Rash of parked BMW's catching fire

Perhaps BMW made a mistake calling their latest model Galaxy Note 7?

 

Later BMW's are **** boxes. Best to let them burn. Complete corpret junk.

 

Bad news for BMW!

The FAA has just announced no one is allowed to carry a BMW on an airplane in the United States.

 

thanks for that! laughed out loud !

 

Really strange. It seems it goes all the way from the first gen X5 and E46 3 Series to the 2016 Series 2.

BMW giving them the cold shoulder kind off turned off my search for a low miles BMW F80 M3.

 

Burning Motor works....BMW

 

Maybe the Crappy all-plastic cooling systems, that they refuse to stop putting in their cars, are becoming more and more fragile and flammable!!!

 

The Germans used to love to advertise that the engineering department called all the shots for production. Those days are long gone. The bean counters have been very firmly in control for a long time and there is no such thing as too cheap. We'll never have another German car. Plastic tinkertoys.

 

I test drove an X5e the other day for my wife. $80k msrp. Not even real leather inside. Same fake material as used in her Murano.

 

Seems like a typical news story, employing lots of sensationalism. The only common thread appears to be the make of car and that some of them were sitting when they caught on fire.
It's not like BMW is the only manufacturer which has produced a car that has experienced an electrical fire. The sample of BMWs they referenced in the story seemed to span over a large period of time and across a number of models.

 

BMW is a leasing company that builds their own cars. Once out of warrenty they are a complete disaster. It's like they are on a time clock. The company expects you to trade it in, and keep renting. The higher line BMW's are on par with Ferrari as far as expense to maintain. God help you if you own a TT n63 v8. Last of the real BMW's was the e39 series.

 

You're certainly right on the second point, use of a common faulty component can lead to a defect in vehicles spanning a large period of time and across a number of models... Due to a problem in a cruise control switch, Ford recalled 14 million cars built over an 8 year period. Because they could catch fire, even while parked.
So the premise of the story is entirely plausible.
https://cars.usnews.com/cars-trucks/daily-news/091014-ford-expands-cruise-control-switch-recall

 

Hey Jim, we should trade our BMWs in for a Lamboghini Aventador.

Our wives might appreciate having a larger barbecue grill for those all the burgers.


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I've had a great owner experience with my BMW X5. Had a Volvo XC90 SUV (piece of garbage) and the Mercedes styling didn't do it for me. I've driven the X5 FL to Maine, very reliable and comfortable car.

Great car, until it catches on fire.
I won't park it in or near the garage for now.



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Totally. I have an E38 now that I love but have spent an obscene amount of time and money sorting and maintaining. I love the car but if I had a time machine and could go back to early 2014 I would NOT have bought the car. I'm finally closing in on the break-even point of ownership after year 4.
They're fun and nice to look at but are not worth the hassle!

The OEM bimmer parts are by far the worst quality of part I have ever witnessed in my life. Everything designed and crafted to break, and break often.

Companies like Bimmer and Merc. are luckier than hell that Lexus abandoned making clone german-looking cars. If Lexus went back to making the boxier looking angular line cars (like they did in the early 90s), they would have a fight on their hands all over again.

 

So sad I have had three including two M3s and they were good, but that was a long time ago.

Two years ago my wife wanted a 5 series BMW and our mechanic warned us of electrical problems and fires.

He suggested another brand and as he promised it has been perfect for many years,

So sad a great marque.

Lee

 

I'm reasonably new to BMW's. I have only started to do anything to them beyond gas and oil as they start to age. Anything prior to the E46 was pretty darn good. I remember even being able to replace the rubber seal on the aluminum radiator plastic header unit and it worked!! Now they are just cr@p. Everything is disposable and poorly made and even more poorly engineered. My kid and my BIL have 2008 E90 sedans. I just replaced the 6 seals on the single valve cover. It took nearly a whole day! What a POS. I can take the intake off a 550 maranello and change both valvecover gaskets and replace the intake gaskets faster and easier than these BMW's. BMW's break right on cue too. When my BIL's car breaks my daughter's is right behind his. Then there is my wife's newer X3. It is the E90 sedan reincarnated. The electronics in these 3 cars is super incestuous. Everything is tied to everything else. It is like the fake engine noise in the new M4 that you can't turn off or get out of the car. This is worse than the incestuous Ferrari alarm system. I won't be buying any more BMW's.

