HalfJobHarry

They certainly are overpriced :D. There is far too much "premium" applied for manual versions. Also don't forget that that dealer price of 17k...with a bit of bob and weave you could walk out with it for 13k on a good day (last weekend/day of the month etc, dangle the possibility of finance and buying all the extra PPI guff etc)... If I was happy with the state of my vehicle and know the history and that I've kept it well maintained, I would personally go down the manual conversion route if I intended to keep it long term. However as mentioned there are some sensibly priced ones around. IMHO, pretty much and of the Straight 6 BMWs are much 'more fun' in the manual versions. Personally there isn't really any comparison to a 'full manual' (not DCT!), for driving enjoyment (in the right setting!!) If it's a daily and you're going to be grinding down on-ramps and packed motorways for 2 hours a day in traffic jams...then for me an auto is the thing. I'm British and manuals dominate the UK. You learn to drive manual, your first cars are almost always manual..they are everywhere, and people seemed to look down on autos and so did I until I owned an Auto 330i and the rest for my poor clutch foot in London traffic was like heaven itself

It's another one to consider for sure. I'm ambivalent about upgrading to something that effectively becomes a 'fixed' configuration though...the attraction for an Android type base platform is the ability to run the random things like Torque and Waze...admittedly this does fall beyond the requirements of my original post...I'm getting scope creep. Given it's probably a no-no to dump the factory head unit given it's the MOST bus controller, a replacement screen unit (like a Belsee) is the way I'm likely leaning right now....but in no hurry so will keep evaluating.

Yeah, good point, thanks. I have the HiFi option so got the factory amp...there is also the mysterious 'Telematics' / Bluetooth unit on the bus too.

I checked the battery voltage on the 135i...been tracking it for a few days. I don't know why but I have a feeling my battery is unwell or I'm getting higher parasitic drain.

Looking good. The golden hour doing it's thing there

Totally, the CIC upgrade doesn't interest me really at all for exactly that reason. If you have CCC/CIC and go with an android unit, does one typically replace the dash mounted screen and then disregard the stock headunit controls , or get rid of the dash screen and mount a double DIN ..or is that just a choice thing?

It must be. One of the most common questions I get (usually from those who have not been overseas) is "Why do you like it so much here?? What's so good?".... I usually say as a small example like..not only do you have beautiful public parks everywhere (they have reduced over the decades in the UK), those parks almost always have public toilets/changing facilities etc (they were mostly all closed in the UK some 25-30 years back) and those facilities usually actually have TOILET ROLL in them (this was unheard of in my lifetime in the UK). This usually prompts some laughter and a reaction that surely I must be joking....because all of those things are "just normal right?"....no. We are very lucky here.

So my E82 has the CCC...in the era of smart phone sat nav and all the rest of it..I'm not fond or too fussed on doing something like a CIC retrofit etc. I'm thinking of two possible directions, keep things stock but go for some kind of built in bluetooth adaptor thingy (I had a box called a GROM in my E46 which wired into the factory harness and gave modern functions via the smartphone using the built in radio and steering wheel controls. It pretended to be a CD changer and was kind of cool... Alternatively , is there some option out there to replace the CCC screen/unit with something else entirely? I do like to keep things looking quite original in terms of styling so not sure how I'd feel about some kind of double DIN replacement headunit, mainly in how it would be in keeping with the interior style. BMW audio options are by far my weakest point of knowledge so any guidance and suggestions are appreciated. EDIT: Spotted the headunit below in a youtube video....that looks classy...ish...something like that could be tolerable.

Excellent points. I find as a guest in this great country that there is a somewhat fatalistic outlook on things here, that everything seems terrible and poor, but in reality compared to even 'advanced' places like the US and the UK things are on the whole pretty good here. I wish more of us would stop to reflect on that a bit more.

China have an economic victory over the entire world at this point and there isn't a military in the world right nowthat could stop China doing what it wants militarily in the Western Pacific.... realities to keep one up at night ...

I know, I'm being a little glib there with the batch thing. Totally agree, we are in a very different position with COVID...but I don't have any doubt the outcome would have been the same as the US, UK or similar to what is now being seen in VIC and NSW if we had gone the same way. UK and US being severe examples, Brazil and India being totally extreme. Where NZ is very different is that the ICU capacity is alarmingly small...I work around the health sector here and the genuine sense of relief that ICUs were not swamped (and the extra deaths caused by lack of ICU spaces, heart attacks etc etc) was palpable. I do have sympathy for destroyed businesses and livelihoods....but there is some confidence that many thousands of lives have been saved. I for one am glad I'm not the person/people who have to put dollars on one side of the scale and human lives on the other.

True, very true. That said I suppose food is something as you say, that will always be needed, regardless of any other economic issues.

This is true in so far as it's a coding and programming operation. It's not 'special locksmith tools'. You just need the software and interface to program the module and code it properly. It's probably easier on CAS vehicles than it was with EWS from what I can see. EWS was a pain in that many of the operations could only be done by pulling the module and reprogramming it directly with a kind of 'clamp' that sat over the CPU. At least on CAS vehicles everything can be done via the ODB.

