E34 540i 1 Year Before & After

[Kees 594]

I've had my E34 540i exactly one year. Thought I would put a few photos up showing the before and after on the car and how it's changed over the last 365 days. 

At some point I might make a proper thread for the car detailing everything I've done, I'm the iPad generation so Forums were a bit of foreign territory for me so I've got a messy collection of discussions instead of one big one. 

Anyway here is the before and after from the day I picked it up (17/11/20) to today (17/11/21), 

 

Before:

 

After:

 

Before:

After:

 

 

 

Edited November 17, 2021 by Kees

[E28E30 335]

Looks awesome @Kees, good work!

[Kees 594]

2 minutes ago, E28E30 said:

Looks awesome @Kees, good work!

Thanks! 😁

[m325i 709]

Great work!

You should get a fresh plate - they are like $30 or something. 

[Sammo 2544]

Awesome work! those wheels on an E34 is perfection

[Kees 594]

1 hour ago, m325i said:

Great work!

You should get a fresh plate - they are like $30 or something. 

Yup they are on the list, I was thinking euro plates would look quite good plus the front one can help cover some rock chips which is a bonus 

[Kees 594]

1 hour ago, Sammo said:

Awesome work! those wheels on an E34 is perfection

Thanks! Yeah the throwing stars make a huge difference. Car drives so much better than when it had the sofa wheels as you can get far more modern tyres on it. The 15 inch BBS look alright they are just way too small for such a big car imo. 

[Michael. 2313]

It's come along way. Another saved from the scrapheap! 

[KwS 2425]

2 hours ago, m325i said:

Great work!

You should get a fresh plate - they are like $30 or something. 

Would lose the OG two letter plate then and end up with a gross modern plate. Only way to remake it and keep it is to get it changed to a personalised/euro plate.

Car is looking amazing though.

[Kees 594]

2 hours ago, KwS said:

Would lose the OG two letter plate then and end up with a gross modern plate. Only way to remake it and keep it is to get it changed to a personalised/euro plate.

Car is looking amazing though.

Definitely wouldn't want to lose the original combination. One of the reasons I bought the car was its original 1994 combination as I'm quite OCD about original plates for some reason. Both my cars have original plates lol. If you get a euro plate do you have to surrender the old plates even though its the same combination?

[E28E30 335]

17 minutes ago, Kees said:

Definitely wouldn't want to lose the original combination. One of the reasons I bought the car was its original 1994 combination as I'm quite OCD about original plates for some reason. Both my cars have original plates lol. If you get a euro plate do you have to surrender the old plates even though its the same combination?

Unsure about surrendering @Kees but I am just as OCD about plates too.  I got lame personalised plates for my E30 as it was cheaper than having the original 1991 plates (PS2040) made into a personalised plate (the only way they’d “re-issue” an old plate), as it had had a few personalised plates over the years and lost its original ones.  Hated having meaningless M-reg modern plates on it.  When the personalised ones arrived last month I had to return the MBP520 ones for destruction, but that’s a different scenario. 

Edited November 17, 2021 by E28E30

[E28E30 335]

$169 to remake plates into standard, $299 to remake as European

[Kees 594]

@E28E30 Thanks for the info, I think I'll end up going for euro plates in the style of the one on your car just with the original "SO9785" combination. 

The other reason I can't get rid of the plate combination is that my car has a sister car with the plate "SO9857". Both are 540s and have a difference in VIN of 70 units so would have been close to side by side on the production line. Pretty insane coincidence. The owner has his combination on euro plates which looks good. 

The personalised euro plate on your car looks really nice btw! Much better than the MBP520 government issue plate! 

I have the combination "DOENUT" but it isn't on any car because I keep getting cars with original plates so would never put it on. I'm slightly obsessive about original plates, whenever someone has a car on original plates, especially one thats like 20+ years old and then they change it I cringe so hard. Unless a car I want wasn't offered new in NZ, I'll always try find one with original plates! 

[E28E30 335]

1 minute ago, Kees said:

@E28E30 Thanks for the info, I think I'll end up going for euro plates in the style of the one on your car just with the original "SO9785" combination. 

The other reason I can't get rid of the plate combination is that my car has a sister car with the plate "SO9857". Both are 540s and have a difference in VIN of 70 units so would have been close to side by side on the production line. Pretty insane coincidence. The owner has his combination on euro plates which looks good. 

The personalised euro plate on your car looks really nice btw! Much better than the MBP520 government issue plate! 

I have the combination "DOENUT" but it isn't on any car because I keep getting cars with original plates so would never put it on. I'm slightly obsessive about original plates, whenever someone has a car on original plates, especially one thats like 20+ years old and then they change it I cringe so hard. Unless a car I want wasn't offered new in NZ, I'll always try find one with original plates! 

