Neal

First of all, thanks for running a great forum , whilst I'm not a volume poster I find that I'm often reading the forums. Some ideas / thoughts Events calendar on the front page , have a running ticker tape of up coming events Front page has past events going back over a year. Try and keep the page a bit more recent Check the multimedia area more frequently , many of the links are broken and are old . Look at a way where members can update this area out of the forums Put bimmersport merhandise on the front page Keep a check of relavant advertising on the front page. E.G tonight we have dresses and handbangs being offered (great for drag racing ?) yet what % of members are ladies ? Make it easier for member to contribute to the running of the forum via email drop or front page (internet / webhosting charges etc) Have a look at using later versions of Vbulletin, later versions are great for embedding multimedia , sponsor adverts etc (Check out kiwibiker.co.nz for E.G of this software) Rolling banners on front page for those companies that support bimmersport Have an Expert forum with a number of topic areas....... Some ideas for Expert forums going beyond forum stickies. This site has some of the best advice found on any site in the world , People like Jochen on all things electronic / Nat Sav , yourself for that matter on race car setup/car mods, Conrod for engine advice, The guys that built that E46 race car with M5 v8 transplant. No doubt we have professionals in the tyre industry on here that can offer advice less subject advice on performance tyre choice and advise on the lastest and greatest developments in this area. I also notice from time to time we have some great NZ bmw race drivers on here. Would like to hear about the odd racing story , bios etc. Some people know more about E30's than is humanly possible in one's life time , others know E28's E36's E46's like the back of there hands BMW motorsport area .... Role of honour , team profiles , car profiles. Also ,perhaps keep a check on the BMW Dealer bashing that goes on here ? When a dealer tried to enage via the forums on here (offering discounts on e46 body kits a few years back) they where chased off by a couple of members and haven't re-engaged since. No doubt other forum members could have benefitted from the start and future of that inital enagement. I belong to a Mini club in Wellington which enjoys great Club support via the local BMW / Mini dealer and as a result I can get a discount on BMW parts as a result of Mini Club membership. You'd think it should be via Bimmerport.

Sound like the 323i Msport now has the owner it deserves ! Nice work

Cheers Vanossa , These are a good sounding head unit with great features for ICE setups (4volt our front/rear/sub , DSO , Listening postions setting etc) . I ran one of these with a Phoniex Gold amp and Boston Acoustic speakers and then later with a Soundstream and PPI speaker combo. It was also able to run the factory sony Cd changer. The reset to factory default reset button is on the left of the cd when the face is open (2 mm hole). However , a remote sequecnce is required to restart the unit after (Anti thieft system)

Go for the proper xenons lights with autoleveling if you can , I have these in the current car and they are the best headlights i've driven with short of rally car setups. Low beam is great and highbeam is expectional. Down side is you don't get that angel eye look. You might be able to get these second hand via some of the parts suppliers that advertise here.

Make sure it isn't the local station isn't set ( Might be toggled via sa button on right hand side) Note , you can default all the settings to factory by putting a paper clip end into the reset hole. If you do this then the unit will drop back to factory settings. You will need your remote control to re-activate the head unit after with a squence of buttons (PM me if you need this info) Otherwise these units do have tuner module failures (Sony CDX II tuner, my one failed, but Sony NZ replaced the tuner module under warranty) I think the part was a few hunderd dollars retail

I'd say your more thank likely to be ok with these as they have crimped fittings. The cert laws have on briaded lines have been relaxed a bit since they first came in. I have ones on a race mini that I'm converting back to road use I'm building that have a second nut where the line goes onto the fitting. I belive that it this type they are not letting through as they are worried about DYI's lossening these by mistake (LTSA and low volume cert web pages)

on a similar vain .... Ruth Flowers

Seem to remember an articile in Top Car Mag in the 90's that had a Hartge widebodied 850i with quad turbos and 550 plus hp.

Running Soundstream sst4.0 in the rear boxes. Didn't want to change to IB rears as the air preasure from sub would pound the crap out of the surrounds. About the right size for the small read ported boxes. These are reasonably powerful for a 4 inch. Sound good and clear considering the size. Just using them for rear fill.

Remember watching him during the Nissan Mobil 500 in Wellington. The 2.5 M3's had a fantastic sound at high RPM. Unfortunatly he had an altercation coming together with a lapped car. There where paint marks in the concert barrier from where his helment touched the barrier. The M3 was totaled and Tony was very lucky not to have been seriously hurt. (remember seeing a very bent M3 in the pits after)

Not good for Samoa , Was booked into a resort next week. The resort owner is in hosiptal & his wife has died. Much of the resort has also been taken by the sea. Not much to say apart from I'm glad to be in NZ at the moment.

1, E9 3.0 CSL 2, E30 M3 Funny how the M cars get more and more powerful , for those that picked the latest M5 I wonder if they would have the same view in 10 years time

Have a couple of small dents left from Smith & Smith last time they replaced my windscreen. Take them off your list with a decent classic such as yours !

Either will do a good job, have taken various BMW's to them both over the last 20 odd years. Vijay has been around for a long time. Was funny to see his service stamp on my old e30 323i at 20,000km then again at 320,000 km's. My e36 325i has been going to Jeff Gray for the last 9 years and 165,000 km with no issues. Safe bet either way.

My reply was tougue and cheek as well, I'm hoping he'll see this as we've been looking at some of his companies house listings from time to time. If he could just find a way to include this in a house sale without the wife knowing I'd be a happy man . He'd have a laugh at the Hyundai .... How about it Blair ?

Um no , he owns the local realesate company. His daily is some kind of compressed V8 with AMG on the back. Your looking at a "Sunday" driver. I wonder if he'd include this in a house sale ......

music varies a bit, but always seem to have a faithless CD in the car Probably played "Killer's Lallaby" the most .... Stereo gets a good workout with this track It finishes .. "No surprise couldn't hear that" "Closed my eyes as he steered that old black BM home again" "Not knowing how and not knowing when"

Without starting a religous war my comment on bass timing was based listening to a number of audiophile systems over the years, attending a number of SQ sound off's and also on back to back listening on B&W top line 800d & 801d .These retail in NZ for $40 k plus. 800's have dual 10's verse the 801's single 15 and had a top end amps and CD / Dac combo worth an additional $70k. The dual tens in my view where far more musical as did the person buying them. A couple of muso mates that play bass guitars prefer bass cabs running 4x10's rather than 12's or 15's. This is for the same reason. At the end of the day it's what you like the sound of. Having run free air / IB / IB with passive radiator & isobaric enclosers I'd agree on the IB are best / easiest for sound quality. These days I just run a single 10inch IB with passive radiator which gives a very small box size. It's given the boot back and is a good tradeoff between size and sound quality.

Just to had to the confusion I'd recommend using PhoniexGold amps and Boston Acoustics speakers combinations. PhoniexGold are a USA brand of Amp that is near Audiophile class without the 3-4k budget and often the higher end amps come up on trademe for a third of retail. This brand of amp has been the basis of many top USA car stereo winning vehicles. I have one of these amps from the 1990's which was produced for the 100 watt competition car stereo class. With the engine off it's rated at 25 watts x 4 (12.5 volt rating). With the alternator running (13.8 volts) and 2ohm speakers it produces 75 watts rms x2 and 150 rms + for the bass channel. The power and control of this amp is fantastic They've had a recent name change to Rodin. http://www.rodinaudio.com Speaker wise the Boston Acoustics Pro Series are worth an audition. Boston Acoustics are a USA audiophile speaker company that also produce car stereo speakers. The Pro series speakers build quality is extremely high, have amazing power handling levels and have a handy 3 ohm loading which will take advantage of higher current amplifiers and make them produce more power than with a normal 4 ohm speaker. The crossovers have high end capacitors and these speakers produce a extremely good sound stage for a car speaker. Depending on you music tastes you might get away with a sub , however , A 10 inch sub will allow you to hear the lower octaves that are normally lost to road noise or to smaller speaker rolloff. You could listen to some 12 inch subs, but unless you spend mega dollars you'll find the timing of the bass being slower. (eg B&W 800d verse B&W 801d) For you BMW a sub sitting in the boot firing through the rear arm rest is a good way to go. BMW have been considerate enough to allow for a ski port that goes through the arm rest. If your car does have this as standard if you take out the rear boot lining you'll notice that BMW have tac welded a panel behind the arm rest. This is easy to remove and can be put back in place when you wish to sell the car. I've mounted subs this way on a couple of BMW's I've owned. Check out Mikes E30 sub install , In my view this is the best way to do bass in a bmw http://www.bimmersport.co.nz/forums/index.php?showtopic=8920 The ski port panel that can be removed without causing warrant of fitness issues http://www.bimmersport.co.nz/forums/index....ost&id=7432 Alternatively just use the "transfer function" that occurs with Bass in a car. Have a boxed sub in the boot and the bass will transfer through the metal of the car and into the cabin. You'll need a bit more power into the sub, but you'll still achieve a reasonable level of bass. http://www.caraudiohelp.com/newsletter/cabin_gain.htm Head unit wise , I’ve fallen behind , but I’d look for time alignment features , decent DAC’s , sub out / control. Some of the better sony head units have 24 bit burr brown Dac’s. The sony joystick remote that can be mount on the steering column is brilliant. All the functions of the unit can be control via this without having to take your eyes of the road and leaves you hand close to the steering wheel as well.

Glad to hear you didn't come off ! What an ahole of a driver. Pitty you horse didn't kick back and put a nice hole throught the grill. Personnelly I think everyone that drives should also try other means of using the road , eg ride a horse , motorcycle , cycle to gain a better apperication of what consideration is required for other road users. Most people with half a brain would know that many horses can easily be spooked and can throw the rider off. If I'm on my motorcyle and need to pass a rider / horse I'll stay way back , pass on the other side of the road and have enough momentum to pass with the clutch pulled in so the bike is at an idle when passing (Italian VTwins are a bit on the noisey side). I'll coast of as least 30 meters before re-engaging it. I do the same thing in the car (Although it's a lot quieter) Keep safe ! PS, I two have a green BMW , but I haven't let the Wellington region for some time.

Didn't know that Golf GTI's where known as radio's but $500 seems about right for a Golf GTI

If you can picture an overweight 40 something going grey and the hairs thinning a bit with a mullet I think it would be called a muppet ! Still....... always lusted over the Mad Max interceptor ...... things you'd consider doing for a car ........ I think the old interceptor would be interesting on a dyno though.

Makes me want to build up a Ford XA coupe with a 671 supercharger and a clutch kit for the supercharger ...... without the studded leather gimp suit

Saw this or a similar car during a London Motorcycle show a couple of years back. Was part of a stunt team. The carwhich was about 1/2 size sounded like it was motorcycle engined powered. It must of had some kind of front wheel locking device as the driver got out of the car whilst it was doing dougnuts on a dime. The driver was showing excellent skills on what was usually a roller/ iceskating ring. They also had a team of extereme style motorcycle jumps. Very cool show !

I'm an IT Network Manager for large NZ govt Ministry. Been working with / building/ managing large computer networks since the late 80's Have a small property rental company on the side for hopefully early retirement. Don't have a company car as such, but use the 325i / 328i for our 25,000 km annual commute. Whilst "DINC's my wife is an accountant hence our modest cars. Spare dosh goes into property and some discretionary income goes into Italian motorbikes and a coupe of old Mk1 Mini’s.