NZ BMW

You’ll probably be up for suspension components soon. But once you’ve done them you wouldn’t have to do them again for the time you owned the car.

Does JD have an M Division equivalent?

What do they say? “Nothing runs like a Deere”

That is one wide car to be sure!

Yeah, it works pretty well. I use the smaller enclosed garage as my workshop for want of a better term. It’s an older building so I plan to lay carpet ties and line it at some point to tidy it up. That’s the dream at least!

No quite - I wish it was that cool. It’s a single garage to the right with a large double carport on the front. With the door fitted to the left it basically seals off the whole front of the property with our hedges. I believe that a lesser or different consent applies to a carport so it would have been an easier conversion at the time.

Had the front windows tinted to more closely match the rears. Still a little lighter but much better.

“Yeah, just put the original springs in for the WOF, bro.” “Yeah, I got a sweet Monster Energy sticker to go with my hat, bro.”

Wow, that is really worn ?

Really? It’s 240hp, would have thought that would be fine and relatively well balanced for most people.

I was thinking 16-17k. It’s a lot of car for the $$$ as people like to say.

I think they should go for more SUVs like in the US. Higher up to see around things, lots of space for all your ‘cop stuff’ and when blacked out look scary. Just what a police force needs ? My first car was a VH Commodore Royal. I’ll admit it, I’m sad to see the brand go. Although, like many, one they shut down the manufacturing it was pretty much done for me.

Surely a “service centre” is not as sustainable in the long run. They’re not adding more cars to their customer base to keep that side of things ticking over. Also, you don’t need as much space if you’re not parking all the stock outside. I would think dealers like the Newmarket one will have to close, that lease must cost a bomb and if you can’t put stock on it, what’s the point?

So according to Vauxhall’s Wiki page it was sold to PSA in 2017. So it’s still around, just not under GM. Here was me thinking “how did I miss them closing down Vauxhall?!”. I assume they didn’t have manufacturing capacity in Japan, which is dominated by domestic makers so losing the UK leaves pretty much nothing for RHD.

I didn’t realise they had pulled out of other RHD markets. Guess when you put it in that context, what choice do they have vs focusing on USA and China where most of the growth in the world is.

I was following a 120i today in the same shape. Did none of these things come with the shark fin? That long antenna looks like something which belongs on a 1993 Golf. Horrible.

Ah, so at least you do get some extra stuff. I wonder if anyone has really compared them in terms of performance relative to the stock M5?

If this is your headspace why consider a BMW at all? I’m sure another brand of hybrid will be cheaper to run and service. The other thing to consider with hybrids is how the battery will age. Sometimes they do fail but at least (assuming the hybrid is like the i3) BMW do not have a totally integrated and sealed pack like some other makes and you can replace that. I believe some aftermarket warranties will cover that too.

So the Dinan upgrade package gives 15-20 bhp more... anything else in terms of how the car revs or performs? I’ll be honest, 12K US for that, what the point of a car like this?

Nice looking car. However I don’t like the size of the grille. I saw the current model of 7 Series the other day and even in person, the grille is comically large. I have no problem with large a large grille, so long as it’s in proportion. These ones are clearly not. I think it’s a really lazy design on what is an otherwise stunning car.

My biggest complaint with Dragon’s Breath was that the spray pattern from the trigger bottle is so damn narrow. I ended up using far more than I felt was necessary to clean the wheels.

My E70 suffered this on the steering wheel. I just removed it all - not as nice but better than peeling. I think if you could do it (or get it done) well by someone a vinyl wrap would look good and be durable. But obviously not inside cup holders.

Yeah, guy in my office blew out one on his touring coming back to Auckland from Tauranga. Didn’t sound fun. It’s probably something you might just want to replace before it leaves you on the side of the road. not so much a comment on the F10 but in my experience BMW suspension components and cooling systems start to show their first signs of failure between 100-120k kms. So you might just want to budget for some of that as they can get a little pricey.

That looks fantastic. Really. Hats off to you for doing a DIY. A lot of people (myself included) either wouldn’t know where to start or would chicken out at the first bump in the road during the process. Seeing it through and coming up with something that looks like this, you should be proud. I have to ask though, are there any remaining bits of the interior which are sort of amplified given that you have done the seats, wheel and other trim? Sort of like painting half your house and then the original bits which have aged are really noticeable.

Sometimes people overfill them during the servicing too. Just a comment on getting dealers to fix things. I have had a lot of disappointing experiences with this - they operate on such thin margins that most of the fixes they do are the absolute bare minimum. Just be careful and don’t get your hopes up that you won’t end up redoing other parts of the cooling system later on.