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Don't buy a BMW?

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GoodRevrnd said:
I thought I'd retire my e39 from daily driving by now, but I pretty much hate every alternative.
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+1

E39 and E46 are, by far, my favorite BMW's. I just loved the way they drove. I've been eyeballing F22 2 series for a bit now and might jump back in. I will have to actively ignore my own memories of how often my BMW's were in the shop and focus on how excellent they were at carving a back road.

It couldn't be any worse than NS1 and his mini right?
 
monkeydelmagico said:
+1

E39 and E46 are, by far, my favorite BMW's. I just loved the way they drove. I've been eyeballing F22 2 series for a bit now and might jump back in. I will have to actively ignore my own memories of how often my BMW's were in the shop and focus on how excellent they were at carving a back road.

It couldn't be any worse than NS1 and his mini right?
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I think you will be pleasantly surprised by late model BMW reliability. The F22 is their most reliable model (according to CR).
 
monkeydelmagico said:
It couldn't be any worse than NS1 and his mini right?
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did 50 miles in 59 minutes through the canyons yesterday during rush hour. suck that LA traffic.

check engine light hasn't been on in 2 weeks. I highly suggest people do not get a Mini unless they have a quality Mini mechanic near them and a decent slush fund. Luckily, my Mini mechanic is within the 100 mile AAA premier tow range.
 
TridenT said:
I still stand by the fact that you shouldn't buy a BMW.

I don't care what rankings are saying about them. It's total BS. Consumer Reports listed them as #5 in reliability. There is NO WAY that they are #5. HOW IS HONDA BELOW THEM?

The number of things that go wrong on these cars is insane! I'm not talking small little things like you gotta replace bulbs (although those happen plenty), it's more like major massive failures like your water pump goes bad and that costs $500+ (THAT IS FOR CHEAP PARTS ONLINE AND NO LABOR). Your charge pipe blows off and you have to buy aftermarket (because OEM will explode again) AND you gotta get towed. AND THEN you have other massive issues like your drive shaft support bearings going bad, the flex disc, your actual drive shaft, the differential... etc etc etc. Big coolant leaks, and big oil leaks that are very difficult to fix. Try replacing the oil pan gasket. Gotta lift the engine for that one!

The amount of LARGE and COSTLY failures on this car is huge. Maybe Honda just has a lot of little things like bulbs and stuff not working that knocks them so much. I don't really get it.

At this point, buying a Prius and a literbike sounds like a better way to go. :|
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Honda has a big issue on their V6 engine. Cylinder seal failure leading to plug fouling and knocking since plugs would not fire. Needs to crack engine open and replace 1-3 cylinder seals plus clean up the whole mess.

Two day job. Hopefully they stopped cheapening out on seals.

So basically every single car I have ever bought have big issues...
Maybe I should stop buying cars...
 
Ns1 said:
did 50 miles in 59 minutes through the canyons yesterday during rush hour. suck that LA traffic.

check engine light hasn't been on in 2 weeks. I highly suggest people do not get a Mini unless they have a quality Mini mechanic near them and a decent slush fund. Luckily, my Mini mechanic is within the 100 mile AAA premier tow range.
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I read about your mini on another thread, not that I am interested in a mini. Just can't believe the patience you have with that car.
 
eng2d2 said:
I read about your mini on another thread, not that I am interested in a mini. Just can't believe the patience you have with that car.
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I can only speak for my situation - I drive the shit out of that thing for 400 miles every week and every mile that it works is a smile.

The biggest smile I had this week was when a Porsche left me in the dust yesterday morning. Soo nice to see people driving expensive sports cars the way they should.
 
monkeydelmagico said:
+1

E39 and E46 are, by far, my favorite BMW's. I just loved the way they drove. I've been eyeballing F22 2 series for a bit now and might jump back in. I will have to actively ignore my own memories of how often my BMW's were in the shop and focus on how excellent they were at carving a back road.

It couldn't be any worse than NS1 and his mini right?
Click to expand...
I read a forum for a while that filtered the s-word as "E36 M3."
 
monkeydelmagico said:
+1

E39 and E46 are, by far, my favorite BMW's. I just loved the way they drove. I've been eyeballing F22 2 series for a bit now and might jump back in. I will have to actively ignore my own memories of how often my BMW's were in the shop and focus on how excellent they were at carving a back road.

It couldn't be any worse than NS1 and his mini right?
Click to expand...
I wanted to buy an M2 but then felt what we got was pretty lazy for an M car. I was especially disappointed by the weight. Maybe I should just look at it like a modern e46. Revisit at LCI.
 
my last car was a BMW. granted i only had it for slightly over 4 years but i never had a problem with it.

you have an N54 based DCT car so maybe thats a bit more of issues. but the most reliable BMWs seems to be the less expensive ones from what i've seen. like a 320i is not an unreliable car.

Personally I've had 3 german cars all new. One was really bad because of an engine defect (an audi). Other two have never had a problem. And well they are fun to drive, and honestly not any more expensive than say a lexus. And a lexus from having driven a few just feels like its missing a soul (i havent driven an LC500 or LFA or any of those lexuses).

So hey if you like driving i think its worth the money.
 
hans007 said:
my last car was a BMW. granted i only had it for slightly over 4 years but i never had a problem with it.

you have an N54 based DCT car so maybe thats a bit more of issues. but the most reliable BMWs seems to be the less expensive ones from what i've seen. like a 320i is not an unreliable car.

Personally I've had 3 german cars all new. One was really bad because of an engine defect (an audi). Other two have never had a problem. And well they are fun to drive, and honestly not any more expensive than say a lexus. And a lexus from having driven a few just feels like its missing a soul (i havent driven an LC500 or LFA or any of those lexuses).