This is true but there are similarities...I know CAS and EWS are substantially different...but the crank with no fire ...along with that code....seems like too strong a symptom to ignore. Given that the engine runs with donor CAS and DME...it seems to strongly point to an issue between the two. If both the CAS and the DME can be interrogated then are likely to not have 'died'. That coupled with the fact the car wasn't run for quite some time.... I'm saying it's an area worthy of further investigation, rather than at this point going out out sourcing (and having programmed and coded) new CAS and DMEs.

I recently finished a little weekend job of putting a front and back dashcam, hardwired with ignition controlled parking mode (and flat battery protection) on my E82. If anybody is thinking of tacking something like this and wants any info on what I did or any pitfalls I found give me a shout. I failed to document the process fully with pics or anything but more than willing to share some findings. I hardwired into the fuse panel (junction box) and picked the overhead console 7.5 amp fused always on supply for the parking mode (via the PowerMagic Pro box) and the accessory/cigar lighter fuse (20 amp) for the ignition switching).

Late to the party on this one sorry...but the symptom of cranking but no fire reminds me of when the CAS and DME are not synced. I have some memory of the 2fa4 incorrect data code being some symptom of this. In fact as I sit here wracking my brain..I'm almost cetain that 2fa4 IS a data mismatch betwenn the CAS and DME. This doesn't point to a physical failure in my (somewhat limited) experience with this. I remember around 10 years back when I swapped the DME in my E46 there was a whole heap of coding and programming to do on the DME/CAS to get this going. Also sometimes the 'rolling code' between the CAS and DME can get out of sync as there is a time based element at work (at least on the E46) might be different on the later models. There is a function in INPA to sync them again that is probably also somewhere in ISTA-D.... EDIT: The process is call CAS/DME Align ....

The first time I took my my 330i out after I did the vanos seals (fun little job and a good opportunity to replace the brittle valve cover gasket which literally snapped apart), I could not believe the change it made. The instant response from the first twitch of the foot blew me away. I understand that the seals fail as soon as 35k in many vehicles, so many owners probably never experienced the way they were suppose to drive. I only ever needed to replace the pre-cat O2 sensors on my M54 as I had a failure on one. The post cats are used only for emissions related ULEV (or whatever) stuff and are not directly used to adjust the fuelling so cannot result in any drive issues etc (but will cause codes to be logged if the cats are not working or something)... The O2 sensors outputs won't be considered on cold starts at all as the ECU will be in open loop...so depending on the start temperature and a couple of other factors you may still get that increased initial revs (as there is some cat warmup stuff , cold start enrichment etc etc) going on.

Totally! They get some bizzare fuel adaptations once the old O2 sensors go silently old an senile. Have you by chance ever done the VANOS piston seal replacement? That transformed my M54B30 in ways I couldn't imagine and HIGHLY recommend it if it's not been done.

Welcome! Love the rims you are running.

Took the wheels off the 135i for a deep clean (over a couple of lunchtimes admittedly!) Before and after. My weapons of choice are meguiars wheel brightener and a pot scrubbing pad....

I'd love these also, got a rebuilt N54 in need of a set of late index injectors...but used they are rare as nobody wants to part with them . I'm probably going to bite the bullet on these and get them from FCP Euro. Expensive, but they have a lifetime warranty (for which the complication of having to ship back to the US is worth it).

I've given this some thought and the issue is that for rich people to get richer, they don't want to sell produce at low prices to a local market, they want to export in insane quantities that we would never consume if they only had to serve NZ. Hence why NZ Avocados are 60 cents each in the UK (all year round) but $7 dollars here and never less than $3...when we can get them. Agreed, it's certainly a government issue, but it's the first challenge of exactly this type in the post WWII time frame...certainly in the 21st century. Our modern globalized society has no 'runbook' for dealing with this kind of thing. I was/am hoping it will be a catalyst for a new, fairer and more equal distribution of wealth, via something like a Universal Basic Income (so all people can have some basic financial security even in the face of issues like COVID), although it's looking less and less likely that will become a reality :(. Additionally, it's clear to me that the long term reliance on agricultural exports is not a safe position, as ultimately apart from relying on the 'NZ Quality' and 'Clean/healthy' selling points, pretty much any other country with the right conditions can produce meat and veg. China is always trying to establish illegal versions of Kiwi owned variets etc etc. The question for NZ is what is the future on the global stage? I feel like we seem to want to have it both ways, be a 'global player' but be a local little insular country at the edge of the world at the same time. I'm not certain both of those positions are compatible.

22 deaths....the numbers speak for themselves. It's almost universally accepted that we have handled COVID-19 as well as humanly possible given the unknowns. Sure there have been issues, but when you set a high bar you are certain to have failures like this. When you don't really even try (like the US and the UK) you can effectively do no wrong. I'm pretty cheesed off my grandmother in the UK had to die at 72 (not a bad run admittedly) from COVID because the country is run by total fu*kwits these days...but hey ho I suppose some folks here in NZ couldn't go to their batches when they wanted to so were "put out"...

Packaging huh? Curious, I read many many months ago in some study that COVID-19 can stay active on damp cardboard for weeks..... Murica....nuff' said..

Wife saw a woman in a wheelchair being pushed aside so people could buy wine yesterday....people turn into animals. Is this an Auckland thing because I don't see much of the oft talked about Kiwi solidarity when the iron is in the fire