A V8 at last - my BMW 645Ci
Discussion
After much research and deliberation, a useful thread on here and some email conversation with a fantastically helpful owner, I took the plunge on this baby last week:
This is a 2004 E63 645Ci, with 118,000 miles. I had at one point discounted every single V8 E63 for sale as "not quite right", but when this car came up it immediately caught my eye. Rare and excellent colour, proper interior combination with glass roof, "correct" 19" ellipsoid alloys, sensible mileage, very cheap... When I went to see it the reasons for that price point became apparent. It's been smoked in, the service history is somewhat questionable, there are bits of interior trim hanging off, and the dealer had been using it as his personal car for the last six weeks with near zero mechanical sympathy - I took it for a test drive, did thirty miles without going especially easy, and when I got back the range was reading two miles further than when I'd set off! But I fell for it nonetheless. With an agreement to change the gearbox oil, get the plainly wrong geometry corrected and put a fresh MOT on it, a deal was done and I picked the car up a few days later.
It is absolutely magnificent. The journey home made it clear exactly what this car was built for - making a 120-mile drive in heavy traffic and appalling weather feel like a ten-minute pop down the road. So refined, so composed, so effortless. It feels special from the moment you turn the key, with a big flare at startup and a muscular, deep-chested sort of growl even when just rolling around at town speeds. Part of the reason I needed a V8 in my life was that the inline sixes I owned sounded plain or even dull until being properly revved out, and I wanted something that was pleasing under all conditions. I also wanted flexibility, performance without demanding drama for my daily drive. This car delivers, on all levels.
It's hard to express without demonstrating it. You can drive it gently without a single care for what the engine or gearbox are doing and it'll be smooth, quiet and capable - but if you ask it a big question, you get a big answer. There's a sort of controlled rage about this engine when you've got it fully opened up, it sounds angry but it really loves what it's doing, and pulls harder and harder the further you let it rev. Third is the naughty gear - this is the first car I've owned that pulls harder beyond 80mph, because it's really getting into its powerband. It's extremely impressive.
Giving in to lead-footed temptation aside, the breadth of ability is what's so brilliant about this car. Nothing you ever do seems to bother it, and it feels like you're only ever using half its capability. You can get on the motorway, stick the cruise on and hear nothing but the (rather good with optional Logic7) radio for your whole journey. Or you can make driving in traffic no bother at all, with the auto 'box and bags of torque everywhere. You can even make a pretty good fist of flying down a B-road, the Sport mode giving you weightier steering, sharper gear selection and a more aggressive throttle map - it belies its size, feeling smaller and more agile the faster you go, and the body is always very well controlled. It feels like serious money has been spent on the dampers, and despite 19" wheels allowing very little tyre sidewall, the ride's pretty good. Road noise could be better but most of it is the notorious "Bridgestone howl", and I expect it to be far quieter on 18" winters in a few weeks' time.
There's a long to-do list to get through before the car's right, but I knew that before I bought it and it still represents great value. I'm really looking forward to putting the time into it and getting it perfect - it deserves it, because you can feel that there's a truly great car underneath the little faults. I'm still thoroughly enjoying driving it, or even just seeing it parked on the drive! Stay tuned for updates as things develop..
This is a 2004 E63 645Ci, with 118,000 miles. I had at one point discounted every single V8 E63 for sale as "not quite right", but when this car came up it immediately caught my eye. Rare and excellent colour, proper interior combination with glass roof, "correct" 19" ellipsoid alloys, sensible mileage, very cheap... When I went to see it the reasons for that price point became apparent. It's been smoked in, the service history is somewhat questionable, there are bits of interior trim hanging off, and the dealer had been using it as his personal car for the last six weeks with near zero mechanical sympathy - I took it for a test drive, did thirty miles without going especially easy, and when I got back the range was reading two miles further than when I'd set off! But I fell for it nonetheless. With an agreement to change the gearbox oil, get the plainly wrong geometry corrected and put a fresh MOT on it, a deal was done and I picked the car up a few days later.
It is absolutely magnificent. The journey home made it clear exactly what this car was built for - making a 120-mile drive in heavy traffic and appalling weather feel like a ten-minute pop down the road. So refined, so composed, so effortless. It feels special from the moment you turn the key, with a big flare at startup and a muscular, deep-chested sort of growl even when just rolling around at town speeds. Part of the reason I needed a V8 in my life was that the inline sixes I owned sounded plain or even dull until being properly revved out, and I wanted something that was pleasing under all conditions. I also wanted flexibility, performance without demanding drama for my daily drive. This car delivers, on all levels.
It's hard to express without demonstrating it. You can drive it gently without a single care for what the engine or gearbox are doing and it'll be smooth, quiet and capable - but if you ask it a big question, you get a big answer. There's a sort of controlled rage about this engine when you've got it fully opened up, it sounds angry but it really loves what it's doing, and pulls harder and harder the further you let it rev. Third is the naughty gear - this is the first car I've owned that pulls harder beyond 80mph, because it's really getting into its powerband. It's extremely impressive.
Giving in to lead-footed temptation aside, the breadth of ability is what's so brilliant about this car. Nothing you ever do seems to bother it, and it feels like you're only ever using half its capability. You can get on the motorway, stick the cruise on and hear nothing but the (rather good with optional Logic7) radio for your whole journey. Or you can make driving in traffic no bother at all, with the auto 'box and bags of torque everywhere. You can even make a pretty good fist of flying down a B-road, the Sport mode giving you weightier steering, sharper gear selection and a more aggressive throttle map - it belies its size, feeling smaller and more agile the faster you go, and the body is always very well controlled. It feels like serious money has been spent on the dampers, and despite 19" wheels allowing very little tyre sidewall, the ride's pretty good. Road noise could be better but most of it is the notorious "Bridgestone howl", and I expect it to be far quieter on 18" winters in a few weeks' time.
There's a long to-do list to get through before the car's right, but I knew that before I bought it and it still represents great value. I'm really looking forward to putting the time into it and getting it perfect - it deserves it, because you can feel that there's a truly great car underneath the little faults. I'm still thoroughly enjoying driving it, or even just seeing it parked on the drive! Stay tuned for updates as things develop..
Thanks for the kind words, guys 
the wood is my biggest question mark so far too, I have dark walnut in my E46 with an otherwise very similar interior and really like that, I believe this one is birch. It is a lot better in the flesh, and fits the character of the car quite well but I'm still pondering going to a darker wood. I think it would really benefit from sports seats too, if a really nice set appear on eBay I'll get them.
Speaking of things appearing on eBay, looks like my winter wheels are sorted:
8Jx18 Style 118s, cosmetically not perfect but no serious damage and pretty good for £250. I'm thinking 245/45R18 Dunlop Wintersport 5s for these. I'm curious to find out what it does to the ride quality - naturally there'll be an improvement, but if it's really substantial the car might find itself on 18s for summer too!