I think we share the same brain  me too!  In the end the “3 letters and 3 numbers” personalised plate option is cheaper by $250-300 than an “any combination” one, and all the good E30 ones are gone 😕 so I went for this fairly lame/tame one.

Remaking is a good idea.  I ordered two Euro frame holders: The back one wouldn’t line up with factory holes so just went with double sided automotive tape in vertical strips, it is stuck on.  Will go with the car when it is sold.  Front one uses the frame I bought.

[Kees 594]

9 minutes ago, E28E30 said:

I think we share the same brain  me too!  In the end the “3 letters and 3 numbers” personalised plate option is cheaper by $250-300 than an “any combination” one, and all the good E30 ones are gone 😕 so I went for this fairly lame/tame one.

Remaking is a good idea.  I ordered two Euro frame holders: The back one wouldn’t line up with factory holes so just went with double sided automotive tape in vertical strips, it is stuck on.  Will go with the car when it is sold.  Front one uses the frame I bought.

Yeah fair enough with going for the THE325 combination, spending $999+ is a bit ridiculous when all the good plate combos are gone in general given the vast quantity of personalised plates that have been issued over the years.  

Oh right I should probably order some frame holders too when I get my euro plate. Not sure if it would bolt straight onto the E34, although seeing as its NZ New it has the wider license plate surround at the front so it might just go straight on which would be good. I might just "lose" my original government issue plates in the garage because it would be a shame to surrender them. They are so old that when I drive the car at night, according to my mates, the rear plate is incredibly challenging to see and read, which has its bonuses lol. 

[martyyyn 102]

Not legal and not sold as such, but I'll just leave this here.

Pressed aluminium, correct flag and fern, correct font, correct colours and reflective.

https://doozi.co.nz/listing/701059322/create-your-own-euro-nz-style-number

[E28E30 335]

32 minutes ago, martyyyn said:

Not legal and not sold as such, but I'll just leave this here.

Pressed aluminium, correct flag and fern, correct font, correct colours and reflective.

https://doozi.co.nz/listing/701059322/create-your-own-euro-nz-style-number

I have pursued similar routes in the past @martyyyn and ran into no issues, germanplates.com 

[martyyyn 102]

YMMV obviously.

I've done germanplates and even had Euro plates made at Blackbush Market in South London (sadly no longer) and was eventually pulled up by an English cop in Otaki, twice, in a week !

I saw a friend of mine a few weeks ago who had a plate made at least 15 years in the German font and it's still on the car so he can't have had too many problems.

[m325i 709]

15 hours ago, E28E30 said:

$169 to remake plates into standard, $299 to remake as European

Source? 

 

https://consumer.licensys.co.nz/plate-vehicle-details

$23.15

[E28E30 335]

11 minutes ago, m325i said:

Source? 

 

https://consumer.licensys.co.nz/plate-vehicle-details

$23.15

Hmm was on the Kiwi Plates website.  This is better price.  And in fact I am completely wrong.  The prices were for “restyling” a government issue standard plate into something else eg graphics etc.

I put you wrong sorry @Kees

Edited November 18, 2021 by E28E30

[Sammo 2544]

@E28E30 Damnit haha - 'THE325' was on my short list of E30 p plates to consider 🤣

Although if I get one with original / two letter plates I'll just get Euro plates.

[E28E30 335]

@Sammo that’s really funny.

When I looked there were a few interesting ones left.  I toyed with a few, using 0 instead of Zero helped with some too, but then I got over it and noticed the cheaper “three plus three” price so went for that one.

[qube 3570]

5 hours ago, m325i said:

Source? 

 

https://consumer.licensys.co.nz/plate-vehicle-details

$23.15

this is correct.

if you want to just get the same plate/style remade you go thru licensys and it costs next to nothing.

If you want it restyled/diff combo then kiwiplates and it costs a lot.

[Vass 831]

11 hours ago, E28E30 said:

I have pursued similar routes in the past @martyyyn and ran into no issues, germanplates.com 

A mate of mine got pulled up for running those, got slapped with a fine as well, something like $150/200 iirc. 

[Kees 594]

2 hours ago, Vass said:

A mate of mine got pulled up for running those, got slapped with a fine as well, something like $150/200 iirc. 

My wealthy older neighbour has german plates on his X5M and TTRS and he's never been pulled up about it. 

That said, seeing as I'm young and get the "random license checks" rather frequently they might try get me for it. Although I like the look of the plates so I sort of want to get them and then if they ever hassle me about it I'll just try talk my way out of it.