E39 M5 Questions
Discussion
Test drove an E39 M5 yesterday. Absolutely loved it and almost put down a deposit, but having done some more research on the web I'm a bit worried that it would cost me the earth to run. Used to have a TVR Cerbera, and don't want to go back to that sort of regular expense. Can anyone answer the following questions please?
What's the typical service interval? Read that typically between 6K and 10K miles, is this accurate?
How many green lights on when it's just been serviced?
Ignoring wear and tear items, what does a typical service cost at a BMW main dealer? Does it vary much by mileage? If I buy a recently serviced car with low 30K miles and do 12K pa miles in future what should I expect to pay over the next 2 years?
What's a typical cost for new brake pads and/or disks?
Does BMW warranty extension cost c £900 pa for a 2001 ish car? Can you get a full BMW warranty if the previous owner hasn't maintained the original warranty throughout?
Sorry for lots of questions, but if anyone can help it would be much appreciated.
Cheers
What's the typical service interval? Read that typically between 6K and 10K miles, is this accurate?
How many green lights on when it's just been serviced?
Ignoring wear and tear items, what does a typical service cost at a BMW main dealer? Does it vary much by mileage? If I buy a recently serviced car with low 30K miles and do 12K pa miles in future what should I expect to pay over the next 2 years?
What's a typical cost for new brake pads and/or disks?
Does BMW warranty extension cost c £900 pa for a 2001 ish car? Can you get a full BMW warranty if the previous owner hasn't maintained the original warranty throughout?
Sorry for lots of questions, but if anyone can help it would be much appreciated.
Cheers
Warranty cost is £970 and is an absolute must. This can only be renewed if not previously lapsed. Cant really comment on servicing, but I expect an Inspection 2 (incl. pads, discs, coolnt & brake fluid) to be circa £1500. Oil Service at £250-300, Inspection 1 at £600. MPG abt 15-20mpg.
johnp68 said:
What's the typical service interval? Read that typically between 6K and 10K miles, is this accurate?
How many green lights on when it's just been serviced?
Guessing 12/15k with normal UK driving. Five lights. Each seems to last just under 3k miles on my car.
Sorry don't know precise answers to the other info as I've only had the car six months.
DAZ
Hi again John. Thought you'd like it 
Service interval is based on fuel consumption, so is dependent on how hard the car is driven. It's now been 10k miles since my last service and i've still got 2 of the 5 lights green lights left. That has been a mixed bag of motorway, town and all out maximum attack! Gneeral concensus is 12k-15k intervals on average. Last oil service cost me £158.
Conventional wisdom is to have the renewable warranty. My car DOESN'T have one, as the last owner had let it lapse, and BMW will not under any circumstnaces allow renewal once it has lapsed. It costs around £1000 to renew and gives peace of mind. However, my car has had a new clutch & flywheel, and one bank of VANOS replaced at no cost at the discretion of the dealership despite the lack of warranty!
Have you checked out BM5W.co.uk? A wealth of info over there.................
Never going to be a cheap car to run. Heavy on tyres, brakes and fuel (my average is 22mph). But not that bad considering the performance.
If your buying from a stealer i would get them to print out any stored fault codes from the onboard system and to check out the VANOS and MAFS, as these are common issues that can really hit the performance of the car.
>> Edited by stuh on Sunday 4th December 13:40
Service interval is based on fuel consumption, so is dependent on how hard the car is driven. It's now been 10k miles since my last service and i've still got 2 of the 5 lights green lights left. That has been a mixed bag of motorway, town and all out maximum attack! Gneeral concensus is 12k-15k intervals on average. Last oil service cost me £158.
Conventional wisdom is to have the renewable warranty. My car DOESN'T have one, as the last owner had let it lapse, and BMW will not under any circumstnaces allow renewal once it has lapsed. It costs around £1000 to renew and gives peace of mind. However, my car has had a new clutch & flywheel, and one bank of VANOS replaced at no cost at the discretion of the dealership despite the lack of warranty!
Have you checked out BM5W.co.uk? A wealth of info over there.................
Never going to be a cheap car to run. Heavy on tyres, brakes and fuel (my average is 22mph). But not that bad considering the performance.
If your buying from a stealer i would get them to print out any stored fault codes from the onboard system and to check out the VANOS and MAFS, as these are common issues that can really hit the performance of the car.
>> Edited by stuh on Sunday 4th December 13:40
Thanks Guys. What determines whether a service is Oil/Insp 1 or Insp 2? Boxster was easy - eg 12K small service, 24K medium, 36K small, 48K big etc.
Spent a few hours last night searching for info. Came across BM5W.co.uk and had a look but there's so much there it's going to take a while to read it all! Don't get much time to do this with baby around now.
Just thought of another question. If I buy from a dealer is it still worth getting an RAC inspection done or is it a waste of money? I was impressed with the job that RAC did for the guy who bought my Boxster off me.
Spent a few hours last night searching for info. Came across BM5W.co.uk and had a look but there's so much there it's going to take a while to read it all! Don't get much time to do this with baby around now.
Just thought of another question. If I buy from a dealer is it still worth getting an RAC inspection done or is it a waste of money? I was impressed with the job that RAC did for the guy who bought my Boxster off me.
