BMW and M Power Owners
- Thread starter panthro
- Start date
Soldato
- Joined
- 28 Oct 2003
- Posts
- 5,507
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- Worthington-on-sea
I fully appreciate the appeal of a luxo-barge now! My focus is comfy but a couple of hundred miles makes you feel like you've driven it.
The only thing I didn't really likes out the 520 was the slightly detached feel from the steering. I'm slightly spoilt maybe by the Focus's being so precise but in the Beemer it felt like the steering wheel wasn't directly attached. More like drive by wire, if you know what I mean. Probably something about the type of PAS I guess.
The only thing I didn't really likes out the 520 was the slightly detached feel from the steering. I'm slightly spoilt maybe by the Focus's being so precise but in the Beemer it felt like the steering wheel wasn't directly attached. More like drive by wire, if you know what I mean. Probably something about the type of PAS I guess.
I only ever use Eco Pro on the motorway. Around town, the lack of throttle response is incredibly frustrating with very little gain.
Pop the gears into Sport and it shouldn't ever auto-change (until you get to the rev limit)
Pop the gears into Sport and it shouldn't ever auto-change (until you get to the rev limit)
I discovered something interesting today. It's not a car, but this bike it said to sound "just like an M3", and it also happens to be a BMW straight 6.
I can't argue with this either, it really does sound like a baby M3 engine and a wonderful one at that.
I can't argue with this either, it really does sound like a baby M3 engine and a wonderful one at that.
So now I've done over 1000 miles in my 535d I thought I'd type out some thoughts on the car for the benefits of others but also helps me think about things...
Firstly, I want to write about my experiences with BMW main dealers lately. I have had quite a few BMWs over the years now and in my time I've dealt with about 5 BMW dealers and they have all ranged between acceptable and awful. My local BMW dealer is utterly terrible at doing what they say they are going to do and in this regard, the dealer I purchased my 535d from were no exception. I asked for a detailed condition report and was told that, basically, it is "just like a new car", with the only thing wrong being an alloy wheel needing a refurb. Of course, when I got there after a 5.5 hour drive, there were a number of cosmetic issues which I immediately noticed. Not happy. We negotiated an acceptable conclusion to the matter but I shouldn't have been put in that position in the first place. BMW really do need to address the shortcomings in their dealer network before it costs them their reputation.
Anyway, the car. My second F10 after a late 2010 520d SE which I owned until Feb of this year and being run in tandem with a Z4 sDrive35i...
In many ways, this car is totally different to my 520d. I'm not talking about the engine, or the fact I have full black panel and M Sport suspension now but there is something fundamentally different about how the car feels. They have sorted some of the really terrible areas (seat plastics, I'm looking at you...) but have introduced some areas that are less than great - the steering wheel plastics are one example. The actual car itself is just better somehow, it feels more taut and more assured.
The way the engine/gearbox feel is a bit of a Jekyll/Hyde thing. In Comfort (or ECO PRO) the whole experience is pretty underwhelming. I'd go as far as to say it feels slow and ponderous. I used to think the ZF 8HP gearbox was the pinnacle of gearbox tech but coming back to it from the DCT box in the Z4 it is markedly slower at everything and it really does stand out for me. But if Comfort is the Dr Jekyll, Sport/Sport+ is Mr Hyde. It is an absolute missile in the faster modes. The whole car comes alive and really is faster than a diesel repmobile really ought to be. Open the taps at 40mph and despite the moderate shove in the back giving you some clue as to what is going on, it doesn't feel all that different - until you look at the speedo...
The SAT is a bit faster than the 'vanilla' ZF box I believe, but it is a shame it isn't quite as fast as the DCT box. For 99.9% of the time I am driving this car, the ZF box is going to be good enough but I really have become accustomed to just how insane the DCT box is. Having said that, in outright comfort terms the ZF8HP is quite a bit ahead of the DCT box mode-for-mode. Why did BMW bother installing paddles on the wheel? I suspect nobody knows and they are quite useless!
