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Finally got an 04 545i, wish me luck. Haven't even laid eyes on it yet as being delivered tomorrow. Looking forward to spending the long weekend getting used to it. Had an E39 523i two cars back and been hanging out for another Beemer but with some grunt since. Keen to keep an eye on here for tips, advice, parts, drives/runs and anything social.

Looking to bring my car back to stock height. I'll replace the entire suspension eventually, but looking to undo the crappy lowering job that was put on it. Anyone looking to sell their stock e39 springs? Msport or non, I don't mind for now. (slight preference to Msport fronts)

I'm after some bits and bobs to bring my car as close to stock as possible. To that end, I'm after some bits and bobs listed below. I'm more than happy to pay in cash or beer. One left fog lightUnder engine plastic skid platesFront Cup holderAuto Shifter knob in silver and blackGood condition carpet set in blackOil level sensorAmbient temperature sensorOil filler capValve cover (or whole head, see below.)Double VANOS unit (or, a whole head top down with all the bits, bolts,tabs and fittings) Msport front door sill covers. Thanks! Gabe

I'm looking at doing a transmission flush and all the references online are for US-based products which are non-trivial to find here. What ATF do folks use for their e39 transmissions? Looking for some LT 71141 compatible ATF, I can get the ZF stuff, at ~$25/L or trademe/SCA has Valvoline/Royal Syntrans/Penrite at ~$15/L.

She wasn't the flashest car on here but it was mine and I loved her. Only the 523i but the fella who bought it new put M Sport wheels, steering wheel, door entry trim stuff, black leather, may have been lowered etc felt real nice to drive and surprising how well an older 2.5ltr can go. Better than any 1996 sh*t box Commodore or Falcon still knocking about.

1994 e34 540i, Factory minus stereo. I've owned this for about 3 years, just been doing work on the engine general servicing as its at just over 265000kms. I've completely deleted the sunroof, in the process of getting it welded up using the same panels other than that haven't made any major plans for it yet no rush. Really nice car to drive very comfortable, its been on some big road trips from Dunedin to central north island and Gizzy to Lake Hawea, did Dunedin to Wanganui on a tank of gas! Tank is 80L. 2001 e39 540i, Just picked this one up this month, just over 200000kms, full service history and paper work, nz new, all optional extras. Brilliant car an absolute dream to drive. 1992 e36 325i ac schnitzer, You may have seen this one on trade me recently, was on 5 spoke ROH's. AC schnitzer front lip, rear lip, rear spoiler, springs and struts, front strut brace, drilled rear discs, bbs 18x8.5 235R 215F, a few other little gems, 140000km, and its JDM. Just in the process of converting to manual should be done in the next month. Very minor things wrong with the car, i was blown away at the condition of it when i picked it up.

Hi Folks, i'm back for round two. My 540i e39 has always had a voltage slow leak which culminated a couple of weeks ago with my battery needing to be replaced finally. Since then i've had intermittent issues starting the car, especially when its hot. Ie if i start it cold in the garage in the morning it runs fine but if i drive it to the shops then its almost guaranteed to not start a second time. Most of the time if i hold the key in the crank position it will eventually crank over and start and run like normal. Just to be clear, when it doesn't start it doesn't do anything... No sound, no click from the starter solenoid, no crank, just normal lights on the dash. So it carried on like this for a week or two until this week when it began not starting at all, even when cold. I noticed that if it failed to turn over then you couldn't move the key to the start position a second time which i presume is a failsafe and quite normal. I also noticed that no matter how long i held the key in the start position nothing would happen, well not quite... After about 30 seconds the lights on the dash (the park brake light and others) would start to dim and flash randomly, also the temperature gauge would be off the gauge on the hot side, a few more seconds and the engine failsafe message would come up on the display, sometimes after this the car would start and run normally but generally not. If i turned the key to the ignition 2 state and left it there it would do the same thing with engine failsafe normally. So i decided to get my laptop with INPA back from a friend it had been lent to and proceeded to check the codes etc. I cleared all the codes and adaptations and let it relearn everything, started the car once and gave it a few minutes to warm up and idle down and a few good revs and switched it off, then it was back to its same old tricks of not starting. To compound the problems it seemed that while it was in that initial 30 second initiation phase INPA couldn't read anything from the computer and it took me several tries to get the error codes out of it but i finally was able to extract one concise error: Date: 01/15/17 13:10:36 ECU: ME72KWP0 JobStatus: OKAY Variant: ME72KWP0 ------------------------------------------------------------- RESULT: 1 errors in error memory ! ------------------------------------------------------------- 136 Test emergency air position Error frequency : 1 Logistic counter: 40 Supply voltage 12.53 V Intake air temperature 28.50 Grd C wdknlp 15.69 % Setpoint DK-angle at NLP-position 15.68 % DK So i did some googling and found a lot of conflicting arguments, some people said it was a MAF problem, some people said it was a throttle body problem, i tried unplugging the MAF and it started a couple of times but i've just gone out now to try starting it again and its doing the same thing even with the MAF unplugged so probably a red herring. I'm probably going to try unplugging the battery for a few minutes and double checking the battery leads are good and tight and free from corrosion. I also need to check the main computer loom plug for moisture but i don't know where that is. So i guess i'm stumped at the moment, if someone can give me a hand i would greatly appreciate it

