Haven't done one of these threads for a bit, and found myself ill in bed all weekend (which is why i've been so active on here in the last 72 hrs!) so here goes.
Gets a call of one of my buddies a month ago, he knows I'm into the old blue'n'white roundel (amongst too many other marques) and asks if I know anyone for his mates 'old 5 series beemer' he's had laid up 'for ages'. So I says "gimme details". "It's a blue L reg V8, was a nice car before he got hold of it, it developed an 'misfire issue' of some sort and he punted it round a few garages before being frightened to death of the cost and parked it up. He wants about 5 ton for it"- hmmm - i'm now thinking even if it's Donald Ducked, it'll break and weigh in for a good whack of that at least - maybe if I can chisel him a touch, I can have a quick play with it and see where it's at.
Phone call was made, hit him straight in the nuts with an offer with the promise to take it out of his way the next morning.I wasn't really expecting the reply of "come and get it out of my face", but that's the way it went! He just wanted his E39 M5 rep wheels back off it. NP, I thought, I had a few options around me for it anyway.
I gets over to his house the next day with the beavertail, and was surprised to see it parked on the road, covered in curse word, but sporting a mint set of 15" X spokes.
He comes out of his house, shakes my hand, gives me a load of paperwork, takes my money, says "you'll have to drag it on, the battery's dead", hands me the keys and dives back in. Bye then!
Jump leads off the van weren't coaxing her, so we winched her on, strapped her down and headed back to the unit.
I read through the paperwork on the way back (riding shotgun obv!) - service history, reciepts and bills for everything, including a transmission rebuild @ £2300 - 20k ago! Recon Bigg Red calipers, etc etc. Plus an MOT that runs til May 2012. Even had a months tax in the screen!
He last drove it in December 2010, it had sat in the same place since. Once back at the ranch, we winched her off, gave her a bath,she then looked like this
Quite pleased with her appearance (notice how IT has become a SHE), I put a suitably large battery on her (the one taken off was put on charge as was only 11 months old - I had the reciept, see!) to see how she kicked over then. After cheking the fluids and a bit of cranking, she limped into life, rattling as she ticked over, as lumpy as a morning fart after a night on Newcastle Brown. As much as reason was telling me 'it's probably a few empty tappets', your mind still thinks the worst (Headgaskets, cracked rings, destroyed bores etc etc.) and after 5 mins of ticking over and some not too harsh revving she was still sick as a dog.
Using my best skill and judgement, I floored the curse word, bounced her off the rev limiter ( yeh, yeh, I know you shouldn't do this to a slushbox in Park or Neutral) and she settled down to a perfect idle. Result as they say.
So there you have it, a 4ltr V8 BMW, 135k miles, taxed and MOt'd for the price of a bloody good weekend on the pop. Will continue tomorrow, with more pics and the saga of the 'misfire'
Gets a call of one of my buddies a month ago, he knows I'm into the old blue'n'white roundel (amongst too many other marques) and asks if I know anyone for his mates 'old 5 series beemer' he's had laid up 'for ages'. So I says "gimme details". "It's a blue L reg V8, was a nice car before he got hold of it, it developed an 'misfire issue' of some sort and he punted it round a few garages before being frightened to death of the cost and parked it up. He wants about 5 ton for it"- hmmm - i'm now thinking even if it's Donald Ducked, it'll break and weigh in for a good whack of that at least - maybe if I can chisel him a touch, I can have a quick play with it and see where it's at.
Phone call was made, hit him straight in the nuts with an offer with the promise to take it out of his way the next morning.I wasn't really expecting the reply of "come and get it out of my face", but that's the way it went! He just wanted his E39 M5 rep wheels back off it. NP, I thought, I had a few options around me for it anyway.
I gets over to his house the next day with the beavertail, and was surprised to see it parked on the road, covered in curse word, but sporting a mint set of 15" X spokes.
He comes out of his house, shakes my hand, gives me a load of paperwork, takes my money, says "you'll have to drag it on, the battery's dead", hands me the keys and dives back in. Bye then!
Jump leads off the van weren't coaxing her, so we winched her on, strapped her down and headed back to the unit.
I read through the paperwork on the way back (riding shotgun obv!) - service history, reciepts and bills for everything, including a transmission rebuild @ £2300 - 20k ago! Recon Bigg Red calipers, etc etc. Plus an MOT that runs til May 2012. Even had a months tax in the screen!
He last drove it in December 2010, it had sat in the same place since. Once back at the ranch, we winched her off, gave her a bath,she then looked like this
Quite pleased with her appearance (notice how IT has become a SHE), I put a suitably large battery on her (the one taken off was put on charge as was only 11 months old - I had the reciept, see!) to see how she kicked over then. After cheking the fluids and a bit of cranking, she limped into life, rattling as she ticked over, as lumpy as a morning fart after a night on Newcastle Brown. As much as reason was telling me 'it's probably a few empty tappets', your mind still thinks the worst (Headgaskets, cracked rings, destroyed bores etc etc.) and after 5 mins of ticking over and some not too harsh revving she was still sick as a dog.
Using my best skill and judgement, I floored the curse word, bounced her off the rev limiter ( yeh, yeh, I know you shouldn't do this to a slushbox in Park or Neutral) and she settled down to a perfect idle. Result as they say.
So there you have it, a 4ltr V8 BMW, 135k miles, taxed and MOt'd for the price of a bloody good weekend on the pop. Will continue tomorrow, with more pics and the saga of the 'misfire'
