Sammo

Get a NA 6 cylinder ?

Jeeeez, almost as bad as the very low km E46 330ci for $21,500. A silver auto, no less...

Thanks mate, yeah, car definitely felt better with the new plugs in. Will tackle the valve cover gasket in a few weeks then check the plugs again a month later. Been freaking myself out googling valve stem seals the past half hour ?

So was giving my 330ci some love this weekend (oil, filter, plugs). This is the first time I've changed the oil and plugs on this car, so not sure of its history. Anyways, when I pulled the Spark plugs, several had a decent amount of oil on the threads (one particularly so) and most were a bit wet and sooty. The ignition coil boots however had no oil at all, even the one connected to the oiliest plug. A bit of googling has me thinking it could be the Valce cover gasket leaking, but given the coil rubber boots were dry, I'm not sure. Car showed a few misfire codes several weeks ago (P1342, P1346, P0300) but after I cleared them they have not come back. Car had been feeling a little sluggish, nothing obvious but is running great now with the new plugs and no codes - if its a leak I imagine it will be a matter of time before the issue manifests again. Pics below, including the plug wells. Car has been using a fair bit of oil (2 litres in 4000km) but that isn't unusual for an M54 from what I've read.

Update, Airbag light from the seat swap sorted ? Dropped car this morning at BMW (the huge, brand new Continental dealership on Wairau Road) for the latest Takata airbag recall. They replaced the passenger airbag but drivers airbag is on backorder so will need to get that done at later date. Fantastic service I must say, gave my car a vacuum and hand wash and even got a call from one of the techs working on it who was extremely complimentary and wanted to buy it ? Cleared the totally unrelated airbag light as I'd hoped as well ?

Hmmm, think the E36 had a similar tan - Modena I beleive? considered that as well.

Update, dropped car this morning at BMW (huge brand new Continental dealership on Wairau Road). They replaced the passenger airbag but drivers airbag is on backorder so will need to get that done at later date. Fantastic service I must say, gave my car a vacuum and hand wash (was pretty clean anyway) and even got a call from one of the techs who was extremely complimentary and wanted to buy my car ? Cleared my unrelated airbag light as well ?

Very odd - appears to be, but I also saw this article late last year with BMW NZ indicating it only impacted AU cars: https://www.driven.co.nz/news/news/bmw-nz-confirms-local-3-series-models-not-affected-by-takata-recall/ Contrasting with the guy from BMW who called me this morning, proactively, (I half completed an online form in the weekend) looking to book me in ASAP for potentially both front airbags... although I've only had the car since August 2019, I have not received any letters. The driven article states “The Takata safety recall is limited to certain BMW E46 3 Series built between November 1997 and June 2000. These vehicles were built for the Australian market only.” Mine is a June 2001 build, imported from Japan in 2006... At least once done, my 20 year old car will have brand new airbags!

US article so possibly does not apply but talks about an initial temporary fix done? https://www.consumerreports.org/car-recalls-defects/bmw-recalls-cars-and-suvs-to-replace-faulty-airbags-again/

No recalls to date in my ownership - 2001 330ci... Not sure, I always thought it related to drivers airbag, so possibly the passenger is the new recall?

Update on this, although my car rego or vin didn't come up on the government recall site, and its build date is after what I've seen in articles, I spoke with BMW this morning who advised it will definately need a passenger airbag replacement and possibly drivers. Booked in for Friday. Worth giving them a bell for any E46 owner I think, they must be getting swamped!

Cheers! Yup, was off to Cheltenham for a swim ?

https://www.vehiclerecallsafety.nzta.govt.nz/takata/takataalpha.html

If it seems to good to be true...

Need to get mine checked, VIN / plate does not appear on the check website but I had the airbag out a few weeks ago and it is a Takata one. 2001 330ci.

One of the best ever BMW colours ?

That could work well actually as I'm dropping my wife at the airport Sunday morning. Car is getting bonnet resprayed at the moment but was supposed to be finished yesterday so should be back for the weekend ?

Beautiful car! Yeah, seems durable so far but early days - the clear top coat should really help though.

Thanks! Nothing obvious, interior is pretty mint now except my front and rear pillars definately need recovering. In a perfect world I would get a new centre console as I'm not totally satisfied with my repaint of it and I like the idea of trying piano black trim instead of the carbon cube. There's always something ?

