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Good day at Taupo on the weekend for a shakedown

When I was applying for a Special Interest Vehicle Permit to bring an E39 M5 in from the UK BMWNZ kindly provided sales figures for cars sold new here. 1999 unknown for unexplained reason. A friend that is in BMW sales remembers about 18-19 were sold 2000 11 2001 6 2002 2 2003 3 As this was nearly 5 years ago I have taken note of cars I saw for sale and jotted down the rego/serial numbers and with help from Martin and Glenn have 35 listed. 1999 x 12 of which 11 were NZ new 2000 x 10 of which 8 were NZ new 2001 x 4 of which 3 were NZ new 2002 x 6 of which 3 were NZ new 2003 x 3 of which 2 were NZ new 1999 x 1 from Singapore 2000 x 1 from Singapore, 1 from South Africa 2001 x 1 from UK 2002 x 3 from UK 2003 x 1 from UK Colours: 12 black, 12 blue, 4 silver, 3 green, 3 red, 1 anthracite 1 x 1999 silver W/O and 1x 2000 red W/O (HellBM) Year of manufacture from information at M5portal.com This is worth a read... http://www.m5board.com/vbulletin/e39-m5-e52-z8-discussion/203127-write-up-e39-m5-extensive-production-statistics.html n.b. The above register is not complete as more cars will no doubt appear Dave

I'm 43... the whole injectors, turbo thing, scared me... so I chickened out and went old school. Bought a E86 3.0si. N52... pretty much bulletproof.

Yep. You're right. Sounds like those made to high standards probably manufactured in china parts are working out really well.

People on TradeMe don't get it when I ask if their car is the Spanish version.. so many list them as being "Manuel"!!

Well I ended up with a 4.8is. It's had most of the "known problems" sorted - valve stem seals, new radiator etc at a fairly substantial cost to the previous owner. Condition was good inside and out (it'd been taken care of) so decided to pull the trigger. Only a few grand more than the "base" model 4.4 (which is a great ride in and of itself) so I figured why not? Thanks for all the opinions, much appreciated. Now if only this thing had bluetooth it'd be perfect... I'm reluctant to remove the factory unit since its responsible for the trip computer etc. I have read you can retrofit a newer "ULF" into this car and then you should be able to simply pair your phone and off you go - anyone know anything about this? These "ULF" modules seem to be quite plentiful on ebay.

The compatibility of the components are most likely wrong, causing high temperatures and warping the discs. I suggest starting again using the right parts. This is why we only use ATE German components that won't give you problems. BTW: The loose caliper had the potential to kill someone. Blue thread lock should have also been used.

Si 'manuel'!

I would strongly suggest you get a PPI carried out by either the Dealer or an independent BMW specialist

Per title, wanting to buy an E30 Touring. Any condition, let me know what you have Cheers (and yes I know I missed out on the white one recently...)

US shipping doesn't have to be expensive; UPS from FCP Euro is pretty reasonable, though UPS Service in NZ can be dire. and this is where we get to variability of charges. I was raped by UPS recently for a shipment that was NZD 5 over the threshold, total cost under NZD400. They can charge whatever brokerage fees they like. DHL or FedEx are far more reliable and reasonable. I'd not touch NZ Post youshop with a barge pole, their terms of service are shocking - they're written by some paranoid who expects all clients to be scum. If you want a reliable forwarder in the US, MyUS.com are good, and if you search for their Visa Promotion you'll get gold service for two years for free. W00t! Discounted freight, free amalgamation and a month's free storage, not to mention a choice of reliable carriers. HTH

