At the risk of turning the tale of the 550i into a self-help blog, 'know your limits' should always be the golden rule when it comes to the job of turning an auction lot into a usable car. I doubt I am the only victim of seemingly straightforward YouTube videos and well-thumbed Haynes manuals, but a recent skirmish with the fabric roof of a Brabus Smart Roadster (five-minute removal the internet's way; an afternoon of blood, sweat and tears, mine) left me in no doubt about beating a path to my local mechanic.
Category Cars is a repair shop run by father and son duo Terry and Ryan who have both been fixing crash-damaged cars for their entire professional lives. This is the kind of experience I like to fall back on; ditto the self-contained spray booth in the middle of the workshop. After discussing what I wanted to do with Ryan, and agreeing a rough budget, he was happy to take the 550i on. The deal involved me sourcing all the parts (the bit requiring internet access and a credit card) and Category Cars putting it all together (the bit requiring skill and manual dexterity).
First step: assessment. Obviously there was a bit of trepidation here, but with the bumper off the news was essentially good. While the polystyrene topping had been deformed ever so slightly, the crash bar itself wasn't bent or damaged at all. Good for my wallet, even better for the car's structural integrity. Further investigation called for a new headlight, fog lamp and surround, front bumper, bonnet, wing, headlight spray, nozzle fixing and lower grid grille. A not insignificant list, but a manageable one at least.
In order to keep the cost down, I intended to source all this stuff secondhand - although the optimist in me decided an initial call to BMW couldn't hurt. Total original parts quote? Over £3,000 from the local dealer, thanks mostly to the price of the adaptive Xenon headlight - beyond £1,300 - and the £700 the manufacturer wanted for an unpainted M Sport bumper.
With that merriment over with, I returned to plan A. Using a well-known auction site, I managed to track down a complete second hand headlight and control module, lower grille, fog light and surround for the grand total of £266. I toyed with getting second-hand panels, too, but what I could find was a bit hit and miss; bumpers were usually slightly scuffed, bonnets stone chipped, wings scratched, and anything genuinely good was collection only and inconveniently located hundreds of miles away.
Consequently I dipped a toe in the world of pattern parts, which for the E60 seemed, at face value, pretty reasonable versus the dealer prices. Ryan though, had other ideas. Based on long experience of lesser fixings, he suggested it was better to just repair the original components - so the bumper was heated, glued, filled and sanded, the dents repaired on the bonnet and wing, and everything prepped for fresh paint.
The paint in question, Carbon Schwartz, is particularly lovely. Almost black at times but with an underlying blue metallic fleck. Personally, and with the possible exception of Estoril, I think it might be the nicest colour BMW has ever produced. It's also, somewhat unsurprisingly, a tricky shade to match. Fortunately, Ryan proved more than up to the task, spraying the whole front end to blend it well beyond the point where a layman can tell where the old paint ends and the new begins.
The price for all this expertise you ask? Well, paint, panel repairs, dismantling and fitting it all back together came in at a very reasonable £500. This was reduced from the normal rate as I agreed to finish off the mopping process to help save on labour costs. Which means that all in, the good-as-new cost totalled £766. Not too bad, even with general hassle and elbow grease factored in. The car now owes £4,232, which I'm also fairly happy with, even allowing for the fact that a category N repaired car is always likely to be worth circa 30% less than a non-damaged version.
Of course, we haven't got to extended driving yet, or what other perils may be lurking just over the horizon. Sadly there has been too little of the former in the current climate, but at least that ought todelay any premature appearance of the latter. I'll get to that next week anyway and also try to answer some of your questions from last time - although I will say straight away that the valve stem seals seem okay. Touch wood.
FACT SHEET
Car: 2005 BMW 550i
Run by: Sam Liggett
On fleet since: April 2020
Mileage: 107,235
Price as tested: £4,232
Last month at a glance: Fixin' time
Last seen:Auction time
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