Leaderboard

I do have a bit of hate for the Ute down these ways. Every 2nd vehicle is a Ute here. They are the fastest, best handling and most capable vehicle in the world. We call it Ranger Danger. Because you just know the one sitting 2m off your bumper in a school zone is going to pass you in a dangerous spot using all of their 1500hp and F1esk handling. It's funny because it is the behaviour that BMW drivers usually get blamed for.

Every UTE IMO. Most are incredibly impracticable too. Builder with all his tools in the back seat because he doesn't have a hard top for the tray and his tools can/will be stolen.. Seems to be the average punters dream vehicle at the moment. The Ford Ranger. 70K+ worth of yuck.

Was pleasantly surprised by the interest in my last post on my recently acquired manual W8 Passat. Thought I might make a small thread detailing things I do to it while I have it for anyone interested. Not sure how long I will end up keeping it. A friend of mine has named the car Franklin as she thinks it looks like it would be called Franklin. I dismissed it at first but then I went through the owner's manual and found the car's original purchasing receipt from Giltrap Volkswagen. To my shock, the first owner's surname was Franklin! So the name Franklin it is! My 540i failed WOF again today because of a leaky shock absorber so I spent today giving the Passat its first clean so that I could get a better understanding of what condition its in. I started off with a decent wash as the front of the car was caked in bugs from my drive up from Wellington over the weekend when I picked the car up. There was heaps of tar and other road grime on the car which indicates it probably hasn't been washed in quite a while. This notion became a bit more obvious later on. I probably spent a solid 2 hours just doing general cleaning of the wheels which had a bunch of baked on brake dust (some of which I'm still yet to get off). It's a bit of a shame but the wheels are quite significantly curbed so I'm not sure what I'll do about that. Probably will have them all refurbished at some point because they are probably worth a decent bit of money as they are factory 2-piece BBS. In the mean time I might just get some curb protectors to stick over the curbing because its quite an eye sore. Drying the car was not a pleasant experience. The paint is crying out for a polish and wax or ceramic coating as it feels really rough and was hard to dry as its not overly hydrophobic. I then discovered that there is trim over some roof gutters where one might mount a roof rack or something like that, and of course they were filled with grime. This is what really started to show me the car hadn't had a decent wash. I then cleaned the gutters around the windscreen which were also filled with grit. My attention then turned to the door jams. After giving the sills a wipe down, I cleaned all the hinges and then lubricated them all to displace any moisture and stop them from squeaking. Attention then went to the boot. I cleaned around the hinges and blasted out debris that was blocking the water channels past the rear lights and around the rear window. I then moved to the door cards. Wiped them down with some Turtle Wax leather cleaner. Surprisingly, the W8 has some really nice materials in it, reminds me alot of my S8, its just all the materials are shaped in a way that is very early 2000s so it does look dated. Door cards cleaned up really nice. Anyway, after cleaning the door cards, dash and centre console, I gave the car a quick vacuum. Following this I polished out some stubborn sun-screen marks with some Meguiar's ultimate compound. Over the weekend I would like to hopefully wax the car and wet-vac the carpets. The car has a strong cigarette smell which is particularly pungent when its been parked overnight with the windows up. I also need to source a couple centre caps for the wheels, find some boot gas struts, and then try sort the boot lock actuator which isn't working so the boot has to be opened with the key. Also want some new tyres because wtf are "Black Lions" lol. Passat isn't really a car to tear up a backroad so some Pirelli Dragon Sports like I have on my 540i will be just fine I reckon. Want to have the headlights polished ASAP too!! Want to have it serviced soon as the coolant is grotty and I have no idea what weight oil is in it. Apparently keeping clean oil in the W8s is extremely important.

love the name franklin and the significance! I reckon those wheels wont cost too much to fix up if you spent the time to split it and get the lips repaired and polished back to shiny chrome. the door cards came up very nice after the clean! Also, blacklion tyres are alright.. Is it the BU66? nothing amazing but if they are in good condition with tread left I think its not a disaster tbh. https://www.productreview.com.au/listings/blacklion-champoint-bu66 Most important is probably an oil change and coolant flush!

Probably the next steps would be spark plugs, and checking over the cooling system.

