Not going to lie....My favourite cars are BMW's but i just can't afford it :-(

BMW's services are not set at 25K kms, they are driver dependent. I've had 5 BMWs and never reached that distance between services, lowest was 17K Kim's on a E46 328i ..... Lowest my dealer had ever seen .....

South Africa has a similar climate to Australia, with more extreme temps, summer heat to 50degrees C in places and winter temps of lower than -10degrees C.

Problem is not the schedule, it's the requirements of the later 6cylinder engines needing really good oil or the Vanos packs up within 100K kms and it does that even in Germany. Blame the previous owners.... I had an E36 M3 for 160K kms with no issues due to regular full
synthetic oil changes.

Agree with sharkie however engine oil in particular non synthetic progressively breaks down more rapidly if the car does short trips and the engine is allowed to cool down. BMW were on to this in the early 1980's when the first installed service indicator lights to their cars which used to monitor the number of cold starts and time engine spent doing over 4000 rpm

My BMW E36 M3 ran rubbish on fully synthetic....The best oil i found and was advised to use by my german friend was the oil that BMW put in at the factory....which is Fuch's mineral oil. It ran like a dream after that. I changed the oil every 6500 km's...so you are correct about the non synthetic breaking down more rapidly....but it was very good....

I have been lucky enough to do the 'BMW Experiance' at the Spartanburg, South Carolina back in December 2010. For $100USD I got access to the BMW museum onsite, a tour of the X5 and X6 production line (which is the same production line, builds all models of both vehicles including the M spec models, and builds all the X vehicle for the would wide market... The X3 production line was just gearing up for this at the time of my visit), then we headed over to the BMW test track to thrash around high end vehicles... On both dirt and bitumen surfaces... For the dirt track, I took a X5 3L diesel (there was a 50cm deep fording pit), then on the bitumen I took out an X5M, 750I, 550I, and Z4... All great cars, but the X5M was the most fun surprisingly enough...

What topped it off though was paying the extra $30 and getting one of their driving instructors to take me out in an M5, and just wring its neck!! I will admit to laughing my ass off, and having a ball!! Best $130 I have ever spent, and I have the pics and videos to back it all up!!

My dream car is an E30 M3, and one day I'll have one!!

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Originally Posted by Acko1991

My BMW E36 M3 ran rubbish on fully synthetic....The best oil i found and was advised to use by my german friend was the oil that BMW put in at the factory....which is Fuch's mineral oil. It ran like a dream after that. I changed the oil every 6500 km's...so you are correct about the non synthetic breaking down more rapidly....but it was very good....

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eeek, I've got my E36 320i (M50B20 Pre-knock Pre-vanos) Running on a local brand of oil.
Really can't complain, it's doing a lot better than the Repco garbage the last owner put in it :mad:

The repco rubbish used to be Fuch's. lol but they changed it over to an australian brand which we found out about a few years ago.....he may of not realised the change.....it was great though....thus why i did oil changes all the time.

In bigger news my old man has taken the plunge and ordered a Brand new BMW 125i Coupe in Alpine Weiß. With the 6 speed auto and the innovations package. Which includes bi-xenon headlights, BMW business navigation system and some other stuff that i can't remember...should be pretty cool!....i did tell him to get the 135i but my mum has to drive it and she is a shocker haha.

I have been told the 3 litre in the 125i can be worked on anyways.


i might be able to convince him.

Many people like BMW but he cant afford. Not only you.