Bruce's 540 M-Sport

[BCS_ZHP]

A long overdue thread considering I've had the car a month as of today. I'll try to be more diligent from hereout.

Before it left NY, had Gary's mechanic do some things to it: belts, idler pulley, starter, spark plugs, valve cover gaskets, both P/S lines, rear ball joints, oil separator hose, PCV (under the intake manifold), and intake manifold gasket set. I probably could have gotten away with just the belts but "The Little Speed Shop" in Rochester charges half the labor rate as Virginia, plus they gave me a huge reduction on labor for each item (e.g., valve cover gaskets is normally 2 hours per side, they charged me 3 hours total and the intake manifold is normally 5.5 hours, they charged me 3 hours).

Here's some pics of the day after I bought it:

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[Newjack]

Dangit Bruce, this car makes me jealous I tell you what.


Edit: I like the mods so far. They make the car look so much better and require almost no time or effort to swap out. I'm excited to see where this goes.

[BCS_ZHP]

First week made a couple of small cosmetic changes -- upgraded AEs, ZHP shift knob, black kidneys.

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[GMATT]

Dang Bruce, just a couple of small changes and the car looks great! Do I see a custom plate?

Gary

[BCS_ZHP]

June 20th, coming home from the airport and snapped the upper radiator hose, luckily caught it immediately and no damage to the engine. Had the car towed to my house and replaced the hose the following day but couldn't get all the air out of the system so parked it. Then went on a 9 day annual family beach vacation. Too much time to think about it, I ordered a cooling system refresh kit while sitting on the beach - water pump, lower hose, thermostat, and temp sensor. I knew the radiator and expansion tank had been replaced during 2011, the previous owner told me that. Got access to the BMW repair website and found out the radiator and expansion tank were replaced in Dec 2011, so only 6 months old.

Came home from the beach and was all ready to start this project but we had a little storm on Friday, June 29th while we were gone and had a couple of days of tree debris clean-up to tackle. Then a little thing called work got in the way.

Finally last Friday, July 6th, went to a friend's shop for the cooling system refresh. He's a master BMW tech, gave me access to a lift and gave me some instructions, then he disappeared to start detailing a customer's car. I arrived after 7 pm, pointed a fan at the engine to help it cool down and worked on some other things. Started about 9:30 at night, he checked on me occasionally, gave me some tips and advice throughout, finally took it out for the test ride around 2:30 am. No leaks, no lights, no overheating, and even tested it Saturday when temps were 105 degrees. Cleaned up his garage and helped him out a bit, didn't arrive home until 4:30. I'm a bit old for an all-nighter like that but was so pumped knowing the cooling system is fresh that I couldn't sleep when I got home, took the car out for a little romp on my favorite road.

[BCS_ZHP]

Gary, Yes custom license plate came while we were on vacation, its the one mod I installed before tackling those silly downed trees.

[BCS_ZHP]

And when you have time to recharge your batteries at the beach, make sure you don't have Ray's number in your cellphone. JK. I texted Ray and ordered new brakes too -- slotted & drilled rotors, pads, SS lines, sensors, and new fluid. I got to all of that one night last week, or maybe it was on the 4th when I didn't have to work. Anyway, the previous front end shimmy I had is gone and the car has great stopping power now.

And while I had it all apart, sanded the calipers a bit and repainted them silver. Everyone who has seen it thinks I put new calipers on too.

I'm dilinquent here, I'll snap a photo and add it. Ray (Smilez) is the man on brakes, haven't found anyone to beat his prices and his product is pure quality. Even my BMW tech friend was envious of the set up last Friday. The set up I ordered was StopTech brand, the pads have a super bite but also lots of dust because of it. I may end up swapping over to ceramic pads but for now I'll have to wait as momma is starting to track my spending.

[BCS_ZHP]

Today, July 8th, for her one month celebration in VA, spent the day claying her and doing a Zymol wax job. She looks real purdy but all of the front road rash now stands out because most of the other blemishes were eliminated today.

A couple of pics:

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[Beau B]

Great looking car, I would love to find one in White one day..

Beau

[BCS_ZHP]

Beau,
There is a white one at that highline BMW guy in Ohio, believe it was white with tan and about 60K miles. But get ready to shell out a lot of moola as he wants close to $30K for it.

[ryankokesh]

that is reeeeeeeeeeally nice.

[johnrando]

Looking great Bruce!

[danewilson77]

Very nice acquisition.

[BCS_ZHP]

Dangit Bruce, this car makes me jealous I tell you what.


Edit: I like the mods so far. They make the car look so much better and require almost no time or effort to swap out. I'm excited to see where this goes.

Rob - Kensington isn't that far from Fairfax Station, give me a call one weekend and come take it out for a spin. If you like the look, the V8 torque will make you drool. But as Gary pointed out, it's nowhere near as nimble as a ZHP.

[GSEN820]

Damn your new DD is awesome.

