Aside From The Usual Problems...

"RCMF - is hungry for V10 Touaregs and long kinja names" (mile-rei-club)
10/17/2017 at 00:27 • Filed to: E39, M5, Ebay

...any red flags with this (stunning-looking) E39 M5? Current bid is US$3000 with 5 days to go. High-ish mileage (133,000), but it looks remarkably clean for a 17-year-old car. The listing itself is refreshingly coherent, too.

I’m not in the market for any car right now but hope to be within the next year or so, and 2000s super-sedans occupy an irrationally special place in my heart. If I were ready to pull the trigger now, this ad would be stupid tempting—am I missing something?

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DISCUSSION (14)

E90M3 > RCMF - is hungry for V10 Touaregs and long kinja names
10/17/2017 at 00:34

Does a 4k repair faze you?

ptak appreciates old racecars > RCMF - is hungry for V10 Touaregs and long kinja names
10/17/2017 at 00:34

god thats hot

Nibby > RCMF - is hungry for V10 Touaregs and long kinja names
10/17/2017 at 00:35

is it in your driveway yet?

no? ok. then is it in the shop yet?

CB > RCMF - is hungry for V10 Touaregs and long kinja names
10/17/2017 at 00:35

That’s a risky buy. Wouldn’t do it unless you had serious coin for maintenance.

RCMF - is hungry for V10 Touaregs and long kinja names > E90M3
10/17/2017 at 00:36

So that’s the thing, VANOS looks like it was replaced recently... What other failures are as common/serious as that? Clutch, maybe?

facw > RCMF - is hungry for V10 Touaregs and long kinja names
10/17/2017 at 00:39

Autocheck comes back clean for what that’s worth. Does list it as a five owner car.

Looks nice, though a nearly 20 year old high performance European luxury car with 130k miles sounds like it could be expensive to keep running.

E90M3 > RCMF - is hungry for V10 Touaregs and long kinja names
10/17/2017 at 00:39

It’s an M car, nothing is cheap. I’ve learned that the hard way. Maybe, all the common faults are taken care of, but you want to be prepared for random expensive failures because M car.

RCMF - is hungry for V10 Touaregs and long kinja names > facw
10/17/2017 at 00:41

Thanks for letting me know. Yeah, maintenance is something I think I’ll just have to stomach. I’ve heard people with nightmare stories and others who’ve had no problems at all. Definitely a risk, though.

Powershiftmedia-ResidentDSMGuru > RCMF - is hungry for V10 Touaregs and long kinja names
10/17/2017 at 01:58

I’m very familiar with these, here’s things to look for as someone that’s worked in BMW land :)

1) OBC pixels that are dead, no big deal but it’s an eyesore.

2) VANOS failures are insanely expensive and intricate to fix

3) Tying into the VANOS issue is timing chains. They have a near 100% fail rate. ECS Tuning sells the kits, it’s a 40 hr procedure to do it.

4) Like any BMW in history, LCABs (lower control arm bushings) plan on fixing them

These are definitely robust cars. Make sure you aren’t hearing any metallic sounds or anything like that. If you do, bank on a very expensive repair.

RCMF - is hungry for V10 Touaregs and long kinja names > Powershiftmedia-ResidentDSMGuru
10/17/2017 at 02:25

Thanks for the info! Heard terrible things about VANOS on these guys, luckily the seller claims he had it replaced recently (though he says “upgraded,” so I’d still ask the question). Good to know about the timing chains.

diplodicus > RCMF - is hungry for V10 Touaregs and long kinja names
10/17/2017 at 08:11

I’d definitely ask for receipts, he’s either talking Dr.vanos or Beisan Systems. Dr.Vanos does the same thing as Beisan as far as I’m aware. You just have to do the work yourself for Beisan but Dr.vanos does a core swap and rebuilds your old ones to sell to someone else. http://www.beisansystems.com/procedures/s62_vanos_procedure.htm

diplodicus > RCMF - is hungry for V10 Touaregs and long kinja names
10/17/2017 at 08:24

I knew that looked familiar https://detroit.craigslist.org/okl/cto/d/2000-bmw-m5-e39-carbon-black/6325699890.html

His reserve is probably close to that asking price.

SnowShark > RCMF - is hungry for V10 Touaregs and long kinja names
10/17/2017 at 09:45

https://bringatrailer.com/listing/2003-bmw-m5-17/

Check this one out...All major E39 M5 repairs have been done & no reserve!

LOREM IPSUM > RCMF - is hungry for V10 Touaregs and long kinja names
10/17/2017 at 10:51

Nice price, all day long. That thing would probably sell for 15 grand here.