Leaderboard

https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/motors/cars/bmw/listing/4305264355

Back from overseas, dug straight into sorting a few issues before even waking the car up from its 3 month slumber. When replacing the diff, I noticed some oil dripping out from the bottom of the CCV valve, running down the return tube and onto the oil pan. Was making enough of a mess to be worth addressing. Hard to tell what the main failure point was as 2 of the 3 hose connections were covered in oil as well as it looking like the diaphragm housing had split at the seams and oil was weeping out from there as well. Due to it being the highest up saturated area, I suspect its the latter and the oil just ran down from there, although the bottom return hose also seemed to wobble around excessively so might have been multiple failure points. Not awfully happy about it, being a brand new part that failed after barely 2,000km but it is what it is. Had read a bit of negative feedback on that particular part from FCP Euro and it being a bit sketchy how they don't specify who their "OE SUPPLIER" is but figured I trusted them enough to give it a go. Guess the internets were right on that front. Went with a little "hack" I'd read about on E46 Fanatics - buy a genuine BMW Cold Climate Version of the CCV. The cold climate valve is just a regular one in a foam jacket around it, you can just remove it and end up with a genuine CCV with two additional genuine hoses for around half the price of just a regular valve alone. Not sure how the pricing makes sense on that but it has held up for a number of years now so a good tip for anyone looking to do a CCV refurb. Figured it wouldn't hurt keeping the jacket on for the occasional morning frost we still get around here, summers don't get that awfully hot here either so figured there's no real downsides to some extra insulation. A much tighter squeeze installing it with the added padding, definitely not a job I'd want to do with the intake still on the car. Will monitor how this one holds up, I do have a bit more faith in it being a genuine BMW part. Hopefully it was just a faulty batch and not an underlying issue with the engine producing excessive pressure or something like that. Another bit that annoyed my was the way the lower intake boot sat. No matter how I tried to align it, the smaller offshoot going to the ICV just didn't want to sit right and looked like it was caving in on itself. Decided to replace the Febi hose I had with another genuine part. The quality of the rubber feels better even just looking at it and it does seem to sit straighter. For now anyway. Did a slight mod changing the temperature buffer on the cluster to make it more accurate and informative of potential overheating situations. Basically, with default programming, the temperature arrow pointing straight up indicates quite a wide range of temperature and doesn't give you much warning of the temps going up before it being too late. With very simple coding you can change it to what it is below. Lastly, replaced the front indicators, both the headlight side markers and the fender ones. Of the front ones, one side was cracked, the other kept getting condensation buildup inside and both the fender ones were foggy and faded. TYC brand ones looked to have good reviews and were cheap enough from Spareto so I ended up getting sets of both clears and ambers. Put the latter ones on for now to switch it up a bit, quite like how they break up the monotony up front. Will see which one I end up sticking with long term and will sell on the other set. Boxes of new parts keep stacking up in the garage. New additions are an AC compressor, condenser, drier, expansion valve and a full set of O-rings, all ready to get the AC back up and running in time for summer.

Sorry to mislead. It was an attempt at humour - a comment on the price of petrol these days. If I was to hazard a guess I would say check your fuel breather valve.

Owner just screams lazy

Just use the tried and true biocides like Olaf mentioned. Magnets dont kill bugs. Thats like the old Peter Brock box of magic and wizardry.

Just over a month of ownership, and easily the best car I've ever owned in terms of power, handling, comfort and just sheer enjoyment. Glorious.

Replace the cmos battery - requires you to open up the unit and separate the two boards to get to it. It’s a standard button lithium battery. you can crack the GT1 bios password with an online program. when you enter the password it gives you an error and provides you with a 6 digit number it is a generic phoenix code I can provide you a link that allows you to enter that code and it will spit out a password. Once in just change the password to whatever or blank. Change the date and time in there - much easier than via the Gt1 menu where you have to physically click it over one day at a time from 2002 - it will take hours!! Infrared keyboard has to be synchronised to work it is the little black button on the top right of the keyboard - usb keyboard can be configured to work quite easily but bit hard to explain on here. email me aviemore.tom@gmail.com