So hey if you like driving i think its worth the money.
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Not sure who exactly you're replying too, but OP's is an N55 and the DCT is solid until you go past 400whp-ish at which point the clutch starts slipping.
 
The issue with the DCT isn't that it can't handle power, it's that it's dog-crap. It's absolutely unreliable in city driving. If you're flooring it around the canyons and never getting below 20mph, it's pretty good. It shifts pretty quickly and behaves modestly. The big issue is that it struggles with anything related to 1st gear. 1st gear is by far the most difficult part of this car. It shouldn't be so bad but it is. It will NOT downshift into 1st gear most of the time. I can click down a thousand times and it'll refuse. (This is well below redline) Trying to engage in first rarely works the way you hope. A camry would win a 0-60 contest with this car. The first 2-3 times the car tries to move, it'll miss the shift or it'll detect wheel slippage and then gut power... causing it to miss the shift (it'll disengage because otherwise the car would stall). It'll do that 2-3 times before it moves more than 10ft. By which time, you've gotten t-boned by an SUV because you moved out into traffic and are stuck.

Only way I've gotten around this a little is by pushing past the kickdown switch. Which is abhorrent because then the car is basically uncontrollable. It will fiddle left and right in whichever way and slip the wheels like crazy.

It's just a shitty car sometimes. I probably would've gone with a manual transmission if I had known it would be this bad. When I was test driving the car, it was bad and I was like, "wow, this is shit in city driving." I didn't think it would matter too much but a lot of my driving is... in the city. :|
 
LOLWUT?

I don't know what you're doing wrong, but if you're missing shifts, you're doing something wrong. The only time it stops you from downshifting is to prevent over-reving. If you've had the car this long and still can't figure out your shift points, you really should go back to a Civic. Or a bicycle.

You're also doing something wrong if you're "slipping like crazy" on PSS's.
 
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I'm pretty sure unless you're coasting to a stop (<10mph), you're not supposed to try to downshift into first gear unless you want to destroy your transmission.
 
snoopy7548 said:
I'm pretty sure unless you're coasting to a stop (<10mph), you're not supposed to try to downshift into first gear unless you want to destroy your transmission.
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On any manual transmission I've driven, including my BMWs, even 10 mph is too fast without double clutching the downshift. No idea why TridentBoy thinks a manual would solve that "problem". I am also not really sure why you'd want to downshift into first in the first place.
 
XavierMace said:
LOLWUT?

I don't know what you're doing wrong, but if you're missing shifts, you're doing something wrong. The only time it stops you from downshifting is to prevent over-reving. If you've had the car this long and still can't figure out your shift points, you really should go back to a Civic. Or a bicycle.

You're also doing something wrong if you're "slipping like crazy" on PSS's.
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I don't think you get what missing shifts really means. It's a well documented problem with the car. Many people have these issues.
 
TridenT said:
I don't think you get what missing shifts really means. It's a well documented problem with the car. Many people have these issues.
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Then perhaps you should provide a reference to the "many people" who have these issues. Because i can't find any reports of people being unable to take off from a stop normally nor have I experienced any issues. I've done no shortage of hard launches in my car and never experienced what you're describing. Nor have I had any issues with normal in traffic driving.
 
repoman0 said:
On any manual transmission I've driven, including my BMWs, even 10 mph is too fast without double clutching the downshift. No idea why TridentBoy thinks a manual would solve that "problem". I am also not really sure why you'd want to downshift into first in the first place.
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Yeah, I stand corrected. On my drive home from work I realized you never really downshift into first unless you've already stopped.
 
XavierMace said:
Then perhaps you should provide a reference to the "many people" who have these issues. Because i can't find any reports of people being unable to take off from a stop normally nor have I experienced any issues. I've done no shortage of hard launches in my car and never experienced what you're describing. Nor have I had any issues with normal in traffic driving.
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http://www.1addicts.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1402323

One guy was able to get his potentially solved after going to a dealer for an inordinate amount of time. Do you think I'll have the same (mis)fortune as them? I've even called around to dealers around here but most just say, "Yeah, no idea how much it'll cost. You'd have to leave the car here and we'd bill you an hourly rate. It can take a whole day to do software updates and tweaks." And that *might* fix it. Not even guaranteed. That guy had some kind of warranty or lemon law come into effect.

:|

http://www.1addicts.com/forums/showthread.php?t=943387

Another with the exact problems I've had... many people have this issue.

Here is a review even stating the exact same issue: https://youtu.be/TKqHQ_PvlXM?t=6m40s This is a MAINSTREAM REVIEW. $150k car

I've basically been completely turned off by BMW DCTs. They're HORRIBLE.

If you can't find a person saying BMW DCTs are horseshit, you're running blind and know nothing about these cars.
 
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TridenT said:
you're running blind and know nothing about these cars.
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You're one to talk. This entire thread is pretty much a monument to you knowing nothing about your car. In this particular case, it sounds to me like your car never had the SIB done. You'll not in the threads you linked to, there's plenty of people reporting no issues with their DCT's. I haven't had any issues with mine either.
 
snoopy7548 said:
So why did you buy one? 😀
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These threads didn't gain the same traction until after I bought the car. Even then, I thought that it was solvable with the update. I thought I could go to a dealer for a few hundred dollars and it'd be all fine. Turns out it isn't that simple and most people at the dealers I've talked to here have no idea what I'm talking about when it comes to these updates or the symptoms. 🙁
 
TridenT said:
These threads didn't gain the same traction until after I bought the car. Even then, I thought that it was solvable with the update. I thought I could go to a dealer for a few hundred dollars and it'd be all fine. Turns out it isn't that simple and most people at the dealers I've talked to here have no idea what I'm talking about when it comes to these updates or the symptoms. 🙁
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So...you're saying that BMW doesn't know shit about BMWs?
 
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