Up to a a $400 value you are normally OK and don't need to pay anything extra to the NZ government. Bear in mind that this is simply a 'not worth our time' figure, so they could charge you anyway. If the value is between $400 and $1000, and this is noticed, your goods are held and you are at the mercy of NZ Post. (Sometimes something slips through with ahigher value - don't count on this!) I bought some parts in, and received a letter from NZ Post saying they'd need paying before delivery could be arranged. They neglected to give me any sort of reference number and it was only by the grace of a very helpful Customs bod in Tauranga that I was able to get things sorted. Still took them 10 days from confirmed payment of duties to get the parts to me. Over $1000 you need a client code which must be arranged in advance of your purchase. This requires completion of customs form NZCS 224, and (iirc) the code must be entered on the customs slip by the shipper. It's an enormous faff about and makes no sense to a private individual; ask about it, and customs simply suggest you use a shipping agent. US shipping is typically expensive. I'm not sure how the NZPost YouShop facility compares. Shipping of larger items from Europe has also increased dramatically in the last year or so - where I had previously paid EUR40-50, it's now EUR100+. And that shipping cost is a factor in whether you pay duty or not. Yes - your duty is calculated on the purchase price + shipping cost + insurance cost. If the seller doesn't discount local taxation (VAT, etc) then that is also included. All hail the system where we pay tax for the benefit of paying tax to a foreign government! (Actually, that's a little unfair - the seller pays that tax, and probably has a mountain of paperwork to get through to remove taxation from an out-of-country sale.) There's a further issue with this. Let's assume you had an XYZ device that broke and required return to manufacturer to repair. You send it back, it's repaired, and the manufacturer ships it back to you. They label the package 'Warranty Repair', and insure it for (say) $1200. You will be charged duties based on $1200+shipping+insurance for the import into New Zealand. This is an important distinction - it is the total value of the import that is used for any calculation, and not how much you may have paid. To avoid this, you will need to provide evidence of having exported something for repair - the shipper's say-so is not sufficient.

I can testify from my experience, the 4L V8's run happily deep in to the 300,000K territory, mine never missed a beat from 320,000 when I bought it till 360,000ish when I sold it, service history is key though.

Hi Everyone, I'm a long time BMW enthusiast and have finally joined bimmersport. I currently have a 1974 NZ New 2002 and have owned a few BMW's in the past including an E46 ETCC 'factory' race car, an E21 323 and a few E36s. Plans for the 2002 are to leave it standard(ish) and slightly lower it on a set of BBS RS's I am currently re-building. Cheers, Shaun.

you need www.whatsmyduty.org.nz as soon as the combo of GST and Duty on your import (including freight charge) hits NZD60 you get kablammoed with all manner of fees and raped for over a hundy. EDIT: your brother was lucky not to be incarcerated for class A importation. LSD indeed.

Your very lucky it was the top bolt that came out first, otherwise you could have ended up on the wrong side of the road playing dodgems. How is he now going to help you with this Chris ? Get in touch, I should be able to help you with this.

They seem to be appreciating in the UK so holding not so bad.......

Yes there are bargains to be had at times locally. I bought an e39 front spoiler/wheel arch shield that lists for US300 (in US) and EUR190 (in Europe) for NZ$115 off CJBMW. The parts manager even took a quick photo of the screen in case it "vanished.."

If a car is newer than 20 years old, it needs to meet emissions standards. Older than 20 years old, you can import to your heart's content. This is intended for classic cars, but is a bit of a gap in the current legislation...

E39 M5! Parked directly outside work yesterday. A very rare sight in Welly! It looked dirty and driven - as they should be!

Bought an E36 318Ti earlier this week. Miss M has pretty much lost interest in driving stick, and it'll be good for her to get behind the wheel of something. She has enjoyed it so far, and has said that she'll probably look at a manual license later. The seller is a forum member... Anything I list here as needing doing is not a slight towards him, but acknowledgement of buying a 20-year old car cheaply. More on that in a maintenance thread.

Well value takes a hit so as long as you're paying a fair bit less than what you would for a low km one it's ok. Just get a PPI from a good specialist as above. My 335i DCT just passed 150 000km and it's been ok. A few things break as expected but nothing catastrophic. Even took it to a 20 min track session recently and it handled it fine.

First Drive went. Need to re balance them as need be able to adjust idle better. Also removed a few extra emission systems and brackets for more room to work