Kees

Manual 540s seem to be very illusive. Are your friend's cars both manual? Is his hell red one XD9969?

@HerbmiesterI am a jealous man, I remember seeing it on trademe, still have the screenshot of the listing. Beautiful colour! Wish my 540 had a manual box...

A black e38 750iL used to park on that street in Milford too. Haven't seen it in a while though.

Fixed the twisted seat in my e34. Reclining adjustment on the right hand side was stuck causing the seat to twist. Was a bit of a mission though.

@coop @leichtbau Yes the iS was the 1996 hellrot one that popped up on Facebook Market Place for 5K. It is also an M Package car making it even more rare! Apparently other than the paint, the car was mechanically in good shape and so was the interior. Of course at 5K there was a huge bidding war because everyone (myself included) wanted the car. The guy selling it was overwhelmed with all the messages and couldn't keep up with what people were keen to pay for it. He had no idea what he owned. He almost sold it for 7K but then the first buyer reneged on the deal due to the state of the paint. I believe it sold for 8.5K in the end, and the new owner is spending more than that on a full glass out respray to restore it back to how it should be. It should look factory fresh once its done! Although I missed out on it I'm happy an enthusiast got it and is going to restore it, rather than someone who would use it for skids and just abuse it. Judging by some of the comments on the marketplace ad, there were a few people keen to do the latter with the car The silver one was for sale in November 2019 and was the last iS to come to NZ. Its a very nice example, I have seen it in person a few times.

Yes thats right I remember having it on my Watchlist when it was 8K. Seems like its a very nice low km example, which is getting increasingly challenging to find. When I was compiling my registry I found quite a few 540s have their registrations on hold or haven't had a WOF in a few years, so it seems there aren't a huge number being regularly driven anymore. Yeah the V12 touring is certainly an interesting one! Wouldn't mind owning it myself, would leave quite a few people speechless when they see that V12 under the bonnet of a station wagon.

Yup I know who the owner is! He is only selling as he managed to score an amazing deal on a 540i/6 recently and now has 3 e34 540s. Are you part of the E34 Enthusiasts NZ Facebook Page? Personally I would go for the 540 seeing as they are both automatics.

Wow 800nm in a 1 series, that's insane! Surely race the S65 powered one against this, would be very interesting!

Yeah fair enough, it seems all the tidy ones have been hoarded away. I got mine for 2.5K in November 2020 but it was far from tidy so I've spent thousands getting it back to its former glory. There are a few rougher ones on Trademe for the 3K mark but they would need some decent work to get them looking mint. Looking back at old Bimmersport posts I can't believe in 2013/2014 you could get a mint 540 for 3K with nice wheels and exhaust.

Oh bugger thats unfortunate! Surely its time to get another one.... ?

Which one was your first 540?

Just been going through the list and RY definitely fits as being the plate combination for end of 1992. RY8168 was a random plate I chose and it was registered April 1993 but starting with an 8 would have been near the end of the RY combination run meaning RY most likely started in late 1992. Haven't got one on the list just yet that is RY or previously was RY but if I come across it I'll let you know. There aren't too many blue ones around, was most likely Sorrent Blau, Lazur Blau or Orient Blau if it was dark blue. It was an Automatic right?

No cars with the plate starting RY seem to be on my list, that one must be still out and about waiting to be added to the list!

Thanks for the information! So far I've got the three Techno Violet ones, two of the Hellrot ones (both MY 1996, one of which I was too slow on scoring a few months ago), the final one in Arctic silver and one in Avus blue. I wonder where the rest are hiding! What's interesting is I have an Alpine White one on my list which doesn't seem to be on that list which is a bit strange.

Yeah very true I really should get into it! The garage where I store it is big enough to comfortably work on it so there really isn't an excuse for me not to. And yeah if I break something I still have a Peugeot and a Smart Car to drive so it is a no brainer.