I believe BMW NZ stocks them for $650 a set (according to recent intel)

Not to go massively off topic, but agree that ute's are not family wagons and the top end ones are useless at most things that the underlying platform was designed for - you can dress them up all you want and they are still a horrid ride and now priced at the pointy end of the market. Two years ago we spent a lot of time investigating a family wagon that we could also use on the lifestyle block, and most of all it had to have a drivers seat with proper lumber support - I had broken vertebra in my back and sitting was not something I endured well. Having driven almost everything available we drew the same conclusion as many (but clearly not all) that a double cab is not a family wagon, by the time you try to modify it to be a family wagon with aftermarket everything you may as well have bought a Prado or Landcruiser. Even after all that I nearly put the money down on a Toyota Hilux Mako when I was looking at the M5, I would still be waiting for delivery of the Toyota. Back on topic, fuel prices are painful - luckily the M5 has a pathetically small tank to fill

We have received an insane amount of enquiries on hybrid vehicles in the last week and sold all our 2nd hand stock within days. Plug-in hybrids are the way to go I think. 40km battery range which will get most to work and back and with petrol to help on long range

I found trial fitting the baby capsule to a dual cab Ranger was a no-go and the standard rear facing seat was a tight fit. Not a roomy or practical family wagon. Funny enough the passenger seat in our "average size" Lexus GS is in line with the driver seat with that exact same baby seat. Although neither offer quite as much room as my Austin 10 W212 wagons are currently my flavour of the month for next family car upgrade, in diesel and a light colour so it looks less like a Volvo V60 at the front. Was going to be an LS600h...but that's hard to justify For the most part, many utes do offer reasonably low cost of ownership (minimal depreciation) and most are fairly trouble free for most users for the first 300km or so, if you do decent milage. And quite a few of the current crop return pretty good economy. The majority of them are now a nicer place to sit than an e53. Not sure if that's impressive or not

Yup - the guy is very responsive and customer focus - works through paypal and ships via DHL. Was $700 landed including shipping - not cheap, but a better looking option than the Blaupunkt SQR46 IMO.

good luck mate. Trying to move any car that isn't a hybrid or electric at the moment is a hard one. may get easier after April, if the prices of new imports are made prohibitive.

Most e36 and e46 will be due for a second, or 3rd cooling system now. I would put zero confidence in the plastics at that age. They're also a bit harsher on brakes and suspension than a generic Japanese car. And window regulators, and...everything else. Unless you don't mind DIY, avoid it

Yeah, loving it - it looks totally at home in the dash works perfectly and sounds pretty good even with my unknown (stock??) front components and 20 year old 6x9s. Have amp pre-outs if I eventually run out of other things to spend money on too. Shipping and communication has been great too - he actually sent me a free microphone grill / plug that looks cool in the dash (it is a slightly different surface that makes it look a little lighter but not obvious in the flesh) and makes Bluetooth calls easy and clear too.

So a fair bit of progress to report lately, mainly due to having caught covid and being in isolation downstairs with the rest of the family upstairs. Lucky for me the garage is conveniently located ... downstairs Also very lucky I've had a mild case and that it looks like we've managed to keep me from infecting other family members. So essentially all of the Nissan power wiring is complete in the engine bay now along with sensor wiring needed to power up the engine (electrically speaking only). Thats things like the gas pedal, fuel tank temp sensor, OBD2 connector, neutral switch etc. While in isolation I've also managed to get my Arduino happy with 2x CAN bus shields attached so I can pull from Nissan land and push to BMW land ultimately. Now that there is power on the engine I've also been able to start capturing CAN messages from the engine ECU in preparation for coding up the translation. Just today I found an awesome resource with all of the PID's and byte representations from a 370Z so that will be a massive help. Also have been progressing the transmission mount by 3D printing some mockups and checking clearances etc. Waiting for a new hotend for my printer to try and get the ASA filament printing properly (more temperature needed i suspect). I've constructed a thermostat controlled 'hot box' for the printer also to try and solve warping issues using ASA. Its a little on the sketchy side so will be a 'print while we are home' only solution. Onto the pics ...

E46 M43 318i.

Digging this old girl out. Has not run since 2015. After living overseas, multiple delays acquiring a property and building a shed, I finally have somewhere to work on it. Goodbye container. Will get an entire new look I think. Though unlikely to race in the BMW series again. More for hill climbs and club events at Manfield.

Got the new shocks and springs etc in - ST 50mm/40mm springs, AP Sport shocks, Meyle mounts front and rear and new BMW (I trimmed them) bump stops and 10mm spring pads No drama's at all on the install but I am a slow wrencher! Car drives much better than with the Dobi's and tired Koni shocks that were in it - a little firmer but well damped now and overall firmer, but more comfortable. I've not had a chance to spank it on a back road but while this isn't an out and out performance combo, it feels like a good street setup with my 22mm/16mm swaybars. Ride height is now a bit low at the front but should look better when/if I go for 16's. Reversing into my driveway now is an exercise in caution. One of the front perches was missing the lower spring shim, but I can't imagine new front spring shims would make too much difference in height? maybe 3-4mm? The yuppie-mobile in its natural habitat: