My E90 BMW 330i

[PranK]

Hi All,

This is going to be my restoration thread. It might turn into a build thread in the future if I get the car to a good place where I can start upgrading and not fixing.

Last week I picked up my E90 330i with only 50,000k's on it. I'm totally in love with it but there are a number of things that need my attention.

I haven't got many pics yet.

 

The body and mechanical are immaculate. It has a solid service history from BMW and its only bits and pieces causing me grief.

Here is my current list of things to fix;

• The seal/trim around the rear window has disintegrated
• The same around the windscreen also
• Both front door seals are falling apart
• The rear passenger window won't go up when put the whole way down - looks to be catching on something and triggering the anti-pinch
• Bluetooth not working (MULF) - i have bought a BT interface to use in the interim
• Headlight washers don't go the whole way in and the passenger fell out when I was looking at them the other day. I'm scared to use them in case it falls out on the road. 
• Drivers side cup holder does not come out without some persuasion. 
• Boot struts are gone (have already ordered new ones after almost being killed by my boot)
• The electric rear sunshade has broken in one of the arms. It looks like a big inflatable person when I put it up, limbs everywhere

When I'm happy with those being fixed I'm going to consider;

• Wheels. Some M-Sport ones maybe. Mine are ok but a bit too tucked for my liking and I don't want to use spacers
• New sport front seats. The current seats are in great nic and do a good job but lacking a little in support.
• Something with iDrive. The screen is pretty nice but it does bugger all. Maybe an after market reverse cam or even a new interface or something.

I believe the car was not used by passengers, or at least not regularly. The only floor mat missing from the car is the drivers one and the others look mint. The passenger seat was super hard like it hadn't been used and theres no evidence of the rear seats having much use either. This meant that the passenger seat belt was putrid with mould. It took lots of hot water, car wash and vinegar to get it looking presentable.

The pics don't do it justice. It was thick enough to stop the belt bending properly.

[PranK]

Its worth noting that the car is so nice to drive! 50:50 weight split and that brilliant 3L 6 with a relatively good box makes for some really nice squirts here and there. 

I'd always wanted a BMW and I probably would have liked one newer than this if I'm honest but with the k's and the condition of it with that service history it was hard to look beyond.

[PranK]

Oh, another one for the list;

• New angel eye bulbs. They're a little lopsided and very brown in colour.

[KiwiRS4T]

3 hours ago, PranK said:

 

• Headlight washers don't go the whole way in and the passenger fell out when I was looking at them the other day. I'm

Who was the passenger? Relative or just a random friend?

[PranK]

Who was the passenger? Relative or just a random friend?

They deserved it. That's all you need to know.

[GeeDog]

Nice. I've got an E92 335i and love driving it. One of my headlight washers doesn't retract properly sometimes - haven't tried to fix it yet. 

[WantGTR]

welcome to BMW life! i just got out of it. Invest in a odbii reader and buy the Torque app if you can. Very handy when you are fault finding.

Sweet ride by the way.

[niZmO_Man]

Nice buy. Did you get rid of the VW?

[Dose Pipe Sutututu]

yummy...

VWs suck, DSG boxes fall out and cam chains/tensioners fail, not to mention the odd cam shaft snapping!!!!

[PranK]

Thanks all.

Yep got the torque app tho my OBD2 reader died so new one is en route.

1 hour ago, niZmO_Man said:

Nice buy. Did you get rid of the VW?

I still have it. I still love it. It will be sold, likely in parts.

53 minutes ago, Dose Pipe Sutututu said:

yummy...

VWs suck, DSG boxes fall out and cam chains/tensioners fail, not to mention the odd cam shaft snapping!!!!

Yeah mine was a proper VW. Mk4 4Motion with 6 speed. Love it to death but she's had a hard life and I'm not sure she has much left in her. 

I decided to pre-empt her imminent failure so I wasn't stuck.

[GeeDog]

2 hours ago, WantGTR said:

Invest in a odbii reader and buy the Torque app if you can

The Carly app & a suitable OBD adaptor are probably better value - there is a shit-load of things that can be re-coded on these cars. 

[PranK]

10 minutes ago, GeeDog said:

The Carly app & a suitable OBD adaptor are probably better value - there is a shit-load of things that can be re-coded on these cars. 

I did look at Carly. The full version app is $80 though - do you reckon its worth it?

[Leroy Peterson]

Cool! I love hearing about euros that are falling to pieces and this thread makes me happy because it's clearly been not looked after and you're doing a solid effort to bring it back to glory

How the hell do you get seat belts looking like that??
What year is the car?
Why isn't pod filter on the mods list? This is SAU ffs
Also what's your budget for wheels? I'll keep an eye out on Yahoo Auctions

[PranK]

3 minutes ago, Leroy Peterson said:

Cool! I love hearing about euros that are falling to pieces and this thread makes me happy because it's clearly been not looked after and you're doing a solid effort to bring it back to glory

 

Yeah agreed. They actually can be good solid cars if looked after. This ones great cause the expensive stuff seems ok.  

3 minutes ago, Leroy Peterson said:

How the hell do you get seat belts looking like that??
What year is the car?
Why isn't pod filter on the mods list? This is SAU ffs
Also what's your budget for wheels? I'll keep an eye out on Yahoo Auctions

2

Yeah, the seatbelt was so gross, poor kids had to use it until I cleaned it. I thought their fingers would burn off.

Car is an 06.

Haha, yeah was going to use some PVC pipe and have a CAI behind the grille.

I don't have a budget atm, gotta fix the other bits first. Please send through anything interesting though. 

Thanks

 

[PranK]

I've started researching non-BMW iDrive replacements.

This looks awesome!

https://avinusa.com/8-8-bmw-3-series-e90-e91-e92-e93-android-multimedia-navigation-system.html

 

[GeeDog]

4 hours ago, PranK said:

I did look at Carly. The full version app is $80 though - do you reckon its worth it?

I didn't think it was that much. My son has it on his phone (for his car), and I paid for an upgrade so he could code a new battery for me. Pretty sure the upgrade was less than $20, but not sure how much he had already paid. 

I've changed quite a few things, including lighting when unlocking & locking, digital speed display on the dash, new battery, getting rid of the nav disclaimer, seat-belt handovers (you won't have these) etc, and have a few other things to change when I see him.

I assume you have the CCC idrive. Mine is a bit newer so has CIC which is a fair bit better.

[PranK]

5 minutes ago, GeeDog said:

I didn't think it was that much. My son has it on his phone (for his car), and I paid for an upgrade so he could code a new battery for me. Pretty sure the upgrade was less than $20, but not sure how much he had already paid. 

I've changed quite a few things, including lighting when unlocking & locking, digital speed display on the dash, new battery, getting rid of the nav disclaimer, seat-belt handovers (you won't have these) etc, and have a few other things to change when I see him.

I assume you have the CCC idrive. Mine is a bit newer so has CIC which is a fair bit better.

Yep, I have the CCC which is why I think a better option would be to just replace the whole system with an Android one.

This is the Carly app I found, its $75. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.iViNi.bmwhatFull&hl=en

I'm more than willing to pay for it as it does look really good. Just hard to pay that much for an app that has no trial period. The 'Lite' only has code checks. 

Maybe yours is different?

[GeeDog]

3 hours ago, PranK said:

Maybe yours is different?

I'll find out for you when I see my son - probably tomorrow.

[PranK]

Thanks!

[GeeDog]

51 minutes ago, PranK said:

Thanks!

Just spoke to him, and he said that somewhere around $75 rings a bell. He bought it a few years ago. I paid an extra $20 or so to get the battery coding module a few months ago. He also bought the OBD adaptor from Carly.