https://forum.e46fanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=739600&stc=1&thumb=1&d=1523757381

I'm at "200,000 Miles Check-In" with that mileage, 04-14-2018.

 

NICE! I had to put a post-it note on my gauge cluster to remind myself to hit the trip odometer reset button at 299,000 so I could capture the 999.9

and just before it rolled over I slowed down to 29mph for the photo, at 2:59PM.

In a couple hundred miles I'll see if I can try and catch 300300 300.00 at 3:00

 

Glad to see I'm not the only Wisconsin native to stick lots of $$$$ into an e46, my e36 isn't far behind lol.

 

"In a couple hundred miles I'll see if I can try and catch 300300 300.00 at 3:00"

I'm at 31xxxx, not sure what to catch, 325325 at 3:25...
'cause 333333 is a long wait

 

Yeah 333,333 definitely feels like a long way to go. 325325 would be fitting for a 325i or ci in your case.

 

Good post- appreciate the data.

I***8217;m at 192,000 and would love to take her to 300,000

 

In the nearly 8 years I've owned the car I've spent $10,100 on maintenance and repairs including oil changes, tires, cooling/fuel system replacement parts, suspension refreshes, etc..

Congrats! Less than $1,000 per year.

 

$10,100 / 8 years comes out to $1,262.25 per year actually. That's more than $1,000 per year not less.:shhh:

I've had this '02 E46 325i for 7 years and it runs perfectly. Put about $4k into it in the very beginning, basically blitzkrieged everything that I could surmise would potentially fail me right after I bought it off the original owner. Using intel gleaned from this forum of course. Mang The Merciless and jfoj being the most useful contributing members, many thanks to them both. Although I am at a measly 160k, I feel like I've driven the car to death during my ownership and remains the most faithful car I've ever had. Weird talking about a BMW being reliable and cheap. I haven't done anything but oil changes and washings/vacuumings to maintain the car since that first bit of bankroll.

 

Doh!

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk

 

I was on the fence about sticking more money into this car and fixing some of the issues it has vs driving it until something major breaks, then parting it out.

I decided to give it some love and fix it up. The E46 wagon I bought last year has been my current daily driver and will get parked for the winter. The eventual plan for that car is an S54 swap (separate thread for that car here)

So far I've got a few hundred bucks worth of parts into the sedan and it's about mid way through some much needed maintenance and restoration. The list of new parts so far:

-Differential output shaft seals
-Differential fluid and drain plug seals
-Brake pads & rotors front & rear
-Parking brake pads, springs, expanding locks, adjustment screws
-Rear disc brake dust shields
-Gear shift ball cup bushing and rubber mounts
-Used main driveshaft w/ new center support bearing & guibo
-FCABS (Meyle HD)
-Exhaust flange gaskets & copper nuts
-Fuel Filter
-Air intake filter
-Spark Plugs
-Oil filter and oil change

I also rebuilt a few things:

-Sand blasted and rebuilt calipers with new caliper seals, dust boots, bleed valves, guide pins, anti rattle clips, hardware, etc. Painted the calipers & brackets silver to look as close as possible to the factory plated finish.

-Repaired rust on rear suspension trailing arms, control arms, hubs, subframe, differential, etc. I wasn't going for perfection here, but wanted to at least slow the rust down on the chassis components before it turned into a structural issue.

-Drilled out sheared off exhaust flange studs and replaced with stainless nuts & bolts.

-Rebuilt my short shifter with new bushings and fresh grease.

I haven't been taking a lot of pics but here are a few in process of the rust removal and restoration. There was a lot of rust on the rear suspension and subframe so I decided to remove as much of it as possible with an air powered needle scaler and wire wheel. Then I brushed on some Permatex rust reformer, primed and painted semi gloss black.

I didn't get a true "before" pic that shows how bad the rust was but this was how it looked after a lot of time cleaning things up with needle scaler and a wire wheel.

Rust reformer applied https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000HBNX38/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Rust reformer cured

Mask, Prime, Paint

Unmasked:

Some of the new parts ready to install:

Currently I've got all the new parking brake parts installed, rear rotors, new drive shaft, shifter rebuilt, and a few other misc things done.

Now I just have to finish rebuilding the repainted calipers with new seals, reinstall the calipers and brackets, hook up the brake lines, torque all the rear driveshaft and differential bolts, reinstall the driveshaft heat shields, and reinstall the exhaust.

Then I can start working on the front of the car replacing the brakes, bleeding the brake lines, installing new FCABS, fuel filter, change the oil and air filters.

 

Nice. How did you mount the parking shoes without the backing plate?

 

The photos don't show the backing plates but I ordered brand new ones since mine were completely rusted out. I was able to remove the old ones without pulling off the hubs since they just about crumbled in my hands.

To install the new ones I didn't want to have to pull the hubs off and risk damaging the wheel bearings...

So to install the new backing plates I cut out a notch out so they fit behind the hubs. Here's how I modified them:

Amazon for the win on the new backing plates by the way:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07GJ83LLC/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

This set of chinese knockoffs was 28 bucks vs 90 for OEM. The amazon knockoffs were a perfect fit and everything lined up with my original plates (what was left of them). I usually don't go for aftermarket parts but in this case I figured it was worth a shot.

