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Hi All, Here's my newly aquired e39. I had a 98 540i many years ago but a Corolla sent that to it's grave in Easter 2014. Since then I've only owned another commodore which was then sold when company cars came along. I've been passively looking for a weekend toy for a while and this one came up in Christchurch, originally the seller was asking $3800 but with no wof or reg and a list of things required. I initally gave it a miss but it came back up with most of the work completed so I gave it a second chance. In the end I purchased it with no wof on Thursday and, one ballast replacement later, it passed it's first wof since April 2018 this morning. 205k's on the clock. The Good: Drives quiet and smooth. Interior is in reasonable shape. Exterior is straight and only minor scratches. Full service history up to 2016. Trans rebuilt at 152k. Minimal oil leaks, the power steering reservoir is the main culprit I think. The Bad: Bonnet and roof were recently resprayed. Kinda looks like they did it in a corn field during harvest... Unknown service history from 2016-present (except what previous did to it which included manifold gaskets, PCV, couple of suspension pieces and steering arm.) Car had sat for at least a year. Exact details on the last couple of years are a little vague. Plenty of small trim items to repair/replace. ABS light comes on occasionally. Brakes are a little spongey so hoping a full fluid replacement solves this. Passenger's side cabin air duct is broken at the filter housing so it's sucking from engine bay. Timing chain guides haven't been touched (tensioner has been replaced though). I've got a few things on the way from FCP including a maintenance kit. The oil was last changed at 178k (that I know of) and I'm not sure if it's been touched before or after it sat. Will do a full service excluding trans. To Do List (in no particular order? Full service including brake bleed/ Replace cabin air duct. Fix power steering leak. White "angel eyes" (low beams are already 6000k). Fix seat twist problems (driver and passenger!). Fit new windscreen seal. Replace stereo unit with aftermarket. Most likely a Chinese Dinan knock off. Remove car phone and replace with something that provides storage. M5 Grill Get sun visor lights working Dye parcel tray back to black Get decent radio reception back Respray bonnet and bumper Fix ABS trifecta I'll get some better pics once I've given it a proper clean up. A couple of the pics attached are the seller's from FB. Cheers! Sam My old 1998 e39 540i. Had done around 155kms at time of death.

Car has now been running for the longest period of my ownership without breaking woohoo! Completed a nice road trip up the coast today and took the Paekakariki hill road home. Car drove magnificently, the suspension and manual box was a treat on that road. Grip for days and planted the whole time. Exhaust sounds good too! Have found the bushing kit for the shifter, I already have Driveshaft guibos to fit(have to take Driveshaft out to get to shifter bushings) and will investigate trans mounts since will be in that area doing the shifter/driveshaft and that should also help with the gearshift feel/slop.

Have you guys got water restrictions up there too? ?

I have mix on my 2002 Turbo, slim on front & wide on back ...

Also has this crazy, rear seats down cargo net. It's OEM but took me a fair while to work out! ? There are supplementary fittings in the roof for it.

You can get one of each, I did for my 1er. Slim looks terrible on the back, it's too small. They look great on the front though IMHO. Edit: you'll need a frame for the large Euro plate, the slim front one has holes and you screw it to the bumper.

Cage done and seats and belts all in.

Tonight I gave the interior a decent wipe down and gave the leather a quick once over with some conditioner I had on the shelf. Happy with how it came up except for the back seat having a bit of a worn patch. I'll have to get googling a patch up for that. Also did a quick dash mod. I did this on my last one as well and quite like how it cleans up the dashboard. I had a set of rings already but lost the little ones ?‍♂️. This will do for now. Used a paint pen for needles. Probably thicker than it needs to be but it came out nice and even with the lights on. Maybe not to everyones taste but I think it's an improvement over the white. Now I'm basically waiting for the FCP order to show up. They reckon I'll have it on the 18th.

didnt know slim was a thing thanks

The cargo net is very handy, it stops my dog licking my ears whilst driving to the vets

No Euro = wide, Slim = smaller in all dimensions, see above.

Work today

Cheers! Yeah car was from Hamilton had been for sale for about a year, I gave them a good offer and they accepted. Ive never owned a car that handles so well, Im pretty impressed. I must say my first encounter with Hawke's Bay BMW was a pleasure, The car only came with one remote so I ordered the spare key from them (just the one that goes inside the adapter). Guy on the phone was helpful and ordered they key which comes from Malaysia and turned up in like 4 days. Couldn't start the car with it though... Guy said to take it in Turns out the little stainless spring inside which can easily goes either way only works in one way. While it was there they did the recall on the heater resistor and didn't charge me anything for testing the key and making it work.

Forgive the crappy phone pic but this thing, parked around the corner from my office, is seriously mint, possibly the nicest I've seen. Great plate too.

Fine! Have done some more driving, on my second tank of fuel now! I'd say while it's clearly faster than my tuned 335i... it does what it does with much less drama. It's quieter, so stable and composed like it's not even bothered when you're flooring it or slamming the brakes. I floored it in a countryside intersection and did a small drift, I was definitely a little sideways but I couldn't even hear any tyre squeal. Perfectly smooth, most mellow feeling drift ever. Maybe the fake interior engine noise was hiding the tyre sound. I guess if I imagine myself driving the 335i hard, making a lot of noise, spinning tyres, slamming the brakes... the M4 would casually keep up without breaking a sweat or making much noise. It's so insulated, you can see why they added the fake engine noise. It's the only way you can tell what the engine is doing unless you have the windows down. At least with the stock exhaust, because it's not that loud. I think I'd want an aftermarket exhaust or downpipes before I disabled that (which I'm not doing any time soon). I also don't get why some people online complain that it's constantly trying to kick the back out. I think these guys just drive with the assist on and assume every time they see the TC light come on it's just stopped them from throwing the tail out. I drive it around in MDM (from what I understand, it means assist only kick in if you go beyond a certain slip angle). Even with foot to the floor on imperfect roads I never had any unintended sliding, just on one slippery wet bit of road it struggled for traction from a standstill. Maybe my opinion on this will change as I get more confident with it, I'm still taking corners very carefully - both because I haven't driven in 6 months thanks to the situation with my old car and I'm still getting used to the M4. Speed builds up both more quickly and smoothly than the tuned 335i, it's even easier to get into loss-of-license territory when overtaking. I performed what felt like a slightly aggressive overtake on a country road of a single car, who was doing 90, and I hit 150kph as I was going past the guy... it barely felt any different to 100kph. Think the same effort in the 335i might have me hitting 130... at least then I might keep my license if I get caught doing it! The HUD is also great, seeing your gear and speed without having to look down is actually super helpful when driving a bit 'spiritedly' on the back roads.