Some of the garages/dealers I use used to do it 5-10 years ago, some even had a notice about it. These days they don't seem to bother - though I can't say I generally check the recorded video to be 100% sure. I used to unplug mine if I remembered but likewise these days I often don't bother any more, though I don't care if they disconnect it while doing work.
What have you done to your car today?
- Thread starter mattyprice4004
- Start date
Some of the garages/dealers I use used to do it 5-10 years ago, some even had a notice about it. These days they don't seem to bother - though I can't say I generally check the recorded video to be 100% sure. I used to unplug mine if I remembered but likewise these days I often don't bother any more, though I don't care if they disconnect it while doing work.
No I couldn’t do it myself as the unit needs coded to the immobiliser, seems to be safe against clocking as he had a few units all with different mileages and he did tell me he could add miles to a unit so it’s the same mileage as the one that comes out but can’t reduce a units mileage
Underboss
Pretty standard across the board
Had it just over a week slowly doing bits here and there.
Dechrome:
Front grill
headlight trim
taillight trim
belt line
scuttle indicator
Matte black badges
Scuttle decal matte black
15/20mm spacers
Door handle dechrome left to do
15% rear tints booked next week
Possibly lower 20mm on Eibachs at some point
Leap Chi spoiler extension.
Dechrome:
Front grill
headlight trim
taillight trim
belt line
scuttle indicator
Matte black badges
Scuttle decal matte black
15/20mm spacers
Door handle dechrome left to do
15% rear tints booked next week
Possibly lower 20mm on Eibachs at some point
Leap Chi spoiler extension.
Started the morning off by fixing an annoying noise on my car. Not my video, but basically I am getting this exact noise under heavy acceleration and only in 1st or 2nd gear. Anything beyond that, and if I do normal gentle acceleration, there is no noise at all.
youtu.be
It doesn't sound good, and I was lucky enough to recognise the noise from my previous F30 otherwise I would probably have been bricking it, although the circumstance there was different. In my previous F30 I drove over a deer that was already dead (couldn't avoid it) and the car started making that noise. That turned out to be the metal heatshield around the prop shaft, it was just bent in and rubbing against the prop.
This time it was a simpler and common F30 problem. The handbrake cables run directly above the prop and BMW use a plastic clip to hold them in place and these clips frequently break. The official BMW fix is to replace the cheap part with another cheap part that will likely fail again, but the biggest problem is because of the amount of labour involved (they drop the fuel tank slightly to get access to it) it costs hundreds. Though looking at it, I do wonder if it might be possible to get a small ratchet spanner in there:
Can clearly see the left cable is still clipped in but the right one is hanging down. I can't be bothered to mess around with it too much right now so I've just done the quick and easyfix bodge:
Metal cable tie against the diff mount to just hold it up a bit. I originally had it tied in a different place which is why there's two ties but looking at it now, I don't know why I didn't remove it and just use one. Regardless, noise is now gone. Also popped a tie on the other cable to support that before the other part of the clip breaks too.
BMW F30 Grinding from center console
weird grinding noise coming from center console area. any ideas?Fourm on quick fix: https://f30.bimmerpost.com/forums/showthread.php?p=25553557#post25553557
youtu.be
It doesn't sound good, and I was lucky enough to recognise the noise from my previous F30 otherwise I would probably have been bricking it, although the circumstance there was different. In my previous F30 I drove over a deer that was already dead (couldn't avoid it) and the car started making that noise. That turned out to be the metal heatshield around the prop shaft, it was just bent in and rubbing against the prop.
This time it was a simpler and common F30 problem. The handbrake cables run directly above the prop and BMW use a plastic clip to hold them in place and these clips frequently break. The official BMW fix is to replace the cheap part with another cheap part that will likely fail again, but the biggest problem is because of the amount of labour involved (they drop the fuel tank slightly to get access to it) it costs hundreds. Though looking at it, I do wonder if it might be possible to get a small ratchet spanner in there:
Can clearly see the left cable is still clipped in but the right one is hanging down. I can't be bothered to mess around with it too much right now so I've just done the quick and easy
Metal cable tie against the diff mount to just hold it up a bit. I originally had it tied in a different place which is why there's two ties but looking at it now, I don't know why I didn't remove it and just use one. Regardless, noise is now gone. Also popped a tie on the other cable to support that before the other part of the clip breaks too.
Started the morning off by fixing an annoying noise on my car. Not my video, but basically I am getting this exact noise under heavy acceleration and only in 1st or 2nd gear. Anything beyond that, and if I do normal gentle acceleration, there is no noise at all.
BMW F30 Grinding from center console
weird grinding noise coming from center console area. any ideas?Fourm on quick fix: https://f30.bimmerpost.com/forums/showthread.php?p=25553557#post25553557
It doesn't sound good, and I was lucky enough to recognise the noise from my previous F30 otherwise I would probably have been bricking it, although the circumstance there was different. In my previous F30 I drove over a deer that was already dead (couldn't avoid it) and the car started making that noise. That turned out to be the metal heatshield around the prop shaft, it was just bent in and rubbing against the prop.
