scottr

Hi all, trying to find the source of my brake judder when coming to a stop (right at the very end of stopping) and groaning when i let go, or change from R to D with brakes on whist turning the wheel. Pulled the brakes off, gave them a good clean and lube and checked out the pads. they're pretty new looking, probably only done 5,000km on them at best (I've only owned the car for 3,000km). I can't find much about the brands i found, anyone seen these before? Front brand is WOKINGT (with a sideways T) and rear brand is ICER inside a diamond. I'm figuring these are pretty sh*t given my experience with them.

Ugh I hear that., got two temperamental ones at the moment.

Hi all, have replaced the front tension arms on my car as the bushings were noted in a PPI (and i was chasing a strange creak/shudder when stopping and taking off), and they aren't a DIY by themselves unless you've got a press lying about. Figured before I threw them out someone on here might be keen on a second set so they can press new bushings into and do a simple DIY swap later. Arms are from a 2009 e60 550i with 80km. The ball-joints still feel quite reasonable but bushings have very slight cracks starting. TBH I didn't really notice much of a different from changing them, although the creaking/shudder is somewhat better (now onto the next thing!) PM or reply here if you're keen. First to pick up will own.

Glad to see ebay worked out for you, I've been checking out this DIY as I need to do this for my drivers side seat. Dunno why they ever thought a plastic gear was a good idea...

Interested to see your results of playlist navigation, spotify etc. I've gone down the path of airplay to CIC but it's a pain in the ass to connect and control from my phone. Looking for something with better value and more DIY (potentially using r-pi) for idrive integration than installing a combox or dension unit.

Hello Peter and thanks for the reply! It's been a great car so far, although after 2 months of ownership I can already see the next 6 or so months of projected maintenance. You're right there - not sure what it is with BMW rubber but it doesn't really last very long. I've only got a slight seepage so far up top but the alternator beads and drips occasionally. Hoping it'll hold out until the weather warms up as I don't fancy cracking my knuckles up in this cold. Glad to see the mechanical insurance has worked for you, might be something worth looking into once I've sorted these issues.

Hi all, recently purchased a 2009 e60 550i Motorsport (and loving it btw ;)). The car comes with the standard assortment of BMW V8 oil seepage/leaks (noted in PPI) which i want to sort out sooner rather than later. The valve cover gaskets and timing covers don't seem like too much of a drama but the one of most interest is the alternator leak. Looks like i'm in for a world of pain on this, but i'm interested to know whether or not the ex-japan cars come fitted with an oil cooler (had a quick look before but wasn't able to see down to the bracket itself) and what peoples' local experience was with this. Any stories or help would be appreciated!

Had the ABS trifecta on my e46. Ended up getting a full abs module + pump block from ebay (came from latvia) for 140 NZD landed (yes, including shipping). Read a how-to on resetting the VIN via flashing the module and presto! All fixed.

Hah good idea., i'm in auckland (blockhouse bay specifically).

Hi all, as per the title i'm going to replace the front and rear bushings in my car, likely this weekend. I've done the front before but this will be the first time replacing the rear., does any one have an RTAB tool they'd be happy to lend or rent to me for a couple of days? Rates can be paid in cash or beers Cheers, Scott

Awesome that was the first place I was going to try, thanks.

Hi all, hope some Taupo people will be able to help me out here! So the wife and I have spent the first weekend away from the baby in 18th months.., I took time off work, got the mother up to babysit, and took off to whakapapa for a well needed night away, snowboarding and relaxation. Anyway, great weekend, but on the way back we stopped in Taupo to wander up and down the lake., When we jumped back in the car to drive away we realised that one of the rear tyres had gone flat! Upon inspection it seems the aging tyre has started slowly moving outwards and eventually let all it's air out. The otherside's looking pretty much the same and even though it's still up, i'm not convinced i want to drive on tit. Long story short, we've had to stay in Taupo overnight and not make it back to auckland to see our baby boy. Tomorrow morning we're going to need to rather quickly buy two new 245/40/17's for the rear, get them fitted and continue on our way. About a year ago we had some eagle f1 asymetric's put on the front, and ideally I'd like to get this put ont he back as well, but i'm not confident of my chances of finding them tomorow morning. Does anyone have any advice on where we shoudl go/who we should talk to about getting it done? Any help would be appreciated! Cheers, Scott