http://www.trademe.co.nz/Browse/Listing.aspx?id=1217823659

Hello, Has anyone any experiences / information on the potential issue of carbon build up in e39 M5 engines? In both the secondary air system and in general? I've been reading it can be a problem on US Spec LHD cars, but unsure as to Euro spec RHD's (ours). Also related to fuel quality and how often the big jandel is utilized... more nana driving accelerates carbon build up? Has this caused any problems here and solution?

Hi All, Some latest shots of the e39 coming out of the end of a 5 month mid life refurb... latest was paint-less dent removal, saying goodbye to about 15 small indiscretions was best two hundy ever spent... Cheers.

http://www.trademe.co.nz/a.aspx?id=1180938776

Hey guys I've recently acquired a 540i Msport (love it~). It currently has style 167's from an m5 on it which the previous owner got reconditioned and painted, they are in MINT condition with no curbing. I'm interested in swapping for another set of wheels that are either 18's or 17's with appropriate offset for an e39, I'm just not a huge fan of the way this wheel looks. Or $2000 ono. Specs are (to the best of my knowledge, I haven't had them off the car yet) as follows from the bmwstylewheels website: 19x8.5 +12 fronts with 245/35's with about 5mm tread - Achilles ATR sports 19x9.5 +28 rear with 275/30's with about 5mm tread aswell - Nexen N8000 Located in Murray's Bay over the shore, Auckland. If you have wheels with tyres that would be worth more than these send me a pm and I may be able to give enough cash your way to keep you happy, cheers.

$30K ono with 205kms and looks to be in very tidy condition - and I must say I do like the 2-tone interior But not sure if anything but Avus blue would do. http://www.trademe.co.nz/motors/used-cars/bmw/auction-1165130233.htm Still toying with the idea of picking up one of these in the near future - tho E60 M5s are the same price or less but really not sure which makes more sense ... Also pondering E55 (blasphemy!) as an alternative ... hmmm.

http://www.trademe.co.nz/Browse/Listing.aspx?id=1134958076 Start price 7900, with reserve higher, looks an import, relatively low k's, dealer, worth a look for local e39 fans....

