BreakMyWindow

Love the colour! Congrats on the purchase. Hope you enjoy it.

My guess is that you will upset the balance of the car without increasing the thickness of the front sway bar.

haha! Will have to get the interior checked for traces of E coli ;-)

How are you finding the short shift kit? Mine feels quite notchy, and I think it will cause premature wear on the syncro's.

Mothers leather cleaner, a soft brush, and a microfibre towel. And a bout 2 hours worth of elbow grease to complete the entire seat. One thing i've learned is that the microfibre towels should be washed prior to using them to wipe away the leather cleaner. The cleaner made all the dye come out, so i was left with a loveley red tinge (colour of towel) on the caramel seat. 2 hours later using the same cleaner, and a white pre-washed microfibre towel, and the seat is looking amazing. Next bit of work is to get the stone.. aka now rust chips around the A pillar and roof repaired. Damn previous owners neglecting stone chips!

Started off with some treatment of the interior. The front seats were showing some serious signs of neglect. Here is a before and after pic of a section of the front seat.

There is some 'spider-web' type rust kicking in around the front windshield pillars (who ever did the last windscreen job didn't touch up the bare metal deep scratches they made!) as well as on the roof, and a small patch by the passenger rear door. Pays to get on to stone chips before the rot sets in, especially in the south island. This will be the first repair so far.

That's for the 2 valve cover gasket sets, inlet manifold, 8 spark plugs, plus the sh*t load of rubber seals and o-rings you need to do the s62 valve cover gasket job properly. Around $390NZD delivered from www.ecstuning.com I went for genuine BMW parts which ECS is good for. A few other sites show cheaper prices, but they're cheap and nasty. The M62 should be a bit cheaper as you don't need to remove and re-seal the inlet manifold. What year 540i did you get?

There is a little bit of change from $400 for all the bits to do it properly. Parts are coming in from the US&A.

Picked it up from Nelson last Weekend. The same car that was advertised earlier in Jan for around 17k on trademe. The car has had some rangi mods done to it, i.e spray painted matt black over the wood trims, and the front bumper has had a quick and nasty re-spray to hide the stone chips. mechanically all is well except for the thermostat being stuck open, and leaking Valve cover seals. Will start a project thread to fix up the rangi-ness. This one has some rare options which include a full Alcantara line Boot trim, and rear parcel shelf. Rear passengers get to control the stereo from the arm rest, and also get seperate fan controls. beers kept cool in the cooler box as well. Only 2 at a time though. Some pics :

U dont happen to have a 5-speed that will bolt up to an m60b40 would ya Brent? Asking for a mate who's doing an e30 conversion.

Tried PM'ing ya, but your inbox is full :-S

Trim is called BRUYERE CLUB, if any one has some? Need the dash trims (Car has TPC so need the trim with the hole in it for the button) and 4 door trims. cheers!

The issue I have is that it'll be very hard to find a matching wood trim for the rear centre console as they are a rare option. The wood trim isn't the standard vavona in the M5 it's some other type that i'm trying to find part numbers for, so unless I can find replacement trims to match the front and rear centre console trims, I have to try my best to remove the spray paint..

The previous owner of my e39 m5 has gone and spray painted over the wood trims. What would be good for removing this paint without damaging the coating over the veneer?

Is it just a simple plug and play? Im not fussed with the nav not working but am concerned about the aspect ratio remaining 4:3 on a 16:9 unit.

The menu rotary knob/button for my on board unit is stuffed. If i look at it funny the button will work sometimes. The scrolling part is fine however. Also, pretty much every other button except for the volume and power do not respond when pressing them. On the steering wheel all on board monitor related buttons dont work except for volume. This to me sounds like a pcb failure within the unit. Has anyone had this issue before? If so is it repairable, or time for a new unit? Thanks!

Agreed, keep on top of cooling system maintenance, regular oil changes and the engine will out last the rest of the car.

I've generally just gone with the suppliers shipping option. This site also helps work out how much duty you will be stung : http://www.whatsmyduty.org.nz/

The M sport should feel quicker with the shorter final drive ratio. Ride should be a bit firmer but handling much better. The m62tu feels quicker and is off the mark with its torque advantage. The earlier m62 is better at the top end. Some non msports come with the shorter final drive ratio. It pays to check the options list using a vin decoder. Test drive a non m and an m back to back and u will see.

May have had the springs/shocks changed at some stage. The vin decoder for this one shows it came spec'd with m-tech II

Definatly has the M-tech II suspension. US spec models only got m-tech II in the 2003 model year. Rest of the world got M-tech II from 99' onwards, or when ever the e39's were released with M5 styling.

You can pick up the core unit for about 650 + gst Only the M62TU E39's have the water cooled unit. My 540i has done 298k and the alternator is fine, no noises or leaks. They are a reliable unit in my experience. The trick with higher mileage 540i's especially the vanos models is to check if the time chain guide rails have been done. I had to do mine at about the 250k mark. But this varies on how the car has been driven and serviced. This is a BIG job, expect to pay 4k + if having a mechanic do it. Suspension will probably need attention. Ball joints, links and possibly rear sub frame bushes. If you import parts from the USA it's not too expensive, just make sure you go for Genuine BMW or Lemforder items, although I've heard that some Lemforder parts are now made in China, and quality can be an issue. Pays to just use your good judgement. I.e a Genuine BMW rear subframe bush priced at $45 USD or a Lemforder one priced at $20USD. Chances are its crap. Where as if the Lemoforder equivalent is 10 - 30% cheaper, chances are it's as good as the part with the BMW logo on it.

Get the car up on the hoist, and spend a good hour underneath looking at it all. Check all the bushes for play with a pry bar. As a guideline, for an independant specialist to change the rear 2 e34 subframe bushes, it's about $400 + GST. other suspension/engine parts are very cheap from the USA, just be wary of the duties charges on anything where the Shipping and parts total GST amount equates to > $60

Made 180rwkw on Gavins dyno.