Yup getting that gasket part down there was a royal PITA, but fishing it out was better than the other option of attempting to remove the exhaust cam + the bed it sat in and then redo timing etc. I was not prepared to do any of that so it was get the plastic out or send the car down the road and spend $$$ for someone else to pull it apart instead. Hopefully there's not any more down there that I didn't notice., I had a good hunt around but didn't see anything that looked out of place. Seems to be fine though. Cheers for the compliments on the write up, hopefully someone else undertaking this someday finds it useful I need to do the waterpump at some stage soon, so it was good practice at least.

Hi all, right., so like Allan here I've also recently replaced the vanos seals in my car (weekend just gone), and I'm here to describe my experiences with the effort (both good, and bad). Sorry about the length, but hopefully there's something of use to someone in here. I tried adding to the other post but it seems to have locked now, so I've made a new thread. Admins, feel free to merge this with Allan's thread if you think it's appropriate The car is an auto 2002 E46 320i, with the 6 cyclinder 2.2 litre dual vanos M54 engine which has done 120k. Unlike Allan we didn't experience any really telling signs that the Vanos unit was tired, but once I'd done some research after investigating an oil leak (which appeared to be coming off a nut that was holding the vanos unit to the engine) I'd released there were some subtle signs that the vanos unit wasn't in the best condition. It would idle rougher than i thought it should sometimes after cold starting (still idled fine though). It also used a bit more fuel that I thought it should. Note we never had an issue with stalling, bunny hopping, hesitation etc. The car ran fine, it just seemed rougher at times, and used more fuel that I expected. So, I ordered a bunch of tools from amazon, valve cover gaskets etc from pelican parts, some random assortments from deal extreme (led work lights) and the beisan seal kit. It arrived over the course of a couple of weeks and once it had all arrived I'd started into it on the following weekend. I opened the Beisan procedure guide on a laptop in the garage, grabbed a beer and put on some tunes. The rest of the story goes as follows... 1.) Getting the fan off. I manned up and used a 3pound sledge hammer and a large spanner. It was easy enough to get off and was exactly as described. A few fast-ish but guarded hits and the nut came loose. I'd definitely recommend using a hammer with some weight in it. I got the 3 pound sledge from super cheap auto for 12 dollars. It's cheap and looks it, but it did the job required. 2.) Removing the valve cover, inc coils and cabling. I'd removed the cabling and coils as per the instructions on beisansystem's website (easy enough to do, I've already replaced the spark plugs before), and eventually was ready to remove the valve cover itself. Note., whilst here I'd discovered that there was another leak of oil coming out from under one of the grommets at the front by the first sparkplug, which was running down the length of the gasket and slowly dripping onto the exhaust. Intermittent burning oil smoke found! Unfortunately however I'd bought everything but the grommets as I didn't expect I'd need to replace them, and shipping on them was a killer (Pelican parts had them as individual items, with a massive shipping cost attached). That's no matter though, I can get some here (and did today from European Autospares. Same day delivery, very impressed!). The valve cover seal took a little bit of effort to break, but eventually I was able to get a putty knife under one corner and the rest of it lifted off easily enough. And this is where it went bad. As the valve cover came off, half the seals around the spark plug holes stayed on the head. That's fine, the valve cover seal was knackered and felt more like hardened plastic than rubber, and had pretty much no flex in it whatsoever. I started lifting off what had stuck to the sparkplug holes using the putty knife when all of a sudden a piece shattered into two small bits and fell into the head. I was able to remove one piece easily enough, but the second piece was just unreachable and had slipped in behind a valve spring. 3.5 hours later and I had it out, thanks to a piece of strategically bent number 8 wire, a mirror on a stick (it was behind a valve spring so this was akin to keyhole surgery) and a long pincher tool. It was a curved piece of plastic that was covered in oil so it was incredibly difficult to postion so that I could get it out. Luckily, the piece was triangle shaped and largeish and I was able to eventually aim part of it down into an oil gallery so that I could grab the other end with the pincher tool. It was not a fun time. PROTIP: Recommendations are that if you end up with gasket still attached to the head, cover the internals before trying to get it off. If it's brittle it's likely to shatter. 