[extreme_torque]

My fav 5'er ever. I even used to "drive" the 'M' version of the same in the need for speed game in my teens I still go to used car websites sometimes to look for E39's on sale and look at them longingly. Such a well proportioned car.

P.S. I like the Touring version too, arguably even more than the sedan.

Here's the last one I looked up, 540i V8 *Sigh*
https://www.carsales.com.au/private/...-4759212/?Cr=1

[anup.bronco]

Dear CrazyStuff, 17 year of ownership is truly commendable and re-enforces my love for the older BMWs, clean lines, simple design. Excellent write-up by your friend pls. pass my wishes to him, and deja-vu as I read this post and walk past this clean BMW in a lovely shade of red. Attaching the pictures of this eternal red beauty.

[Gildarts]

E39s are the best looking ones for sure. BMW had a sporty design till F10, but the current gen G30 5 Series has lost it completely.

[CrazyStuff]

Few more pics of the interior and engine bay of the car.. clicked today morning.

[arjithin]

Originally Posted by CrazyStuff

Few more pics of the interior and engine bay of the car.. clicked today morning.

Very well kept car CrazyStuff. What is the current odometer reading?

[Jeroen]

Thanks for sharing! It is good to see how proper maintenance and some TLC ensures you can keep a car in excellent working order and still looking good as well.

We have a thread on the advantages of buying second hand cars, but it would be interested to hear from more members that buy new and keep their cars for many, many years.

Would be interested to see what sort of (unexpected) maintenance popped up over the years. Over time and mileage lots of bits on any car will eventually wear out. Even the ones that the manufacturer PR boys enthusiastically had labelled as "good for life".

I dont know about BMWs in India, but in Europe these cars, well maintained are becoming increasingly populars. Anything from about 15-25 years old is considered a youngtimer and they are becoming increasingly popular. There are dedicated magazines and exibitions for this segment. And most of these young timers are typically pretty high end cars.

Despite a lot of people having qualms about the electronics in these car, the actual experience in terms of reliabillity tends to be very good though. Of course, in this particular case, it being a BMW means it was put together very thoroughly with good bits and parts to start with.

Maybe we should open a Youngtimer (15-25 years) thread to show of our cars and share experience.

Keep it rolling!

Jeroen

[CrazyStuff]

Originally Posted by arjithin

Very well kept car CrazyStuff. What is the current odometer reading?

Its 127k in odo now.

Since my friends Team-BHP account activation is still pending, posting the answers from him:

1. Restoration was over a period of 3-4 years actually, as it took some time to figure out what were the gremlins. Starting with replacement of the plastic parts- door sills, underbody covers, fan cowls, hoses, trailing arm bushings, guide supports (shock mounts) - DISA Valve, CCV delete for catch can, sensors - all of this took some time primarily because there was no technician trained on the E39. The E60 was the first official BMW into India and hence all the technical personnel were trained for the E60. I had to rely on technicians from US and Middle East to diagnose little things like the morning stutter at cold start - (CCV), the intermittent/ unexpected missing - (air intake sensor), the occasional metallic noise at cold start - (Timing Chain Tensioner), rear tyres wearing out unevenly - (trailing arm bushings)., Trifecta lighting up - (DSC Module). Many at times, this was extremely frustrating as ,

• a- you didn’t know what the problem was and then had to patiently research, listen to a 100 comments and views/ suggestions/ opinions on various forums and then the technician who has not seen your car, but you would consult in Dubai or New York or London and then take your call
• b- not a single part was available in India - so any such problem would take at least 30–60 days to solve and most times I would handcart the parts in my baggage.

The sole aim was to solve any and every issue and get everything fixed. Yes, the parts were not cheap...

Sometimes you were also in for a rude shock, when the trailing arm bushings were not sold as such, but you were asked to buy the entire trailing arm that cost USD 2000/- . So I would write letters to ZF who are the makers of the bushings - who would then make me run from their German HO to their production site in Pune- India to finally decline to sell me the bushings (as it does not have a part number of its own) . Yet, I persevered to get the OE bushings from a Taiwanese manufacture who I found out what the other supplier to BMW! This I got to know from a parts provider in UAE.

Through all this, the one person who guided me right on everything , despite the expert and not so expert advises was my father. He had a clear mind for anything mechanical and would tell me pro actively what was happening. No doubt I learnt as much as I could from him, he still was the real expert.

To be very honest, I never once did write a statement of accounts for the money I spent on this car. Like clockwork, every 2 years I would have all the fluids replaced whether I used the car or not, brakes serviced, AC oiled and topped up. This was and still is routine on my calendar. Any tiny scratches were immediately tended to, polished, ceramic coated and brought back to showroom condition.

2. One of the largest expense was the complete new set of 17” M5 alloys that I had to special order from Germany. The official dealer in India had quoted me Rs 1 lakh per wheel but I wasn’t going to pay that much as I knew it did not cost even half that in Europe. So I ordered it through my Dubai office and imported into India paying the requisite Duty and still costing me half that of what the dealer quoted me. It took me 6 months to get it on the car. I went ahead and ordered 7 alloys instead of 5, just so that I have 2 as spare and don’t have to wait another 6 months if I ever needed it.

3. The single biggest expense was the full Supercharger Kit, the Rotrex supercharger, the oil cooler, the pulleys, the pressure lines, the cold air intake kit, the high performance injectors did cost me a big sum. What made it interesting (and risky - the ECU would have gone kaput if there was any error) was that I had to download and then upload the new map all by myself. ActiveAutowerke US mailed me the tuning software. I was never this nervous when I worked on the car all through.