They were indeed runflats as standard, Bridgestone RE050As in 245/40R19 for the front and a quite ludicrous 275/35R19 for the rear. This car has three (!) non-runflat RE050As and one Michelin Pilot Supersport. I expect road noise to be rather better on 18" winters, and it might well cure the slight vibration I have at high speed, it feels like it could well be a wheel imbalance or tyre imperfection. Getting the 19s off will give me a chance to investigate the front left which is losing pressure, important to check that out as the ellipsoid wheels are known for issues with cracking.
the wood is my biggest question mark so far too, I have dark walnut in my E46 with an otherwise very similar interior and really like that, I believe this one is birch. It is a lot better in the flesh, and fits the character of the car quite well but I'm still pondering going to a darker wood. I think it would really benefit from sports seats too, if a really nice set appear on eBay I'll get them.Speaking of things appearing on eBay, looks like my winter wheels are sorted:
8Jx18 Style 118s, cosmetically not perfect but no serious damage and pretty good for £250. I'm thinking 245/45R18 Dunlop Wintersport 5s for these. I'm curious to find out what it does to the ride quality - naturally there'll be an improvement, but if it's really substantial the car might find itself on 18s for summer too!
They were indeed runflats as standard, Bridgestone RE050As in 245/40R19 for the front and a quite ludicrous 275/35R19 for the rear. This car has three (!) non-runflat RE050As and one Michelin Pilot Supersport. I expect road noise to be rather better on 18" winters, and it might well cure the slight vibration I have at high speed, it feels like it could well be a wheel imbalance or tyre imperfection. Getting the 19s off will give me a chance to investigate the front left which is losing pressure, important to check that out as the ellipsoid wheels are known for issues with cracking.
stewies_minion said:
The dull car cleaning fanatic in me would be interested to see how the smell of smoke is removed?
With enormous difficulty, I'm told - but luckily for me there isn't a perceptible smell in this car, it's just some light staining to the seats that's giving it away in this case. I'm hoping it's nothing some Gliptone cleaner and conditioner can't deal with.TR4man said:
Very nice and so different than the usual silver grey that 80% of 6 series seem to be.
Part of what sold this car to me! It also helps that this colour (as far as I know, at least) wasn't available on the 650i, and I really like it, so that helps justify the tradeoff with the engine.No smoke smell in this car, no problem there! Just minor staining. Interesting to know how it could be dealt with for future reference though.
CLS500s were on my radar, similarly ridiculous value but I prefer the character of the E63 in any guise, and I was never terribly impressed with Mercedes' output from their five litres. I can't imagine 30mpg on a run in one of those.. not exactly why I bought this car but it's nice for it to be reasonable!
CLS500s were on my radar, similarly ridiculous value but I prefer the character of the E63 in any guise, and I was never terribly impressed with Mercedes' output from their five litres. I can't imagine 30mpg on a run in one of those.. not exactly why I bought this car but it's nice for it to be reasonable!
Fartgalen said:
For me, these have aged very well. I wasn't keen on the looks when launched, but I could quite easily see myself taking a punt on one of these to barge around in.
Looking good OP.
Cheers! That's exactly how I feel, to be honest. I was never impressed when they came out, but it's really grown on me and now I can only find a couple of awkward angles. It's better in the flesh than in photos too, perhaps because it's so rare. It turns out the "Bangle Butt' is useful for some things, too.. All four of those wheels fit with room to spare!Looking good OP.
carinaman said:
I wasn't keen on the looks when they were new. While I was waiting around for an appointment a few years ago there was a black one with brown leather and I spent a while walking around the car decided in black with that leather it was quite smart. Their appeal is also related to how affordable they now are used.
What's the deal with run flats come MoT time? Do they have tyre sensors that will flag up errors during the MoT test?
For me it was idle classifieds browsing, I saw one that looked lovely and was photographed really well, suddenly I was seeing myself owning it - as you say, appeal relates to attainability too!What's the deal with run flats come MoT time? Do they have tyre sensors that will flag up errors during the MoT test?
Should be no problem running normal tyres. There are tyre pressure monitoring sensors, but these operate the same, and the car doesn't know whether it has RFTs fitted. I don't actually know which type of system these cars have - as speed_addicted says, typically they monitor each wheel's speed and use any difference to detect a pressure deviation, but there are systems that have wireless sensors in the tyre valve itself. When you have a pressure warning you have to reset the system when stationary and then drive a short distance for it to recalibrate - this tells me it's likely to be a wheel speed sensor. That would be much better, as you already had those sensors for ABS anyway and it's no extra complication when running two sets of wheels.
gf15 said:
Book marked!
The CLS was the alternative I looked at too.
I think the wood trim is superb and the glass roof brightens up the interior.
A friend had an Audi that someone broke into and sprayed the interior with lighter fluid and torched (happened to several cars close to him on the same night). The car was repaired and they used the smoke bomb thing to remove the smokey smell. Friend said it was very effective, but still got rid of the car.
You have the "Exclusive" leather which produces quite a strong leather smell once treated with Gliptone.
I do think it is the best looking six series I have seen.
Look forward to the updates.
Thanks GF, no small thanks to you that this car is on my driveway. The kind words mean a lot, since I consider your 6er to be the best looking one I've seen! Might throw one of those smoke bombs in anyway just to see if it freshens the interior. Looking forward to getting Gliptone on it, I already had some Auto Glym Leather Care Balm so went over it with that, much more supple now but not perfect.The CLS was the alternative I looked at too.
I think the wood trim is superb and the glass roof brightens up the interior.
A friend had an Audi that someone broke into and sprayed the interior with lighter fluid and torched (happened to several cars close to him on the same night). The car was repaired and they used the smoke bomb thing to remove the smokey smell. Friend said it was very effective, but still got rid of the car.
You have the "Exclusive" leather which produces quite a strong leather smell once treated with Gliptone.
I do think it is the best looking six series I have seen.
Look forward to the updates.
ETA - Quick glance at the manual tells me "The check of the tyre inflation pressure is based on monitoring the relative speeds of the wheels. A flat tyre is detected and reported on the basis of a deviation in certain speed ratios.", so it should indeed be the wheel speed sensors and no extra kit. Good!
shalmaneser said:
I love these. I don't know if I could handle an auto though.
I felt the same until I drove one. The decision is partially made for you, because well over 90% of production is auto and when I was looking there wasn't a single V8 manual coupé for sale in the country, but it does suit the character of the car very well. I'm a staunch advocate of the manual gearbox and would never have this if I didn't also have my E36 for fun, but the big Six is never going to be the most involving car, that's not what it was meant for. I think a manual one would feel like unnecessary effort far more often than it would add an extra dimension. I'd feel differently on a 630i, but with such a flexible engine it works well.Funk said:
These have popped onto my radar lately, nice to see you taking the leap OP. I'll be watching with interest; I have some saving to do before I'm in a position to buy but am using the time to learn what to look for in these.
