Palazzo

This is what I was thinking of. https://f15.bimmerpost.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1618734

I was meaning smoke that could be seen from space. I’m pretty sure there’s a YouTube vid of someone fitting a catch can to a diesel X5, have a look.

Worn turbo seals I’ve seen in the past have poured blue smoke out.

Good choice, would have been a little surprised if the 30d didn't do it for you.

I want to replicate the finish on my 21” factory wheels, apparently Prismatic Powders is the best bet. They are like a black chrome with blue finish. I’ve found a few colours that are close, but nothing in the Dulux range.

It’s at the police yard, then off to the auto sparky…

Dulux colour, Metropolis Coal Dust Kinetic. Prep is absolutely the key. If I’d known you did this, would have come to see you. Just trying to help anyone who goes down that road. Some of the advice was poor, the service laughable and some of it was top notch. The place I used does a lot of commercial work (railings, verandas etc) as well as wheels. I told them this was the first time I’d done this and they were spot on with advice and communication. I’m happy with the result, aim was to get a serviceable set of wheels to avoid 21” tyre tax.

I bought some spare 20” wheels for the X5, they had been painted (badly) and were pretty rough. Decided to powder coat and got them sand blasted, then powder coated, result is below. Note, due to a combination of laziness/desire to get it over with and some indecision over the alloy wheel filler I had standing up to the powder coating oven, they got a quick file of the worst bits, so there are some ripples on the edges, but the powder coating itself is mint. Ironically, the worst damage (3rd wheel from the left) happened on the way to the powder coaters in the back of the car. Stuff I learned @aramoana Sandblasters aren’t equal. I had one guy do one as a test. He moaned about how hard it was and would only take $100 in cash. The second guy charged $80 + gst a wheel, pulled themselves up at not getting them perfect and redid them, then laughed at the other effort and redid that. Powder coaters aren’t equal. One company gave me a quote, then told me it was all too hard, they didn’t have the colour, wouldn’t order it and to try somewhere else. As a sales pitch, unbelievable. BMW wheels have some god awful rubberised coating on them that is difficult to remove. Make sure your wheels can’t move in the car, alloy is surprisingly soft….. The powder coating guy recommended stripping the paint before sand blasting. He also recommended against chemical stripping as they have had the chemicals “get into” the alloy and then ruin the powder coated finish. Make sure the wheels are as clean as possible and try not to touch the face once prepared. If you buy cheap centre caps from TM, you will get what you pay for. I thought the fake carbon ones that came with the wheels were rubbish, the stickers on the new ones aren’t even stuck down properly. Be patient. Im really happy with the result, they did a great job and were $30/wheel cheaper than another place I tried, not the one mentioned above.

An update for you that might be of interest, got my wheels powder coated for $62.50/wheel.

Ha! Maybe. It had a full tank, so seemed a bit random. One of those weird things, took a different way home for my second lockdown coffee and stumbled across it. Neighbour is stoked, that’s the main thing. And yeah, having to stress about your stuff sucks.

FOUND! About 1200m from home, perfectly parked.

This is my neighbour’s 70 series that he’s been slowly fixing up and loves. Stolen last night from Mt Albert, probably end up as parts or sold somewhere. If you see it, let me know, thanks, Scott.

Come to think of it, it was later, '06 onwards at a guess. Either the same car, or identical looking, very high spec and immaculate. You'd possibly have remembered my mate hurling a flaming pot into the common driveway area and screaming "fire" if you'd been there later.

At a guess between ‘02-‘07?

If I was to buy a car like that, I’d want to open the garage in the morning and go “f**k yeah!” With that, I think only the first word would come out.

Did you live in Grey Lynn at one point, Summerfield Villas?

They did.

Yes, but they’d sold it for more after agreeing a price.

Reminds me of the seller of a bumper recently “don’t bother coming, it’s been stolen”. Whatever.

Not too much use unless you know someone there, but Tauranga Pickapart have one.

I did the X5 at Henderson tip, added up what was inside and compared to handbook, it was pretty much spot on.

I paid $70+gst for the blasting, not sure they’d be keen to replicate that though.

That’s much cheaper than blasting, factory wheels have some rubberised coating on them that is tough to remove with blasting.

I just had some wheels sand blasted. Whatever you do, don’t use Master Blaster in Grafton. I ended up using Autoblast on the North Shore, who were good. But I think you’re in Hamilton?

NZ Post turned up at our place to deliver a package, rummaged through the van and declared they couldn't find it. Delivered it two streets over to someone who called us (number on the packing slip) to collect. Delivered another package of ours to number 14 in our street (we are 24), then the following week delivered a package for 14 to us. As an ex courier driver, I find it truly bizarre.