[Smilez]

looks really good bruce. With a baby coming along i been thinking of trading my 325i for a 5series. but i can't see myself letting her go haha.
Planning to tint your windows?

[BCS_ZHP]

Ray - she's at the tint shop this morning, going 35% all around, I'll get some pics posted afterwards.

[cannan]

Looking good!! I know how you feel about the front end road rash. I spent most of the day Tuesday and Wednesday of last week doing a much needed paint correction on my car and now I want to get the front bumper and hood repainted because the road rash stand out so much now.

[BCS_ZHP]

Boy I owe some pics, this is a place holder/reminder.
1. brake job including painting the calipers
2. Tinted windows
3. Wet sanding the hood & 3 stage this weekend to remove road rash

Just got back from wet sanding the hood at 3:30 am, will post pics when I wake up.

[BCS_ZHP]

Brake job, SS lines, S&D rotors with StopTech pads initially and a couple weeks later I switched to ceramic pads cause I hated the dust. All parts courtesy of Ray (Smilez), standard silver caliper paint you get from Advance Auto or Auto Zone. Sorry for the crappy pics.

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[BCS_ZHP]

And here's the tint job before & after, went with 35% all around and its perfect. First 2 are factory, next 3 are after tinting (kind of hard to tell in the bright sunshine).

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[Newjack]

Love the progress Bruce! Keep up the good work. :thumbsup

[BCS_ZHP]

And the paint correction detailing, not sure if this is going to show up on pictures but the car's paint looks wet.

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Notice how clear the clouds are reflected in the hood. The crepe myrtle trees reflected in the hood are on the other side of our Denali which is parked next to my car, so a good 10+ feet away and the blooms are crystal clear in my hood.

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Neighbor's house across the street 100+ yds away and then reflected in my paint.

The paint is so smooth and scratch/swirl free it readily shows the factory orange peel in the paint, refreshing to see that these cars weren't perfect.

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[JupiterBMW]

Beautiful car Bruce! The mods all look really good so far too. Well done!

[BCS_ZHP]

7 hours Fri night + 26 hours Sat/Sun last weekend on the paint correction, detailing, waxing process, I'm still numb to it after a week but the end result was fantastic. Have driven over 700 miles since last weekend, one quick wash and it still looks great!

[Johnmadd]

Looks awesome Bruce!

In the picture in your garage with the tires stacked up, the rear rotor has rust and the front doesn't, is that a pic in progress of changing them?

[BCS_ZHP]

No, had just washed them and got that post-wash surface rust on the rotors. I drifted down the driveway with my foot on the brake which cleared the fronts but not enough pressure to clear the rear rotors. First time you press the brakes hard it goes away. Also the 90+% humidity (I heard Marcus loves humidity) we have helps keep that surface rust around for awhile.

[Johnmadd]

Cool, just making sure you didn't have a brake issue you may have not noticed.

[BCS_ZHP]

No brake issues, took her out for a spirited ride last night, you'll experience my favorite route in October. Did about 15 minutes in some twisty roads, parked her in the garage and the brakes smelled beautiful, I broke out a chair and sat in the garage with her just listening to the car as it made those neat metallic sounds of the brakes cooling down. Oh, and all rotors were beautifully shiny.

[Johnmadd]

^hehe, I love those sounds too, it means you just drove your car like it was meant to be driven. I wanna line up right behind you on "your" road. :)

[BCS_ZHP]

Just finished replacing the timing chain tensioner, external mount so only a 15-20 minute job. But dropped a 3/8" drive short 10mm socket down there somewhere and had to tear the front right underneath apart to find it. Had the belly pan, pork chop, brake ducting, and half the bumper off, about a 2 hour job. Also found a 1/4" drive 8mm short socket that I lost a couple of weeks ago when changing turn signal lights. Now if I can just remember where that 7mm deep wall socket went walking, don't even remember which car I used a 7mm on, it's been missing a couple of weeks. Or maybe it wasn't even me, my son and his cruising buddies like my garage because of the tools, come home from work some nights and find cars in the garage in various stages of disassembly. Happy that they're proactive and learning but I end up having to lend a hand on reassembly about half the time.

Also replaced the hazard light/central lock switch on the TIAG this morning. Botond's euro-flash s/w update is back and working perfectly.

[illirep]

Since you linked it, I'm bumping it. Why on earth did you sell this car?

I've had these on my search list for year now and have not found one worth buying!

[BCS_ZHP]

Timing - 1st son went off to college and left his TIAG ZHP coupe, wife had her ZHP vert, had my graphite ZHP plus this M-Sport, family hauler was the Denali in the background. 5 cars for 2 full time drivers was a bit much so sold this & the Denali in order to buy the x5, also sold my son's TIAG.

[Smilez]

:hi:

[illirep]

Gotcha - man this was a gorgeous car. If I recall, the buyer eventually sold it, not too long ago, but I didn't get the sense of this car's true stunning condition from his listing. If I had seen this back then, I would have been all over it.