New Owner Questions

[shaken not stirred]

Hello to all.

I have recently aquired a beautiful 2001 525i wagon with low mileage. As a starting point I went Barnes and Noble and purchased every magazine related to BMW. What I read goes against everything I believed true about BMW.

Sadly, what I read is that the car is crap. It is prone to all sorts of problems - from transmission and water pump failure to horrible rust proofing. A huge let down for me being a person always wanting one of these incredible and beautiful machines.

Is this true or just the rambling of a bunch of idiots?

[MEDSTUDENT87]

It all depends on how you take car of the car. If you expect it to drive like a chevy then you will be disappointed. The car will require allot of (preventative) maintinance(spelling?). If you do not take care of the car it will give you lots of problems just make sure you follow the maintinance schedules. They are awesome cars but not many people believe it should take so much to own one, but its worth it.

[bimmerguy82]

Originally Posted by shaken not stirred

Hello to all.

I have recently aquired a beautiful 2001 525i wagon with low mileage. As a starting point I went Barnes and Noble and purchased every magazine related to BMW. What I read goes against everything I believed true about BMW.

Sadly, what I read is that the car is crap. It is prone to all sorts of problems - from transmission and water pump failure to horrible rust proofing. A huge let down for me being a person always wanting one of these incredible and beautiful machines.

Is this true or just the rambling of a bunch of idiots?

Well, being that it is a mechanical machine, it is inclined to have parts wear out or break. This can be reduced greatly with proper care and maintenance.
If you stay on top of it you should have very few issues with your car. The only thing that is close to true about what those magazines said is that the water pump failure happens on almost any bmw, but replace it with a aftermarket metal impellar and you're good to go. i hope this relieves some concerns, Bmw's are great cars to own and drive.

[shaken not stirred]

Thank you for your replies.

As you said PM is the key.

[Teh Prof]

Originally Posted by joshsanders82

but replace it with a aftermarket metal impellar and you're good to go.

Until the bearings die in the aftermarket water pump, causing the serpentine belt to snap, the radiator and associated hoses are shredded, and the mechanical fan is snapped!

This happened on my old M3 a few months back...I had put in the metal-impeller water pump two years previous.