Opinion of E65 Bmw 745i

SpannerMonkey

hi guys im thinking of getting a 745i they are going for stupid small money these days can anyone give me their opinion of them and anything to watch out for
Pros vs Cons

unkel

early cars (now sub €10k ) had electrical gremlins, so make sure everything works. Get the car checked over by an indy BMW specialist. This will cost you very little but will give lots of peace of mind.

And yes, you are spot on. The one to go for would be the early 745 V8 auto. Best value for money top exec car around.

I drove 7-10 year old V8 BMW saloons for the most of 10 years and my total cost of ownership was less than if I'd bought 2-3 year old Toyota Corollas

Voodoomelon

I was looking at one today on Carzone, 82k, genuine sport, less than €10k, you'd prob get it for €9k.
Almost tempted to switch myself, but the early ones are butt ugly.

SpannerMonkey

ya was looking at that one myself i love them serious amount of car for the cash

Padraig Mor

Be very careful. Fantastic cars but the V8s seem to have a major engine design flaw, whereby a rubber o-ring degrades. The part itself is only pennies; however it's buried deep in the engine and requires the engine to be taken out and pretty much disassembled*. Irish cost circa €7k + VAT! The problem applies to the E65 735i and 745i definitely; the 740i and 750i (2005 on) may also be affected. The problem has been appearing a lot in the last year to 18 months, particularly on 02 and 03 cars with 70k+ miles. Especially prominent in the States, presumably due to the amount of V8s there. All the info you want here:
http://www.bimmerfest.com/forums/showthread.php?t=321434


I myself came very close to buying a 2002 745i a few months ago - 140k miles trade sale from a BMW main dealer. To cut a long story short - I believe the car had this problem and the dealer knew it too. Service dept there also confirmed that they've had to do this job on a number of Irish cars.




*recommended course of action. An indy crowd in the States have recently come up with a cheaper option, using a custom designed part:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UoCED1jyfL4

Padraig Mor

Voodoomelon wrote: »

I was looking at one today on Carzone, 82k, genuine sport, less than €10k, you'd prob get it for €9k.
Almost tempted to switch myself, but the early ones are butt ugly.

Think I know the one. I'm not 100% sure that it's a factory Sport though; owner couldn't clarify either.

Voodoomelon

Indeed.
As tempting as the prices are, I wouldn't touch a pre 2006 E65 with a ten foot clown pole.

Leonard Hofstadter

That is appalling stuff, even worse than the turbo and the swirl flaps(at least removing the dreaded swirl flaps is only a good few hundred quid), it seems the only deserved reputation BMW engines should have these days is the amount of basic design flaws and how after a few years they all turn into piles of $h!t€:rolleyes::mad:!

Whoever works in the quality control department in BMW should be sacked en masse for this kind of stupidity.

SpannerMonkey

:rolleyes:That's a very open statement , yes there are design flaws but name one car that has no flaws worst car I ever had experience with was a Nissan followed closely by a Toyota and then by an audi I have owned many bmw's and have never had any problems out of the ordinary , they are machines audi have known flaws Toyota have Mazda have ford have there are design flaws on every single car on the road an the price quote is to go to a main dealer this job can be done at an Indy for 1500 so yes it's good to know but it wouldn't put me off , thanks to padraig mor for highlighting this;)
so anything else to watch out for ,
has anyone owned a 7 series , what are they like to live with ??

Leonard Hofstadter

There are design flaws and there are design flaws though, that is an appalling design flaw, I don't care what anyone says.

If the o-ring went you're basically saying bye bye car, that is just not good enough for a car of that price, it's not even good enough on a little Ford Ka.

The 4 and 6 cylinder petrols just don't work ever since they greened them up a few years ago, the diesels lunched turbos and swirl flaps for years, the 6 cylinder petrols back in the 90's came up with a special BMW invention: the Nikasil problem(oh wait - what's that - didn't the V8s do it as well - oh yes they did:rolleyes:), now there is this o-ring problem and that's before we get things like the ESP module which is 2k in a 3 series to repair and goes after as little as 3-4 years and crap like overheating and pixels on the dash going in the 5 series.

I like BMW's too, I even love a couple of them like the E39 or the old E34 and I love the sound of their 6 cylinder petrol engines, I cannot understand how they can make a non hybrid 3 series diesel do 70 mpg yet still have 163 hp and hit 60 in 8 seconds but I am not deluded enough into thinking they are great designs, let's face it you have to be extremely careful when it comes to buying one, because choose the wrong model, and/or engine and you will have a moneypit that will break your heart.

VolvoMan

I think a late E38 makes a much better buy than an early E65. They are a far more elegant, graceful design and there is far less technological nonsense to go wrong.

Padraig Mor

Slightly OT re youtube vid above: gotta say it's great to see an indy garage taking the initiative of developing such an efficient workaround for a problem like this.

Stevie Dakota

VolvoMan wrote: »

I think a late E38 makes a much better buy than an early E65. They are a far more elegant, graceful design and there is far less technological nonsense to go wrong.

Still from from cheap to run though. Any luxobarge this age and complexity must be bought with open eyes and deep pockets.

Voodoomelon

VolvoMan wrote: »

I think a late E38 makes a much better buy than an early E65. They are a far more elegant, graceful design and there is far less technological nonsense to go wrong.

Good man.

Stevie Dakota wrote: »

Still from from cheap to run though. Any luxobarge this age and complexity must be bought with open eyes and deep pockets.

Absolutely. Got my brakes done last week, 4 discs, 8 pads and two sensors, €600+ for the parts alone, you'd be talking over €800 easy for a dealer to do it.

Thats why I bought the parts up the North and did it myself for €410.

unkel

Voodoomelon wrote: »

Thats why I bought the parts up the North and did it myself for €410.

And let's put things into perspective. How often does one need discs + pads all around? Maybe every 4 years on average mileage?

As an aside, even the tyres on my Rover 75 are still fine and they've lasted 4 years and 30k miles (except for one that got ripped by a very nasty and sharp lump of glass)

Voodoomelon

Ah I know, but i'm just giving an idea of cost. And chances are if you're buying such an old car, it won't have new discs. I find that I have very little brake wear in general with the automatic, I drive in a style that uses the brakes very little.

One of my mates gets new pads every year. On a Rover Streetwise

Bumpstop

Jaguar XK8!!!!!!!! BMW 7 series indeed. XK8 so cheap if it blows up buy another one. sub 6K sub zero Hear the V8 roar
As Voodoo says it's an old car and will need stuff replaced the Jag is really easy to work on, Hey part of owning an old barge is doing stuff yourself.

Leonard Hofstadter

Stevie Dakota wrote: »

Still from from cheap to run though. Any luxobarge this age and complexity must be bought with open eyes and deep pockets.

Indeed, but it is still a much better built car than the E65, it also looks much better too and won't have stupid problems like degrading o-rings or expensive iDrive to worry about.

I wouldn't be telling someone not to buy an E38(once they realised that it won't be as cheap to run as a Toyota), but I definitely would tell someone to avoid a pre-facelift E65 if you know what I mean.

Stevie Dakota

Curse you E38, every few years I find myself trawling for a mint 01 728i sport, Biarritz blue with cream leather, oh baby.

Padraig Mor

Stevie Dakota wrote: »

Curse you E38, every few years I find myself trawling for a mint 01 728i sport, Biarritz blue with cream leather, oh baby.

All correct except for the 728 bit - it's gotta be a 740i!