Still unsure whether to go for a coupé or convertible - I really like my E36 convertible and the shape of the roof on the 6-series looks awesome.
It's well worth taking the time to research and read people's experiences, there are rather a lot of known issues to look out for! I haven't been in a convertible, it didn't hold much appeal for me so I didn't look. One thing I would say is that these cars are so refined that any little knock or creak will stand out and really annoy you, my glass roof seal is a bit tired and squeaks when the roof is closed and it's immensely irritating because it's the only thing you can hear. I imagine that this might be a much bigger problem in a convertible that was anything less than perfect - little noises that are easily lost in an E36 would bother you in one of these.Still unsure whether to go for a coupé or convertible - I really like my E36 convertible and the shape of the roof on the 6-series looks awesome.
RE coolant leaks - the most common "big job" does indeed seem to be that pipe that runs through the valley, a seal near the front of it can fail and cause constant weeping. The engine drains it out fine so it doesn't cause further damage, as far as I know, but you have a permanent leak and the potential for it to worsen. The original replacement isn't worth thinking about but a US company makes a solid pipe that can go in instead, eight hours' work to do that and the part doesn't seem terribly cheap either.
There is, however, a new solution - a company called Bimmerfix (again US) have produced a kit that allows you to reinforce the affected area from the front of the engine by just removing the water pump, rather than going in from above and requiring the entire inlet manifold with all its attendant harnesses, vacuum lines and fuel hoses to come off. That kit costs $200 and looks to my eye like a four hour job, which isn't half so bad.
If you're really lucky, you might find that it's just the expansion tank, which can also crack on the underside.
Gummi Pflege is just the stuff already on my shopping list, cheers GF!
I'm not sure about the spec on this car making it an ex-demo - it's lacking a few things I did want, namely the sports seats and the dynamic drive package (active hydraulic anti-roll bars). The former is easily sorted but the latter I'll have to live without. I'm not sure if the HUD was introduced by this year, nor comfort access, but I don't have those either.
I'm already recalibrating to the big cruiser way of doing things - for a while I found myself having to go quite big on the brakes at times because I was carrying far more speed than I'd noticed! Deploying the power takes thought in the wet, too, I had traction intervention in third a couple of times yesterday without doing anything especially daft. I have heard that the Bridgestones are crap in the wet and 275 is far too wide for those conditions anyway, so I expect it'll be much better on the new 18s.
Happy new year, all
dme123 said:
That leather looks nice. I looked at these 18 months ago, along with the later 650i and the standard "dakota" leather is absolutely f
king horrible stuff. A total dealbreaker for me to have it in a car like that, and barely acceptable in a cheap 320d. Yours was either a well specified demo car or someone with deep pockets ticked the best option boxes when ordering!
Yeah, I was well advised to make sure any car had the upgraded leather, this is "Pearl" - I didn't view an E63 with standard leather but I had cheap nasty stuff in an Audi a while back and I'm glad to have avoided it in a car like this.king horrible stuff. A total dealbreaker for me to have it in a car like that, and barely acceptable in a cheap 320d. Yours was either a well specified demo car or someone with deep pockets ticked the best option boxes when ordering!I'm not sure about the spec on this car making it an ex-demo - it's lacking a few things I did want, namely the sports seats and the dynamic drive package (active hydraulic anti-roll bars). The former is easily sorted but the latter I'll have to live without. I'm not sure if the HUD was introduced by this year, nor comfort access, but I don't have those either.
I'm already recalibrating to the big cruiser way of doing things - for a while I found myself having to go quite big on the brakes at times because I was carrying far more speed than I'd noticed! Deploying the power takes thought in the wet, too, I had traction intervention in third a couple of times yesterday without doing anything especially daft. I have heard that the Bridgestones are crap in the wet and 275 is far too wide for those conditions anyway, so I expect it'll be much better on the new 18s.
Happy new year, all
This engine in a Morgan would be really quite something, never mind the bigger 4.8! Awesome.
I'm hoping to get the car to a local specialist next week for a once-over, just because it's quite hard to be certain whether everything it does is exactly right.
speedster986 said:
Lovely car. I had the same exterior colour with a black interior. Loved it but it did develop a terminal gearbox problem. It may be worth considering a gearbox oil flush as a precaution.
Thanks! What was your gearbox problem? As part of the deal, the vendor did change the gearbox oil before I took the car but I don't completely trust him so will be taking a squint at the drain and fill plugs for signs of recent movement. I understand only around half of the oil can be dropped at a time so doing it again might not be the worst move anyway.I'm hoping to get the car to a local specialist next week for a once-over, just because it's quite hard to be certain whether everything it does is exactly right.
The styling does impress me, it was at least five years ahead of its time, perhaps more as it's only recently started to make sense. With that and all the technology and development budget thrown at what was the top-line GT car, it feels like a far newer car than its eleven years.
Thanks for the info on your failure symptoms, mattman - it's good to know what to look out for.
Granfondo, is that your car on 18k?! It looks immaculate, as well it should! Those wheels are a rare choice that suit it really well, too.
Synchromesh said:
When I read about the dealer doing the gearbox oil in the OP I was dubious. From my reading it's quite a specialist job, and needs to be done in a specific way - possibly not something I'd get a dealer to take to his mate to do in a backstreet garage. In fact, from my research, it seems the only failsafe way of doing it is by taking the car to the ZF service centre in Dortmund. It happens to be conveniently close to the Nurburgring too...
Well, the procedure isn't complex and is easy to find online, and the 'box is very common so I'd expect anyone experienced to know how to work with it. The main question for me is a) whether it was done at all, and b) which fluid was used. I think for peace of mind, it's worth a repeat attempt. I want to get the car in to a local specialist for a once-over anyway, so I'll talk to them about the gearbox then. You know very well that if I'm going to the 'Ring, this isn't the car I'm taking - though there is some chance I might end up over there for work, which would be a good use of this car...Thanks for the info on your failure symptoms, mattman - it's good to know what to look out for.
Granfondo, is that your car on 18k?! It looks immaculate, as well it should! Those wheels are a rare choice that suit it really well, too.
parabolica said:
PH won't let me post a pic (size issue) but I have the exact same car OP; although mine doesn't have the sunroof and has dark walnut + dechrome around the Windows; bought in 2013 on 65k - just passed 95k yesterday. Agree entirely with everything you've said, especially the way it drives.
Got rid of the run-flats on mine and the ride is almost perfect. It has had a lot of work down in my tenure however; gearbox + engine oil seals, new alternator and battery (after the old one left me stranded during the hottest night of the year last summer) and a few suspension bushes to rectify some appalling squeaking that developed. That said I love it and can't bear to think parting with it.
