windshield rests, brought the wires around the frame radius , applied sealant and set windshield, plenty of room.
I did it for interior lighting purposes.
IMG_2567.jpg

Jet

[RPGs818SNA]

Thanks Jet! Love your light. Now I see that I need to pull several extra wires in case I want to add lighting or other useful devices or displays that belong at the top of the windshield.

RPG

[RPGs818SNA]

Thanks to encouragement from Bicyclops, I finished drilling a pilot hole taking great care not to drill through the other side. I used a wooden block to keep the twist drill from drilling too deep, as they are prone to do. I switched to a step drill which is much easier to control, and for the final half inch hole, I used a countersink bit which has no propensity to drill too deeply.
mirror 1.jpg

I found that the actual top cross section looks more like this with plenty of room for wires.
mirror 2.jpg

The challenge comes on the side where the steel support takes up a lot of the space inside the surround. I probed it with wood strips and wire and found a 0.72x0.22” rectangle or 0.37” wire could be pushed up to the corner.

I wanted to get 3 wires from the mirror to the interior: a GPS antenna wire, the camera wire, and power. I was hoping to pull all three through the surround without cutting off the connectors. The camera and power connectors couldn’t make the turn going through the half inch hole until I ground out the back side of the hole at an angle.
mirror 3.jpg

Amazingly, I was able to pull the right angle GPS connector from the side up to the top center by attaching it to a 16 gauge wire and doing a lot of twisting and jiggling each time it got hung up. The string shown was useless as it found a way to get pinched and become immovable.
mirror 4.jpg

The other two were pretty easy to pull down from the center hole. I pulled 5 more spare wires just in case I wanted to add something else up there. Here’s the result.
mirror 5.jpg

RPG

[Bicyclops]

The hardest part for sure is convincing yourself to drill a hole in the windscreen frame. After that, its just another task.

Ed