165k mile BMW Z4 2.5 - 3 Careful PH Owners
Discussion
Court_S said:
Car looks great, shame it’s time to move it on but it’s only a car. Which era Cooper S have you bought?
CSL’s are ace by the way!
I had a hankering for another R53, just for the supercharger whine but decided to go R56 to give the turbo a try. CSL’s are ace by the way!
Will need to get the exhaust seen to, I’m way too old to be driving something this loud. Other than that, I’m liking it very much so far.
Pic below out of the downstairs window - I found it amusing that the roof sits at about the same height as the bottom of the windows on the Big Mama.
lemansky said:
I had a hankering for another R53, just for the supercharger whine but decided to go R56 to give the turbo a try.
Will need to get the exhaust seen to, I’m way too old to be driving something this loud. Other than that, I’m liking it very much so far.
Pic below out of the downstairs window - I found it amusing that the roof sits at about the same height as the bottom of the windows on the Big Mama.
Looks well.Will need to get the exhaust seen to, I’m way too old to be driving something this loud. Other than that, I’m liking it very much so far.
Pic below out of the downstairs window - I found it amusing that the roof sits at about the same height as the bottom of the windows on the Big Mama.
I’m a big fan of MINI’s. The R56 passed me by really because I was such an R53 fanboy but they’ve grown on me over time. I enjoyed driving my friends GPII, that was a lot of fun.
So, after a few weeks of back and forth with lemansky and using it as an excuse to visit a friend up in Glasgow, I embarked upon the furthest journey yet to pick up a car.
3 trains, a bus and roughly 7 hours managed to get me from Grantham to my Premier Inn in East Kilbride. I'd managed to get an absolute bargain on tickets which meant that my route all the way through to Edinburgh (so about 4 hours) was spent in LNER first class for only £65 all in!
Complementary breakfast, lunch, various hot drinks, shortbread and a scotch and coke were all enjoyed on the first class section of the journey which, along with having plenty of reading material, made getting up there a rather pleasant, if tiring, experience!
Fast forward to the morning after and my Glaswegian friend turned up in an ND MX-5 before the Z4 was kindly delivered to the hotel after a bit of a change in plans on lemansky's side but all was sorted in the end.
Car pretty much checked out as expected, I certainly wasn't short of information thanks to this thread! The deal was done, hands were shook and the key, service history, some spares and the car itself was handed over.
Straight out for a roof-down country road blast from there with my mate, ended up visiting a farm shop/cafe called The Heron Farm Shop & Kitchen for some lunch, south of Glasgow. This gave me a really good opportunity to get used to the car and certainly as far as the driving experience goes, one could be forgiven for believing the car has half the miles displayed on the odometer (165k, for those counting)!
The car drives very nicely aside from some bits which we'll come to later.
Obligatory photo of the pair:
Another jaunt back to my friend's house involved the rain coming in so the roof unfortunately had to go up for a while! From there it was a fuel stop and onto festivities as a group assembled for his 30th for drinks, dinner and more drinks.
A mild hangover kicked in the morning after and once breakfast, check-out and another trip to my mate's to borrow some CDs was dealt with, it was time to head off.
Ooft.
Full confession - I had actually done this drive before (as well as the opposite leg), in my very first car - the 1.3 diesel Astra without a working turbo so had a rough idea of what to expect. This was a completely different experience, both positively and negatively speaking.
That 4h26m was of course incredibly optimistic - it turned out more like 7 hours once rest stops had been taken into consideration.
Let's start with the negatives of such a journey and have the positives later on for dessert.
This car is not built as a long-distance cruiser. At all!
It rides surprisingly well for a car that is low to the ground, light and short of wheelbase, but it is an incredibly loud space to be in, even with the roof up (note: I think there may be a reason for this, will come back to it later).
Seats are really not a strong point for BMW when it comes to long journeys - I had exactly the same problem with my M135i, I really can't do much more than an hour without some serious discomfort. I dread to think how bad they'd be had they not been upgraded to the E46 ones!
The air-con was in dire need of a replenishment of gas, I had to have the window down at motorway speeds for a while, despite the present rain, to avoid baking and reduce sweating
. A workaround was found...
This is the first time I've done a reasonably distant journey without cruise control in I reckon 4 and a half years or so? It was sorely missed and has found its way onto my list.
Right - onto the journey itself where the positives start to come through.
My first leg took me from south Glasgow surburbs all the way to Gretna Green services at the Scotland/England border on the A74(M), about 80 miles. Stopped off for a tea and a snack.
Down the M6 from there to Penrith, at which point, the sun had made an appearance and I was starting to get a bit sweaty. Unperturbed by distant clouds, I took the roof down for the A66 leg across the country to Scotch Corner.
My god, what an experience. I struggle to put it into words but it was absolutely sublime. The sights, the sounds, even the smells! This is the point at which I knew, despite some niggles, I'd made the right decision and was almost euphoric in feeling. Until...
Pulled over at the first opportunity I could and was able to confirm that none of the tyres had decided to go pop on me. Made the decision to cautiously make the further 10 miles to Scotch Corner services (my next scheduled stop), check the tyre pressures at the petrol station and add air where needed.
That's exactly what I did - a late lunch and another rest stop later, I set the tyre pressures to spec (there was a misalignment of about 2 PSI between the two fronts - 30 v 32 iirc), reset the TPMS and the light was extinguished.
Roof back up as rain had started coming down again and onwards with no real decision on when the next stop would be. That decision would be made for me after another hour or so as I noticed I was starting to fall asleep so managed to duck into Wetherby services for a nap, a coffee and another snack. Also felt I'd been cooking again a little bit on that last leg so it was time to chance dual carriageway driving sans roof.
It was lovely! The rain stayed away and I went another 80ish miles all the way home with the roof down and had a rather pleasant time
The speakers are surprisingly competent for a BMW base system!
Made it home about 8pm and found my way to bed rather promptly!
Will put plans into the next post.
3 trains, a bus and roughly 7 hours managed to get me from Grantham to my Premier Inn in East Kilbride. I'd managed to get an absolute bargain on tickets which meant that my route all the way through to Edinburgh (so about 4 hours) was spent in LNER first class for only £65 all in!
Complementary breakfast, lunch, various hot drinks, shortbread and a scotch and coke were all enjoyed on the first class section of the journey which, along with having plenty of reading material, made getting up there a rather pleasant, if tiring, experience!
Fast forward to the morning after and my Glaswegian friend turned up in an ND MX-5 before the Z4 was kindly delivered to the hotel after a bit of a change in plans on lemansky's side but all was sorted in the end.
Car pretty much checked out as expected, I certainly wasn't short of information thanks to this thread! The deal was done, hands were shook and the key, service history, some spares and the car itself was handed over.
Straight out for a roof-down country road blast from there with my mate, ended up visiting a farm shop/cafe called The Heron Farm Shop & Kitchen for some lunch, south of Glasgow. This gave me a really good opportunity to get used to the car and certainly as far as the driving experience goes, one could be forgiven for believing the car has half the miles displayed on the odometer (165k, for those counting)!
The car drives very nicely aside from some bits which we'll come to later.
Obligatory photo of the pair:
Another jaunt back to my friend's house involved the rain coming in so the roof unfortunately had to go up for a while! From there it was a fuel stop and onto festivities as a group assembled for his 30th for drinks, dinner and more drinks.
A mild hangover kicked in the morning after and once breakfast, check-out and another trip to my mate's to borrow some CDs was dealt with, it was time to head off.
Ooft.
Full confession - I had actually done this drive before (as well as the opposite leg), in my very first car - the 1.3 diesel Astra without a working turbo so had a rough idea of what to expect. This was a completely different experience, both positively and negatively speaking.
That 4h26m was of course incredibly optimistic - it turned out more like 7 hours once rest stops had been taken into consideration.
Let's start with the negatives of such a journey and have the positives later on for dessert.
This car is not built as a long-distance cruiser. At all!
It rides surprisingly well for a car that is low to the ground, light and short of wheelbase, but it is an incredibly loud space to be in, even with the roof up (note: I think there may be a reason for this, will come back to it later).
Seats are really not a strong point for BMW when it comes to long journeys - I had exactly the same problem with my M135i, I really can't do much more than an hour without some serious discomfort. I dread to think how bad they'd be had they not been upgraded to the E46 ones!