This is E39 specific, but it MAY work for the E38 and E53 too - not sure, probably best to find out, before you try it. I made this from info collected off the net, and use it quite a bit, so thought I'd tidy it up and sort it out to hopefully make it of use to others. Because of the high number of problems with cooling systems, and the HUGELY buffered gauge on the E39, I thought I'd make a "How to" to read the KTMP (Coolant Temp) your E39. NEVER trust the gauge - there are a lot of E39's out there with faulty thermostats and are consuming copious amounts of fuel because of running too cold. Also, on those with "map-control" electronic controlled thermostats, they can run too hot if the thermostat heater is burnt out (It logs a fault code in the DME fault memory, but does NOT bring up any warning to the driver). The E39 temp gauge seems to read "normal" (12 o'clock) from about 75C up to at least 115C. High OBC is a text display under your instruments Low OBC is a picture of a car under your instruments Test 7 displays the KTMP figure, in degrees Celcius. This is the coolant temperature that the ECU is measuring in the engine. I've not confirmed it, but some people report change in the KTMP display depending on key position - Position 2 (with the engine running or not) appears to be the side of the coolant sensor used for the ECU temperture readings, and position 1 appears to be the temperature the gauge uses - The sensor is called a "Dual Temperature sender" because it has the two readings. If one side is faulty, this should show it up. To access the "High OBC Secret Menu" and KTMP (Coolant temp) add up last 5 numbers of your vin (mine are 59439, so 5+9+4+3+9 =30) turn ignition on 1 or higher (or start engine) Hold right side button until test appears( 5 seconds?), repeatedly press right button until test 19 is shown, then repeatedly press left button until it says Lock: 30 (or whatever your VIN added up to) press right button press right button until test 07 shows press left button and it will show KTMP - coolant temp. press left will cycle through KTMP, RPM and something else. It will stay there until you turn the car right off (key position 0). To access the "Low OBC Secret Menu" and KTMP (Coolant temp) The 'low' OBC, with your one button is a bit harder: There are three actions you can use with the button: short press, long press (1 second+ish) Wait turn ignition on 1 or higher (or start engine) Press and hold the button until "test 1" appears (5 seconds?) and immediately release the button. quickly start "short presses" on the button, with a short pause between keep up the short presses until you get to "test 19" (if you go past, you can keep going up to 21 and back to 0...) While "test 19" is displayed, "wait" - it will enter test 19 after a short wait (If you accidently drop into another test, Easiest way is to start again - key off and back on) Display should show "Lock ON/OFF", where on and off will alternate between one and the other. short press while it says "Lock OFF" and as soon as it display changes to "test 0", start the short presses again, until you get to "test 7" When "test 7" is displayed, "wait" to enter the test, and it will then display your KTMP. It will stay there until you turn the car right off (key position 0). Thermostat ratings: M52 = 92C, Mechanical thermostat M52TU and M54 = Map Control, Mechanical rating 97C (generally run at 92C - 98C at cruise, may drop down to high 80's briefly under load) M62 and M62TU = Map Control, Mechanical rating 108C (generally run at 92C? - 110C at cruise, may drop down to high 80's briefly under load) S62 = 79C, Mechanical thermostat Diesels = I think 88C, Mechanical Thermostat The Mechanical Thermostats should generally stay above the Thermostat rated temperature, unless going down long gradients using no throttle (lot's of airflow, but no fuel burned) - though that will usually only drop slightly and come backup quickly once fuel is burned in the engine. They may go higher, if the cooling capacity is exceeded - the viscous fan, or auxilliary fan should pull the temps down before "the China Syndrome" The Map Control ones will function like the mechanical thermostats above, except the ECU controls a small heater built into the thermostat. It can heat the thermostat up, forcing it to open more and pull engine temps down during heavy loads. The engine temp can vary a lot, but should never cool down much, for very long. Most of the time you should be in the ranges I stated above. Do be aware, with the Map Control ones: The small heater can burn out, and the ECU loses it's temperature control mechanism - it will them run at the High temperature that is the Thermostats mechanical rating, and should be replaced, ASAP. It will NOT bring up a warning of any kind, except when scanning the DME (ECU) for codes. Diesels may have an EGR thermostat too, which can cause warmup issues. If you have any cooling system issues - use the KTMP reading to see what's really happening - because of the bufferd gauge, it doesn't tell you what's going on, and if it does move to the red, it may already be too late! High OBC cars (only) will give a loss of coolant warning. Low do not. If the coolant suddenly escapes, you can cook the engine without the gauge even moving - the sensors only work properly when they're IN coolant.

So I decided to start the week by doing this to my e39 (see pic below). Basically the side skirt on the passenger side is damaged. AFAIK the side skirt is part of the car's body/frame. Anyone know the best route to go down for fixing this? Just have panel beaters pull out and repaint? Not sure if I want to cut out the whole skirt and weld a new one in.

194kms on it but looks to be in beautiful condition! Listing here. Very nice!

Hi All, First post, joined in 2012 with an 03 530 motorsport titansilber but now have just picked up TopasBlau 03 motorsport. Was looking for a v8 but couldn't go past this one at the price. A few new parts are streaming in from the US and Europe. Done the CCV and DISA, a damn good clean, painting wheels, got a waterpump and thermostat to do, the valve cover gasket needs doing and I may do the Vanos O-rings at the same time. Underbody spoiler shields are missing (Geez they're expensive..) and a fair bit of watermarking to deal with. Apart from that - he's perfect.... Look forward to learning a bit of stuff and sharing a bit of knowledge on here... I'm also on bimmerfest. Cheers Stuart.

Would like to convert my standard angel eyes to white rather than the standard yellow light. BMW gave me the heads up that some after market units sometimes have a different resistance which sets off the 'headlight alert'. Has anyone found an alternative brand that works? Thanks for your help.