That sounds excellent, please do see if you can get some photos up as I'm thinking about going for dark walnut myself - if they're too big, you could open them in something as simple as Paint and resize them to 75% or 50% to get under PH's 2MB limit. Out of interest, which suspension bushes did your car need? One thing that impressed me about the E63 as a type was that each one I test drove - on 68k, 127k and this one with 118k - felt almost totally identical in terms of ride quality and noise, so I thought perhaps they didn't chew through suspension components quite as quickly as the likes of E46s.Got rid of the run-flats on mine and the ride is almost perfect. It has had a lot of work down in my tenure however; gearbox + engine oil seals, new alternator and battery (after the old one left me stranded during the hottest night of the year last summer) and a few suspension bushes to rectify some appalling squeaking that developed. That said I love it and can't bear to think parting with it.
parabolica said:
Managed to find a pic I had posted on another thread - don't have any of the interior but will try to get some soon. Glad to say the council plate is no longer on it either 
Can't remember which bush exactly but it was a rear, inner bushing - the car was squeaking at any slight movement!
That looks bloody lovely, there's a nice target for what mine should end up like! Any more photos, especially of the interior, would be much appreciated Can't remember which bush exactly but it was a rear, inner bushing - the car was squeaking at any slight movement!
I too have something of an issue with NI plates over here..The updates on these cars are quite hard to keep track of. They don't seem to have all been thrown in with LCI like on some models, but year by year. The move to push-button start and the availability of keyless access and all that seems to have been in 2005 when the 650i and 630i came in, but the updated shifter doesn't appear until 2008. The gearbox itself isn't any different (and the 8-speed in the F06 isn't actually a dual-clutch, but ZF's newest torque converter offering). I'm sure there are many more detail changes that I haven't seen enough cars to notice.
Re. space in the rear, I'm 6'0" and my 5'4" other half can sit behind my driving position. She couldn't if she was much taller at all. On the passenger side, I think you could get two people around 5'10" in comfortable positions. When buying I considered the rear seats a privilege rather than an actual feature, but they aren't too bad and apparently quite pleasant to travel in, good visibility and particularly with the glass roof very airy.
I got my first taste of how inconvenient these cars can be the other day:
Yes, that's an ignition coil that doesn't really fit out of the engine without fouling the bulkhead, an air con pipe or a hard brake line. Very nice! Bank B (passenger's side for RHD) is even worse, the coils are underneath those two metal clamps, requiring removal directly into battery cables (not so bad), coolant hoses or the fuel line:
The car had a slight misfire from cold, and common consensus seemed to be that they're very sensitive to plugs, so I thought I'd take a look. I did a quick bit of research on the forums to see if there were any issues with doing the job, and was astonished to see huge long DIYs and talk of setting 4+ hours aside! I knew a Vee would be more awkward than the lovely straight sixes with everything accessed from straight above, but when you look under the bonnet the problem becomes quite clear. The engine's mounted very far back, with an almost unnecessarily large amount of free air between it and the cooling pack - I blame the M6's extra two cylinders for that. This means that the rear two plugs on each bank are facing the suspension turrets, and all the ancillaries are nicely crowded in around them. I was able to get them all done, but I've never had so many extensions and universal joints hanging off one part before, it was amazingly convoluted!
If you're interested, the procedure is:
- Remove both microfilter housings by releasing the big clip on the inboard side and turning the plastic 13mm locking clip on the outboard side. Might as well replaced the microfilters while you're at it, I did. Make sure to use activated carbon ones rather than just paper types.
- Remove the bonnet seal that runs along the leading edge of the scuttle. Just pulls off and only fits one way.
- Remove the plastic bracing in the centre of the scuttle, this weird little panel just slides out.
- Undo one T25 screw holding each side of the scuttle down near the suspension turret. Turn six (I think) more plastic 13mm lockers to release both halves of the scuttle. Take note of how they fit when removing them, they need to be pushed right down into the drain holes to the wings. Mentioning those, take the opportunity to clean them out, they'll be full of leaf mulch and assorted crap.
- Remove the engine acoustic cover. If I remember right, this uses a different Torx bit, but I can't recall whether it's a T20 or T30. Will check later on and update. Four of them, and it pulls off.
- Remove the side cover of the bank you're going to work on. I'd recommend Bank A (left as you're looking from the front of the car) first, it's easier. The covers just pop out of two rubber grommets, but take some force. Bank B's is fiddly to get out, if you let it slide down into the engine bay a bit then it comes out better.
- Go and buy an E7 female Torx bit, if you can find one anywhere. Even worse than using 7mm hex keys for caliper sliders, that, well done BMW. Not having one to hand, I used an E8 to undo the metal clamps holding each pair of coils down, but this was a nightmare as it would slip unless held on tightly and access is so awkward that this made it slow going. I also wouldn't make a habit of using the wrong size, as while my screws didn't show any damage, they might if yours have been overtightened in the last job. Dropping one of these screws or clamps would be very unpleasant indeed, so I stuffed a rag beneath to catch anything I dropped.
- The coils are straightforward to remove. The cable is locked in by a cap that rotates 90° upwards, release this and then use one finger in the hole on the cap, the other hand pulling and turning the coil by the boot, to remove it. It will feel very tight and then suddenly pop out in a rush - if you weren't wearing gloves before, you want to be now because you're gonna clout hard objects in the engine bay when the coils come loose. Set the coil aside. I work on one cylinder at a time, though I can't think of a technical reason why you couldn't refit the coils any place you like, and the leads won't reach incorrect coils so you can't mess up the ignition timing.
- The drop into the wells is long enough that I would only recommend doing this with a proper spark plug socket that grips them by the insulator. Get your socket and a 3" extension, and tape them together. I don't always do this, but trust me, you do not want the socket staying on the new plug when you're working two feet above it because there's no space!
- For numbers 1-3 on Bank A, quite straightforward to use an extension bar and remove the plugs. All usual precautions for working with plugs re. cross-threading apply, always start new plugs by hand, and I turn them backwards until I feel them drop back onto the top of the thread, then immediately start turning them in. This guarantees they take the thread correctly and saves time messing around with hosepipes like other methods. The correct torque for the new plugs is 31Nm, or so I'm told.
- For number 4 at the back of Bank A (the one in my first photo above), clearly the coil won't come out with everything where it stands. The easiest way to remove it is by moving the air con lines mounted to the body metal nearby. Undo the two 10mm nuts and pull the bracket off the pegs. It will feel like it really doesn't want to move, but it will come free without damage. Once free of the pegs, you can push the whole line down out of your way and you should be able to remove the coil. To get the plug, I used a universal joint on the 3" extension, then a 10" extension. Then I found it was still a pain, and I'd ran out of extensions in 3/8", so I added an embiggulator to 1/2" drive, another 10" extension and finally a ratchet to undo the bugger. Once the plug comes free, take off everything except the first 3" extension to remove it safely.
