my_e36

M52TU engines starts in the e46 range. The gain comes with the dual VANOS which control the exhaust side as well as intake rather than just intake side on single VANOS on the non-TU engine.

It must be the fastest and most expensive car on sale through TradeMe ever.

That's sad.

as topic, maybe share your experience and tips on this one? I just can't seem to make a smooth down change when I do heel toe. Any hints?

Basically, you'll need a good clean, cut, polish, touch-up, fill then protect. It's 2 full days of work and while it's best indoor because there will be less dust (hence lower chance of swirl when you polish). Outdoor is fine. Make sure you have PLENTY of clean, soft towels. Farmers sells some fancy face towels (20x20 cm squares), those are perfect ($2 each on special). Cut the label off so it won't scratch the car, wash then tumble dry to make them soft. Clean - Dish wash liquid to get rid of old wax, clay bar for other contaminent. Cut & Polish - You can try 3M PerfectIt-II Rubbing Compund (you can get this in trade supplies stores) or Meguiar Medium Cut (Super cheap). For best results, you'll need a electric polisher to apply them. Touch-up: use a small art-work bursh. NEVER use the brush that is in the touch-up paint bottle. Fill: Fill deeper scratch that polish can't get rid off (if you polish too much, your clear coat will be gone). I use 3M Machine Glaze or Hand Glaze. (Trade supplies store) Protect: Any "Wax" product basically. Carnuba based product for more depth and shine, polymer based product for long lasting. Polymer based product can usually "layered" for a deeper shining look. Plus here's a step-by-step article from Total BMW a while back. TechNov02.pdf

Have the heater turn to hot right from the start so you'll drain the stuff in the heater core as well.

Yeh, try something bogus like 316d, 720d, 518i, ///MX5, etc...

How about down-badging a car? e.g. badge a 320i car with a 316i badge.

It's been written off. There has to be a story behind that. Beware!

First of all, welcome to the site. There's quite a few discussion about this recently, have a look around, you'll find a bit of what you want to know. http://www.bimmersport.co.nz/forums/index....showtopic=12386 there's another one about 325/323/328 in a different topic, it's not about e39 but since e36 and e39 share some the engines so the info are still revalent.

Personally I can't handle my drinks that well so I never drink enough to get done drink driving to start with. As for my friends, they are all working so if they have a night on the town, they get taxi.

It's like bringing a US clock radio to use in NZ - 60Hz vs 50Hz power supply. Laptop uses DC, so it shouldn't matter. Besides, how can the clock be slower while powering on anyway? It could be more than the battery.

Have you try cleaning the idle control valve (ICV) ?? Heaps of info on this one on Google and other BMW specific forums overseas.

Got a MS Word file that outline how to fix that (with pix). It involve some soldering and change a few capacitors. If you are confident in doing those, you can PM me your e-mail address and I'll forward that to you. I followed the instructions to fix mine (same symptoms as yours) it's working fine for almost a year since.

You are right, hand brake is a cable brake, so foot brake is not affected. Part of your cable might have been snapped/broken, as they split for left and right as it gets to the rear of the car.

IMHO, if that's the case, I think you can do with the 400D plus the original kit lens or the "uprated" lens from the 30D/5D kit - 17-85 IS USM. This should get you started nicely. With the savings from not buying a 40D (which is around $1500 retail savings) you can get yourself some nice lens with that. Maybe the 100mm macro for the butterflies and the 75-300 IS (or 100-400 L IS if you have deep pockets) for other stuff that are further away.

Without knowing what kind of photography you mainly do, it's hard to recommend something for you. In general, most of our customer goes for twins lens kit which cover most day-to-day photos. The rest of the lens usually have its special uses like the 50mm prime lens, the 85mm macro lens, etc... Depends on which school you go to, some people swears by the Canon, some swears by the Nikon. There's no "best" camera in the market because the best is only so if it's "best" for you. I personally have a Nikon D50 which I really liked. When I bought it, the choice was D50 vs 350D. I chose the D50 because of the handgrip being chunkier. If you want to talk more, I am happy to help. Can do a bit of a hook up too if needed. BTW, the last list wasn't quite an exact match. It looks like they seem to have products that try to fill the competitor's gap. I think it should be more like this... Canon 350D vs Nikon D40 Canon ??? vs Nikon D40X Canon 400D vs Nikon D80 Canon 30D vs Nikon D200 Canon 40D vs Nikon D300 Canon 5D vs ??? Canon 1D vs Nikon D2x Canon 1Ds vs Nikon D2xs (or soon D3, Nikon's first FullFrame Digital)

Story no longer available. Anyone got a cache copy of that?

Better looking than M5 touring for sure.

Why don't we run a rego check on that plate? (presume we have access to German's car rego system)

I agree, don't settle for 520. While it's been updated to 2.2L (same as the e46 320i), it's still a relatively small engine for that size of the car. 530 are likely to have more toys, similar fuel consumption (well, a bit more, depends on how you drive) and better balanced handling and steering due to the different steering mechanism and less weight in front compare to V8 models (535, 540).

With my e36, Team McMillan quoted around $650 for parts (new seat sensor mat) plus around 2 hours labour. The auto sparky that I went to built a circuit to fool the SRS system that the sensor is ok and the seat is always occupied. Basically what this means is if airbag were to deploy, both front bags will come out instead of just the driver bag even if the passenger seat is empty. The idea behind the seat occupancy sensor is, supposingly, saves repair cost. But if an airbag is needed to deploy, the car is more than likely a write off, so where is the savings??

Just watch what gearbox fluid your car uses. BMWorkshop said my 98 e36 323i's gearbox uses one of those latter "Life Time" fluid, which is very expensive (something likes a $100 a litre). And it's not recommended to use other "normal" tranx fluid.

Just drive at a faster indicated speed to compensate for the slowness! But that doesn't explain why my speeding tickets are faster than my indicated speed on speedo. Do we have a defense if we have recorded the GPS reading at the time?

^^^^^^^ couldn't be more true. Esp. those in late model 5, 6 series and the v8 X5s