So picked this up from Dunedin and drove back to Morrinsville over a couple of days. Wow what a drive, 1500 kms with a mixture of boring straights, amazing scenery, mad hairpins, wicked roads, mental tourists and flickering traction control lights Special thanks to Mason in Dunedin for checking it out for me, LEGEND! Replacing the E500 as the daily driver. Will use this as a bit of a record of works etc. as they come up. So to the details: M62TUB44 540i, Steptronic box Production date 26.07.1999 , Jap export version, first registered NZ 2008 Colour: Biarritzblau Metallic (363) M-Sport Package, sports suspension II, told M5 rear bumper/ Mirrors and M5 exhaust (pic for ref) happy to be told otherwise. Be interested to know. Purrs real nice ! Mileage :152000 km's Summary: Well maintained engine, drivetrain, mechanicals. Stored outside for 3 years but cared for. Works completed by PO: Valve cover gaskets, PCV Valve, all cooling hoses, Valve covers blasted and powder coated, Various engine gaskets, battery replaced, plugs replaced, glass headlight fronts replaced, had three and half years did 20000kms. Avoided metal roads like the plague! Works to do: Aircon doesn't work, apparently not need in DUN (?). been to Hamilton Cool Air and searching for leaks, nothing apparent - refilled and returning for die testing in a fortnight. Clay bar paint surface. Polish and wax. Detail interior. Detail Exterior. Rear window regulator broke on the way down with putting the windows down all the time with no AC, lol. Replacement ordered arriving tomorrow. May put NZ 4:3 or 16:9 radio with RDS in as currently just Business Jap version with band expander, works really well though. Other then that looks OK. Just given it its first wash to remove 1500kms of grime, muck and bugs.

Hi all, Had the sunroof in the E39 on the vent position ( 'tilt/popped' ) while parked up last few days in town during those fine days and noticed when I came back that the sunroof was shut. Some f***wit must had forced it close by slamming it as now the sunroof does not tilt anymore however still fully slides open and closes. If I've pushed the tilt position the sunroof does not pop however it can be tilted up if pushed from bottom but obviously does not stay in postion. Upon fully opening back the sunroof I found one of these broken clips along the tracks. Did some googling and found that the clips are actually pretty cheap (if thats the only problem) however from what I've seen it can be quite a complex fix. Seen a few DIY steps on the net for the glass sunroof but none for the solid panel sunroofs. I think the glass sunroof removal is different to the solid one because they don't have the inside sunroof layer in the way to access the side screws (correct me if I am wrong)? Wondering if any of you guys had this problem before or similar and can shed any tips or tricks into fixing this? What steps should I take to remove the sunroof to see the rails/damage?

I am after a full set (4) of BMW style 66 wheels for an E39. The tires need to have reasonable tread, not just barley warrantable. In Auckland and not sure about price of course it will depend on condition and tread.

Hey, I am after some headlights or headlights lens. Went for a WOF and failed due to the cloudy lens. Polishing wont save my current ones. Anyone out there got some cheap ones? Get in touch.

having abit of a clear out seeing as im between bmws e39 right rear window regulator. $50 Works fine, stud is starting to come loose as shown but as its not broken yet very easy to glue in place. E39 rear window regulator repair kit, bought for car but sold before i installed, comes with new cables, alloy window grab etc etc to renew your broken ones fits either side $50 E30 dash, good condition, a couple of minor cracks around passenger indent, worst is about 25mm long, shown in pictures. otherwise pretty good. can ship at buyers expense. bought for an e30 project that i never ended up doing. $200

Firstly hello! I'm new to the forum and haven't owned a bimmer since 2010 when I left the UK for NZ. But now I'm setting my budget to around 10k and really need to make a decision by tomorrow morning. So I'm looking at a near mint E34 535is 1990 (Msport) NZ New . 25% Lsd. Manual. 300ks Also I'm looking at an E39 528i 2000 msport nz new. Near mint. 250ks Finally looking at E60 -2003 Singapore import near mint. 185ks The e39 is fairly cheap for what it is and all nice leather interior. E34 is tricked out with all the toys of the time and has very good black leather for it's age. Again the e60 is in great condition. It looks like an Msport but I suspect that someone added the badges and the steering wheel as it lacks the suspension and mags of most Mtech i know. I have owned 2 e39s and enjoyed them in the UK - i also had an e36 and I've played with an e34 and an e30. Personally I prefer the body look of the 30/34s and consider them true drivers cars. That said I'm buying a car for weekend use only and would really value your opinions on what you would buy given the choice. E39 is half the price of e60 and the e34 is $7500. So- I want to buy tomorrow. But which? I'm torn!