- Numbers 5 and 6 at the front of Bank B aren't so bad either.
- Numbers 7 and 8 on Bank B benefit from moving the battery jump cable. This is held on by a black plastic sleeve that has a grey plastic nut a little way along the cable, and then clips in further down. Undo the nut, manouvre the sleeve out, and the cable is a bit more mobile. You can also push the huge harness trunks running from the ECU up a little bit to get more space. Be a bit clever about where you feed your tools in - my extensions often went through the gaps between hoses or cables rather than over the top of everything - and you should be able to get them done.
This took me two and a half hours from garage-open to tools-away. I'm only mediocre with the spanners but I am quite good at working in stupid fiddly spaces, so this may take a lot longer if you struggle with that sort of thing. Three years part time at Halfords fitting bulbs means working blind, wet and numb in a space too small for human digits is normal to me! All eight of my plugs came out looking like this, which I'm happy with, pretty healthy:
I'm also happy that these are NGK BKR6EQUP, one of only two plug types approved for this engine. The other is Bosch FGR7DQP, which are in it now. If anyone's thinking of tackling this and would like any more explanation or photos, just let me know, I'm hoping the above makes enough sense when read alongside looking in the engine bay! It's not mechanically difficult, just monumentally awkward. This procedure is obviously written from a 645Ci, you may find it varies on the 50i engine, but I believe the installs are very similar with this engine in E60 and E53.
Yes and no. It seems much happier at a cold start and feels like the response is cleaner when driving, but just once yesterday I noticed it hunting around a little bit when stationary in D. It'd only been been running for a couple of minutes, and I haven't seen it since. It didn't feel like it was necessarily a misfire, though, could be some oddity with the idle control. I'll continue to monitor that.
philmots said:
Hunting on a warm idle is most likely the PCV's..
They're about £13 a side and a doddle to fit.
Yes, I'd read about these. If I spot the issue again I'll look into them!They're about £13 a side and a doddle to fit.
Granfondo said:
Maybe on 19k now!
It's never seen a winter so looks like new but doesn't get used much due to other cars but won't let it go for buttons!
Lots of people have wanted to buy it but when they tell me that they can get one on EBay for £7k my answer usually offends!
Heh, I can imagine It's never seen a winter so looks like new but doesn't get used much due to other cars but won't let it go for buttons!
Lots of people have wanted to buy it but when they tell me that they can get one on EBay for £7k my answer usually offends!
not something you'd want to part with! I do worry that even if mine's absolutely perfect in five years' time, it still won't be valued much because it'll have well over 150k on it. But then I decide I don't really care about that enough to stop enjoying it!That's a very impressive list, Speedster! I just had a look on BMW's site out of idle curiosity, the cars qualify for "value servicing", and for mine an oil service came back as £222, rising to £568 for the microfilters, air filter and plugs as well. Where are you getting a full service for £250, philmots? That's very cheap even for an indy, when you have £88 of plugs, £40 of microfilter and (I think?) eight litres of oil just in materials cost.
lHeadlamp condensation seems to be quite a common sight on E63s, and mine was suffering particularly badly. In fact, the xenon and parking light (angel eyes) on the passenger side failed in quick succession just a couple of days after I'd bought the car, which didn't impress me in the slightest. Not having the time to engage in the process of getting the lamps off the car, I tried replacing the dipped beam (a D2S bulb) to see if I could at least have proper lighting while I waited to sort the problem entirely.
The manual tells you to go to BMW Service to get the xenons changed, which they justify by saying they shouldn't really ever fail. In fact, the process is quite simple:
I shan't bore you with the details of removing the bumper and the lamps, not when all I did was follow the rather excellent DIY posted here. Note that these photos are after demisting, which I did by getting all the bulbs out, clearing out the ventilation tubes (which be honest were quite clear anyway), and applying a hairdrier for a while. I then left them to dry out thoroughly..
I was very popular, as you can imagine. I took a rather optimistic approach to diagnosing the problem, first taking all the "cheap" hardware from the working side and transplanting it into the dead lamp - the bulb, locking ring and igniter. Unsurprisingly, this still didn't work, leaving only one piece - the ballast unit, a silver case screwed to the bottom of the lamp. Off it came, and open it was prised, to find this:
Hmm. Several obvious problems there. One would presume water damage. Sure enough, the lamp worked perfectly with all its old hardware and the ballast unit from the working side. Naturally, the only component to have failed would be the one that costs around £100 even on eBay. Anyone got a spare?!
Not neglecting the parking light, which I found had shattered entirely and is really quite hard to source an exact replacement for. It looks like this, and is 10W which seems vanishingly rare in such a small bulb. BMW will only sell it to you with the holder as well, for about £25, which I politely declined.
During all this buggering around with the lamps, though, I did notice that the parking lights were quite yellow and didn't match the colour of the xenon dipped beams at all. On most cars this doesn't matter because the xenon drowns out the light from the smaller bulb, but with two separate rings, you can still see the inner one quite clearly when the dipped beam is on. Using the awkwardness of an OEM replacement as an excuse, I plumped for these LEDs designed to match the xenons. I'm very much anti-LED in almost all aftermarket applications, but these I hoped would be alright because you can't see the bulb at all, they simply feed light to the angel eye rings. Sure enough, they look rather good and like they should have been OEM. I'll try and get a photo when the light's right. I'm pleased, at £14 for the pair.
The driver's side is an utter, utter bd to fit, by the way, and this is from someone who spent three years working for Halfords and was able to achieve every single "Do Not Attempt" bulb fit in their system.. best done off the car, that one!
The manual tells you to go to BMW Service to get the xenons changed, which they justify by saying they shouldn't really ever fail. In fact, the process is quite simple:
- Turn the wheels full lock towards the side you're changing
- In the wheelarch liner, there is an access panel. There are two screws which it seems can be either 8mm or 10mm, undo these.
- Reaching through the hole, you'll find another cover on the back of the lamp, which clips at the top. Unless your name's Sam, in which case there won't be a cover there and the reason for your condensation problem will become quite obvious. £12 from the dealer, if you find your previous owner has eaten yours too.
- Now you're looking at the igniter, a black and red block on the back of the bulb holder. Turn it about 45° counter-clockwise, it disengages and can be wriggled free. The wiring harness detaches itself.
- The bulb holder is unusual, and is removed by rotating the outer black ring counter-clockwise by a similar amount. Don't try and turn the bulb or the plastic around it, won't work and you might upset your adaptive motors.
- Be careful removing the ring, as the bulb will sit loose and could drop out. Once it's off, remove the bulb, noting that the shaft under the glass goes at the bottom. The ring is helpfully marked TOP in the appropriate place.
- Refitting is the reverse of removal, with extra care once your new bulb is sitting in place without the ring to hold it yet! Make sure all four pegs of the igniter engage properly before trying to turn it, if it feels like there's resistance, pull it away and try again. Don't attempt to refit the wiring harness until the igniter is in place - there's a tab to stop it.
- Enjoy renewed illumination. Unless your name's Sam, in which case the lamp still won't work. Balls.
I shan't bore you with the details of removing the bumper and the lamps, not when all I did was follow the rather excellent DIY posted here. Note that these photos are after demisting, which I did by getting all the bulbs out, clearing out the ventilation tubes (which be honest were quite clear anyway), and applying a hairdrier for a while. I then left them to dry out thoroughly..
I was very popular, as you can imagine. I took a rather optimistic approach to diagnosing the problem, first taking all the "cheap" hardware from the working side and transplanting it into the dead lamp - the bulb, locking ring and igniter. Unsurprisingly, this still didn't work, leaving only one piece - the ballast unit, a silver case screwed to the bottom of the lamp. Off it came, and open it was prised, to find this:
Hmm. Several obvious problems there. One would presume water damage. Sure enough, the lamp worked perfectly with all its old hardware and the ballast unit from the working side. Naturally, the only component to have failed would be the one that costs around £100 even on eBay. Anyone got a spare?!
Not neglecting the parking light, which I found had shattered entirely and is really quite hard to source an exact replacement for. It looks like this, and is 10W which seems vanishingly rare in such a small bulb. BMW will only sell it to you with the holder as well, for about £25, which I politely declined.
During all this buggering around with the lamps, though, I did notice that the parking lights were quite yellow and didn't match the colour of the xenon dipped beams at all. On most cars this doesn't matter because the xenon drowns out the light from the smaller bulb, but with two separate rings, you can still see the inner one quite clearly when the dipped beam is on. Using the awkwardness of an OEM replacement as an excuse, I plumped for these LEDs designed to match the xenons. I'm very much anti-LED in almost all aftermarket applications, but these I hoped would be alright because you can't see the bulb at all, they simply feed light to the angel eye rings. Sure enough, they look rather good and like they should have been OEM. I'll try and get a photo when the light's right. I'm pleased, at £14 for the pair.
The driver's side is an utter, utter b
d to fit, by the way, and this is from someone who spent three years working for Halfords and was able to achieve every single "Do Not Attempt" bulb fit in their system.. best done off the car, that one!There is indeed, you can access it through the wheelarch. When you have the cover off the back of the dipped beam housing, there's a little lever outboard of the igniter block. For driving on the left, the left-hand headlamp's lever should be all the way down, and the right-hand headlamp's lever all the way up. Reverse this for driving on the right. I'll see if I can get a photo when I have the lamps off again to change the ballast.
I can't confirm, but I think it's only UK-spec cars that have this function, as we're in the unique position of being surrounded by countries who drive on the other side of the road!
I can't confirm, but I think it's only UK-spec cars that have this function, as we're in the unique position of being surrounded by countries who drive on the other side of the road!
carinaman said:
Please don't go out of your way on my account, though it may add to an already interesting and useful thread. That it can be done seems fitting given the Grand Tourer nature of the car.
No worries, it wouldn't be any trouble and I'm happy to anyway. One problem I found when looking at these cars is that general info can be quite hard to find compared to most, and also that DIYs are relatively uncommon. I suppose the rarity and the original price point of the cars both contribute to that - but I decided I should explain things as fully as I can in this thread, in the hope that it could make a handy reference. That includes using my car to answer any queries anyone has about the type - though I can't promise that what mine does is necessarily correct jayemm89 - wholeheartedly agree
and my leather is improving a little after two coats of Gliptone.parabolica said:
My headlights have suddenly misted up in the past week. Is it possible to check/clear the vent holes with everything in place? I don't really have the means or space to dismantle the front of my car at the moment.
Honestly, I'm not sure - I can't visualise the location of the vent pipes on the back of the lamps and I don't have a photo, but I can tell you that mine were clear so not the cause of my condensation. I had some condensation in the right-hand lamp too, despite it having all its covers in place, but it hasn't returned since I had it off the car and thoroughly dried out. The disassembly isn't too bad, I did it on the driveway in perhaps an hour. I'll see if the vents are accessible next time I'm in there.philmots said:
It's bizarre, I was made aware of it from the E61 bearding thread months back, I've just done it again.. £232 for oil and filter, air filter, micro filters and spark plugs!
The offers still stands now, one of the guys had it done IIRC. I really want to get mine done but it's not due while October so seems a waste to get it done now, specially as I'm selling March/April 2017.. I'd rather sell it Having had a recent major service.
Bizarre indeed! If I hadn't already done everything but the oil and filter, I might consider it, but as it is I may as well do that myself now.The offers still stands now, one of the guys had it done IIRC. I really want to get mine done but it's not due while October so seems a waste to get it done now, specially as I'm selling March/April 2017.. I'd rather sell it Having had a recent major service.
Stupidly I didn't note down the part number of the ballast when I had it off the car, but AL 1 307 329 072 01 seems to be the one. Definitely don't want to go down the aftermarket replacement route, only heard bad things about those, but trying my luck with a few cars that are being broken before taking the plunge on a new one.
Ah, nice one. You may want to leave it off entirely, I've heard of people drilling holes in the bottom of the lamps to improve ventilation and all sorts. I think there's very little chance of water ingress through that vent hole, and with the sealing not quite what it should be, they need all the help they can get to dry out.
I noticed someone mentioned contacting ZF on another forum - possibly a Land Rover one, the 6HP26 makes its way into many and varied cars, from the DB9 to the Discovery! - and I thought that would be a nice reliable way to find out which of my gearbox's little foibles were normal. So I found their technical enquiry section, sent them a few questions, and the next day received an excellent and very complete response. I was impressed! For the sake of completeness, roughly reproduced below:
SM: At a cold start (from overnight), the lockup clutch does not seem to engage for the approximately the first 5km or five minutes. At a constant speed and moderate engine load, engine speed is higher than it would usually be for the selected gear, and can drop below the "normal" locked-up speed when engine load is removed. After 5km / five minutes driving, normal lockup behaviour is resumed. Is this a warmup strategy?
ZF: The extended shift points/ delayed upshift and change in converter lock up regulation are all part of the warm-up shift program. This is done to help speed up engine warm up and normal in this application.
SM: At all operating temperatures, reverse gear is selected quite slowly, taking 2-3 seconds to engage. As an example, if stationary in D with the brakes applied, if one selects R and immediately releases the brakes, the car will roll forward for a short time before reverse actually engages. I have been advised this could indicate a low oil level causing slow solenoid operation?
ZF: Boxes being slow to engage reverse i.e. taking a couple of seconds can be normal, depending on the shift system. However if the box is low on oil then it can cause issues.
