JaseNZ

I vote Ray and Glenn move to Christchurch

Yup i do use Gavin and Ray and they are great, but was just one of those i need it today things and with xmas comming and heading away i just wanted to do it. Thanks for the info Glenn will get them to clear it when it goes in for its next check, Yup was the 4 pin plug, Nope don't have asc. I understand they have a business to run but does not stop me moaning about it

Yup sure has but at an expensive price.

Now i know some are probably going to say i can get them at a way lower price than that but today i got sick and tired of my check control telling me intermittently that my brake circuit had failed. So off i go the dealership to get a new switch as i know this is a common fault that cause's the check control display. I was expecting maybe 40 to 45 bucks for said switch but nope i was stung for $105 for a bloody plastic switch, Now i know bmw parts are more expensive but come on a bloody plastic switch that's probably been made in Japan anyway. I did not want to replace it with a second hand one as at least i know where i am at with a new part. Where the hell does a price like this come from for such a small plastic switch. ?? Rant over but i am also now broke for the week.

Yeah i thought that was a bit steep , May have to have a look around i think.

Ok so i have got these new solid out ball joints and cabs ready to go into my car. BMW here are quoting 250 to put put them in for me, If possible i would like to avoid having to do this and do it myself, Just a couple pf question's Once up on jacks if i remove the nut from the top off the ball joint will it drop down or it is it pressed in there as well. I have access to a workshop at work and they have a press (could i use this to press the balljoint out of the control arm ??). Or do hire places have pickle forks they hire out ??. Or best to leave it to BMW to swap them over. ??

Has anybody replaced the drivers door window seal on an e36, Mine is getting old and in some places brittle, Brent has sent me down a decent one to replace it with but i was wondering on how to go about this. Do i have to have the window removed to do it or are there better ways i can get it in. The seal looks like it goes all the down into the door on the front section, Was sort of not hoping to have to remove window etc to do this.

Holly sh*t Nick that stuff is amazing, just used it and it bought everything up like new, Never ever would have thought stuff could be so good, i would rate this stuff 10 out of 10 no problems at all.

Cheers guys I went and bought the Meguiars Gold Class Trim Detailer, At $20.99 i did not think that was to bad a price if it works well.

Guys what have you used you have found to be the best in bringing up the black trim around your car. Mine is ok but just a little faded than i would like, In places there are white marks where i think maybe shopping trolleys have knocked into the trim etc.

Yeah Tm police or that other fellow that does them for $100 has complained, Might have to pickup a second hand one and just do the same as him but at 1/2 the price. Heres the nice little email from tm. All i wanted to do is help people out for a much lesser price and make a little coin for myself in the process. Anybody got one they want to part with for not to much going or not.

Just a bit of self promotion guys incase anybody needs it and wants their e36 climate control fixed. >> clicky me <<

Cheers Glenn i just rang wellington as the car was mostly in lower hutt before it came down here, I did not realize that all the service's and work carried out were on a integrated database and he just listed the things i have had bmw do down here, So will take your advice and get them to do a full inspection with a oil and filter change and go from there.

To be honest Glenn it did not come with a service history but i would say it would have had one done at some stage, BMW here in chch have done all the work on the car that i have needed doing since i have had it but its time i put it in for a proper service just wanted to know what sort of $$ i would be looking at. I did buy the owners history via carjam which gives me the location it has been in since its been in NZ i could ring around some of those locations main bmw service agents and see if the number plate is in their system.

Guys whats the approx cost these days of a interval service one.

i would be interested in a front brace if you could get a price for my e36.

Yup sure will, The stalk just lets you cycle through the displays without having to reach down to push any buttons.