Cheers - yeah, since ogling over posters or red Ferarris with tan interiors as a kid, I've always wanted this kind of colour interior... Ebay wheel wrap - took wheel off and about 2-3 hours with a needle and thread - surprisingly perfect fit and feels great: https://www.ebay.com/itm/DIY-PU-Leather-Steering-Wheel-Cover-for-BMW-E36-E36-5-E46-5-5-Series-E39-M3-M5/123160799804?hash=item1cacf4aa3c:g:zAwAAOSwZGJcwS2t https://www.ebay.com/itm/MEWANT-Custom-Genuine-Leather-Steering-Wheel-Cover-for-BMW-5-Series-E39-M3-M5/362698740720?epid=28029194137&hash=item54728793f0:g:x5kAAOSwIXZdKCO1 I went with black with partial perforations and black thread, accidentally ordered PU leather but its still nice, I'm sure the leather would be better for a few more $$ - you can get ///M stitching / alcantara etc as well if you like - great cheap mod.

Thanks mate! Ended up being a hell of a lot of work but stoked with the result and colour

I used a mix of satin and matte black paint to get mine right. Looks fine, but does not feel amazing - not sure how plastidip would go, worth a try I think as new console parts are a bit spendy for what they are.

Finally, after letting it all dry / cure for 5-6 days, I reinstalled the interior (not much fun), gave her a good groom and a photo shoot. I'm stoked with the colour and quality, there are a few tiny areas where I would have liked to do a better job but you would only notice by having it specifically pointed out and eyeballing from 6 inches - for day to day use it perfect and my wife thinks I'm crazy to think otherwise. The colour is a great, classic navy / tan combo with the orient blue and IMHO has enough wow factor without getting into 'marmite' territory. Only issue I've run into is my airbag light is now on, I believe due to switching the passenger and driver seat bases with the passenger occupancy sensor no longer in play. Hoping I can clear that and get the sensor delete thing from Ebay / TradeMe. I'm a little anxious to see how this wears - supposedly should be good for years (we can but hope) - at least this car rarely see's passengers and I now have the perfect colour match for any driver seat touch ups that may or may not be needed in the future. Its been finished 3 weeks with daily driving and several beach trips (i.e. wet, salty bums) and looks perfect. Final pics once completed - looks and feels better than most new cars inside now.

So with the interior in pieces, I set about prepping the leather - an extremely important part of the process and the point of no return: 1. Scrub down with horse hair shoe brush and water to get dirt off 2. Rub down with acetone using a green scouring pad - this starts to lift off the factory top coat and colour 3. Rub down with Isopropyl alcohol with a green scouring pad - lifts off more colour and any oils / silicones left to improve adhesion 4. Light sand with 600grit sandpaper - 'tooth' up the surface a little and made the leather beautiful and smooth ready for paint. From here I started (the fun part?) painting, first by rubbing in two coats by hand, getting into all creases. This looked absolutely hideous and was quite discouraging, looking like I had smeared fake tan all over green leather with terrible coverage - not to worry. Now the actual fun part began, spraying on the colour using an air compressor ($70) and Trade Me HVLP spray gun ($25). After two coats of sprayed colour the vision really started coming together, being very easy to get even, smooth colour all over, on difficult surfaces and into little gaps. After two more coats, sanding between each coat, coverage was complete. At this point colour was quite intense and while pretty good, looked and felt slightly cakey in parts - not bad, but not amazing either. The matte clear top coat however came to the rescue - after 4-5 coats of this, the leather looked and felt amazing - some a fantastic finishing product - it toned down the pigment a little, gave a lovely matte finish and added a really silky feel to the leather - beautiful stuff. Pics: Work in progress Lower seat examples - before prep / after first spray coat - still greenish/ final spray coat / matte clear coat

I've really admired several M3's with Cinnamon interiors on Instagram, although I've seen plenty of photos of Cinnamon where it looks very orange - possibly due to flash used / lighting but I wasn't quite up for the risk and I didn't have time to order different sample colours from the UK if I was to get this done during the Xmas / New year break. I therefore settled on Caramel, which is an E39 M5 leather colour, very popular in the US - quite a rich tan, with a nice warm tone I felt was safer and would look great with the Orient Blue paintwork - certainly felt like a safer option than Cinnamon but still different to other E46 leather options. After a fair amount of research, I went with Furniture Clinic in the UK, who stock a range of BMW colours, using their leather colourant (a durable, highly flexible, latex leather paint) and their matte topcoat which gives a factory matte look while adding feel and durability. https://www.furnitureclinic.co.uk/Leather_Dyes_Restoration Great products with excellent reviews and there are several huge DIY threads on international forums with seemingly good longevity. I started by removing the interior and disassembling everything. Despite taking half the car apart previously to do an audio install, I was surprised how long this took as the electric seats came into what seemed like a thousand pieces - I removed the lower seat cushions to get maximum coverage and switched the driver and passenger seat bases as my driver lower bolster was slightly collapsed. The door cards were also a lot of fun, with the leather inserts requiring the removal (wood chisel and hammer) of about 40 plastic welded rivets on each panel, again to ensure I had the best coverage. I eventually put them back together with some 9mm screws and washers.