Topic already exists. Mods please merge with this one.

 

 

This is an old thread but better than creating a new one.

For those that purchased aftermarket grilles (CKS to be exact), how did you install the 360 camera? The OEM camera cover-mount does not work with the new grille and the removable cover that comes with the grill does not have a big enough opening for the camera (it’s a tiny slit as opposed to a round opening like the OEM cover has). With so many of these installed, there has to be a solution.

I’ve emailed CKS but looking for others experiences and solutions.

 

*****I just installed an aftermarket grill (not CKS, I got a cheapie from Ebay for like $200 shipped) on my 2018 C63s. Please see the pics below. I can't imagine CKS being that much different but the piece you have with the slit may be the back portion of the kit, and you simply use the original case (I guess the box on the right with the hole in it in your pic..) with the round hole to hold your camera in, unless your kit was supposed to come with some different holder for the camera where the camera rests inside and pushes up against the front of the grill.

The front piece with the slits on the side (round hole piece, original) basically slides in to the grille from the front of it, and the back piece (looks like yours has a slit, please note mine had a bigger square opening - I tried to take a pic with a mirror from behind the engine compartment on my car), but that slit on yours might be either for the cable or connector piece somehow..) essentially sandwich the camera between them and you use the screws, hopefully provided to hold it all together once the front and back piece are together. The tabs on the grille itself are what provides the interference needed to the sandwich front and back pieces together. That's how mine worked anyway...

It took me a few minutes to figure out the orientation of everything and make it work - no instructions were included with my grill and it all seemed to just flop around until I got it all together, aligned the camera, and screwed it in with slightly longer screws than were provided - what came with mine were just a hair too short for my tastes, but it might have worked ok, I just wanted a bit more threads holding it all together..

Anyway, check out the pics and see if it helps you some. The pic with the mirror is essentially upside down and looking UP into the back of the grill.

Hope this clears it up a bit.

 

@MaxVO2 - thanks! I actually realized that the OE cover actually had to go in front of the new grille’s mounting tabs, not behind.

Front to back:

OE cover > camera > grill mounting tabs

It says to use the OE screws (T20, I believe) but I’m not sure they’re going to be long enough, so I’ll probably grab slightly longer screws.

It seems like I’m going to need to take the bumper back off, and loosen the grille from the bumper to slide the camera and cover in front of the grill mounting tabs.

 

*****Yikes, taking off the bumper again seems like a LOT of work to properly mount that camera and screwing it down, etc.. I installed the entire grill without removing the bumper at all, and just carefully removed the two bolts per side through the wheel wells after getting the plastic retaining clips off with a trim tool, had to remove the front belly pan to get to two or so bolts at the bottom of the bumper, and basically rotated the bumper down, after separating the bumper a bit from the fenders by pulling down a bit and away from the rest of the car for access to the back of the old grille, and all of the tabs, etc..

The cameras back side is in a bit of a blind spot due to the top of the fascia that forms the top area above the Star, but if you use a small thumb rotator torx bit holder you can put the back plate on with the longer screws and tighten it all down no problem. Pics of the tool and extension I used. I think the thumb tool and assorted tips and Torx bits all cost less than $20 at AutoZone. There's plenty of room to fit your hand and the tools needed to tighten the camera box retaining screws down properly once you start the screws and can use the thumb rotator thing in the pic. No need to remove or even loosen the bumper for just the camera. Good idea to have a magnetic tool or sneaky pete in case you drop the screws into the sealed compartment trying to put them in that way (been there, done that..).

Anyway, good luck to you. I think the new grille looks awesome on my car and the car looks absolutely menacing now, yet still friendly and somewhat approachable.

Pics below.

 

@MaxVO2 - appreciate all of your insight and knowledge transfer here. Finally have time to get my front camera remounted - not having it for almost 2 months has been a PITA.

Judging from your picture below, were you able to slide the camera "housing" and the camera itself in from the front?
From a quick test fit, like you mentioned, the top of the star housing curves up and makes it difficult to slide the camera housing and camera in from the front.
You mentioned not needing to remove the bumper at all to install the camera and camera housing, so trying to figure out how to get that done.
Obviously the screws come in from the back.

 

*****Yes. It's been a few weeks since I did my Grill, but I'm pretty sure I got the plastic front piece in from the front with the camera just inside of it, and then bolted it all together from the back side with the torx screw and thumb thingie. It's a blind area so I used a little mirror to get an idea of where the screw holes were in the back (back of grill) so everything could squeeze together correctly. I had to play with the camera a bit so it was well centered and functional as there was some slop until I snugged the screws down a bit, moved the camera around a little bit, and did a final tightening of everything. The grill I got from Ebay had screws that were too short to really work well in tightening down the camera box thing so I used slightly longer screws I had from other projects.

If you are having problems getting it screwed down as I did at first, make sure it is not because the screws you have are too short and not engaging threads as it was with mine, and don't wail away on those screws as it is thin plastic and easy to strip if you are a muscle man. The mockup of everything before finally bolting everything down wasn't the easiest thing to figure out as the camera didn't seem aligned properly - it took some time for me to figure out how to get the back piece to hold everything together in proper alignment. I figured it out but it would have been nice to get some flippin' instructions from the manufacturer.

Guess I shouldn't complain as one of my friends bought what I guess is an OEM grill and it was over $400 and he paid a shop to put it on and they removed the bumper, and connectors, with the car on a lift and charged him about $500 to put it all in. I think the shop had more problems than I did, but it probably took them 1/4 the time or less as they just took everything off the front of the car while I took almost nothing off the car, just moved stuff out of the way to get it all done. My friends car and my car look the same after everything was done, but he didn't get his hands dirty at all. I like tinkering on cars and have a nice garage and hand tools, etc..