3.) Getting the vanos unit off. This was easy, follow the instructions and it pretty much comes off. Follow the instructions on how to deal with the oil and you won't get any mess. 4.) Replacing the seals. The seals were easy to replace., easier than i expected. take out the pistons, cut the old ones off and stick the new ones on. I soaked the new ones in warm water to warm them up a bit first (as directed by beisan) as it was a cold day outside and I didn't want to have to muck around too much trying to get them on. Working the seals into the unit took a bit more effort than i expected, but as the instructions say just keep at it and they'll eventually get in there. Intial feelings were that it was quite tight, and i wasn't sure if it was ok as it sounded like there was a bit of metal touching metal noise when pushing them in and out. I figured this was probably because i wasn't pushing them in fully square and continued on. I'd pulled them out a few times to make sure and everything looked ok (which it was). The old seals were alright, they weren't too loose (as in the didn't fall out), but they could be moved with relative ease. The new ones took considerable more effort. The old rubber rings were flat, and hard like plastic. There was very little give and very little elasticity. 5.) Reattaching the vanos unit. Attaching the vanos unit was easy enough, except for the fact that in/lb the torque wrench I bought wasn't actually reversable so I couldn't do an exact left hand thread tighten. I wish I'd spent a little more and got an in/lb one that was reversable, as the ft/lb one I bought was. Lesson learned though. I got the feel for the required torque setting and torqued the bolts up to an amount that was slightly higher in feel than that. PROTIP: If buying a torque wrench for this, ensure that it works in both directions. 6.) Reattaching the valve cover gasket with including seals, and attaching the coils and cables as necessary. It took considerable time and effort to get the old sparkplug seals out of the valve cover gasket. Probably ~30 minutes as the seals were incredibly brittle and shattered with every attempt. putting in the new seals was easy enough though, and so was attaching the cover back onto the head. 7.) Putting the fan back on. This was easier said than done, you don't have a great deal of room so it's difficult to get it on there square so that you can turn it onto the thread. I'm sure with practice however this would become easily enough. Overall Effort. Overall, excluding the nightmare with the old gasket, it wasn't a difficult task to do and difficulty-wise I'd rate it slightly above just changing the valve cover gasket itself. It took more effort to get down to that point than it did taking off the vanos unit, changing the seals, and putting it back on. It took me ~10 hours all up over 2 days, and that's including the drama with the shattered piece of valve cover gasket. So take that off and it ends up being about 6ish hours at a slow and steady pace. Starting the car once complete. I started the car and it had an immediate but minute hiccup here and there, then settled into a very smooth idle at just over 1000rpm, then very shortly dropping to a very smooth and constant ~700rpm idle. It wasn't usually this smooth after starting for the first time in a few days, so I could tell things were looking reasonably promising. Driving the car once complete. I took the car for a drive around the neighbourhood and it felt slightly hesitant for the first little bit, but then eventually it just became quite smooth in both driving and idling. I started doing take offs from standing, slowly at first and then eventually giving it a bit more power until I was comfortable that all was well, and that I could notice the difference in power delivery and performance. What's different? Below is a list of what's noticably different, both from what I can tell and what the wife's said after driving the car around today. I've already mentioned the idle, which is more consistent and smooth. It was consistent before, but it's better now. Starting and idling from cold is not really any different than from warm (before it was a little rougher). Power delivery in the lower rpm range is definitely better. The car feels much more responsive to drive in the lower rpm range. The gear changes feel slightly different (the wife says smoother) But the thing I've noticed most of all is the correction for driving up hills. We've both found ourselves having to dethrottle quite a bit going up hills as the car takes noticably less accelator effort. The normal acceleration point causes the car to continuously accelerate as opposed to keep constant speed.I've just filled the car up and reset all the meters, so the jury is still out on mileage. Hopefully someone finds the above helpful, it's always useful to have someone's real life experience with something like this.

