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Don't rush buying an M5, don't limit yourself to what is on TM right now - none of those come close to JUN's one, at a bare minimum why not pony up for a flight to Wellington and see what a mint M5 is like in the flesh before looking on the open market. If you do convince his wife to part with it I will take my finders fee in petrol vouchers .

Some stuff came from Aliexpress arrived today, mostly for another car. But to be honest I am more excited to fit this on the M5. Although being Aliexpress, the color is not like what was in the photo of the website. The floor mat color is much more darker grey, I wish it was light grey (in there photo) which would match the interior better. What do you guys think, does it make the car look better? It actually fits well, so dirt and mud will be better protected. Is there any good way to make it lighter color? I told my wife I would bleach it, she said no the color will not be uniform and mentioned to me that I will throw the mat out because wouldn't be able to accept a mediocre job.

Yes me and my wife was contemplating about it due to her health issues. Having sold my old R34 Skyline and likely to sell her Cayenne in the summer; For now we have decided to keep her M5, but if the right offer comes we are open to the idea of letting it go. My wife is doing better now, in fact last Sunday's meeting up and breakfast with fellow BMWs was her first time to eat out in months. So we are likely to keep the M5 as long as we can. @Mantic you can see my start of journey on the thread below, some info there maybe useful in considering if E60 M5 is a car you would want to own I have a thread regarding our ownership, which I update every now and then. This guy in youtube is a good follow as well, fun fact when I bought our M5 there was 4 M5 at the dealer. I picked ours out of the 4, while a few weeks after he picked the other one which he currently owns. https://www.youtube.com/c/MTechGuy I think the M5 E60 is a great car, but its not for everyone. What I think was the best thing about the ownership is not the car, but rather the people you get to know while owning the car. People here in bimmersport, mechanics that will service your car and general car community.

So many people talk themselves out of owning M cars. E46 bearings / smg / subframes , e90 bearings , e60 bearings , f80 crank hub etc etc. Plenty of perceived reasons as to why not to. From personal experience you’ve got to do it. And your choice is such a stonking car . Do it before you regret and wonder what it might have been like.

Ideally lowest km with a service history, LCI is more than just cosmetic and there are hardware improvements on the S85 that came with the later built cars. As long as you have a warranty and are not going in blindly thinking that your case will be different and the car will be mint with the bare minimum of maintenance then you will be fine. There are plenty of us with E60/E61 with good ownership experiences unlike what the majority of keyboard warriors will have you believe, the common link is that we all feed the beast what it needs. They are a supercar, don't for one second think you are buying a high powered Camry. @Jun was looking at selling a while ago, and that is a well sorted car that ticks all the boxes.

Hey Team Long time no post, Still waiting on the two engineers to get the v12 motor and the n62 sump sorted so in the mean time I thought I would share as this is also e46 related. Picked up this pretty clean 2004 330ci earlier this year. Over the past couple weekends i have done the 420g manual swap which is a converted smg box from Kayne Barrie and finished tacking up the custom headers. Still to go subframe plates, install coil overs and adjustable lower control arms, rest of the exhaust, pedal box and few other small little things. Hopefully the other project stuff will be ready by the time I've finished with this car. So glad i had a spare motor to build these headers out of the car. It also took me a solid 4hrs to cut 2x ice cream containers worth of pie cuts and deburr them too. I also swapped the Hamann wheels for some BBS rk to go one the 4.6 v8 sedan and finally pulled out my ACS wheels that will be for the M3. Both sets will be powder coated at some point. Thanks Team

For sale here is my 2003 e46 BMW 330i It's a great car, but it is unfortunately surplus to requirements. Had a good run in it. Quick car that is great to drive, good for a fast daily. Just had fresh wof put on, flew through with no issues, chucked 8 months of reg on too Mechanically very sound Leather interior with electric memory seats 4 New tyres Recently refurbished M-sport 17s Serviced regularly Factory headunit with aux in retrofit Sunroof Year long warrant Has had a fair bit of work done to it quite recently (within last 10k km): New Sachs front shocks 4 x New tyres Refurbished wheels Coolant flush and new lower radiator hose. Power steering leak fixed All oil leaks fixed (new sump gasket, new oil level sender...) New rear window winder mechanisms If you have any questions, do not hesitate to ask. Viewing can be arranged in Napier, feel free to contact me if you want to set something up. As a bit more of a genuine part to the post outside of generic for sale stuff, has actually been a really decent car. I dailied it while the e34 was being worked on for sort of six months. Previous owner did a bunch of work to it, and I've done a fair bit to it as well. Outside of the rear window mechanisms and the drivers mirror falling off, I have had 0 issues with the car since I got it legal (which was 2 shocks). Paint is pretty decent, I have recently done a correction on it myself. Has a fair bit of stone chips on the front but the shine is very great. Interior is pretty decent, drivers seat has a tear at the seam but not very noticeable, and PO cut the fraying top of the wheel off, not much can be done about that now. New tyres and wheels are due to selling the BBS RKs it had to my mate, they're in quite decent nick and look pretty much new. Have it on TradeMe for $4750 will let it go here for $4000

I think this is priced significantly under market value. Guess we will see when the hordes from TM see it...