The air-con was in dire need of a replenishment of gas, I had to have the window down at motorway speeds for a while, despite the present rain, to avoid baking and reduce sweating
. A workaround was found...This is the first time I've done a reasonably distant journey without cruise control in I reckon 4 and a half years or so? It was sorely missed and has found its way onto my list.
Right - onto the journey itself where the positives start to come through.
My first leg took me from south Glasgow surburbs all the way to Gretna Green services at the Scotland/England border on the A74(M), about 80 miles. Stopped off for a tea and a snack.
Down the M6 from there to Penrith, at which point, the sun had made an appearance and I was starting to get a bit sweaty. Unperturbed by distant clouds, I took the roof down for the A66 leg across the country to Scotch Corner.
My god, what an experience. I struggle to put it into words but it was absolutely sublime. The sights, the sounds, even the smells! This is the point at which I knew, despite some niggles, I'd made the right decision and was almost euphoric in feeling. Until...
Pulled over at the first opportunity I could and was able to confirm that none of the tyres had decided to go pop on me. Made the decision to cautiously make the further 10 miles to Scotch Corner services (my next scheduled stop), check the tyre pressures at the petrol station and add air where needed.
That's exactly what I did - a late lunch and another rest stop later, I set the tyre pressures to spec (there was a misalignment of about 2 PSI between the two fronts - 30 v 32 iirc), reset the TPMS and the light was extinguished.
Roof back up as rain had started coming down again and onwards with no real decision on when the next stop would be. That decision would be made for me after another hour or so as I noticed I was starting to fall asleep so managed to duck into Wetherby services for a nap, a coffee and another snack. Also felt I'd been cooking again a little bit on that last leg so it was time to chance dual carriageway driving sans roof.
It was lovely! The rain stayed away and I went another 80ish miles all the way home with the roof down and had a rather pleasant time
The speakers are surprisingly competent for a BMW base system!
Made it home about 8pm and found my way to bed rather promptly!
Will put plans into the next post.
With the new thread title taken care of, let's talk about what there's to do on the car itself.
Apologies to the previous two owners if I'm seen to be speaking out of turn
For the avoidance of doubt, I did know about almost all of this before agreeing to buy the car!
Before I'd even properly sat down and thought about the list, I had the following items to take care of due to them being fairly high impact on the driving experience:
Air-con needing gas
As mentioned on the drive back from Scotland, the air conditioning wasn't actually... conditioning the air, just blowing it around the cabin.
Wheel alignment
A factor I'd forgotten to mention, the wheel was a good 10 or so degrees off to the left- aside from the premature tyre wear bad alignment can introduce, it's not a particularly comfortable experience being permanently askew when driving straight.
Seeing as I had Monday off, I promptly dropped it off to my nearby garage for them to look at and resolve both.
Air-conditioning was sorted easily, as was the front alignment.
The rear alignment however...
The camber adjustment bolts were seized solid and, despite an hour of effort (which they very kindly didn't charge me for), they weren't able to adjust the rear tracking whatsoever.
I'm going to get a better investigation done at some point, but for now I have added the following to my shopping list:
2x BMW - Eccentric Bolt (33303411801)
2x BMW - Eccentric flat washer (33303411796)
2x LEMFÖRDER - Control Arm / Trailing Arm Bush (33326771828)
This is in the hope that only the bush is taken out as collateral damage when the seized bolt/washer is removed...
If the upper control arm needs to be sacrificed at all then that's going to work out rather expensively as they're only available from BMW and don't appear to have any aftermarket support. In lieu of being able to make sense of the RealOEM diagram of the rear suspension, I've looked at a video of the E46 rear suspension and the camber adjuster sits within the lower arm, which *does* have aftermarket support, so I may well pick up a pair of lower arms (Lemforder ones are roughly £30 each on Autodoc, with the bushing included) just in case those need to be sacrificed.
What else then...
Okay.
Driver's door
As mentioned earlier in this thread, there were some issues with being able to open the driver's door from the outside. Unfortunately, this is still somewhat of a problem and a workaround is currently being used.