This time it was a simpler and common F30 problem. The handbrake cables run directly above the prop and BMW use a plastic clip to hold them in place and these clips frequently break. The official BMW fix is to replace the cheap part with another cheap part that will likely fail again, but the biggest problem is because of the amount of labour involved (they drop the fuel tank slightly to get access to it) it costs hundreds. Though looking at it, I do wonder if it might be possible to get a small ratchet spanner in there:
Can clearly see the left cable is still clipped in but the right one is hanging down. I can't be bothered to mess around with it too much right now so I've just done the quick and easyfixbodge:
Metal cable tie against the diff mount to just hold it up a bit. I originally had it tied in a different place which is why there's two ties but looking at it now, I don't know why I didn't remove it and just use one. Regardless, noise is now gone. Also popped a tie on the other cable to support that before the other part of the clip breaks too.
Ah hunting the annoying noise, mine was an adjustment to the bonnet supports to stop a vibration and certain RPM!
Caporegime
Washed my car then removed a few bird etchings. Car got dive bombed during the hot weather a few weeks ago and I only noticed when I finished work.
Got around 25 etchings of various sizes to remove so whipped out the hairdryer and made a start.
Got around 25 etchings of various sizes to remove so whipped out the hairdryer and made a start.
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replaced some of those on a bm touring boot they were more powerful than originals and ended up lifting up the tailgate too far, stressing the rubber pipes for screen wash, that disconnected, actually had to tether tailgate.
weekend - Did some retargetting of the screen jets and cleaning with a needle, to get my windscreen as opposed to tailgating car.
electric mechanism for tilt on the nearside door mirror erratic, did some cleaning/dismantling.
re-programmed paramteric equalizer, battery was out too much over covid when car wasn't used, need to do some experiments with cut-off slope on mid-range speakers, should it be 3db/octave or 12.
new neighbours are shaming everyone else with the regularity of car washing (uses a hose though) also, never seen this before, the couple wash the car together, each to their own.
Soldato
Out of general interest, how long does bird droppings need to be left on the paint for it to etch like that?
Caporegime
Could've been on my car for a few minutes or up to 8 hours so not very long either way. Removed it when I got home and was already like that.
Yeah I hate annoying noises. My car has had another one for a while now - a squealing handbrake.
If I put the handbrake on and the car is on a slope, it squeals for a few seconds when moving off. From reading around it's not uncommon and the general opinion is that BMW handbrakes are generally a bit crap but today I got around to taking a look at it and I think I've sorted it out. The rear brakes are hybrid disc/drum setups, with the handbrake controlling shoes that expand inside the disc to hold the car. I didn't get any pictures of it, but this is the assembly on my old E90 with the disc removed and it's the same on my F30:
I took the calipers, carriers and discs off and gave everything a damn good clean inside but then I saw that the metal backing plate was obviously making contact against the handbrake shoes in 3 places. You can see 2 of the points where the backing plate gets nearer at the tips of the shoes and on this car they were a bit rusted so there was obvious contact there. I just got a screwdriver and gave it a light tap with a hammer to push those parts of the backing plate away to create a very small gap then put everything back together. So far, no more squealing, but time will tell
Also not today, but yesterday I retrofitted the genuine BMW reverse camera and module. This car is a pretty good spec with adaptive xenons, high beam assist, hifi sound system, pro nav, folding mirrors etc but for whatever reason whoever specced it from new didn't spec up front parking sensors or reverse camera so I added it. Nothing interesting to see so no pics, but it now works exactly like it would if it was ordered from factory so I'm happy enough with the spec of it all now.
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It is weirdly inconsistent
I had one that was on a few hours max and it has eaten right into the clear coat others on there days before I get to removing and don't leave any damage.Username got a whole lot more sinister.
How well does the hairdryer work? think I need to try that on one spot on my truck.
Caporegime
It's not perfect all of the time, you might be able to see a slightly duller area of paint from certain angles, but it's always been able to completely remove the etchings for me.
Two of the etchings were on the driver side door and they were both in the sun, both disappeared in less than two minutes. The area in the picture was in the shade and took around 10 minutes.
I've previously had etchings on a black Polo and they all but disappeared on their own on a very hot day, hoping for the same to happen this week tbh.
Soldato
Forgot I had my wheel turned to the right against the kerb when setting off, and crackled the plastic hub caps horribly. Think I shocked the cyclist riding towards me 
Ah, what did you use?
AF Obliterate (Tar/Glue Remover). I was left with the foam a bit like number plate adhesive pads.
Left it to soak, it's a gel, and then used a finger nail to scratch/roll it up and then picked pieces off it off. Applied a little more where necessary. Didn't take too long.