If a major state highway has its speed limit reduced from 100kph to 70kph for around 50kms. Is that stretch of road still really a state highway or is it now just a local road? Going by NZTA: State highways are those roads in New Zealand that form a nationally strategic purpose in moving people and goods nationwide. Local roads are those roads that form a regionally strategic purpose in moving people and goods within regions. These roads are managed by local government. I would argue that 70kph speed limits mean that strategically moving people and goods nationwide is no longer the priority as efficiency for moving those has been significantly reduced. The reduction in speed is due to road surface neglect and poor road layout planning. Also refusal to bypass Carterton and Greytown.

Don't like the mats. Love the leather, awesome colour and material.

Love the floor mats

I had EBC discs on a Legnum VR4 many moons ago and they were complete garbage, I will never buy their stuff again, go for stock discs and upgraded pads and fluid as above.

@treone is doing this with his 840i ownership, I think is of those "in theory it sounds great but in practice not much"

Oft, why would you spend that much to make your tyres look more black? For how long? And you need to dilute and have a means to apply? Seriously, unless you need a multi-month concours car that's just wasting money. Just use something spray-on for short term, or rubber nugget (like the shoe stuff) for longer term if you need it. Save $$$.

Agree with Dan Road pads of your choice, change to Hawk track pads or similar. Uprated brake fluid. And your good to go

'Morimoto' LED fogs I bought ebay ones, but they keep fogging up - so just decided to go all in on these.

Unless EBC has changed their compound in the last 5 years I wouldn't bother. Endless if you're feeling rich. Or Hawk Pads. I ran both for years in my E30 series car. Rotors made zero difference as long as they were not no brand Chinese ones. Also run Motol 600 brake fluid or similar . If you don't that is the next thing to go. Stock will boil with upgraded pad compound as you can run longer. https://www.ecstuning.com/b-hawk-parts/rear-hp-plus-compound-performance-brake-pad-set/hb227n.630/ I buy lots from ECS. Also check FCP though as brake pads are included in their lifetime warranty... Yup they will give you new ones for free when they wear out. But may not have performance pads.

100% The exact same things will break on all of them, if you are lucky not at the same time though. But budget more like 5-7k a year for maintenance and factor in the eye watering fuel consumption, if you can live with that do it!

I reckon the play is buy two cheap ones. What are the chances the exact same things break on both?

Pre-Purchase Inspection by someone who *knows* the e60 M5 is essential. There are Autosure discounts as member of BMW Car Club NZ, not sure about anything offered by Bimmersport? You'll have to be cautious about year of manufacture, you could find yourself outside of MBI coverage. The e60 M5 is a very special car, very rewarding to drive. Buy carefully, it could be the difference between very very expensive, or just expensive maintenance. FWIW I was spending "more than a few k a year in maintenance" on my 545i... with an e60 M5 you're at the High Roller's table! You could buy my 545i, spark the joy, and your accountant would be happy too and cash in your pocket Food for thought. Welcome to Bimmersport! PS: mostly made of Aluminium, so not scared of water and not generally plagued by rust (unless a badly executed panel repair). The e60 (all drivetrains) likes to be cared-for, water is your enemy if drains are blocked and can kill a car with many of the computer modules being easily drowned. Regular routine maintenance reduces that risk significantly.

After checking the fuel system (lines are quite hard), and the usual fluids check. Racecar fired first turn of the key and sat their idling like I run it every day. Hasn't run since Dec 2015. M30's will still roam the Earth long after humans have died off.

To be fair though, who is the wanker that is trying to tank the listing with their super helpful reckons? The seller can list it for whatever they want.

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^^^ My Cappuccino would go over 9K, similar 100 bhp PER LITRE, but turbocharged... and didn't have big end issues... ...maybe the M5 should have been a 3 cylinder ? 10 was just too many... Maybe I'm not overthinking this enough, and you need MORE cylinders! 4,999cc V10 (M5) divided by 657cc I3 (Cappuccino) is about 7.6, rounded up means 8 cappuccino engines for the same power: The M5 needs to be a 24 cylinder!

I think it is a case of death by a thousand cuts, the surface area of the bearings is quite small, presumably for packaging reasons when they designed the motor, there is a very small tolerance between the bearings and crank, the motor happily revs to over 8k rpm, the condition based servicing has the oil changes out to 20000km intervals, and it is a naturally aspirated 500 hp motor built to a price point set by company accountants. Also, because it has 10 cylinders and a seven speed gearbox in a North - South orientation and the letter S and numbers 8 and 5 in its name it has terrible feng shui. I believe it can be improved with mirrors... ?