To put it simply, pulling on the outside door handle does not move the cable as well as the inside one does - as a workaround, the door has been positioned slightly proud of the body to give the door handle the least amount of challenge possible. Adjusting the door fit with the catch plate completely prevents you from using the outside door handle, so it currently sits like this.
The eagle eyed amongst you may have spotted another issue which we'll come to.
Taking a good look has suggested that this positioning of the door means we have a very slight seal gap, which may have contributed to the loudness of the cabin when the roof was up. Too difficult to photograph but it's definitely there.
Passenger-side wiper parking too high
Another one mentioned earlier on the thread, the passenger side wiper parks above where it should be. Requires the wiper motor stripping down and cleaning to resolve.
Bodged rubber seal
The seal that runs backwards from the door, around the entire rear of the car, has been bodged with sealant at one point it appears and the repair has now failed also.
Still trying to figure out a part number for this one!
Rust
As per basically any BMW, we've got a lot of compromised paint on both front arches as well as on the rear wing that hadn't yet been replaced by lemansky.
OSF
NSF
OSR
There's also some rust on the recess the door sits in which I believe has been introduced by the water getting through the broken seal.
And a little bit on the roof frame
Tyre noise
One of the rear tyres makes an awful noise at approximately 55mph. My gut instinct says this is due to funky wear caused by the aforementioned rear alignment issues. Easy enough to workaround and will be taken care of by one of the upgrades..
Useless cupholders
The cupholders on the car seem to do a very poor job of holding cups. I'm guessing there are springs that no longer supply appropriate tension but putting a water bottle in the cupholder provided a mere few minutes of loose-grip hold until it just fell out, onto the floor. Glad I tried with that first instead of one of the coffees I bought on the trip!
For a 19 year old, 165k mile car I'd say that's a bloody good rap sheet as far as stuff that *needs* to be done!
Huge credit to 0a and lemansky's restoration efforts. I'm honoured to pick up the torch and carry on giving this car more love than it makes economic sense to!
I then have the following planned ugprades/wastes-of-money/indulgences-wise:
18" CSL style wheels
Lemansky was kind enough to throw in the CSL-style wheels and accessories he had bought and detailed in this thread. They're being couriered down to me and will be refurbished and shod in nice quality rubber over the winter all ready for Summer 2023.
Cruise Control retrofit
As is common with various options on the early E85s, there is wiring in place for many things where the endpoints just need to be hooked up. Cruise control is one of these and is an absolute must for me.
Genuine mats
Very much a frivolity and a matter of taste but I'm very much not keen on the knockoff M mats that came with the car (even as far as 0a picking it up!) and would like to stick some genuine ones on.
Bluetooth music input
£6 and change managed to secure me a piggyback Bluetooth adapter for the stereo - all plug and play and fits right into the OE stereo.
Multi-function steering wheel
If I can get one cheap enough...
Apologies to the previous two owners if I'm seen to be speaking out of turn
For the avoidance of doubt, I did know about almost all of this before agreeing to buy the car!
Before I'd even properly sat down and thought about the list, I had the following items to take care of due to them being fairly high impact on the driving experience:
Air-con needing gas
As mentioned on the drive back from Scotland, the air conditioning wasn't actually... conditioning the air, just blowing it around the cabin.
Wheel alignment
A factor I'd forgotten to mention, the wheel was a good 10 or so degrees off to the left- aside from the premature tyre wear bad alignment can introduce, it's not a particularly comfortable experience being permanently askew when driving straight.
Seeing as I had Monday off, I promptly dropped it off to my nearby garage for them to look at and resolve both.
Air-conditioning was sorted easily, as was the front alignment.
The rear alignment however...
The camber adjustment bolts were seized solid and, despite an hour of effort (which they very kindly didn't charge me for), they weren't able to adjust the rear tracking whatsoever.
I'm going to get a better investigation done at some point, but for now I have added the following to my shopping list:
2x BMW - Eccentric Bolt (33303411801)
2x BMW - Eccentric flat washer (33303411796)
2x LEMFÖRDER - Control Arm / Trailing Arm Bush (33326771828)
This is in the hope that only the bush is taken out as collateral damage when the seized bolt/washer is removed...
