They look much better. Mine are also annoying me. Have ordered some carbon fiber "style" ones to keep me going until I decide on the real solution.Just picked up my new Lapiz Blue wing mirror caps from the bodyshop, much better than the 'R' silver in my opinion
What have you done to your car today?
- Thread starter mattyprice4004
- Start date
Soldato
That's pretty damn good! Similar to my Ovlov, got around 28-29 on a long run up to North Wales from Hertfordshire lol.
Last edited:
Soldato
- Joined
- 29 Sep 2010
- Posts
- 6,151
To be fair the wing mirrors themselves were £20 off ebay, bodyshop cost was £60 per cap but they did both for £100, so not awful.
Probably could have done it myself but with how cold/wet it is I just decided to go the proper route!
Caporegime
Pretty much the same as I got in my Athlete V with its 1JZ, I was quite impressed. I guess... My wallet wasn't so much
How many SPG?
Soldato
Inspection 2 done today, no valve adjustments needed once again, all within BMW spec.
Did however need a new injector due to number 3 failing (12.9 ohms resistance vs the 0.x ohms of the others). Phoned up BMW to enquire as that injector was bought from them back in 2022, turns out it's a few months out of warranty so nothing they can do, and new injectors are on back order across the country until December, and the price is over £300 inc VAT..........................
Found a refurbished one by a UK company on eBay for £90, got it in, all good. Will send failed one to Hack Engineering to be refurbed and then keep spare incase another decide it's had enough.
All in the total for this adventure was £1.2k, half of which is labour due to the valve clearance checks.
For the diff and gearbox oils I opted for Red Line kits now as they're tried and tested for M3s at this age, it's 50/50 mix of MTL and D4 ATF for the gearbox, and the 75/140+ friction modifier for the diff. The oil that came out was clean, which was good to hear.
Full check-up showed I have a few more bits to be done so that will be seen to before the winter:
- All rear bushes
- Outer engine mounts
- Rear brake main copper lines
- Rear brake pads and discs (already bought, sticking with PFC Z Rated pads, and changing the rear discs to StopTech black series like on the fronts, they're excellent and half the price of ATE uncoated OEM discs
- Tiny issue with lower power steering hose clamp, then flush and fill PS fluid with D4 too
- Front anti roll bar d bushes due to very slight play
- Both aux belts could do with replacing due to age related wear
I ran the 50/50 MTF/D4 ATF in the gearbox, it was a huge improvement, but expect a tiny bit of noise, it is overall slightly thinner, but I had no wear issues and in winter it was very much appreciated!
The Insp 2 is a weird one.. I had mine done twice at ForzaGB in South Wales, £650 and £720.. local indy's in Chelters wanted >£1K, BMW only charge £810 here.
Good to see yours still going and being well maintained..
Does it really need all that work? What's wrong with the rear brake lines? Slight play in ARB bushes, isn't that normal? All rear bushes are shot?Inspection 2 done today, no valve adjustments needed once again, all within BMW spec.
Did however need a new injector due to number 3 failing (12.9 ohms resistance vs the 0.x ohms of the others). Phoned up BMW to enquire as that injector was bought from them back in 2022, turns out it's a few months out of warranty so nothing they can do, and new injectors are on back order across the country until December, and the price is over £300 inc VAT..........................
Found a refurbished one by a UK company on eBay for £90, got it in, all good. Will send failed one to Hack Engineering to be refurbed and then keep spare incase another decide it's had enough.
All in the total for this adventure was £1.2k
For the diff and gearbox oils I opted for Red Line kits now as they're tried and tested for M3s at this age, it's 50/50 mix of MTL and D4 ATF for the gearbox, and the 75/140+ friction modifier for the diff. The oil that came out was clean, which was good to hear.
Full check-up showed I have a few more bits to be done so that will be seen to before the winter:
- All rear bushes
- Outer engine mounts
- Rear brake main copper lines
- Rear brake pads and discs (already bought, sticking with PFC Z Rated pads, and changing the rear discs to StopTech black series like on the fronts, they're excellent and half the price of ATE uncoated OEM discs
- Tiny issue with lower power steering hose clamp, then flush and fill PS fluid with D4 too
- Front anti roll bar d bushes due to very slight play
- Both aux belts could do with replacing due to age related wear
Commissario
All of them. Lots and lots.
Man of Honour
Yeah I spoke to carservicepacks about it in detail and they have years of customer feedback on the kit combo which seems to be the preferred choice now at this age of the gearbox especially. The diff is smoother too now with the use of the FM. Seems a great oil although the OEM stuff that came out was really clean anyway so at least I know all's well. Gearbox definietly feels about the same as what it used to but 1st and 2nd gears feel a bit more refined at cold than before.
Insp 2 prices are indeed a bit mad, though my garage didn't charge too much considering the other stuff I had checked/done at the same time.