Well i got every thing put in today and apart from one glitch that i will go over later its all done and everything works. I started out wanting to do this project quite some time ago but one did not have the $$ and two from the diy's i had seen around it looked like one hell of a mission. Price wise it did not turn out to bad really, break down is as follows, if you are going to do this you may get things cheaper or pay more i don't know but this is what i paid. I got all i needed from Ray and from what i can understand when i went looking for the obc they are not the easy to come by here in nz unless you buy one off of ebay. 18 Button obc - $180 Bc indicator stalk - $50 White plug for back of obc - 1 dozen stubbies ($14) from bmw dealership here in chch. Total cost around $250 Time spent doing it. About 1 1/2 hours install and about 1 hour preparing. Ok now is this conversion really worth it, Well for me I would say yes as i just wanted it, It does offer quite a few more functions and just looks cooler . I am not going to go over the full diy of how i did it as there are quite a few of them already all over the web. I have attached the one i used to this post incase anybody wants it. When i first started looking at doing this project the verious diy's i seen showed dashes half apart and wires everywhere and this put me off for a while until i thought well i want to do this so lets just dive in. In the end after starting to do this conversion all the stuff i seen and read like remove streering wheel and cut off existing 7 or 11 button obc plug is all bullshit. During the whole conversion i never cut a single wire. The existing plug at the back of my 11 button obc could just be plugged straight into the new 18 button one. You only have to tap into 2 wires of the existing plug with your new white plug for ground and power. In the end i used piggyback connectors so i would not have to cut any wires. I did however make sure i used good quality ones and not crap ones. One of the main things i did was to prepare myself and make the loom from out of the new white plug you have to put in. This is easy as all you have to do really is follow the direction's as per the attachment to this post. Once you have this done all you have to do is run the new wires from your loom (5 wires) up behind your speedo cluster. These splice into verious cables as outlined that feed into plugs that plug into your speedo cluster. The other main thing i did and if you are going to do this is i really recommend putting in the BC stalk, This lets you cycle through the verious readout's on your obc without having to reach down and push the buttons by push the end of the stalk. Just make sure you get the right one as they made three different types each with a different ground. Luckily the one Ray sent me was the exact one i wanted. The only problem i ran into and i thought this was going to be a major one was that after i hooked everything up and flicked the switch everything powered up ok and asked me to put the time in etc. When i pushed the check button however to make sure check control was working ok all i got was the left hand display light up as all orange boxes. I knew all my wiring was ok and everything was where it was ment to be so it was onto the web to see if i could see why this happened. After a lot of looking around i finally came across this link here >>Clicky me<< , This refer's to the check control being disabled. This got me thinking that maybe the obc ray gave me came from a car that did not have full check control and hence was disabled on the obc. So as per that link i unlocked thed hidden menus on the obc and went to menu 11 and my values were set at EINHEIT 1 = C5 and EINHEIT 2 = FF, I changed the first value to B3 and pushed set/res and the orange boxs went away but i was greeted with Check Control Inactive. So i unlocked the hidden menu's again and went to menu 21 which is fully reset the obc. Everything cycled but the same message came up so i turned the car off waited about a minute and turned the car back on and the display stayed blank, Pushing the check button i was relieved as hell to see CHECK CONTROL OK. Just to make sure i went and pulled out a tail light and then turned the car on and the nice error message of tail light circuit failure came up so i knew check control was now working all ok. Going back into the hidden menus and menu 11 i checked the values and they now reflected the new values i entered before. So it was a case of tidy up all my wiring and cable tie everything and put everything back in place. So time to try this puppy out, Went and filled the car up and checked the range value which had now gone up. Time for some pics. First up shows everything i used (apart from the black plug did not need that at all just the white plug). Second one is everything installed and shows Consumption, I only went for about a 45 min drive, about 20 mins in town and the rest on the open road. Consumption started out at around 13 lts per 100km around town and dropped to around 9.6 on the open road. I guess after a few weeks driving the obc will be pretty spot on for values. next is range left, The + means the obc is still calculating, Because i filled the tank up i think it waits until its just about empty to start giving a more accurate reading but at the moment i would say its pretty close. the next ones are things like average speed, speed limit which you can set and it will beep when you go over that limit, distance to your destination if you enter in a distance before you go some where, a timer which i think you can set to do something with your vents and last but not least the one i was happy to see the check control ok message. So i would suggest if you want to give this a go its not hard at all its just a case of do i really want it If anybody does want to do this i am more than happy to answer any questions anybody needs to know. Final pics. OBC_2.pdf

Have now found one thanks and am all ready to try the conversion this comming weekend.

lol these are not the sort of plugs you want to try connecting from scratch.

Nice if only i could change them like that without the $$$$$

After my last what you would call photo shoot (pffft yeah right like i know how to use a camera) i have done another one with clears all round as per you kind folk pointed out. I would have to say you were correct much much better. Thanks to Nick who gave me a good deal on the rears and Brent after a mutual swap for the side's, The fronts had to come off trade me and euro lights.

Guys Ray has been able to provide me with an 18 button obc and bc stalk for my upgrade to this he also has the black rear plug but we are missing the rear white 18 pin one, Anybody able to help out with this, The white plug with some reasonable amount of pig tails on it for splicing onto would be fantastic. Cheers Jason

Welcome to the forum Chris plently of like minded people here more than willing to help

You can get a set here if you want >>clicky for ebay item<< or do a search on ebay for e36 door rubbers