SM: When stationary in D with the brakes applied, the driveline always “pulls” against the brakes, no matter how long the car is stationary for – the gearbox does not disengage. I understand some variants of the 6HP26 have a “transmission idle control” function that reduces load when stationary in D. Should my application have this function, or is this behaviour correct?
ZF: NIC or Neutral Idle Control, the decoupling of the box while stationary. This is common on newer transmissions. It was used on some of the 6HP transmissions but I’m not sure when it was brought in for BMW. It may even be the case that the vehicle had it but it was coded out with a software update. To find out if it was relevant you would have to speak with a BMW dealer.
SM: Particularly when in manual mode, 3-4 shift under load is not smooth. There are no bangs or apparent movement in the driveline, but 4th gear engages with a jerk that is not felt with other upshifts at any load. I have not heard about this issue on any other 6HP26 vehicles. This occurs even at quite gentle acceleration.
ZF: If you are concerned about the shift quality 3-4 then I would advise getting the adaption values for clutch fill pressures checked. If there are no abnormal pressures and no fault codes then it may be appropriate to carry out and oil and filter changes. Low oil level can also impact shift quality.
If there are abnormal readings then it may be an indication of and internal issue with one of the clutches involved in the 3-4 shift.
SM: Possibly related, lockup performance at moderate load in 3rd and 4th gears does not seem to be correct: when moderate acceleration is demanded from 1500-2000rpm in M3 or M4, engine speed rises to ~3000rpm and holds there until vehicle speed matches, then lockup appears to be achieved. This behaviour does not occur in any other gears, only 3rd and 4th. Please note this does not appear to be a kickdown behaviour, occurring with less than half throttle and giving a constant engine speed rather than revving out in a lower gear.
ZF: This is a bit more difficult. When you depress the accelerator the lock up clutch will open. Once the slip across the converter has stabilised it will start to regulate again. The function isn’t a straight on/off function, rather it is a regulated slip.
You also can’t compare lock up in a 1st generation 6 speed to lock up in a 2nd generation 6 speed or an 8 speed. The transmissions are very sensitive to slip. If there was an issue this would log a DTC.
If there are no recorded DTCs or abnormal adaptions then transmissions do normally respond well to an oil change. Life guard fluid 6 is the correct oil for the transmission. We don't support or recommend anything other than life guard fluid 6. In fact we would advise against any other oil as it can damage the transmission and often results in worse shift quality than the old oil.
If you are changing the oil then the adaptions should be re-set once the new oil is in. This will trigger the adaptions to relearn. Ideally a specific adaption drive should be carried out, however this isn’t always easy to do on public roads.
So it seems most of what it's doing is normal, and the rest should be cured by an oil and filter change and re-learning all the adaptions. I'll make sure to read the adaptions and check they all seem reasonable before they're cleared, in case there's indication of a problem, but with any luck it could be in reasonable shape
I'm particularly interested to see about enabling that "neutral idle control" function. The response suggests that some E63s might have had it - has anyone noticed on their car? If the dragging against the brakes isn't apparent, knocking the selector to neutral would be your best test. In my car, there is a noticeable drop in engine load when taking it out of D. If it was used on any E63, it should be possible to enable it for others.
SM: At a cold start (from overnight), the lockup clutch does not seem to engage for the approximately the first 5km or five minutes. At a constant speed and moderate engine load, engine speed is higher than it would usually be for the selected gear, and can drop below the "normal" locked-up speed when engine load is removed. After 5km / five minutes driving, normal lockup behaviour is resumed. Is this a warmup strategy?
ZF: The extended shift points/ delayed upshift and change in converter lock up regulation are all part of the warm-up shift program. This is done to help speed up engine warm up and normal in this application.
SM: At all operating temperatures, reverse gear is selected quite slowly, taking 2-3 seconds to engage. As an example, if stationary in D with the brakes applied, if one selects R and immediately releases the brakes, the car will roll forward for a short time before reverse actually engages. I have been advised this could indicate a low oil level causing slow solenoid operation?
ZF: Boxes being slow to engage reverse i.e. taking a couple of seconds can be normal, depending on the shift system. However if the box is low on oil then it can cause issues.
SM: When stationary in D with the brakes applied, the driveline always “pulls” against the brakes, no matter how long the car is stationary for – the gearbox does not disengage. I understand some variants of the 6HP26 have a “transmission idle control” function that reduces load when stationary in D. Should my application have this function, or is this behaviour correct?
ZF: NIC or Neutral Idle Control, the decoupling of the box while stationary. This is common on newer transmissions. It was used on some of the 6HP transmissions but I’m not sure when it was brought in for BMW. It may even be the case that the vehicle had it but it was coded out with a software update. To find out if it was relevant you would have to speak with a BMW dealer.
SM: Particularly when in manual mode, 3-4 shift under load is not smooth. There are no bangs or apparent movement in the driveline, but 4th gear engages with a jerk that is not felt with other upshifts at any load. I have not heard about this issue on any other 6HP26 vehicles. This occurs even at quite gentle acceleration.
ZF: If you are concerned about the shift quality 3-4 then I would advise getting the adaption values for clutch fill pressures checked. If there are no abnormal pressures and no fault codes then it may be appropriate to carry out and oil and filter changes. Low oil level can also impact shift quality.
If there are abnormal readings then it may be an indication of and internal issue with one of the clutches involved in the 3-4 shift.
SM: Possibly related, lockup performance at moderate load in 3rd and 4th gears does not seem to be correct: when moderate acceleration is demanded from 1500-2000rpm in M3 or M4, engine speed rises to ~3000rpm and holds there until vehicle speed matches, then lockup appears to be achieved. This behaviour does not occur in any other gears, only 3rd and 4th. Please note this does not appear to be a kickdown behaviour, occurring with less than half throttle and giving a constant engine speed rather than revving out in a lower gear.
ZF: This is a bit more difficult. When you depress the accelerator the lock up clutch will open. Once the slip across the converter has stabilised it will start to regulate again. The function isn’t a straight on/off function, rather it is a regulated slip.
You also can’t compare lock up in a 1st generation 6 speed to lock up in a 2nd generation 6 speed or an 8 speed. The transmissions are very sensitive to slip. If there was an issue this would log a DTC.
If there are no recorded DTCs or abnormal adaptions then transmissions do normally respond well to an oil change. Life guard fluid 6 is the correct oil for the transmission. We don't support or recommend anything other than life guard fluid 6. In fact we would advise against any other oil as it can damage the transmission and often results in worse shift quality than the old oil.
If you are changing the oil then the adaptions should be re-set once the new oil is in. This will trigger the adaptions to relearn. Ideally a specific adaption drive should be carried out, however this isn’t always easy to do on public roads.