Diesel noise. A tough subject really. At low throttle, it is noisy. Of course, the Z4 is noisier but the noise it makes is much, much nicer. I think because it is shifting more air or whatever than the 20d, it is just a bit more intrusive (although with less vibration) in the 35d. At WOT though, there is no clatter and the general dieselness seems to be minimised - instead replaced by a distant, powerful-sounding thrum of an engine doing work. While the 35i in the Z4 is turning from a grumble into a full-on howl, the 35d is a much deeper, more restrained and I think more fitting noise for the type of car the F10 is.
NBT iDrive is fantastic. Much better than the previous gen in my Z4 just through the little touches here and there and the smidgen better performance. RTTI is great too, I've already come to trust it and it has saved me quite a lot of time by avoiding traffic that I might otherwise have been stuck in had I been relying on TMC.
Dynamically, quite a lot of people talk about the F10 as being a great handling car. The same people seem to slate the Z4 (especially in 35i form) but honestly, I think the F10 is 'good' and the Z4 is 'better'. You can't really hide the fact the F10 is nearly 2 tonnes, and it does show when you tip it into more of a sweeping bend. The M Sport suspension does help keep things in check and the rear end seems less keen to break away than it was in my 520d which is a big plus. In comparison, the Z4 is like an angry bee. A useless comparison in the real world but it does make you wonder what the motoring press is sniffing when they write the stuff they do.
Before I bought the 535d I thought long and hard about purchasing an F10 M5. That was the car I set out to buy and indeed I found a car which I was tempted by and went as far as agreeing on some figures to purchase that car. What swayed me back to the 535d was the all-round competence - it is as capable a car as you're likely to find this side of an S Class and has actual real world usable performance. The turbocharged 4.4 V8 in the M5 is a masterpiece but putting the power down in 1/2/3 is an exercise in restraint (and gives your sphincter a good workout if you get it slightly wrong) and in 4th and higher you're very likely to end up in front of a magistrate pleading for your licence if you keep your foot in for more than a second - I booted it at 40mph on the straight of a private test track and was at 110mph before I could really process what was going on. An animal and an incredible machine but, all things considered, not the sensible choice I needed to make at this point.
So basically, the 535d is underwhelming in Comfort, exactly the car I had hoped it would be in Sport/Sport+ and as a reasonably high performance all-rounder, I just can't imagine anything I'd rather own.
Firstly, I want to write about my experiences with BMW main dealers lately. I have had quite a few BMWs over the years now and in my time I've dealt with about 5 BMW dealers and they have all ranged between acceptable and awful. My local BMW dealer is utterly terrible at doing what they say they are going to do and in this regard, the dealer I purchased my 535d from were no exception. I asked for a detailed condition report and was told that, basically, it is "just like a new car", with the only thing wrong being an alloy wheel needing a refurb. Of course, when I got there after a 5.5 hour drive, there were a number of cosmetic issues which I immediately noticed. Not happy. We negotiated an acceptable conclusion to the matter but I shouldn't have been put in that position in the first place. BMW really do need to address the shortcomings in their dealer network before it costs them their reputation.
Anyway, the car. My second F10 after a late 2010 520d SE which I owned until Feb of this year and being run in tandem with a Z4 sDrive35i...
In many ways, this car is totally different to my 520d. I'm not talking about the engine, or the fact I have full black panel and M Sport suspension now but there is something fundamentally different about how the car feels. They have sorted some of the really terrible areas (seat plastics, I'm looking at you...) but have introduced some areas that are less than great - the steering wheel plastics are one example. The actual car itself is just better somehow, it feels more taut and more assured.
The way the engine/gearbox feel is a bit of a Jekyll/Hyde thing. In Comfort (or ECO PRO) the whole experience is pretty underwhelming. I'd go as far as to say it feels slow and ponderous. I used to think the ZF 8HP gearbox was the pinnacle of gearbox tech but coming back to it from the DCT box in the Z4 it is markedly slower at everything and it really does stand out for me. But if Comfort is the Dr Jekyll, Sport/Sport+ is Mr Hyde. It is an absolute missile in the faster modes. The whole car comes alive and really is faster than a diesel repmobile really ought to be. Open the taps at 40mph and despite the moderate shove in the back giving you some clue as to what is going on, it doesn't feel all that different - until you look at the speedo...