I can take more pics or whatever if you are still stuck. Everything works great on mine, and the camera is perfect and aligned just like it was with the old grill.

 

@MaxVO2 - thanks. I don't see any way to get the camera housing and camera in from the front. The top of the star and top of the grill (where the camera get's sandwiched in between) is just too small. From what I'm seeing, I'm going to (at the very least), unclip the top of the grill from the bumper, and pull the grill back so I can fit the camera housing and camera in front of the grill from the back (engine bay).
Not too worried about putting the screws in from the back since I can pull the top of the bumper forward (after removing the 5 torx screws) and access from the back. But, I guess we will see.

 

*****I just saw your pics. Your replacement grill does not look like it is designed for the front camera! There were several grill options when I purchased mine on EBay and I had to specify if I had Distronic as well as a front camera or no camera, etc... look closely at the pics of my grill in an earlier post and note it has a gap designed for the camera box to essentially slide into and be screwed down in place. The box essentially slides in above the star really nicely into a space that has interference fit slots. The back part with the screws basically just keeps the front camera box from falling out and holds it all together, but the gap and grill on my kit looks different than yours. I don’t have Distronic but do have the 360 degree camera option on my car. Mebbe check and see what other options were available if any for the grill you purchased and received. Yours looks different than mine above the star.

 

@MaxVO2 - the CKS grille supports both non 360 camera and 360 cameras - there aren’t different versions. I removed the placeholder piece (seen below) which is replaced with the camera case and camera.

Unfortunately, it looks like I’ll have to peel the bumper forward and snap a few of the grill clips out of the bumper to sneak the camera and case in front of the grille from behind :/

 

****Yikes. I'm not positive, but I think the Distronic star emblem is bigger than the non, at least that is what it looks like. The housing for the camera, at least on my grill setup, housed the camera and the box fit nicely from the front without having to move anything per se. It was held together from the back, which was accessible through the engine compartment of course. Some pics below. Please note the measurements and see how the box part fits nicely into the grill space on my setup. It literally just slides in and is held by these tabs built into the grill. The back portion is a plate that screws go through to snug it up and align it all. I'd measure and compare as I just don't see how what you have can fit properly unless I'm missing something..

 

Did you find a fix for the temp sensor?

 

Anyone have a direct link to a grill, coupe has drive assist and surround camera?

 

Hello there. Bring this back to life. Has it got easier and cheaper to do the grill tranformation in 2025? I still have 2017 C63s that I love and won't be selling. was thinking if I can do it without too much pain. Budget 500$ with labor. Possible?

 

****Dunno about cheaper due to tariffs, etc.. I think my grill was about $200 when I did mine. I installed it myself. Budget of $500 will depend on prevailing labor rates in your area I guess. Mine came out great but it was not that easy of a job. I did it without removing the bumper fascia, etc.. which made the process a lot harder and longer than it should have been but I got it done. It was mostly time spent figuring out what needed to be loosened etc.. to get all the clips popped to get the original grill out and put the new one in without damage, remounting the camera, etc..

I guess $500 is possible. A pro could probably get the job done in a couple of hours I guess. Took me longer and I was super careful to not scratch or break anything, etc.. Some of the clips had to be released and popped off blindly by feel with several trim tools.. Removing the bumper and fascia completely and laying it on the ground to expose everything would have been much much easier but it seemed like a two man job to me so I did it all by loosening the lower fascia area enough to create a gap and did most work from the top to pop everything free, etc..

Anyway, hope it works out for you.

 

Hello and nope it's still the same procedure if you use OEM parts (which you should be).

I've tested aftermarket grilles in the past and they ALL had off fitment which can be seen with the keen eye. I fitted a rubbish CKS aftermarket one as well to see and it was terrible with gaps.

Try to buy OEM. You'll just need to budget for the front star as well because the factory facelift grille uses a slightly smaller distronic star.

Not to spam, but I've listed all the part numbers on my social media build thread post here if anyone wants a reference:

 

I read all 342 posts on this topic. Do Coupe and sedan parts differ or they are same? I have sedan with distronic and no camera. I checked your insta and it's for coupe. I read the options for lower grill and protection from debris and re revetting which I am highly uncomfortable with. I can deal with plastic tabs but revetting is beyond my skillset. Also concerned of another shop doing it for me and ruining my high performance sedan with loose fit clips vs metal revets. You guys are too brave to do this. anyone got it done with dealer and what would it cost with parts and labor.

 

Go OEM. Any indy you can trust will fit it with no issues

 

No rivetting for the front only the rear coupe when fitting the bottom diffuser it'll need some drilling.

Front facelift parts are identical for coupe and sedan. Rear, obviously different parts and the facelift tail lights for the sedan need a converter module.

Just get the updated front grille, distronic star, bottom front bar air inserts done first and aux cooler mesh covers.

 

The work you’ve put into that car man, amazing 😍

 

Was gonna say.. a genuine good guy been following Jims profile lol underrated to say the least no flashy vids or cringe music clips so his account doesn't get much hits but seeing your comments always makes me laugh like the wheel bolts post bahahaha

 

Thanks boys for being mates with me on my build thread. I get a tonne of inbox messages asking about issues but I struggle to get 20 likes at times haha whatever I'll just do my thing just trying to connect with other people who like our cars.

 

Hahaha and to be honest I follow cause I really like his content

I literally follow 7 accounts on Insta…

 

Thank you. Without install labor and mesh guards the parts alone are coming at 900$. Do you guys have better way to buy OEM parts?
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