I do drive a lot of cars, some are faster, some are more comfortable, some are very refined, some are full of modern electronics and gizmos , some have very good music systems and more - but none have everything in just about the right measure as the E39.

Before I close, a quick word of the Diesel BMW engines of that era- they were all prone to damage on account of the sulphur content in our diesel during the time. Infant the 2.8 Lt petrol engine of that era also were prone to the infamous Nikasil issue where the nickel alloy that was used in the cylinder liners wore off on high heat and most engines lost compression in less than 50k miles.

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by CrazyStuff

Before I close, a quick word of the Diesel BMW engines of that era- they were all prone to damage on account of the sulphur content in our diesel during the time. Infant the 2.8 Lt petrol engine of that era also were prone to the infamous Nikasil issue where the nickel alloy that was used in the cylinder liners wore off on high heat and most engines lost compression in less than 50k miles.

Yes, several , often high end, cars suffered from the infamous Nikasil problems late 90s early 2000s. Jaguar being one. Having said that, these days if cars from the era are still on the road, you can be pretty sure its fine. It would not have survived so long otherwise.

Jeroen

[Herbie]

Hello Team BHP members,

This is my first post here, though my car made an early entry couple of days back. My friend CrazyStuff insisted that I put up the car details here and had me write about it. Did not expect so many true E39 lovers here on the forum.

Overseas, the E39 is considered the peak of motoring design and performance. Most of the queries posted here were duly responded to, as CrazyStuff insisted that we post the responses asap.

The key to maintaining this car was to recognise what could fail and act on in proactively. Despite that - I have had my fair share of disappointment as I was also learning about the potential failures - as were all others who owned this car for 10 years. As mentioned earlier, the big failures globally were CCV and DISA valve, both of which I was glad did not fail but I replaced it with higher than OE spec stuff.

There are cars in the US and Europe that have done 400-500K kms so the possible failure points were known about 5 years back (12 years into ownership) . Typical to our driving conditions, which others had not experienced were plastics becoming brittle and hoses becoming soft and mushy - due to our dust/ humidity and heat. Wheel well covers, underbody covers, sills, cowls, etc needed replacement to maintain the charm of the car. DSC failure was also common and expensive too. AC Compressor failed at about 110k kms- which is also not a common defect, but I believe more to do with Indian conditions, despite having it serviced every 2 years. The electric fan, water pump were again prone to aging.

I can say that of the potential issues , I could pro actively fix 75% of it before it went kaput, and 25% I still had to fix after the problem after it occurred - as these were unique to our conditions and hence I could not predict it.

Nevertheless, it is back now to top spec and every time I drive the car into the dealership for events, there is a small crowd that would gather around it and ask me how I keep it this way.

I have only one thing to say - " Passion ". Simply because no other car I own gives me this satisfaction when I get into the drivers seat. The ergonomics, the perfectness of it, has not been matched yet by any car yet.

The car gives me so much back, so I give back as much as I can. No other car of mine warrants this!

BMW replaced all the engines of the 2.8 ltr affected with this with no cost to the owners. Owners were also allowed to upgrade their cars in Europe to the next higher spec by trading the 328i's and 528i's

[ajmat]

Another potential diesel engine breaker are the intake manifold swirl flaps breaking and getting sucked into the engine. Remedy here

Did you install the supercharger yourself? Hats off to you

[Maverick5490]

Originally Posted by Herbie

The car gives me so much back, so I give back as much as I can. No other car of mine warrants this!

Welcome to the Forum Herbie, and very well said!! Its your passion that has kept the car alive and shining. There were many good examples of E39's about 10 years back, but sadly either due to cost of spares or lack of interest the cars disintegrated into rust. The 540i M62 engine though had massive power, was prone to leakages and misfirings, and eventually a pain to maintain.

The head unit although aftermarket, looks very much in sync with the car!

Cheers!

[Herbie]

Originally Posted by ajmat

Another potential diesel engine breaker are the intake manifold swirl flaps breaking and getting sucked into the engine. Remedy here

Did you install the supercharger yourself? Hats off to you

The Petrol engine also had something like this and it was called " DISA Valve" which was also prone to breakage and falling off into the cylinder. Yes, I imported and installed the SC myself. I had an expert mechanic who could wield the tools better than I, and my father oversaw the operations to ensure we did not mess up


Thank you Maverick and others who have welcomed me here. Glad to be part of this learned and enthusiastic group. Wonder why it took me so long to get in here!!

Some day soon, I will bring in my E30 Coupe too...

[Dhruvtalwar]

Wow, its amazing to see more Bimmer fanatics in India.

I am restoring a BMW E34, which is one generation older than this one, and will PM you to ask about parts and sources etc. Any help would be welcome, I would love to bring the car to the same condition as yours.

My thread is still on the assembly line, but I can't resist sharing a photo here. Its definitely a weird angle though

[Herbie]

Surely I can suggest places from where you can get the parts. If you put your mind to it, you can get it back to factory spec. There are a few E34's around that are neglected. Perhaps you may want to buy a car and use as a donor car. That is the best way to go about this now, if you want it restored fully. Then buy all the parts etc from reputed OE and OEM suppliers.

Is it a 525i?

[Herbie]

Can someone shed light on this ?

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com...w/62931902.cms