The E46 is super sensitive to bushes being on their way, I've done full bushings refresh back in 2016 and the feel and handling transforms from steering feel to how plante dit is at speed to general road comfort. I've done enough mileage now on the 2016 set that it's time to refresh them again hence the advisories for them within the next year or so, so I'd rather get them done and dusted and they're settled for another 5-7 years or so.
The rear brake pipes are copper/nickel and over time at this age they corrode. The pipes are cheap at around £56 from BMW but the fuel tank does need to come out to fit them as they need to be shaped to follow the existing pipes. Not changing them at this age risks the pipes bursting under heavy pressure. Standard affair.
Soldato
Got the car back last week and not leaking oil now.
Took it to another garage for 2nd opinion and sump guard fell off day before. Ah well.
They said sump was leaking....
Took it back to original Mitsubishi Garage and they found sump was leaking, fixed it and replaced sump guard free of charge.
Finally over.... Now to get tyres...
Took it to another garage for 2nd opinion and sump guard fell off day before. Ah well.
They said sump was leaking....
Took it back to original Mitsubishi Garage and they found sump was leaking, fixed it and replaced sump guard free of charge.
Finally over.... Now to get tyres...
Last edited:
Man of Honour
Wife's Peugeot 2008 went in for it's 2 year service today and having covered only 12000 miles they were already warning me the fronts were down to 3mm.
Obviously still a long way off illegal but seems like pretty heavy wear considering it spends 90% of it's life pootling around town.
Obviously still a long way off illegal but seems like pretty heavy wear considering it spends 90% of it's life pootling around town.
Caporegime
removed the heater box and fan because they didn't work anyway (and were an optional extra dontcha know!), removed some superfluous wiring and hoses, fiddled with the carb a bit, fitted an air filter, removed the badge bar because I'm not 100 years old, drove to Tesco and bought a sandwich.
Last edited:
Soldato
Done a full service on my A6 today. Was MOT'd yesterday with a pass and no advisories. Done a few other bits on top of the service, secured a loose exhaust heat shield, replaced the glow plugs (had a fault code prosent on one of them for over a year, although no light on the dash, on a cold morning it was evident that one cylinder was slower to come to life).
Soldato
That's why they have worn. Town driving is worse than motorway miles on tyres. Motorway miles the tyres are barely doing anything. Town is constant stop/start, cornering, parking etc.
Soldato
Caporegime
Have you got a squeegee in the car for the condensation?
I will simply remove the windscreen and wear goggles
Did a bit of coding in the Golf today with VCDS. The cluster animation for the vehicle wasn't an estate. And I wanted the "dots" in the display, rather than nothing, so that it makes it a bit more interesting. Unfortunately I couldn't figure out how to make it an estate, with the "dots" and keep the blue colour, colour is a bit yellow / gold. D'oh. I will try again tomorrow. Should be fixable by enabling ambient lighting.
Now, the last thing I wanted to do is change the vehicle in the infotainment screen. Which was somehow a Passat Estate for a while, but is currently a 5 door hatchback. As far as I can tell, it's the correct coding for a mk7.5 Estate though. So that's a shame. And may require some extra working out.
On the other hand, I have enabled the open / close windows off the key fob. And a couple other little bits and pieces. All small quality of life things really just now. But overall the car is shaping up nicely.
Now, the last thing I wanted to do is change the vehicle in the infotainment screen. Which was somehow a Passat Estate for a while, but is currently a 5 door hatchback. As far as I can tell, it's the correct coding for a mk7.5 Estate though. So that's a shame. And may require some extra working out.
On the other hand, I have enabled the open / close windows off the key fob. And a couple other little bits and pieces. All small quality of life things really just now. But overall the car is shaping up nicely.
Caporegime
Doing all this stuff, meanwhile the EML is on.
VW activities.
VW activities.
Only EML on because the ignition is on. Goes off after the car is started. A full scan only shows one issue, and that is that my cable is too old to talk with one of the modules.Doing all this stuff, meanwhile the EML is on.
VW activities.
Slight lie there actually. One of the rear door speakers also doesn't work.
Last edited:
Don
Topped the R56 Mini up with oil again. Dipstick is terrible to read so no idea whether there's enough in or not.
No visible leaks so contemplating whether I've enough skill to replace the rocker cover (with integrated PCV that commonly fails) myself or whether to pay someone.
Also thinking about whether I can do my front drop links myself as think they are a likely source of a knocking/rattle when driving over rough ground, and seem cheap enough to be a might as well replace item.
Both will have to wait though as the Countryman is now due a Service so need to get that sorted first
No visible leaks so contemplating whether I've enough skill to replace the rocker cover (with integrated PCV that commonly fails) myself or whether to pay someone.
Also thinking about whether I can do my front drop links myself as think they are a likely source of a knocking/rattle when driving over rough ground, and seem cheap enough to be a might as well replace item.
Both will have to wait though as the Countryman is now due a Service so need to get that sorted first