The SAT is a bit faster than the 'vanilla' ZF box I believe, but it is a shame it isn't quite as fast as the DCT box. For 99.9% of the time I am driving this car, the ZF box is going to be good enough but I really have become accustomed to just how insane the DCT box is. Having said that, in outright comfort terms the ZF8HP is quite a bit ahead of the DCT box mode-for-mode. Why did BMW bother installing paddles on the wheel? I suspect nobody knows and they are quite useless!
Diesel noise. A tough subject really. At low throttle, it is noisy. Of course, the Z4 is noisier but the noise it makes is much, much nicer. I think because it is shifting more air or whatever than the 20d, it is just a bit more intrusive (although with less vibration) in the 35d. At WOT though, there is no clatter and the general dieselness seems to be minimised - instead replaced by a distant, powerful-sounding thrum of an engine doing work. While the 35i in the Z4 is turning from a grumble into a full-on howl, the 35d is a much deeper, more restrained and I think more fitting noise for the type of car the F10 is.
NBT iDrive is fantastic. Much better than the previous gen in my Z4 just through the little touches here and there and the smidgen better performance. RTTI is great too, I've already come to trust it and it has saved me quite a lot of time by avoiding traffic that I might otherwise have been stuck in had I been relying on TMC.
Dynamically, quite a lot of people talk about the F10 as being a great handling car. The same people seem to slate the Z4 (especially in 35i form) but honestly, I think the F10 is 'good' and the Z4 is 'better'. You can't really hide the fact the F10 is nearly 2 tonnes, and it does show when you tip it into more of a sweeping bend. The M Sport suspension does help keep things in check and the rear end seems less keen to break away than it was in my 520d which is a big plus. In comparison, the Z4 is like an angry bee. A useless comparison in the real world but it does make you wonder what the motoring press is sniffing when they write the stuff they do.
Before I bought the 535d I thought long and hard about purchasing an F10 M5. That was the car I set out to buy and indeed I found a car which I was tempted by and went as far as agreeing on some figures to purchase that car. What swayed me back to the 535d was the all-round competence - it is as capable a car as you're likely to find this side of an S Class and has actual real world usable performance. The turbocharged 4.4 V8 in the M5 is a masterpiece but putting the power down in 1/2/3 is an exercise in restraint (and gives your sphincter a good workout if you get it slightly wrong) and in 4th and higher you're very likely to end up in front of a magistrate pleading for your licence if you keep your foot in for more than a second - I booted it at 40mph on the straight of a private test track and was at 110mph before I could really process what was going on. An animal and an incredible machine but, all things considered, not the sensible choice I needed to make at this point.
So basically, the 535d is underwhelming in Comfort, exactly the car I had hoped it would be in Sport/Sport+ and as a reasonably high performance all-rounder, I just can't imagine anything I'd rather own.
A rather noobish question but how do I clear the the MPG/miles done etc? I cleared the trip computer via 'Vehicle Status' thinking that might do it, and then cleared the average MPG by holding the trip computer button down on the steering wheel column, but I haven't worked out how to clear the mileage next to the total miles?
I suspect I'm just being a total idiot
I suspect I'm just being a total idiot
I used the paddles all the time in mine when pushing on, the gearbox was never quite where i wanted it to be when exiting a bend and I don't want the throttle to be the determining factor of the gear I am in. Exiting a bend I would rather be in the gear I want, not waiting for it to chose it as I get back on the throttle which in mine it always seemed to.
![[TW]Fox](/data/man-of-honor/2009.png){kind=avatar}
A rather noobish question but how do I clear the the MPG/miles done etc? I cleared the trip computer via 'Vehicle Status' thinking that might do it, and then cleared the average MPG by holding the trip computer button down on the steering wheel column, but I haven't worked out how to clear the mileage next to the total miles?
I suspect I'm just being a total idiot
There is a button in the bottom corner of the panel itself.
The complaints with the Z4 come from it being compared to cars like the Boxster, which it has never been able to properly compete against. The F10, however, is being compared to Audi A6s and E-Class Mercs. Magazines aren't comparing the Z4 against the 5 series.
Of course they aren't comparing the Z4 with the F10 but in both cases I'm referring to reviews in which they talk in absolutes. There are reviews out there that bemoan the Z4s handling and they definitely aren't openly stating "compared to the boxster" etc.
Both cars handle well in isolation.
Yup, you can spin 4 summer runflats on a hill whereas everyone else can only spin two