If the upper control arm needs to be sacrificed at all then that's going to work out rather expensively as they're only available from BMW and don't appear to have any aftermarket support. In lieu of being able to make sense of the RealOEM diagram of the rear suspension, I've looked at a video of the E46 rear suspension and the camber adjuster sits within the lower arm, which *does* have aftermarket support, so I may well pick up a pair of lower arms (Lemforder ones are roughly £30 each on Autodoc, with the bushing included) just in case those need to be sacrificed.
What else then...
Okay.
Driver's door
As mentioned earlier in this thread, there were some issues with being able to open the driver's door from the outside. Unfortunately, this is still somewhat of a problem and a workaround is currently being used.
To put it simply, pulling on the outside door handle does not move the cable as well as the inside one does - as a workaround, the door has been positioned slightly proud of the body to give the door handle the least amount of challenge possible. Adjusting the door fit with the catch plate completely prevents you from using the outside door handle, so it currently sits like this.
The eagle eyed amongst you may have spotted another issue which we'll come to.
Taking a good look has suggested that this positioning of the door means we have a very slight seal gap, which may have contributed to the loudness of the cabin when the roof was up. Too difficult to photograph but it's definitely there.
Passenger-side wiper parking too high
Another one mentioned earlier on the thread, the passenger side wiper parks above where it should be. Requires the wiper motor stripping down and cleaning to resolve.
Bodged rubber seal
The seal that runs backwards from the door, around the entire rear of the car, has been bodged with sealant at one point it appears and the repair has now failed also.
Still trying to figure out a part number for this one!
Rust
As per basically any BMW, we've got a lot of compromised paint on both front arches as well as on the rear wing that hadn't yet been replaced by lemansky.
OSF
NSF
OSR
There's also some rust on the recess the door sits in which I believe has been introduced by the water getting through the broken seal.
And a little bit on the roof frame
Tyre noise
One of the rear tyres makes an awful noise at approximately 55mph. My gut instinct says this is due to funky wear caused by the aforementioned rear alignment issues. Easy enough to workaround and will be taken care of by one of the upgrades..
Useless cupholders
The cupholders on the car seem to do a very poor job of holding cups. I'm guessing there are springs that no longer supply appropriate tension but putting a water bottle in the cupholder provided a mere few minutes of loose-grip hold until it just fell out, onto the floor. Glad I tried with that first instead of one of the coffees I bought on the trip!
For a 19 year old, 165k mile car I'd say that's a bloody good rap sheet as far as stuff that *needs* to be done!
Huge credit to 0a and lemansky's restoration efforts. I'm honoured to pick up the torch and carry on giving this car more love than it makes economic sense to!
I then have the following planned ugprades/wastes-of-money/indulgences-wise:
18" CSL style wheels
Lemansky was kind enough to throw in the CSL-style wheels and accessories he had bought and detailed in this thread. They're being couriered down to me and will be refurbished and shod in nice quality rubber over the winter all ready for Summer 2023.
Cruise Control retrofit
As is common with various options on the early E85s, there is wiring in place for many things where the endpoints just need to be hooked up. Cruise control is one of these and is an absolute must for me.
Genuine mats
Very much a frivolity and a matter of taste but I'm very much not keen on the knockoff M mats that came with the car (even as far as 0a picking it up!) and would like to stick some genuine ones on.
Bluetooth music input
£6 and change managed to secure me a piggyback Bluetooth adapter for the stereo - all plug and play and fits right into the OE stereo.
Multi-function steering wheel
If I can get one cheap enough...
As someone who's just sold one of these, I recognise a lot of what's been written in this thread. The Z4 is an excellent all-rounder, but definitely not the last word in sporty driving! It's a lovely relaxing cruiser that has enough poke to be fun without being super-involving.
Two pieces of advice for the new owner:
1. The rust on the rear of your door shut is very uncommon, and potentially down to blocked roof drains. Lots of info out there on clearing them, but I'd be concerned that there's more rot that you can't see. I'd make this a priority.
2. Wheels. I'd strongly advise against fitting 18s. The suspension on my car was in excellent condition, but the ride on 18s was terrible on anything other than very smooth roads. Try it for yourself if you like, but I'd think very seriously about keeping the smaller wheels on.
Otherwise, these are very mechanically robust cars with lots of knowledge about their foibles. Enjoy!