 

Congrats on the mileage! While I just picked up my first E46 about 6 weeks ago, a 330Ci Convertible (it went over 100,000 the week after I bought it), I have a 13-year old E90 with 383,000 miles. I bought the E90 new. The reason I mention the E90 is I too had to drill out the exhaust flange studs. I did what you did too, which was use stainless steel hardware. I just want to caution you that the stainless steel will not hold up over time. I had to remove my exhaust a few times soon after drilling and replacing the hardware, and the stainless steel, just snapped off. While stainless steel hardware is corrosion resistant, most of the hardware you can buy at the hardware store is actually as strong as plain old Grade 5 hardware; most common hardware is Grade 5. I recommend switching to Grade 8 hardware, or if you went metric, 10.9 hardware. It will be as corrosion resistant as stainless and about twice as strong.

 

Wow that is some impressive mileage you've put on the E90. Congrats on the E46 purchase too.

For the SS exhaust flange bolts I see where you're coming from in regards to strength. I think typical 18-8 stainless is somewhere between a grade 2 and grade 5. I went with 316 stainless from Bolt Depot which has about the same strength but is a little more corrosion resistant.

I considered 10.9 hardware as well but if it's just zinc plated it will still rust. I figured it was worth a shot to try the stainless. I'm not to concerned about it snapping while in use since SS is pretty ductile. If they do end up corroding and twisting off next time I remove them, worst case I can just replace the hardware with new. Drilling out the studs was a huge pain and took about an hour for each one with brand new HSS drill bits. Not sure why BMW didn't just go with nuts and bolts to begin with instead of studs.

 

Finished rebuilding my rear calipers last night. Previously I had masked off the cylinder bores, sand blasted, cleaned, primed, and painted them.

Here they are ready for new caliper pin guide boots, seals, and bleed valves:

Assembled:

Parking Brake pads installed on new backing plates:

Rotors installed:

Some of the other cleanup I did on the rear suspension and subframe

Rusty front brakes that will get redone next. This is what Zimmerman rotors look like after 146,000 miles / 5+ years of use.

 

Finished rebuilding my rear calipers last night. Previously I had masked off the cylinder bores, sand blasted, cleaned, primed, and painted them.

Here they are ready for new caliper pin guide boots, seals, and bleed valves:

Assembled:

Parking Brake pads installed on new backing plates:

Rotors installed:

Some of the other cleanup I did on the rear suspension and subframe

Rusty front brakes that will get redone next. This is what Zimmerman rotors look like after 146,000 miles / 5+ years of use.

Looks good keep up the good work. Your rear end is looking nice and sharp and clean. Made me feel like sharing my rear end work I’ve done 😂
💪 💪 💪

 

I never got around to posting some final completion pics of the rear brakes. This car is back on the road as my daily driver and I just hit 309,000 miles today. The front brakes have enough pad left that I should be able to make it until spring before swapping all of those parts. I'm also going to be replacing both front wheel bearings at that point since they are starting to get noisy. But anyway, rear brake pics:

And in case anyone is wondering, here is what 300,000 miles of highway driving and parking outside in the elements does to the paint on an E46 hood. I am pretty certain this hood was repainted before I bought the car, so this isn't the original factory paint. I've never seen a factory hood chipped this badly or have the clear coming off in sheets.

Last fall i was lucky enough to find a mint hood in the junk yard on this car. I didn't have a good way to transport it so I just unbolted the hood from my car at my house, drove to the salvage yard and installed the new hood in the parking lot.

 

What is the condition of your airbox and filters? Maybe there's a cavity or some sort of leak before the MAF sensor cause it to wear out prematurely.

I never got around to posting some final completion pics of the rear brakes. This car is back on the road as my daily driver and I just hit 309,000 miles today. The front brakes have enough pad left that I should be able to make it until spring before swapping all of those parts. I'm also going to be replacing both front wheel bearings at that point since they are starting to get noisy. But anyway, rear brake pics:

They look amazing. Great use of colors, it's simple yet very appealing. I went the rout of painting my calipers yellow instead of aluminum after blasting. My shocks are yellow as well. Good work mate.

 

I just did an oil change the other day at 312,000 miles which was also my first covered by FCP's lifetime warranty. Just got my refund a few minutes ago.

Return shipping for the used oil and filters was $30 FedEx ground. Not a bad price for 10 liters of Pentosin 5W30, oil filter, and air filter.

 

I'm confused about the FCP part? Are you saying you changed your oil and sent it back to FCP for a refund? Just call me stupid if I'm missing the obvious.

LOL, good idea about getting the hood! Driving with out yours to the junk yard..

 

A great source for hardware is McMaster-Carr (www.mcmaster.com).

 

Checking in at nearly 325,000 miles on the sedan.

I just replaced front wheel bearings which had become loud at highway speeds. Up next is new brake rotors and pads along with rebuilding the front brake calipers with new seals and pistons. I'm stripping the calipers and brackets down to be painted silver like I did for the rear brakes last fall.

After that I've got some new FCABs, spark plugs, and I'm due for an oil change again.

