[uucdigest] Wednesday, July 23 2003 Volume 03 : Number 6595
_________________________________________________________________ | | Search the ARCHIVES: | http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED] | | Visit Richard Nott's Ultimate BMW Database: | http://www.bmwdatabase.com | | For all available Digest commands including unsubscribe/subscribe, | visit the BMW UUC Digest page: http://www.uucdigest.com | | Send SUBMISSIONS to [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Complaints? Send 'em to [EMAIL PROTECTED] if you must. | Technical Problems? Send 'em to [EMAIL PROTECTED] |__________________________________________________________________ In this BMW UUC Digest: [uuc] Re: Carfax [uuc] radiators...Performance Radiator? Re: [uuc] Re: Carfax [uuc] Re: Checklist for a track newbie RE: [uuc] radiators...Performance Radiator? [uuc] How Catholics Know They're Driving Too Fast RE:[uuc] Solution- Issues removing front control arm/outer balljoints from Hu [uuc] Re: Carfax/Brett Anderson/Professionalism RE: [uuc] radiators...Performance Radiator? [uuc] [e34] My headlights melted. What are my options? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2003 16:06:40 -0400 From: Phil Marx <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [uuc] Re: Carfax Anyone ever really found any useful information from a Carfax report they couldn't determine from looking at the car? I know in my state they pick up absolutely nothing that isn't on the title. To expect major accident repairs to come up on Carfax is a fantasy as nothing gets reported unless the car is totalled and resold as salvage in most states. My Toyota pickup was totalled after I hit a deer and I purchased the salvage. It sat for five years until I pieced it back together with non-Toyota (affordable) new parts. I still held the original title and simply paid a new registration fee. There's nothing anywhere to alert any subsequent purchaser to the deer encounter my truck went through. I think dealers use them like they do Blue Book values; to bolster the confidence of the buying public who assume a clean Carfax means a clean car, and that retail prices under the inflated values in Blue Book are somehow a good deal. It's just not so. YMMV. - -Phil Marx ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2003 13:08:56 -0700 (PDT) From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [uuc] radiators...Performance Radiator? I know that there was some talk about Performance radiators http://www.performanceradiator.com Their pricing seems good, but don't know about their performance or reliability. Has anyone BTDT? Marc Plante E36 325i, 214k Vienna, VA ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2003 16:47:03 -0400 From: "Michael Lawrence" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: [uuc] Re: Carfax Phil In my opinion, these are the only things carfax will tell you 1. In some states, a car can be salvaged, rebuilt then have a title that looks like any other title. Carfax will show it had major damage/insurance claim. Also, sometimes a car can have a salvage title and not a good reason why it should have. I have a 88 325iC with a salvage title, never been wrecked and from the looks of the interior and when I had it apart, was not touched anywhere. I bought it at a insurance auction where it had a burnt engine harness and small paint flaking in the middle of the hood above the fire. Cost me about 4hrs labor to change everything. Carfax shows it as being a totaled car, but the car itself is in better shape than 80% of the others I see or looked at before buying. 2. It can show a registration trail that might scare me. I have seen cars registered in 19 states in a matter of 2 years. That would make me walk on a car as it would tend to make me believe it was either dumped from dealer to dealer, owners bought it and discovered problems, so they traded it in and the dealer knew the issue so sent it to another state to be auctioned etc. Have yet to hear a good reason for so many registrations for 1 car in so many states 3. For states that have emissions testing, it can either show a mileage issue or a mistake by the expert emissions testers haha. 4. I also wonder if the dealers have tied into the same databases or started doing something close. I know of places that rebuild totaled BMWs. If it was new enough to still have a warranty, 95% of the time if it needed something, they would take it in and the dealer would cover it. About 2-3 years ago, the dealer started refusing the warranty as they knew it had been totaled. Before that it was extremely rare for the dealer to do that and only when they actually noticed the rebuilt work etc would they question it. Now it seems to be a normal task to check the vin for salvage before going any further with warranty. 