Hi guys, A couple months ago I was sitting listening to a Philosophy general education course lecture (compulsory course for uni) absolutely bored out of my mind. While I was pondering everything except what the lecturer was actually saying a bright idea popped into my head: what if I made an e34 540i registry for New Zealand? E34 540s are far from a common sight in NZ so I was intrigued as to how many there actually are, and then the statistical break down of automatics and manuals, sedans and Tourings, production year, colours, import history etc. So far at last count I have 84 cars on the list! I managed to collate these from the E34 NZ Facebook page, as well as from old Bimmersport posts and then just seeing the occasional one while out and about. There are still quite a few more cars out there though! (There could be up to ~120 according to NZTA stats) I have been a bit busy with University stuff so I haven't quite finished filling in the colours of all the cars (as this requires using a vin decoder) but most of it is complete. Anyway, if you have or know of an E34 540 that isn't on the list, please add it! The registry is on a publicly shared Google Doc: https://docs.google.com/document/d/105QyKE6a_xYv8p-_R4dSbFnPsJcLvHrYUJ8W2PuhgZU/edit?usp=sharing The Google Doc can only be edited on a computer for some reason and if it doesn't work then just leave the plate of your 540 in the comments and I can add it for you. So far some statistics are: 8/84 are Tourings 76/84 are Sedans 8/84 are factory 6-Speed Manual 76/84 are Automatic 66/84 are NZ NEW 15/84 are Japan Imports 2/84 are UK Imports 1/86 German Import (Must have been tourist delivery) 1/84 are 1992 (I believe this was a dealer car maybe for Jerry Clayton BMW) 31/84 are 1993 33/84 are 1994 10/84 are 1995 8/84 are 1996 1/84 are 1997 (Was probably MY95 or MY96 and was in storage)

I'll have to start learning how to do some stuff to my car. I guess parts rarity has always made me leave any mechanical stuff for professionals as I am worried I would break some part exclusive to the M60 and then be faced with the headache of trying to find a replacement part with a non-functioning car.

@Timythenerd Any updates on the V12 E34 Touring by any chance?

Yeah very true, my car is a testament to that idea having done 371,xxx km. Can't see many F10s/E60s/E90s doing that!

Yeah with 400nm and 286hp it still gets up and moves, although I got absolutely obliterated by a Mercedes EQC the other day, and an F10 550i overtook me like my car was standing still 😂

It’s not been 9 months with my E34 540i, so I thought since its lock down and what not, its time for an update. In the last 3 months I haven’t done a heap. I had predominately just been going out and enjoying the car, as well as going to a bunch of car meets to put some decent kms on her. In the 9 months I’ve had the car, I have put around 5000km on it, which I think is rather impressive given that it’s a third car, gets stored at a place that is 20 minutes from my house, so I actually have to plan when I take the car out. Things done in the last three months: I managed to source a new resistor sword for the blower motor meaning I now have control over my fan speed, and it isn’t simply just full blast or nothing, which is rather nice. I also did a few cosmetic things like replace the badges, re-glue the rear door cards, polishing paint, deal with paint transfer and further source the bits required to complete my tool kit (if anyone has a spare screwdriver or tow hook let me know lol) In July it was also the much-dreaded WOF time. Seeing as it had failed on a couple things last time, I had a quiet confidence it might pass first time or fail on a couple easy things, especially since the place I was taking it was hardly VTNZ. SPOILER ALERT: It failed on 4 things that were neither easy nor cheap to rectify. My car failed on: - Rusty Tow Bar - Play in the right front wheel (lower control arm related) - Play in the left front wheel - Power Steering Leak. The easiest to deal with was the tow bar as I could do it myself. I dropped the rear bumper and removed the tow bar which had rather shockingly completely rusted away (after a lot of swearing and what felt like many litres of WD40 due to the 20-year-old seized and cross threaded bolts). I then sent the car to my mechanic who is known to be a legendary BMW mechanic, especially with E34s. Power steering leak was luckily just a hose clip. The play in the right wheel just required adjustment of the lower control arm. However, the play in the left front wheel required the replacement of a rod connected to the steering box, which of course was not cheap. But hey, it's only money, right? My car also developed a pressure related coolant leak in June. In typical BMW fashion it was leaking in two places which meant it required the replacement of the heater control valve, and an octopus looking pipe which had a pin sized hole in it which is connected to the control valve. Once again my mechanic was superb as he had good used parts available in his workshop. With the heater control valve replaced, my car now doesn’t blast hot air at your feet when you turn the AC on which is also another bonus. I now [almost] have functioning climate controls which do what you want… what a luxury!! Next on the list is to get my replacement sunroof painted body colour, as its starting to really annoy me. I also want to get a nice stainless muffler to replace the stock one to make the V8 sound like a V8. Included are some before and after photos from the day I picked the car up compared with how it is looking now. Also included is the difference between the good resistor sword and the bad one, and a photo showing how badly corroded the tow bar was. She is looking quite a lot better I reckon.