Cheers thanks for the advice guys.,

Have ordered a 32mm spanner along with some other tools from amazon. Will be ordering the seals etc shortly. Looks like i'll be going the hammer way., couldn't bring myself to pay 30+ USD for a metal bar with two holes in it

Well the nut was tight enough so I took it off and gave both it and the area around where it mounts a good clean. Put it back on and went for a drive and all seems to be well. Will see how it goes over the next couple of days.

Awesome, good read, sounds like it was a worthwhile fix for you. I'll probably buy the fan tool though as I'm not quite keen to swing a heavy hammer around that much plastic. Will purchase bits and pieces over the next few weeks and give it a go.

Yeah I will do, spent the last day reading up on how to replace the vanos seals and it doesn't look too painful, I just need to acquire more tools and some parts. Has anyone here had a go at replacing the vanos seals? I'm humming and hahing about doing the water pump while I'm there but I might just tackle one thing at a time. I couldn't see any oil seeping out of the gasket and the exhaust looked pretty clean., the only source I could find was what appeared to be slowly coming out of that nut and dripping down onto the radiator hose and a bit onto the alternator.

Hi, thanks for the reply. yeah looks like it might be part of that. The oil seems to be seeping out down the thread itself, which is a bit strange. Maybe it's not tight enough or perhaps the gasket behind it is bung. Either way i think the vanos is starting to show it's age (rough idle when starting from cold, lack of power down low, poor economy) so I might take it off and replace the all the seals at some stage over the next month or so. Thanks for your help!

Hi All, hoping someone will be able to help me here. I seem to have developed a small oil leak, and i have no idea what the nut it's leaking from is for. I drove in the gate today after a bout of 1st birthday shopping and noticed the car smelt a bit funny, almost like electrical burning. Then after parking in the garage noticed smoke coming out of the drivers side of the bonnet. Suspecting an eletrical fire I immediately backed out of the garage away from the house and jumped out. No fire ensued (yay!), and after further inspection (after removing a headlight) I'd found small portions of gritty looking oil over the cam pulse generator, the tube thing beneath it (I can't seem to find out what it is, but it had a plug at the end of it) and gritty drip marks over the radiator hose, which is under the tube thing. Now I think the smell and smoking was a combination of oil + radiator hose as nothing looked melted and nothing started smoking after i'd let the car run for a bit. The engine bay's fairly clean, except for the area around the leak point. It looked like it had been accumulating for a bit (there's not a great deal there, but it looked like it was fairly old) so I think it finally reached critical mass. I gave the area a bit of a clean and ran it for a while to see if I could find a leak. I found a nut on the head that developed a small amount of clean oil on it, but wasn't convinced that it was coming out of the nut (it was just a nut attached to the head that didn't appear to be holding anything down) so gave the area a clean and tried again. I went for a drive to grab some beers (all that effort was thirsty work) and when I got back I checked again. Yup, the only new oil appeared to be seeping out of the end of this nut. I had a look on realOEM and couldn't find much about it, does any one know what this random looking nut is for, and why it woudl be seeping oil? Thanks! Scott

In saying that though you might get different results if you disable arming/disarming with the key lock, and only allow it from the key button. disabling the arm/disarm from the keylock is an option in the computer.

With the alarm enabled in the computer and on you can't unlock the doors from either the button or handles. If you disalbe the alarm in the computer (so the car doesn't think you have one) you can unlock it as you say, with the double pull of the handle. alarm enabled in computer, locked == can't open from inside. alarm disabled in computer, locked == can open from inside.

The factory alarm can be programmed to respect (or not) unlocking with the key as a way of disarming the car. IIRC it respects the key unlock by default.

You talking about the the hutt road one? you're not the first person they've got it wrong with. Guy i worked with with an e39 wanted the remote lock from the key. they ordered it and when he took the car in to code the remote they realised it was an e39 that didn't acutally accept any remote. Not that it had the wrong one, it didn't accept one at all. They were nice enough however to give him the key at the standard non-remote rate (100something, instead of 400 something) seeing it was their f**k up. That IR remote is possibly the stupidest thing I've ever seen. I would've been so unimpressed if I'd bought a brand new bmw and the remote only worked properly in the dark, or up close when aimed correctly through the window.