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Some better photos:

Cool E34 Touring M car . http://www.roadandtrack.com/car-culture/buying-maintenance/news/a33122/bmw-m5-touring-e34-elekta/

Hi all, thanks for the replies. Looks like I'll take it down to an auto-transmission specialist as recommended. Hopefully it's as simple as bung fluid. Thanks!

thanks for that, I'd not gotten much further. sort of put the project on hold, bought an e60 as main car, the e46 is becoming the family run around. later in the year I'll get back to it and revive the hifi project. I think a sub-floor sub would be essential, can't see Mrs Olaf wanting to compromise grocery space for a sub box!

E34 was the high mark for the analogue systems imo, had the benefit of better quality late 80s components as opposed to the 70s tech in earlier cars, very very few failures. So far I'm super happy with the e46 as a digital car, still owner maintainable. You just don't hear a lot about module failures, maybe there is one module that is troublesome per car, e38 lkm, e46 gm5, etc but usually the Internet will find a solution or upgrade path to eliminate the weak link.

Went ahead and ordered a new set of plugs, k&n filter and a aftermarket charge pipe for it today. Wanting to do some preventative maintenance before doing the re-flash. Also got started getting the paintwork up to my standards, will be getting it sealed for winter once i'm done

Long weekend work done. Headliner, all pillars, rear parcel shelf all removed for re-lining. Headliner saggy as sh*t. Since most of the lights are out, might as well do interior LEDs as well. Looking forward to a fresh new interior linings. Just needs starter motor replaced, tomorrow's job for removal. Steering rack is noisy on adjusting so that'll get looked at while it's off the road for a week or so. Then we are pretty sweet, touch wood trim

Depends on: Model Age Environmental exposure, Mileage Generally I find BMW Electrics rather good, newer stuff tends to have module failures so that is a debatable issue. Older stuff (pre 2000) is typically the most logical and simplistic type, using separate wires for each function linked to relays and sensors. It's easier to modify and change around IMO. Newer stuff, early 2000s on, went to a CAN bus (or similar) system that uses single wires between modules to communicate, basically like a Ethernet system within your car. If you have the means to use BMW diagnostic software it's pretty awesome at solving problems and getting live telemetry from the cars sensors so you could argue it's better than the older pre OBD2 CAN systems. However the complexity does go up with that. I personally like the older style as it's all fairly straight forward, if maintained properly, would last for decades. E30 / E34 era etc.

Just remember the space inside your car with its combination of hard and soft surfaces is a constraint and that combined with road and engine noise means that what ever you do will always be a compromise. Also the quality of the DACS in you factory head unit or converter box a major factor. I run a cheap after market JVC head unit and its audio quality is at least as good as factory. I am sure you know that if you are streaming off an iPhone then the quality is already compromised, a good CD player will up that. A friend spent 20g on interior sound in the 90s not for the boom boom but for the quality. His comment was that after he had spent 2k the quality increase was marginal. He also stated that with mp3 being so lossy that hi-fi in cars is a waste of money.