Bimmer.Work seems to work for me. Mdecoder used to work for me but when I created my registry of NZ 540s I used it so many times it thinks I am a commercial entity so no longer works 😅

She's got the BellSouth Aerial and the obligatory holes in the console where the brick would have been mounted! And.... 10 Stacker in the boot!! You nailed it lol I keep an old 90s Motorola in the car just to emulate the baller-ness the original owner would have experienced. Car would have been about ~270K accounting for inflation in today's money but when you were earning 1 million USD in 94' a 540 would have been pocket change to swing.

Yeah I was very lucky to find out the amount I did considering how old the car is! The second owner told me that apparently BMW thought that the gearbox (it would be a ZF box right?) once made only needed very minimal servicing and consequently did minimal servicing to it causing it to seize (no fluid changes or anything). The car had always been serviced with BMW so I think BMW paid for majority if not completely covered the cost of the new gearbox.

Ever since I got my E34 540i back in November 2020, I had a strange feeling it would have an interesting history. Something about having factory parking sensors….in 1994 screamed that the original owner had some money. I always thought it would be interesting to try and retrace at least part of the car’s history, seeing as it has done over 370,000km. The only clue I had of prior owners was I could see on a report that the car had been registered under a company in 1997. I found the director of the company and googled his name. Up popped some old news articles from 2006 detailing he owned some prestigious racehorses and was even a New Zealand actor back in the 70s. Seeing as he appeared to be the third owner, things started to get interesting. I managed to get in contact with him, and actually went and saw him to ask him some questions about the car. He was more than happy to have a chat but didn’t seem overly enthused about the car which was a bit disheartening. He did manage to remember the name of the second owner, “he was a merchant banker from Remuera”, which was very impressive seeing as he had bought the 540 24 years prior. I googled the second owner’s name and immediately I had a plethora of information and a publicly listed contact number. I decided to give him a call on a Sunday and to my surprise he answered. He was happy to hear the car was still around and owned by an enthusiast. He was also keen to see the car again, seeing as it had been around 20 years since he had last seen it. We then scheduled a time to meet and about 3 weeks later I took the car out to Remuera to show it to him. What he had to say about the car was very interesting. He knew the first owner, who happened to be New Zealand’s highest paid salary earner back in 1994! He said the car was bought brand new from the BMW dealer in New Market and was the highest specified 540i available in New Zealand at the time. He bought the car from the first owner in 1997, but sold it soon after to the third owner, only to buy it back in the late 90s and then sold it to the people I bought it off in the early 2000s (who also happened to be a famous architect). This meant my car had always transacted privately and has stayed in Auckland its whole life. I am only the fifth owner which is somewhat impressive for a 27 year old car. The second owner also had a nice collection of vehicles such as an old Daimler and an F10 M5, and exclaimed that the paint on the 540 still looked pretty good considering its very high mileage, which he attributed to his passion for detailing. He then began to recount some interesting things that had happened to the car under his ownership: The car was always looked over by a friend of his, who also happened to be one of Bruce McLaren’s mechanics. While on Holiday in Rotorua, the gearbox locked up and it had to be pushed by a bunch of people up an incline out of the motel driveway. It then got driven home in third gear as that was the only gear that worked. The car ended up having to get a new gearbox at 70,000km, which he was understandably unimpressed about. Another time he recalls being stuck behind a truck with the car fully loaded for the weekend, so when a nice opportunity arose for an overtake, he gave it the boot to wind up the V8. About half way through the overtake the car decided to blow a coolant hose, spraying steam and coolant all over the windscreen, completely obscuring his view, leaving him no choice but to conclude the overtake with no vision and then immediately pull over to sort the mishap. After hearing all the stories about my car, it’s made me fall in love with it even more.