I would wonder about conventional wisdom as expressed above. The dealer service and warranty charges with these cars are very high considering it is actually a very easy car to maintain and very reliable. Had mine a year.
Its an understressed engine (relatively). Maf sensors are expensive but easy to change, and the gearbox is very very small and easy to remove with the clutches being fairly cheap at about £300. so to pay for a £1K warranty a year is all about the vanos.
Dealer charge for vanos is about £4K, indie charge is down to about £3K. Question is do you feel lucky.
With my car services are done properly and not skimped and £1K warranty plus £1K service costs a year go toward the possible vanos. However if my car goes another year it will have already paid for any vanos work?
Its an understressed engine (relatively). Maf sensors are expensive but easy to change, and the gearbox is very very small and easy to remove with the clutches being fairly cheap at about £300. so to pay for a £1K warranty a year is all about the vanos.
Dealer charge for vanos is about £4K, indie charge is down to about £3K. Question is do you feel lucky.
With my car services are done properly and not skimped and £1K warranty plus £1K service costs a year go toward the possible vanos. However if my car goes another year it will have already paid for any vanos work?
johnp68 said:Buy an E39 540 instead there about 10k cheaper and not much slower, there not called the torquemeister for nothing
Test drove an E39 M5 yesterday. Absolutely loved it and almost put down a deposit, but having done some more research on the web I'm a bit worried that it would cost me the earth to run. Used to have a TVR Cerbera, and don't want to go back to that sort of regular expense. Can anyone answer the following questions please?
What's the typical service interval? Read that typically between 6K and 10K miles, is this accurate?
How many green lights on when it's just been serviced?
Ignoring wear and tear items, what does a typical service cost at a BMW main dealer? Does it vary much by mileage? If I buy a recently serviced car with low 30K miles and do 12K pa miles in future what should I expect to pay over the next 2 years?
What's a typical cost for new brake pads and/or disks?
Does BMW warranty extension cost c £900 pa for a 2001 ish car? Can you get a full BMW warranty if the previous owner hasn't maintained the original warranty throughout?
Sorry for lots of questions, but if anyone can help it would be much appreciated.
Cheers
numbnuts said:
Buy an E39 540 instead there about 10k cheaper and not much slower, there not called the torquemeister for nothing
You are kidding right? 286BHP vs 400BHP? Hardly a contest is it? I mean thats 1/3 more power again and a chassis setup to match. The 540i is quick (in manual form) but it aint no M5.....
off_again said:
Buy an E39 540 instead there about 10k cheaper and not much slower, there not called the torquemeister for nothing
You are kidding right? 286BHP vs 400BHP? Hardly a contest is it? I mean thats 1/3 more power again and a chassis setup to match. The 540i is quick (in manual form) but it aint no M5.....
Nope I'd second that, I drove both when looking for the M5. I would say just from the drive the 540 is pretty much down on torque as well. Probably similar to if the sport button is off in the M5 so its pushing out 300bhp, but pressing the sport button in the M5 is quite a dramatic change in suspension, power torque and steering.
800 said:
Have been lurking on the E39 M5 stuff for a while. I'm very tempted as they are such great value at the moment.
However, I'm pretty appalled by the running costs discussed here. Makes the 996 and the XJR like running a Micra in comparison.
Still tempted of course
I think you'll find a Jag interesting to maintain if things go awry.
Julian64 said:
Buy an E39 540 instead there about 10k cheaper and not much slower, there not called the torquemeister for nothing
You are kidding right? 286BHP vs 400BHP? Hardly a contest is it? I mean thats 1/3 more power again and a chassis setup to match. The 540i is quick (in manual form) but it aint no M5.....
Nope I'd second that, I drove both when looking for the M5. I would say just from the drive the 540 is pretty much down on torque as well. Probably similar to if the sport button is off in the M5 so its pushing out 300bhp, but pressing the sport button in the M5 is quite a dramatic change in suspension, power torque and steering.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the sport button in the E39 M5 only quickens throttle response and "stiffens" the steering - it doesn't "boost" engine power, nor does it change the suspension settings ......
derestrictor said:
Have been lurking on the E39 M5 stuff for a while. I'm very tempted as they are such great value at the moment.
However, I'm pretty appalled by the running costs discussed here. Makes the 996 and the XJR like running a Micra in comparison.
Still tempted of course
I think you'll find a Jag interesting to maintain if things go awry.
Er, no. Ran an XJR for a couple of years. £1000 for the warranty (for timing chain tensioner issues, a bit like M5 VANOS issue). Servicing at 12K miles was £250. Other than that, the only thing it had an appetite for was tyres
Oh, and Optimax at 18mpg I said if things go wrong.
My local Jag dealer charges £100/hour versus £90 from the Munchengladbachs.
Touching a large slab of Endorian bark and batteries aside (
) my M5 hasn't ballsed up once.
I'm sure the later Jags are fine but the ones I ran were little short of mechanical Chihuahua.
Toodle pip.
My local Jag dealer charges £100/hour versus £90 from the Munchengladbachs.
Touching a large slab of Endorian bark and batteries aside (
) my M5 hasn't ballsed up once. I'm sure the later Jags are fine but the ones I ran were little short of mechanical Chihuahua.
Toodle pip.
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