NZ BMW

I got mine for about $38 each landed here. Is the price you’re quoting with or without GST and shipping?

I think the cost of the scan is not that unreasonable if you assume a cost of scanning and some labour in there which I would think they would charge out at around $120-150 an hour. The car is still taking up space in their workshop. As for the discount - don’t know why you feel sore about that. How much work have you put through them? Have you ever bought a car from them? And you’ve let them know that you won’t be repairing the car via them. Just bring the remainder of the parts in and change all of them yourself - shouldn’t be too much of a cost and you’ll have them in a week.

Whilst I do agree with this, in my experience the dealers are bloody hopeless. They just reset codes or replace things with the lowest cost, lowest quality parts. if you plan on keeping the car for a while you might want to bite the bullet on some quality replacements.

If you don’t have to drive the car right now bring the coils in out of the US and replace them all, it’s much cheaper than here.

Maybe it is starting to slow then. But to be honest that does surprise me, especially in Wellington.

I work in tech and I can tell you were are all in a fight for good developers, BAs and the like. Not to mention all the money pouring into govt transformation programs and procurement panels down in Wellington. In fact I was reading a MBIE report the other day saying ICT has more vacancies than any other industry.

Or a train?

It’s not as bad as you’d think - I got all the parts in from the US in advance. I would say all up the parts and shipping would have been about $650 or so. Putting in was a couple of hundred more, probably because the back coil is a bit difficult. So I would say the 100km service if you want to call it that was somewhere in the region of $1500. Still a chunk of change but over the life of the car it’s not too much really. Having the luxury to plan in advance is good - a Contitech belt is some $15USD plus shipping. Much more here, it’s a joke really. Likewise spark plugs $8USD a piece for a good quality Bosch iridium or platinum one, hate to think what they are here. Best example would be the oil filter - my mechanic charged me $41 for it. They can be had for $10USD offshore. I feel a bit embarrassed taking those along so I suck up the extra $20NZ!

What worries me a little bit was talking to the mechanic about how difficult it was to change one of the coils on the back of the V8 engine block. Apparently some people only change 7 to save a bit of time.... how many cars are out there with mismatched coils and plugs like that?

I had my coils, plugs and belts changed as well as a service. Actually surprised at the difference it made to be honest but with the car approaching 100k kms it was due. Much smoother idle and more confident starting if that makes sense. I actually thought the car was running fairly well before... Goes to show, sort your stuff before it breaks. Now good for the next 100,000!

Thought people might get a kick out of this. His presenting style is sometimes a bit of an acquired taste but his videos are usually pretty well researched on the various odd-ball bits of trivia on unusual cars. Enjoy!

I always think I’ve cleaned all the brake dust from the wheels... but alas, never.

Can’t speak highly enough of the X5 as a vehicle. They’re extremely versatile.

I replaced my reverse lights and number plate lights with LED units. The reverse camera is so poor on the early E70 in low light conditions and this helps somewhat. I also drilled a couple of holes in my numberplate to mount it without the old Japanese plate holder, looks much better and does not rattle when I close the tailgate.

I quite like them! I’ll see myself out...

I believe the face lifted 740i and 750i were much better. However you then deal with the valve stem issues all those V8s have.

What a machine!

Got to wonder what an entire unit from a donor car would cost? Or is the loom not just isolated to the door?

https://www.arnottindustries.com/ You would have to ask them on shipping - usually you can get stuff in 7-10 days.

There are some aftermarket offerings for the airbags if you can wait for them to be shipped to you.

The IT industry is incredibly short staffed at the moment. When don’t you directly approach recruiters and organisations of a certain size and see what shakes out? Even a six month contract would give you some breathing space.

Maybe I’ll have to start ordering from Europe... I’ve got a couple of packages coming in from FCP - plugs, coils, belts and some wipers...

When you clean them is it obvious that there’s anything in them? Do any deposits or the like come out?

I watched a review of theX5 plugin the other day. They mentioned that all the battery packs in that car add an extra 250kgs to it and change the handling as they’re all in the boot. Still, if you’re like my car and it spends time each day trapped on the southern motorway in the evening these hybrids really start to make sense. I also feel that $50k for an ‘as new’ 2016 3 series is pretty good value.

How do you propose one checks the diff and transmission fluid on these cars at each service? I assume you can maybe get a level read out of the diagnostic computer but don’t they just have a drain plug and that’s it? I suspect what most are places do is a visual inspection of the underside of the car and if there are no obvious leaks it must be ok and is signed off.