After years of bashing through the thick undergrowth, Shed has learnt that the more points of contact you have, the better the purchase - especially when things get sloppy. It’s also vital to keep your drive shafts in top order. But apart from what he gets up to with the postmistress, all that stuff also applies to 4x4s like today’s gen-one BMW X5. Not just any old 3.0 diesel X5 either, but a 4.4 V8 one in a fetching shade of Ruby Red.
The vendors have thankfully resisted the temptation to put their ad through an AI word-mincer. As such, we are not left gasping under the usual tide of words like ‘sleek’, ‘stylish’, and ‘peace of mind’. The sellers have been honest about the condition and made an effort to present it well for the pics, but there’s a limit to how much you can smarten up a car that’s rocking peeling lacquer and parking/trolley wounds on more or less every bit of sticky-out bodywork.
They’ve not been brave enough to tackle the interior, and you can see why. It looks like Bob the Binman has been using it for temporary overflow storage. Back seats normally fare better than the fronts on old cars, but on this one, they’re even filthier than the fronts. It’s properly grimy in there. A specialist with the right products and the right amount of time could probably bring it back to somewhere above bio-hazardous, but then with the muck removed, the next thing you’re likely to notice will be how strangely worn the seats are for a 111,000-mile car. Some people do strangely wear their cars, though. Having examined many a crusty gearknob in his time, usually with a clothes peg on his nose, Shed has often wondered exactly what goes into human sweat.
Depending on whether or not the owner took action on the MOT advisories reported in its most recent test last October, some brake work might be required. After peering through the gaps in the alloys, Shed isn’t convinced that the discs were replaced as the tester was perhaps hoping they might be. You’d want confirmation from the paperwork on that. Having looked at those papers, you could then put them under the car to see how non-excessive the oil leak is on this 4.4-litre M62. Or possibly was, if the leak has stopped. Probably best if it hasn’t stopped, tbh, because at least that way you know there’s still some oil in there, which is what most of us like to see on non-electric engines. M62s did have a bit of a rep for leaking or burning oil.
On the plus side, the chain-timed, naturally aspirated, single VANOS V8 used in early E53 X5s like this offered 282hp at 5,400rpm and 325lb ft at 3,600rpm, enough for a 0-60mph time in the low to mid sevens. You’d think it might go harder than that, but it was pushing nearly 2.2 tonnes up the road. That explains the fuel consumption figure of 20mpg if you were lucky. 2003-on X5s switched to the more powerful 315hp N62 V8, taking the 0-60 time down to seven seconds dead. A 4.6 version of the M62 with 342hp was available from 2001, and a 4.8 N62 with 355hp came out in 2004, a year before the M62 was discontinued. That 4.8 X5 did the 0-60 in six seconds.
Apart from oil leaks, M62 engines also suffered from issues with their VANOS systems, cooling pipes and valve stem seals, and perhaps most famously with their timing chain guides. These plastic items were vulnerable to a good bashing by the chain if the chain tensioner was running dry as a result of blocked oilways. When the chain slipped off the sprocket, all hell broke loose.
Transmissions and transfer cases eventually gave up. The vendor says our shed is driving well, but they do admit to an intermittent cutting out, which they think might be a sensor. It might indeed be a faulty cam or crankshaft position sensor, but it could also be a dodgy fuel pump. Leaky VANOS seals could cause this cutting out too, although Shed thinks that was more of a thing on the double VANOS engines. You could also expect problems with the air suspension and electronics, mainly the window regulators and door locks.
Sounds like a nightmare all told, but if this example has been through all this stuff and come out on the other side, which bar the cutting out thing it may well have done, you could soon come to appreciate it as a decent and characterful all-rounder. Folk sneer at the X5 these days, but we should remember the esteem in which it was held when it came out. They were well built, too. The boot wasn’t the largest in class, but the split rear tailgate with a drop-down lower section and a slide-out floor made loading nice and easy. This car doesn’t have big wheels on it, which your backside will be grateful for on longer trips.
If you like the idea of a V8 and aren’t into perfection, you might think it’s worth a punt at £1,490, a fair reduction on the £45k it cost new. The tax isn’t bad either. Because this 335g/km car was registered in the last week of February 2001, the bill for that comes as a pleasant surprise at £360 a year, less than half what it would have been if it had been put on the road after 1 March 2001. What a difference a day makes, as Shed’s best man said to him the day after his wedding.
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