Two pieces of advice for the new owner:
1. The rust on the rear of your door shut is very uncommon, and potentially down to blocked roof drains. Lots of info out there on clearing them, but I'd be concerned that there's more rot that you can't see. I'd make this a priority.
2. Wheels. I'd strongly advise against fitting 18s. The suspension on my car was in excellent condition, but the ride on 18s was terrible on anything other than very smooth roads. Try it for yourself if you like, but I'd think very seriously about keeping the smaller wheels on.
Otherwise, these are very mechanically robust cars with lots of knowledge about their foibles. Enjoy!
It's a fair point about the 18s, though I'm happy with them myself, even with the sports suspension, but not rfts. 2.5s didn't come with sports suspension as standard, has this got it? Might be best to work through your jobs first and there are bound to be things which crop up.
Re the ride generally, I think the thin seats are a big part of the issue, so I'm going to have mine looked at this Summer to see if the foam can be replaced/improved.. After all, 19 year old foam... In theory swapping the foam is a DIY job.
If you're doing cruise control, if memory serves, when I had it done, main dealer was as cheap as anywhere, and came with the lower cowl, which some didn't at the time. They did say it needed programming in, but it was fine without.
Recommend getting a diagnostic app/tool. I've got Carly though not sure that's the best.
Have enjoyed all the write ups, thanks.
Re the ride generally, I think the thin seats are a big part of the issue, so I'm going to have mine looked at this Summer to see if the foam can be replaced/improved.. After all, 19 year old foam... In theory swapping the foam is a DIY job.
If you're doing cruise control, if memory serves, when I had it done, main dealer was as cheap as anywhere, and came with the lower cowl, which some didn't at the time. They did say it needed programming in, but it was fine without.
Recommend getting a diagnostic app/tool. I've got Carly though not sure that's the best.
Have enjoyed all the write ups, thanks.
lemansky said:
You’re straight in there, no messing about 
Looking forward to reading progress updates; it’s a cracking little car and worth indulging!
(Courier has been booked for the wheels, pickup is tomorrow apparently.)
Indeed, the drive back certainly allowed for some constructive criticism at times Looking forward to reading progress updates; it’s a cracking little car and worth indulging!
(Courier has been booked for the wheels, pickup is tomorrow apparently.)
bolidemichael said:
C70R said:
As someone who's just sold one of these, I recognise a lot of what's been written in this thread. The Z4 is an excellent all-rounder, but definitely not the last word in sporty driving! It's a lovely relaxing cruiser that has enough poke to be fun without being super-involving.
Two pieces of advice for the new owner:
1. The rust on the rear of your door shut is very uncommon, and potentially down to blocked roof drains. Lots of info out there on clearing them, but I'd be concerned that there's more rot that you can't see. I'd make this a priority.
2. Wheels. I'd strongly advise against fitting 18s. The suspension on my car was in excellent condition, but the ride on 18s was terrible on anything other than very smooth roads. Try it for yourself if you like, but I'd think very seriously about keeping the smaller wheels on.
Otherwise, these are very mechanically robust cars with lots of knowledge about their foibles. Enjoy!
Thanks for the advice! It's very much sporty enough for me, I'm not a drive at ten tenths kind of guy but am partial to a good neck wring on some nice flowing roads - this car seems to be very much up to that task from early indications Two pieces of advice for the new owner:
1. The rust on the rear of your door shut is very uncommon, and potentially down to blocked roof drains. Lots of info out there on clearing them, but I'd be concerned that there's more rot that you can't see. I'd make this a priority.
2. Wheels. I'd strongly advise against fitting 18s. The suspension on my car was in excellent condition, but the ride on 18s was terrible on anything other than very smooth roads. Try it for yourself if you like, but I'd think very seriously about keeping the smaller wheels on.
Otherwise, these are very mechanically robust cars with lots of knowledge about their foibles. Enjoy!
Re the rust - the rear wing on the same side was replaced back in March as that was pretty gone too, despite a previous repair.
Before pic
Would make sense that the same root cause was responsible (and possibly for the surface rust on the roof frame too). Not sure where else I could look that the MOT tester wouldn't? The rear will get a good look-around when I do the rear camber arms/bushes/adjustment bolts.