 

Lexus?

 

Yes she bought this car over the 5 series at the suggestion of our long time friend and mechanic.

My wife bought the Lexus new in 2013 and it has been perfect, She is not a car enthusiast she just likes reliable, comfortable transportation. It is a sporty ride with good gas mileage that uses normal gas.

It is a good driving car but I will not be selling my NSX or Corvette to buy one anytime soon.

The good news is American cars have become world class driving machines that are reliable and very inexpensive to live with.

I am sure BMW is in a rough patch but will dig it self out and be a good marque to own in the future. The trick is to know when this happens.

Best

Lee

 

I have a 2015 328GT. The car makes a odd kinda loud(heard from inside the car)2-3 second electrical noise after turning it off. The only time I've noticed it is when sitting in the car for a minute or 2 after turning it off without opening the door. The 1st I heard it I was like WTF was that???
I've had no problems with my bmws but then they've been new.

 

hey Brad - What do you mean by "break-even point of ownership"?

As you know I'm a relative E38 newb only putting 10k miles on mine so far (total 137k miles).

Still debating whether to sell it when my Tesla 3 is ready for production, but every time I get behind the wheel I just love it and can't imagine spending $30k+ on something else. Until of course the valve chain guides break...

Today I'm driving my father's newly acquired 2005 CLK55 and it's an interesting comparison to the E38. On paper the CLK should be significantly faster (couple hundred pounds lighter, ~20% more power) but the BMW 5-sp transmission is just SO much better than the Merc 5-sp the power is almost irrelevant.

I'm taking the AMG to Eurocharged next week for headers and tuning of ECU and TCU so hopefully the transmission will be more agreeable after that.
But they probably won't be able to do much about the slipperier torque converter.

 

What are you in the car for? I would just drive it until it blows up. 137k isn't much and as long as the car wasn't abused you should be able to run it up to 300k. But you will pay to keep sorting it, (suspension, cooling system, etc.) It takes a very particular buyer to pay what these things are actually worth once sorted and in great condition.

I've done about 36k on mine, grabbed it for 7500 and have put about 4 into it totalling 11,500

As of today minus my tax deduction for mileage, I'm driving it for about $125 a month. By next year it will be about half that, and basically a free car at that point.

It's tough for me to let mine go because I had it resprayed after buying and it looks almost brand new, inside and out despite the high mileage. I don't see anyone wanting to pay more than 6k for it given it has over 200k on it. If somebody wanted to pay 8-9 for it then I'd consider it but I strongly doubt that will happen. The truth is you can buy a cream-puff that looks exactly like mine (not red) with 60k on it for 12k and you will then proceed to put 8-10k dollars into it over the years, driving you up the flipping wall. And then many of the cars that are well maintained were serviced with OEM parts, which means your full beautiful service history means dick at the end of the day because everything fixed will be breaking soon! Welcome to BMW LOL. So really you are always better off buying the cheapest non-neglected car you can and then sorting it all yourself. Luckily I have a great body guy that does exceptional work for nothing so I can do resprays. But only when he's in the mood to do so! LOL.

 

I paid $5900 for mine and since then have put in another ~$3k including $800 worth of new tires. $500 alternator was the big one, and ~$500 was non-essential stuff that I just wanted to do to bring her closer to cherry condition.

Yeah there's no rational reason for selling it when the Telsa is ready, I'm just itching for a "next-gen" car (but may end up hating and missing a big V8! lol).

So you've spent $4k on maintenance over 36k miles, on a complicated, aging german luxury car with 200k miles? That sounds pretty damned reasonable to me!
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