jimbo01

Got to watch those sales people though, selling high end monster speaker cable, HNMI cable, and subwoofer cables on bottem end systems where there is absolutely no decernable difference for 99% of people. Caught one the Harvey Normans sale staff using the RCA video in, and showing the HUGE different made by the monster HDMI cable. Was serriously unimpressed when I let his awed older customers into his nasty little trick, and pointed them in the direction of the gaming consoles where you could buy a perfewctly good HDMI cable for about $40. They also sold my sister inlaw over $600 of damn monster cables when she bought an a 42" HD TV, not full HD, just the minimum spec ones they can claim are HD, a end of line Yamaha sound bar which came with a sub cable, and another brand DVD player (not a bluray). Confronted the sale guy who claimed it was a high end system so I got the manger, and asked him if what my sister in law had bough was in any way "high end", he admited it wasn't. I did a blind test with my sister in law and family with the $120 worth of cables we bought from d*ck Smith (including an additional VGA cable for her PC). No one could see or hear any difference.

Bought an extended warrenty with the POS Sony SXRD 60" TV on the recommenedation of the Harvey Normans sales guy. Glad we did - thing failed with 3 separate and well documented faults after the standard warrenty eexpired. Replaced as the other was consided a lemon with a new Sony 55 inch. It is not an equivalent TV but better than the old faulty one.

With 3D there are 2 systems, active which have active shutter glasses and you get full HD, or as LG has done on it's LED TV's, you can have passive 3D, and use the glasses from your local movies theatre. There is one MASSIVE drawback with this though and that is 1/2 the lines are for one eye, the other 1/2 are for the other so basically 1/2 HD. At some point there will be 4K TV's, but even when they arrive they are likeley to carry a premium price for some time. A few of the latest hometheater receivers are including 4K upscaling, they would have to as there is no 4K content. I read that a standard Bluray would not be able to hold a normal movie at the 4K spec - there is just too much data. So we will need new players, and if you download the contetnt they will be huge files, much much bigger than a normal HD movie file. Even with digital broadcasting the signal will require a lot of bandwidth as again there is so much data. So is it something to hold off buying now for? - no way (unless you love being 1st on the block to own something, and have money to burn - they will be pricy).

I'll post details of the reversing camera install, I have a few photos of it. Camera kit is from Hotwire who sells them on Trademe. Camera includes a LED and fits into one of the rear number plate lights. It needs a little modification to get it to fit in the E38 number plate light hole (I used silicon to hold it in place). Kit includes a LED bulb for the other number plate light. There were a couple of mods needed to tap into the video on the video module and Hotwire provides the details of this with the kit. As to turning on the amps; my 'remote on' feed is a white whire from the boot head unit wiring. I think its the 'car awake' wire as the amps stay on for a short while after the car is switched off, then the blue power lights go out. Because of this the moment I turn on the radio or CD I have sound.

http://www.meeknet.co.uk/e38/AV/Index.htm

http://www.bmw-planet.com/diagrams/release...65e66/index.htm Follow this to get to the BMW wiring diragrams site. Every damn connector, module, swtich, and wire is covered down the the colour of the wires. May have to use the Chrome browser to see the diagrams as the site uses Scalable Vector Graphics with IE8 on my Vista Machine wont display, and the IE9 on my Winodws 7 machine won't display. Comes in very useful when doing stuff to BMW's.

Finished the passenger door. Getting the door panel off on these is easy, and getting it back on easy too. Amazed as tweeter is quiet a bit bigger than the old midrange, and new woofer speaker is mounted on a 18mm MDF spacer I made tonight. I fully expected issues. I re-used the old foam seal that goes between the original speaker and the door panel but I think it's contacting the rubber edges of the new speaker due to the spacer so I'll pull the door off and trim it back. Had to pull the door panel off again anyway to replace 4 door clips which Smith and Smith Galss munted when they replaced the window glass. Doing the next door will be easy now I know what to do so i'll take a few more picks and add a new topic covering replacing / upgrading a front door speaker in an E38. If Abtec come back to me with the answers I need (that it will accept line level inputs) I'll buy this to give me iPOD connectivity, and control over the sub level etc. As it comes with a remote it means the kids can skip the music they don't like without me having to do it.

What says mute, the E38 system? Isn't there a jack for the sound (mono) as well as AV?

Got the amps powered up tonight. Major step was pulling the inner door trim off the front passenger door to get at the speakers. I've removed the tiny little mid range and tweeter from the top of the door trim and am installing the tweeter where the mid range was. Have modified the heck out of the plastic mount that came with the Pioneer tweeter and will hot glue it into place tomorrow. Will trial fit after that to check it's going to fit but basically it's suck it and see. New mid woofer needs about a 15mm spacer. I'm not going to be able to leave the stock speaker grills in pace as they have nasty plastic bits protruding in that would damage the rubber edges of the new speakers. Thinking of cutting a hole in the door trim so the speaker pokes through and then use the Pioneer speaker cover. Alternatively I'll remove the exisitng speaker grill and just bolt the Pioneer grill to the trim with the heads inside the door. They will be outside the diameter of the rubber so shouldn't casue a problem.

