Looking to get a E60 5 Series M Sport - Which Engine?

[Creditcrunch]

Hi All,

Will be shortly buying two cars, one being a BMW E60 5 Series M sport to be used as the practical family car.

Want to spend around £15K and wanted to ask what is the best engine to go for.

Fuel efficiency and reliability are the key criteria but I guess I just want the best feeling engine.

So do I go for petrol or diesel and which size?

Are the diesels on these cars considered better than the petrol equivalent?

Is there alot of different between the 2 litre and the 3.5 in performance considering the car is a big and heavy car?

Thanks

Edited by Creditcrunch on Sunday 7th June 01:23

[ipwn]

"3.5" is actually a 3 litre twin turbo diesel engine.

520d vs 520i

525d vs 525i

530d vs 530i

535d vs 545i

That is the line up you have.

Personally I would have the petrols everytime. However if you want economical and speed 535d is where you want to be. The 530i will also be an excellent choice offering a comfortable 36mpg. BMWs 6 cylinder petrols tend to come highly recommended.

In England we do not get the 535i so the petrol competitor tends to be the 545i but seeing as thats a nice V8 it gives around 25 mpg.

We need more detail from what you exactly want from this car.

There is obviously going to be a MAHOOOOSIVE differnece between a 520d and a 535d. Personally I believe reliability wise you may just be better or buying a petrol 530i.

It will give you decent mpg, decent speed, nice refined engine and will be somewhat reliable

The 520d according to my brother was a bag of st, unbalanced, tad underpowered etc.


What mileage are you doing a year ? Is it an Auto you are looking for ? Have you considered spending less and getting a E39 540i 530i ?

Edited by ipwn on Sunday 7th June 03:16

[christer]

ipwn said:

What mileage are you doing a year ? Is it an Auto you are looking for ?

Edited by ipwn on Sunday 7th June 03:16

These are indeed important questions. If you are doing less than 20k miles per year, I would get a petrol. The additional cost of diesel these days goes some way to balancing the benefit, plus a turbo charged engine will always have more things to go wrong than an N/A engine all things being equal.

Assuming less than 20K miles per year, I would go with a 2.5 or 3.0 petrol. If you do less than 10K miles then I would also consider a 545.

[dave_s13]

Does an E60 530 really do 36mpg?

Is that a manufacturers figure and is it combined or what?

It's bloody good either way, 2x what my E39 540 does.

[Creditcrunch]

I will definitely be doing less than 10K per miles in this car.

I always thought for some reason that their diesel engines were better than the petrol equivalent. If this is not the case then I will look for a petrol.

Thanks

[Matt UK]

dave_s13 said:

Does an E60 530 really do 36mpg?

Is that a manufacturers figure and is it combined or what?

It's bloody good either way, 2x what my E39 540 does.

I have a e39 530i, so although not the same engine..

I would have thought it can do 36 mpg. Over a long and steady run. Mine can do that sort of mpg when you get to 60mph, set the cruise and reset the trip computer - I know, I tried it once. But not many of us can drive like that every single day.

If driven normally with stop/start traffic, booting it from tricky junctions, stretching it the redline now and again on motorway sliproads etc it won't average that. But 30mpg is an easily possible ave with a light right foot and the right road / traffic conditions.

[Matt UK]

OP, with that sort of annual miles, a petrol would do you just fine.

A 530i is a lovely thing. Nice blend of price and performance.

Regards the V8, if you can, then you should. They are a bit of a used bargain.

[ipwn]

Typing from mobile

With that sort of mileage it isn't even worth looking at the diesels.
The question now is will you be paying a premium for the petrol engine.

There are he'll of a lot more 530ds than there are 530is, imho its not worthless paying that slight premium.

I would personally look to get something like a e39 540i. Or 530i.

If you really want the e60 look for the 530i or a V-neck.

There was a beautiful 545i estate on at not long ago. I think it was like 12 grand or something daft like that.

[christer]

dave_s13 said:

Does an E60 530 really do 36mpg?

Is that a manufacturers figure and is it combined or what?

It's bloody good either way, 2x what my E39 540 does.