So it seems most of what it's doing is normal, and the rest should be cured by an oil and filter change and re-learning all the adaptions. I'll make sure to read the adaptions and check they all seem reasonable before they're cleared, in case there's indication of a problem, but with any luck it could be in reasonable shape
I'm particularly interested to see about enabling that "neutral idle control" function. The response suggests that some E63s might have had it - has anyone noticed on their car? If the dragging against the brakes isn't apparent, knocking the selector to neutral would be your best test. In my car, there is a noticeable drop in engine load when taking it out of D. If it was used on any E63, it should be possible to enable it for others.
Edited by McSam on Monday 18th January 21:54
philmots said:
I've never driven a TC auto that's disconnected drive, whilst on the brakes in drive, the new ones may do this though.. But Sams is behaving normally.
The 6HP26 is capable of that, I work for an OEM that uses it, hence asking ZF about it in this application! It's only recently become common, but it was possible with our gearbox years ago. You can feel it operating if you're paying attention, and it's clear that our cars don't do it, but the response to another question about it is that BMW would be the only ones to tell when/if it started being used on E63.RDMcG said:
Great cars...bought a manual one when they first came out...loved the sound of that V8......
Just the same as my interior, but with the sports seats and a funny stick with loads of markings on it in the middle! Looks lovely, and a manual V8 is a rare thing indeed, well done for speccing/finding that. In other news, I've just fitted my winter wheels and tyres and gone for a quick drive. Um.. wow. I can't begin to do justice to the transformation that's occured there. It's like driving a V8 cloud! The ride quality is incomparable, before you felt reasonably isolated but were still jerked around by anything but a tiny imperfection. Now, it absorbs everything without even bothering to tell you it's happening. Sharp bumps are blunted right off, and if there's a big dip in the road, the whole body has time to travel and soak it all up. Quite amazing. The road noise has been removed almost completely, before the Bridgestones (particularly the rears) were howling to the point of being irritating on the motorway, but these are so silent I heard wind noise for the first time ever in this car. I'd never noticed that it was completely drowned out by the tyres!
Dynamically it's somewhat interesting, with your turn-in having two stages: initial bite, and then a displacement downwards and out as the sidewalls settle! It sounds odd but feels quite natural and to be honest is quite endearing. Longitudinally, I haven't gone big on the brakes yet but I did find full throttle in second from low revs brought traction control intervention from 3500rpm upwards, and a little bit at the start of third as well. Previously, you wouldn't get any concern in the dry, but I do think the system is a little conservative and I never felt any actual slip, so I might try it again in the "Dynamic" mode to see what it does.
I've gone from non-runflat 19" Bridgestone RE050As to non-runflat 18" Dunlop Wintersport 5s. I shudder to think what the car must have been like on runflat 19s. If anyone's as geeky as me, you might be interested to know the mass effect:
8.0x18 Style 118 Dunlop Wintersport 5 245/45R18 25.7kg
8.5x19 Style 121 Bridgestone RE050A 245/40R19 29.4kg
9.0x19 Style 121 Bridgestone RE050A 275/35R19 29.4kg (weird, huh?!)
It's going to make my 250-mile trip this weekend a lot more pleasant, I can tell you that much!
carinaman said:
Interesting thread McSam.
Cheers!RDMcG said:
I had to order the manual and it was not at all a popular version, but I had had a string of BMWs at the time and liked their shifts.
As for runflats I hated them- they ruined the ride, so I threw on some Michelins and put a tire inflator in the car for emergencies . It was like getting a different, ( and vastly better) car.
I'm not surprised - on either point! It's interesting that the 650i I drove on 19" Bridgestone runflats didn't seem anywhere near as bad, but perhaps that's just because I didn't drive it long enough to get used to it. I've put just a hair under 1000 miles on this one already!As for runflats I hated them- they ruined the ride, so I threw on some Michelins and put a tire inflator in the car for emergencies . It was like getting a different, ( and vastly better) car.
Mikeeb said:
On the 645 the TC does de-couple, it's not 100% effective you get some drag, but it is better than not at all.
Interesting - I can't feel any effect on my car. It'll be reflashed to the latest software when the gearbox oil change is done, so I'll be keen to see if there's any change.My new (OEM) wheel centre caps arrived, so a quick photo - it was getting dark, the car's filthy and I was just using my phone but you get the idea. Thoughts? I quite like it.
Well after a month, I finally got to try out the journey I sort of bought this car for - a 110-mile run from my place in Warwickshire to my other half up in Chester. Half is on motorways and the other half on the A41, a nice, flowing road that's almost entirely single-carriageway. My E46 was good at this journey, but it really called for a bigger, more relaxed car that had much more serious overtaking punch.
As it turns out, I had judged this car perfectly. It was sublime. Quiet, refined and effortless on the motorway, and excellent at making serene but very significant progress on the open stretches of the A41. There are a few roundabouts dotted along it and I realised I was giggling a little bit at the thrust coming off them in third gear. Overtaking is a different ball game in this car, if there's anything that even looks like an opportunity, you can be out, past and back in again in half the time you expected. I have had to get out of the habit of going WOT in third before pulling out, though - if you cross the white lines with it fully lit, you're going to get a lot of traction intervention, and if it's remotely damp you're down to half throttle! I did test out the "dynamic" mode on the traction control and found it didn't really allow any more slip in a straight line (perhaps it does in corners), but turning it all off showed that it was indeed being a bit conservative and in the dry, there's only a little hint of slip high in second gear and nowhere else. The car remains totally stable, you can just sense a little overspeed at one of the rear wheels.
Performance aside, I can't think of an easier way to dispatch a journey like that, and I got out at the other end feeling like I'd barely done half an hour at the wheel. Such an enormously capable car - I've properly fallen for it now.
Oh, and the trip computer indicated a 35.7mpg average on that trip... I think it reads about 5% high, but that still makes 34, which is nothing short of absurd!
As it turns out, I had judged this car perfectly. It was sublime. Quiet, refined and effortless on the motorway, and excellent at making serene but very significant progress on the open stretches of the A41. There are a few roundabouts dotted along it and I realised I was giggling a little bit at the thrust coming off them in third gear. Overtaking is a different ball game in this car, if there's anything that even looks like an opportunity, you can be out, past and back in again in half the time you expected. I have had to get out of the habit of going WOT in third before pulling out, though - if you cross the white lines with it fully lit, you're going to get a lot of traction intervention, and if it's remotely damp you're down to half throttle! I did test out the "dynamic" mode on the traction control and found it didn't really allow any more slip in a straight line (perhaps it does in corners), but turning it all off showed that it was indeed being a bit conservative and in the dry, there's only a little hint of slip high in second gear and nowhere else. The car remains totally stable, you can just sense a little overspeed at one of the rear wheels.
Performance aside, I can't think of an easier way to dispatch a journey like that, and I got out at the other end feeling like I'd barely done half an hour at the wheel. Such an enormously capable car - I've properly fallen for it now.
Oh, and the trip computer indicated a 35.7mpg average on that trip... I think it reads about 5% high, but that still makes 34, which is nothing short of absurd!
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