5.. About 3 pages of complete useless BS and warranties. I find that it is highly over rated and always depend on what I think about the car, doing a pre inspection and looking at the past records. In the past though, I have caught folks selling a car completely bullsh$tting about their story. Saying they bought it new 4 yrs ago, lived here that whole time etc and then car fax will show it being sold new in CA, sold in AZ, registered in FL, emission tested up north etc. So I look just a bit harder at the records and/or car. Beyond that, it doesn't do much. But the last couple of cars I have sold, the buyers insisted on running carfax before buying. On the M3 LTW, I could understand, but on a $2500 suburban I couldn't haha. Mike - ----- Original Message ----- From: "Phil Marx" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Wednesday, July 23, 2003 4:06 PM Subject: [uuc] Re: Carfax > Anyone ever really found any useful information from a Carfax report > they couldn't determine from looking at the car? I know in my state > they pick up absolutely nothing that isn't on the title. To expect > major accident repairs to come up on Carfax is a fantasy as nothing > gets reported unless the car is totalled and resold as salvage in > most states. My Toyota pickup was totalled after I hit a deer and I > purchased the salvage. It sat for five years until I pieced it back > together with non-Toyota (affordable) new parts. I still held the > original title and simply paid a new registration fee. There's > nothing anywhere to alert any subsequent purchaser to the deer > encounter my truck went through. > > I think dealers use them like they do Blue Book values; to bolster > the confidence of the buying public who assume a clean Carfax means a > clean car, and that retail prices under the inflated values in Blue > Book are somehow a good deal. It's just not so. > > YMMV. > > -Phil Marx ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2003 14:08:26 -0700 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [uuc] Re: Checklist for a track newbie Pavel, among other things, the higher inflation pressures are so that you don't roll over too far on the sidewall and/or run the tire right off the rim. At the top of my list of "don'ts" is, "don't lift off the accelerator in the middle of a turn!" One of the "do's" I need to work on more, at least for autocrossing but it applies on the track too, is to look farther ahead. Don't worry too much about what is right in front of the car, because it is too late to do anything about it. Another "do": Look where you want to go, steer where you want to go. Then again, your request for do's and don'ts probably had more to do with preparation than actual driving. HTH, Scott Miller GGC BMW CCA >Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2003 17:28:40 +0200 >From: "Pavel Tcholakov" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Subject: [uuc] Checklist for a track newbie > >Hello all, > >I'm about to take my white beauty to its first track day! :-) > >I'm sending the car for a service and overall examination next week, but >I'd appreciate any advice about do's and don't's on the racetrack. I >know about the fire extinguisher, helmet, oil, and masking the >headlights with tape... What else do you guys do? > >They recommend (in the club newsletter) inflating the tyres to 1 bar >above normal, why is that? Wouldn't that compromise roadholding or does >it make up for the smoother surface of the racetrack? > >Thanks! > >P. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2003 18:07:05 -0400 From: "KMS - Brett Anderson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: RE: [uuc] radiators...Performance Radiator? Possibly a case of " you get what you pay for". Zionsville has just produced an all aluminum radiator for the E36 that is of superb quality. And I'm not just saying that because I stock them. I test fitted one of these just a few weeks back and was amazed at how well it worked. Better than factory in some points, and it has a larger fluid capacity than stock. $489 and they're in stock, ready to ship. Thanks Brett Anderson KMS > -----Original Message----- > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of [EMAIL PROTECTED] > I know that there was some talk about Performance radiators > http://www.performanceradiator.com > Their pricing seems good, but don't know about their performance > or reliability. Has anyone BTDT? ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2003 15:50:05 -0700 From: "T WALROD" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [uuc] How Catholics Know They're Driving Too Fast I find this funny - dyed in the wool Catholics may not. Mea Culpa. <http://www.speeds-cartoons.com/archives/toons36/driving-too-fast.jpg> Tom ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2003 16:10:36 -0700 From: "KKiely" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: RE:[uuc] Solution- Issues removing front control arm/outer balljoints from Hu Jon says: "There's no better way once you master this. Tie rods, ball joints, barking dogs (just kidding)- works on all of them." OHHH.....on their ball joints.... it's painful to even think about. - -Kevin ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2003 16:43:33 -0700 (PDT) From: Ted Pao <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [uuc] Re: Carfax/Brett Anderson/Professionalism Well said Phil. Great review of the new 5-Series in Roundel also. Thanks. Ted Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2003 15:59:01 -0400 From: Phil Marx <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [uuc] Re: Carfax/Brett Anderson/Professionalism Kirk A. Gilchrist wrote: >Just randomly wondering what all of the DIY's would and will do without any >professional assistance or information? Maybe