Look, it alldepends on driving style. My old 540 would do 26mpg on a swift trip perhaps a little more if I had the patience. At 80mph my new 550 does around 30mpg.....so yeah a 530 probably does 35ish on a constant cruise, so its important to compare like for like....

Edited by christer on Monday 8th June 13:01

[istoo]

pretty much identical to me 3 months ago, budget was £2k more i was hunting for 530/530d msport touring as the family car. 530 msports were VERY thin on the ground then. Our family wagon does 20k+ a year but i don't regret it over the petrol. We saw one 530 touring to 6 530d tourings before we bought the one we liked. Although a few of the 545's were in range and that's a lot of car for the money. 535d is great but there were none within that price bracket without interstellar mileage.

Do the homework on the engines as well, swirl flaps being a particular achilles heel of the 530d to a certain date. Its also not that efficent as such out 218bhp auto does about 30mpg and will do 38mpg on a run. Not brilliant but if I wanted efficient I would have gone for a 520d.

both the i's and d's are class leading engines. If it was me, doing sub 10k I would through caution to the wind and aim for a 545i
http://www.pistonheads.co.uk/sales/1079415.htm
unstressed with the capacity for large grin, which to be fair a lot of the 5 line up can do.

[Matt UK]

istoo said:

If it was me, doing sub 10k I would through caution to the wind and aim for a 545i
http://www.pistonheads.co.uk/sales/1079415.htm
unstressed with the capacity for large grin, which to be fair a lot of the 5 line up can do.

£52.2k new!!

At 25% of that, someone is going to get a bargain. That thing has got at least 250k miles left in it!

[Pickled Piper]

I had a similar dilemma. My annual mileage of less than 10K meant that a 530 sport would have been ideal. However, there just aren't many about. Whereas, the 530d models are plentiful.

In the end I gave up and decided to stick with my E39 for another couple of years.

pp

[gizlaroc]

There was a nice 545i touring with 40k miles on it for £13k on autotrader.

At 10k miles you will be looking at £1900 a year on fuel at the very worst.

Buy a 535d and you will be looking at around £1700 a year.


No way a £15k 530i will get 35mpg, even with 20k motorway miles a year you will be looking at around 27mpg.
The new new ED engine might see you get over 30mpg, but you won't get one of them for £15k.

[ipwn]

gizlaroc said:

There was a nice 545i touring with 40k miles on it for £13k on autotrader.

At 10k miles you will be looking at £1900 a year on fuel at the very worst.

Buy a 535d and you will be looking at around £1700 a year.


No way a £15k 530i will get 35mpg, even with 20k motorway miles a year you will be looking at around 27mpg.
The new new ED engine might see you get over 30mpg, but you won't get one of them for £15k.

If sat on the motorway at a constant 70-80 mph, 32-34 mpg is easily possible.

These engines are extremely efficient.

[christer]

ipwn said:

If sat on the motorway at a constant 70-80 mph, 32-34 mpg is easily possible.

These engines are extremely efficient.

Yes, but thats not possible over a year of motoring. ^^

[outnumbered]

You should definitely test a "d" against an "i".

We have a 525d (the older variant of this engine) which I got in preference to a 525i, as the "d" is much more useable in normal driving conditions. The "i" is quite a revvy engine by comparison, so doesn't work well with the normally fitted autobox for making progress on A roads etc... The "d" has a lot more torque for overtaking punch.

If you're going manual (rare on E60s above the 520 level) then the petrol might be more preferable.

[forest172]

for what`s it worth we have a 520d touring facelift man. 57 reg with the 160odd bhp powerplant. (not the latest 177bhp) and it ain`t bad to drive at all, knocking about we get 38mpg on a run 47mpg is achievable.

[dxb335d]

Go for the 535d.

[phelix]

The diesels have more real world driveability (low and mid-range torque) than their petrol equivalents which suits the auto gearboxes most of them are delivered with. They're generally more economical as well. But you need to balance that against the higher fuel cost and greater engine complexity (turbo(s), diesel injectors and pump, etc). You haven't mentioned anything about the performance you're after, only fuel efficiency and reliability. On that basis go for an extended test drive in a 520d and if the performance isn't enough try progressively bigger and bigger engines (25d, 30d and 35d) until you've found what you want.

[x12yhp]

Surely the 535d is just not within the OP's budget - so no point debating it.