@lemansky - I have to assume you didn't see anything structural/underneath the rear wing when you replaced it?
I'll double check the drains also but I believe they've been sorted - I have an awful lot of service history paperwork to go through when I get chance!
The thing with the wheels is that worst case scenario, I could sell them once refurbed and tyre'd if I don't get on with them! The looks could make it worth the discomfort also
Sticks. said:
It's a fair point about the 18s, though I'm happy with them myself, even with the sports suspension, but not rfts. 2.5s didn't come with sports suspension as standard, has this got it? Might be best to work through your jobs first and there are bound to be things which crop up.
Re the ride generally, I think the thin seats are a big part of the issue, so I'm going to have mine looked at this Summer to see if the foam can be replaced/improved.. After all, 19 year old foam... In theory swapping the foam is a DIY job.
If you're doing cruise control, if memory serves, when I had it done, main dealer was as cheap as anywhere, and came with the lower cowl, which some didn't at the time. They did say it needed programming in, but it was fine without.
Recommend getting a diagnostic app/tool. I've got Carly though not sure that's the best.
Have enjoyed all the write ups, thanks.
Correct, I don't believe this is on sports suspension. The wheels are certainly not a priority - they're pretty much going straight into the shed once they arrive until the car is mechanically sorted.Re the ride generally, I think the thin seats are a big part of the issue, so I'm going to have mine looked at this Summer to see if the foam can be replaced/improved.. After all, 19 year old foam... In theory swapping the foam is a DIY job.
If you're doing cruise control, if memory serves, when I had it done, main dealer was as cheap as anywhere, and came with the lower cowl, which some didn't at the time. They did say it needed programming in, but it was fine without.
Recommend getting a diagnostic app/tool. I've got Carly though not sure that's the best.
Have enjoyed all the write ups, thanks.
It's the lower back support on BMW seats that ruins it for me, I tend to get sore after about an hour. Maybe if I was to find some with lumbar support it'd be better but I think the problem is mostly my own body!
And yeah, on the cruise control I've already been advised by my local dealer that the necessary parts to do the job come to £90 which I'm pretty happy with
I have Bimmercode on my tablet from my M135i but I'm not sure that does diagnostics, Bimmerlink is the companion code-reading/diagnostics app which I believe is free - will give it a go later on today.
Thanks for the kind words!
C70R said:
That's too much of a coincidence for it to have rusted there too. I'd read up on some guides about clearing the roof drains, and see how you get on. Major concern would be that there's more rust sitting in there where the drains have blocked.
I've just, for now at least, gone out to test the drains and they are certainly draining - driver's side (the one with the rust) had the water gushing out instantly so I'm pretty confident that whilst the drain may have previously been blocked, it's now flowing freely.
Passenger side draining water also
Though, looking a bit deeper, I'm somewhat convinced that the driver's side door shut has had a poor repair in the past after the initial rust, much like the wing had done.
There's a clear difference in the paints in use here, which isn't prevalent on the other side.
Pulled back the little weather strip also to investigate further
Can't really see any options here beyond another repair? Sand it back, apply rust remover and paint as appropriate?
Good thing I'd never planned for this to be a Concours car!
mholt1995 said:
Pulled back the little weather strip also to investigate further
Can't really see any options here beyond another repair? Sand it back, apply rust remover and paint as appropriate?
Edited by ST565NP on Wednesday 6th July 17:02
C70R said:
I didn't want to say it, but that's my gut feel too. It looks to me like it's rusted out from behind, possibly due to a blocked drain. I'd want someone experienced looking at it, rather than just painting over and hoping for the best.
Feel free to say what you see - I'm not afraid!Following that, I've done what my parents always told me not to and picked at the scab. Seems no different from the plaster blowouts I've been encountering whilst re-decorating my house in principle!
Someone has definitely been here and possibly already used a sparkly stick. The blown out bits of metal came off pretty easily and they were really thin, the metal underneath *seems* to be afflicted only by surface rust - it feels solid underneath.
Pulled some trim back as well and it seems like it's a fairly localised area - the hair's a bit grim though
You're right though - definitely beyond my capabilities this!
There's a decent painter in town who also does a bit of MOT welding - will get his opinion if nothing else.
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