Sony have an interesting unit, the DSP XDP-MU110 takes the output from a headunit and adds in iPOD as a source so you can switch between standard stereo or the iPOD/iPhone. Only issue is that it take speaker level inputs and I've tapped into the wiring before the E38's amps. iPOD goes in a dock with basic controls. Probably not a bad option for an E38 but it depends on if the line level output from the BMW headunti will drive it. Anyone tried it?

Got the amps re-installed tonight and tested. Now just need to connect the power and earth. Going to tackle one of the door speakers this weekend. My replacement speakers are huge so not sure exactly how I'm going to get them to fit in the sealed enclosures, or even if retaining these is a good idea. The other option would be to mount on the door pannel, use some dynamat, and use infinate the free air / baffle. Thankfully there are decent youtube videos on how to remove the door panels and replace the speakers.

Agree on getting an X5 one day. It would definately be a turbo diesel, although not a chipped one. We were impressed with the diesel performance and even with buying km's for the road user charges it was cheap to run day to day. Audis are not cheap to repair, not just because of expensive parts, but also some of the cheaper parts, like the thermostat, are placed where it takes an huge amount of labour to replace. Basically a cambelt job, without the cambelt. It would help if those replacing the cam belt (Audi agents in Hamilton) actually replaced the thermostat at the same time as repalcing the cam belt. Unlikely to buy another Audi - ever. What also didn't impress was the issues with the letters on controls wearing off, and according to forums something still not solved in even some recent Audis. Just not good enough for what is supposed to be a premium product. According to Reuben at Powerhaus, Alltec told him MOST of the turbo failures they see are from cars that have been chipped so yeah I guess they they are seeing a pattern. They took a look at my toasted Turbo and asked "Is the car chipped?". No idea if this is across turbos in general, or specifically diesel cars. That said if you chip a car you need to make sure it is properly maintained. Previous owners + Ford in Taupo are obvioulsy not up to the job. Replacing an oil filter but leaving the old oil seal in place is crap maintenance. Having an engine bay coated with oil due to a loose oil filter is crap maintenance. Having no anti freeze in the cooling system is crap maintencance. Having a completely dirty air filter is crap maintenance. Maybe if it had been preperly maintained this would not have been a problem.

Sold the damn things on TM with full disclosure that there were illegal and got $30! Woohoo. Just $520 out of pocket.

My E38 rear left is higher than the rear right. Wheels are the same, as are the tyres. Doesn't seem to affect it in any way.

Hey Grant - hows things? Been out tracing wiring and looking at the online BMW wiring diagrams. There is something very strange going on. My car is a December 1999 E38, facelift, BUT the wiring in the boot lid appears to be pre-facelift based on the wiring colours. There are a number of wires going through the conduit that appear to be double ups, i.e. the same colour wire is there more than once (and not just the brown earth wires). There are also too many wires, which may explain why the conduit was such a tight fit. There are a number of wires that have been reconnected as the joints are covered in shrink-wrap. I'm thinking WTF but using the pre facelift diagrams I have identified the offending wire; a gray/brown wire from the S205 rear lid swtich that ends up at the General module.

Did you end up selling the "parking sensors" or are they still available.

Yep guy on a motorcyle got me about 2 years ago with a handheld laser.

A quick follow up. Powerhaus were great. We decide to sell the car as my wife freaked out everytime she drove it just in case something else broke. Had the car a total of 6 months and did 12,000km in it, and it was off the road for 1 month of that time. We spent just on $6500 maintaining it in that time. A VTNZ or AA inspection would have revealed several issues and stopped me buying. Trademe trader; a master builder in Taupo and his wife; told barefaced lies. Again an inspection would have revealed this. Bimmer sports people said get an inspection, get a warrenty; great advice that I did not follow. I'll listen next time I promise! However for all that otherwise the car was very economical diesel wise, had plenty of power and was a pleasure to drive (much better once the SuperChip was removed). It has proven reliable for the new owner who had done about 10,000km in it. Says its the best car hes had. Sold it on Trademe with full disclosure of the issues I'd had and what I'd spent repairing it. Sold in 3 days for $20,000 and had plenty of interest from other people. I'm now back driving my 740i, the Wifes Merc and for Skiing the reliable but decidedly thirsty V6 4WD Odyssey. However for sheer drving pleasure the Audi was streets ahead of the Odyssey.

