Last sentence is surely contradictory in terms? It doesn't drive, look or feel like it's old. The only thing that makes it old is it's reg plate and the fact that it's been replaced by 2 different looking superseeding generations.
It doesnt look or drive or feel old, no. Because it's in immaculate condition and wonderfully built. But it looks and feels dated, now. The interior is quite obviously from a previous decade now despite still being a nice place to be. It doesn't have, for example, iDrive, or newer fonts on the dashboard, etc. Most of the time when I see another one now, bits are hanging off and its a bit shabby, or it's at the local partworn centre getting some Linglongs fitted.
I now also drive an E60 and there are still many areas where the E39 is simply a better car. But the E60 just feels newer. It goes 'briiiiiiiiiiing' and politely tells me the tyre pressure is low and that I should only drive at 50mph. It tells me when the car needs new brake pads, it just feels newer inside (If not quite as well crafted, which really annoys me). Then I get out and walk away and think 'That looks nothing like as good from the outside...'
You wouldnt continue to wear a pair of old trainers when you could easily replace them with newer ones simply because you really liked them..
A shame, really, but this will be what compells me to change it - I don't need to drive around in an old BMW, I chose to do so simply because I love this car and it didnt used to be old. I'm hanging onto it for as long as I can as I enjoy it so much and the longer I wait the more choice I get for its replacement.
The hardest thing is that I know I will never again own a car thats so right in so many ways as the E39. BMW have not in my opinion built a car since that was so complete (Executive Car of the Year every single year of its production - nothing has done that before, and nothing has managed that since). Newer cars are better, but only because they are newer and things progress, not because they are fundamentally better engineered products.
And this is a damn shame, especially as it'll cost me considerably more than I paid for this car to replace it, and the 'wow' wont be there.
![[TW]Fox](/data/man-of-honor/2009.png){kind=avatar}