we'll just grow up to become professional techs? How did you start? I don't know about some of you, but I learned from professional techs. I was NIASE certified nearly 20 years ago before the name changed, and managed a three-franchise shop for a few years in between sales and general management gigs. I certainly appreciate the assistance pro techs have offered to CCA members and others over the years. It must often times be a pain in the ass. But if it becomes too much, or you get pissed-off at one respondent, don't lump us all in one basket or you'll be painted with the same brush as all the stealers and incompetents that drive many BMW owners to become DIYs in the first place. There are a lot of us who do it ourselves to make sure the job is done right. There are others who know we can do it as well and hate paying what a shop will charge to do it wrong. There are some without a competent shop within a reasonable distance. And there are others who can't afford what dealers and independents charge for repairing cars they're trying to keep running while putting three kids through college after being laid-off from IT jobs. Don't patronize the DIYs and don't blame all of them for the stupid actions of some. And don't confuse sanctimony with civility. Or patronage with helpfulness. Help because you want to and it gives back some of what someone once gave to you. Or don't. - - -Phil Marx Always willing to help, maybe not with the most knowledge or up-to-date info, or rentable tools or data, but with what I can when I can. Just like most of you. And thanks, in case no one's said it to you recently. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2003 19:52:26 -0400 From: Steven Schlossman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: RE: [uuc] radiators...Performance Radiator? At 6:07 PM -0400 7/23/03, KMS - Brett Anderson wrote: >Possibly a case of " you get what you pay for". > >Zionsville has just produced an all aluminum radiator for the E36 that is of >superb quality. And I'm not just saying that because I stock them. I just had one installed. With 169K on the original radiator I felt I was on borrowed time. Besides, I see one radiator let loose at every driving school. I did not want to slide on my own antifreeze or worse, have someone be surprised behind me. It is a very nice fit. I notice that the water temp is running slightly cooler. My gauge was about one needle width to the right of center. Now it is dead on center. Also replaced the plastic thermostat housing. It did hurt removing a working radiator but it looks like a wise investment. - -- ...steven 1996 328ti 2003 MCS Ofest caravan http://www.happytogether.com/unofficialofest ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2003 19:31:52 -0500 From: "Karl Zemlin" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [uuc] [e34] My headlights melted. What are my options? I've had my 525it for just a few weeks now - one of the first things I did was order some hella 80W 9006 and 100W 9005 headlamp bulbs. Sunday night I got into a LONG stop-and-crawl backup near Dayton - about 90 minutes. Without the benefit of airflow, the 80W bulbs heated up the plastic headlamp reflectors until lamp holder ring melted completely off the reflector and the bulbs fell into the engine bay. I stopped at a Walmart and found enough stuff to make a field repair. I glued the bulbs back into the reflectors with large gobs of epoxy putty - obviously, the bulb placement is a _little_ off - I need to buy new headlights. I figure I will get some used replacements, but I might consider an upgrade if there is a reasonably price option (less than $250). Any sources for used European lighting? What's up with that "new, oe quality" smileys on ebay? Any better US lights - from later years, perhaps, that would work as replacements? Maybe I could cut the glass off the sock lights and glue the Hellas from my e28 in the reflectors (just kidding!) Karl Zemlin Indianapolis, IN '94 525it - 98000 miles (wow, a ZERO on the left end of the odometer - haven't seen one of those for a long time) '85 535i 5 speed - 219,000 miles - for sale real soon. Hellas sold separately. ------------------------------ End of [uucdigest] V3 #6595 *************************** | | In memory of Michel Potheau - friend, enthusiast, founder of the BMW CCA. |________________________________________ | Please visit these UUC-approved BMW parts vendors/service providers: | (listed alphabetically) | | Autoscope-Motorsports - http://www.autoscope-motorsports.com | |==================================================== | | Koala MotorSport . BMW technical information, special tool sales/rental | http://www.koalamotorsport.com | |==================================================== | | Taylor BMW - http://www.taylorbmw.com - Doc Bimmer! | |==================================================== | Turner Motorsport Inc . The Ultra-High Performance BMW Specialist | 207 Elm Street, Amesbury, MA 01950 | 978-388-7769 / fax 978-388-4202 | http://www.turnermotorsport.com | |==================================================== | | UUC Motorwerks - BMW Performance Fine-tuning | and home of the Ultimate Short Shifter - accept no substitutes! | 908-874-9092 . http://www.uucmotorwerks.com |__________________________________________________________
