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Bought these wheels off trademe for $250 and they came with 215 Ling Long tyres, should be a laugh. Happy this car has finally come together and I can't wait to give it a go at my private twilight trackday on the 15th. I can lower the front so that the splitter sits on the ground, but for obvious reason I won't do this, I like having a splitter.

Had to do it and glad I did. Headlights refreshed and the black is now silver. Really lifted the front of the car. And the "Y" is fixed thanks Kyu.

What is wrong with this world, we have a group 5 replica project thread with 3 pages, then a myriad of threads with 10+ pages where people just talk about doing wheels and springs. Keep up the good sh*t Richard!

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.

Not a lot of point having a shell without all the convertible specific bits to go with it...- glass - seats - boot hinges - lots of bits and pieces

The earth terminals in the plugs give a lot of trouble. By pass it from the loom to the circuit board

The only thing it desperately needs is an LSD, any tom foolery in low gears results in the shouty triangle flashing nein to the fun.

Youve done bloody well man .. specially we you see what it came from

its is an auto but there is no slush about it.. especially with steering wheel controls and an Alpina EGS flash.

I've gone from an E36 M3 race car as a daily driver to a MS 335i, my report is that its def not slushy. Nice quick instant shifts and blip on down shift is fun. Certainly not an M car but it's very tight and responsive. Very flat handling around corners with the E90 chassis. I rate it, with the JB4 its sure got some pull. As the JB controls are on the steering wheel you can switch between stock and maps fast, so easy to do back to back pulls. It's quite a difference. Haven't had any faults yet...... 70k. Had fac recall in Japan for injectors and HPFP. Exhaust sounds grouse when cold and can flap is open to both side. Just about as nice as a cold M3. I'll report back and change my tune when it blows up.

Yeah it was well priced but also had been a crashed car repaired which wasn't ideal but still for what paid then it was. I was very excited to own my first real m3 and so far couldn't be happier with it runs really well too Yeah ray flashed the CSL tune although its more effective on the smg version. I noticed friends of mine who smg have those shift lights which the manual doesnt, call me ricer but i think theyre really cool so ray is hopefully going to program them sometime in next couple of weeks

hahaha yep, only no 1JZ. Might chop the roof, but that's much later on. Oh and probably no shark teeth

Spent most of the week trying to get through 30+ years of paint and paint repair. So paint stripping is a slow slow process, but will get there by the time the car is ready for its engine conversion in 2 weeks (hopefully) Oxidisation is coming along nicely, will let it sit for a few days and then give it a light sand and some treatment.

i think if you bought it as a run about, keep it at that. once you start tinkering with it, it will never end, and by the time you're done with the suspension and $800 later, you might want/need to do the cooling system, then you might suddenly feel like repowering it, then msport interior-ing it, blah blah. if it drives, just get a wheel alignment and check oil levels. meh

For a 15yo car, i would say 153k is low mileage.

Yup, they're Xenon. No Angel eyes yet but they're on the to do list. As is this now..lol Another interesting thing happened this morning when I started it up and began backing out the driveway. There where 2 new alarms going off randomly. To be honest it freaked me out a bit and my first reaction was to check the dash for errors. ha ha. Turns out I did something right when I put the front of the car back together. The PDC is now working. Working so well I've just had to cut the long grass that had gone to seed up the top of the driveway cause it was setting the front and rear PDC alarms off at the same time.. lmao

It's just too awesome and hard to relate to. I'm sure if skintkarter did something wrong people would share. But everything is awesome. From the parts choices, custom fabrication, custom tools(the swage tool is beautiful), and that fuel system. Pretty much it's all very inspiring and i'm getting a bit repetitive.

this guy has too many projects going on but not enough progress! come on francois get on to it!

Sweet mind if I come take a hoon on you car for free ?

I have ordered it, I am happy to repay people for going to the effort and expense of making such a "specialist" film - rather than ripping it off from a free download, it's not like they are a major Hollywood outfit looking to make millions from the enterprise. Currently the distributor is out of stock of both the DVD and blue ray so waiting on a new shipment to arrive, hope it's soon I want to watch it all!

Hi guys any idea on who could do a top quality install of this unit in wellington?