Hey One peice of advice - get an inspection, and a warrenty if you can. Advice given to me here, that I did not follow Briefly owned an A6 Audi Allroad last year. Thought Having a BMW, Merc and Audi would be the sh*t. Only one problem with that plan was the Audi. $6500 worth of repairs in 6 months and we gave it the flick. Cooling system srung leaks deep in the V of the V6 under the turbo. Thermostat needed replacement; which is basically a Cam belt job to get to it - entire front of the car had to come off. Then the turbo blew. Powerhaus in Wellington did all our servcing and repairs and were fantastic. Audi in Hamilton then Ford in Taupo did the servicing before that. Car was a 2002 NZ new with 2 owners. New owner loves it and it hasn't had anything go wrong so we must have sorted out all the issues. Lucky him. Jimbo

Hi all. Havn't been on here in a long while. Almost sold the Beemer so ripped out the amps and crossovers. That was about a year ago. Car currently without sounds as didn't reconnect old wiring however thats a blessing as I am about to connect it all up again. Got one issue I need to sort though - I think I broke the wire for the boot closed sensor getting the video cable and power cable through from the boot lid to the boot for the reversing camera. Not looking forward to finding and repairinf that but have to as without it I keep getting an alert that the boot is not closed and of course the auto opening doesn't work as it doesn't un lactche the boot coz the computer thinks its open. Suggestion would be to try using the reversing lights power source for the reversing camera rather than running a separate cable. Making up some speaker covers and installing the upgrade door speakers once all the amps and crossovers are back in. Will be looking to upgrade the 4:3 screen for a 16:9 screen at some point if I can find a replacement. Jimbo

I did already in my post on the discovery my lights were illegal. There were varous suggestions on how to "fix" them. I tired one involving backed bean tin to make shields. They worked, breifly, but I had attempted to solder them in place. I couldn't be bothered goign back in and screwing the tin shields in place as at the ned of the day they didn't have park lights (indicators lit instead), and there was no adjustment motors. Sold for $22.50 which is a massive loss! I was hoping for more - oh well that what you get with $1 reserve auctions.

My issue is have 4 cars. I should NEVER have bought the Audi as it has cost a small fortune to get working the properly - now done 5000km since the Turbo was replaced. Yes I ignored the wise advice of my fellow Bimmersport memebers. However the Audi is now doing the job we intended. It's a descision that guts me but it seems "logical". I hardly use the car - 12000km in over 4 years. That said, now that the Audi is running fine we no longer use the Odyssey - we have done 8000km in the Audi in just 6 months so I guess despite it's limitations (small luggage area) we obviously find it the most convienient of our "fleet". The Odyssey is the more practicle vehicle size wize but it's not as nice to drive, and it costs more in fuel. So conceivably we could sell the Odyssey, or keep the Odyssey and Sell the Audi. Anyway we have to sell one of them as it's insane maintaining 4 cars for 2 people. I have however spent considerable amounts of money on it - new Dunlop 20" tyres, paint touched up, new disks and pads this year for a WOF, new rear suspension bushes and control arms last WOF, adding the Navigation, reversing camera, and several $1000 on the stereo. It only has one fault - I've lost a connection to the boot closed sensor so I may just get an auto electrican to sort that. I think I may have broekn a wire trying to get the reversing camera power cable through the tight plastic sleeves between the boot lid and the boot. The stereo gear I can remove and reuse in the future or sell. I have removed the amps and cross overs already but not the subs. I havn't restored the wiring to it's original amps yet either. the speakers are still available new for $599 from Paul Money, and mine were never installed, just the cross overs. There are the 2 Kicker 6" subs which I can re-use in my wifes SLK Merc, and we can reuse one of the Amps in the Merc too. Hmmmmmm perhaps we try harder to sell the Odyssey given it is now actually our least uesd vehicle. I can still restore the stereo in the Beemer if I needed too.

Hi Fellow Bimersporters I will be shortly selling my E38 but in the meantime i have decided to sell the Angel Eye headlights I bought from the dogdy trader in Christchurch. Turned out they are LEFTHAND drive - of course NZ is RIGHTHAND drive. They are for sale on a $1 no reserve acution on trademe http://www.trademe.co.nz/Browse/Listing.aspx?id=419621486

M60 has 210kw at 5800RPM, and 400Nm at 4500RPM M62 has 210kw at 5700RPM, and 420Nm at 3900RPM - 1996 to 1998 M62 has 210kw at 5400RPM, and 440Nm at 3600RPM - 1998 on. My 1999 E38 with the later M62 has fantastic kick.

Still don't have the car back - was thinking of taking it up the mountain on Saturday to check it's all running OK - oh well weather looks like crap for the weekend anyway.