 

Well done, beautiful car!
I noticed you change oil every 10k miles or so? Based on my experience with high mileage engine you probably should consider shortiening intervals to 7k as max. If you do not have oil consumption problem yet it will eventually come to you, and Castrol oil isn't the last reason of it.

 

Thanks for the feedback, I've started reducing the interval between changes since I've been using FCP Euro's warranty program. It makes it quite a bit cheaper to do more frequent changes. I did the last one at around 8k miles and this next one will be closer to the 7k mark you were suggesting. I used to top up with a quart of oil at least once when I was doing 10-12k intervals. That seems somewhat typical of the M54 so I wasn't too concerned. The Pentosin 5W30 I've been using lately is LL01 approved and seems to be a good oil.

5W30 Pento High Performance Engine Oil (5 Liter) - Pentosin 8043206

5W30 Pento High Performance Engine Oil (5 Liter) - Pentosin 8043206

www.fcpeuro.com

I replaced the CCV system when I first got the car and that also seemed to help reduce oil consumption and some yellowish mayo I was seeing on the oil cap.

 

Slowly but surely I'm getting this sedan back together. I've replaced the FCABs and sway bar end links and the past few days I've spent working on brakes.

Instead of sand blasing the front calipers like i did on the rear brakes last fall, I tried soaking them in rust remover... with less than ideal results. I ended up buying some remanufactured calipers that were yellow zinc plated. I took those apart, painted the calipers and brackets silver, and rebuilt them with ATE seals, pins, and guides. The zinc plating should give me better corrosion protection than blasting the calipers myself and only having a paint top coat.

All that is left to do is torque the chassis reinforcement plate that I had removed to replace the FCABs, install a new set of spark plugs, and this thing will be back on the road.

 

Current mileage is 327,000 and I've been noticing some abnormal engine vibration when the car is stationary at idle. There were previously no issues for at least 1500 miles after I recently swapped in some new spark plugs (NGK BKR6EQUP) so I don't think it's ignition related. No check engine light or pending misfire codes.

The fuel filter was replaced 25,000 miles ago and there is no throttle hesitation, so I don't think it's fuel related either.

The vibration being transmitted into the car sounded like an exhaust leak at first but after checking under the car everything is tight and leak free. I mainly notice the sound inside the car and I can't really hear anything if I'm walking around the car while it's running.

I think I narrowed it down to blown engine mounts which are still original to the car. Even if that doesn't 100% solve the problem they are way overdue for replacement. I've currently got a set on order from FCPEuro... The standard non-M mounts (22116779970) are on clearance right now for 31.94 ea. The trans mounts were last replaced at 300,000 miles and those still looked good.

Hope the new engine mounts solve the problem. Has anyone else had similar symptoms with bad mounts?

 

great car doing well.
i changed my engine mounts 2017 with lemfolder (41.49 each fcpeuro) at 296753 miles. theres was no symptoms.

 

I just finished replacing the engine mounts and that seems to have solved the vibration problem I was having. The LH side mount was torn into pieces and the RH side was intact but compressed about 1/2" compared to the new mounts.

It was actually a much easier job that I was expecting. I gave myself plenty of room to work by removing the air filter housing, DISA, and upper intake hose on the LH side, and the SAP on the RH side. With those out of the way the upper nuts were easy to get to. I used a swivel U-Joint and a couple of long extensions. From below I removed the plastic front pan and aluminum reinforcement plate for easy access to the lower nuts.

From there you just have to jack up the engine from below one side at a time and swap out the mounts. To make sure I had enough clearance with the engine raised up I removed the cabin air filter housing and loosened up the electric radiator fan. When replacing the RH side mount the A/C compressor was up tight against the electrical module on the fan shroud and started to lift it up with the engine. I can see this job being a much bigger pain with an automatic transmission and engine mounted fan.

It took me about 2 1/2 hours total and that also included replacing a cracked fog light.

RH side top nut acces:

Old Mounts:

LH side top nut access:

Removed stuff:

Back Together:

 

slow down

 

I hit another milestone yesterday.

 

You're sick
Taking the time to calculate the exact moment to reset the trip counter so that the numbers align...... LOL

 

Yeah it takes a little planning to remember to hit the reset button. In this case I didn't have to be super precise since I basically had a mile long window to hit the button so the odometer would be at 333333 and wouldn't roll over a number while I was waiting for the tenths digit to catch up on the trip odometer.

The real sickness was timing it to happen at 3:33 while going 33mph

I was secretly hoping the stars would align and it would have been 33 degrees outside and I could have shown the temp instead of having to time it with the clock (since that can be faked). But it was only 27 deg outside.

 

Sick F&@k, In a good way.
Cheers.

 

Now that I'm thinking about it, I could have pushed the clutch in at the last second and revved it to 3300 RPM's to get the tach to match as well.

and I had just filled up the fuel tank, so I could have only topped it up to 1/3 full.

But I'm not a complete psychopath.

 

But I'm not a complete psychopath.

Takes my mind to an old Marx Brothers line between Groucho & Chicco:

C: "Oh my brother, he's a twice as a smart as I am."
G: "Oh a half-wit, eh?"