BMW 523i (e60)

Veloce

Hi.

Just wondering if anyone has experience of the E60 series 523i? They seem like great value at the moment (not considering the 1k annual tax bill).

Will be using this is a second family car for a few creche runs and also for a few weekend trips.

I like a bit of poke. Not really interested in diesels as mpg is not important due to low mileage I expect to cover.

Any advice welcome.

Thanks

Idbatterim

they will be far rarer, but try get a 525 if you can, exact same motor tax, good bit more bhp...

Veloce

Idbatterim wrote: »

they will be far rarer, but try get a 525 if you can, exact same motor tax, good bit more bhp...

Thanks. Any timing chain issues with the 525i engines in the E60 series?

Idbatterim

no the 6 cylinder petrols up to 2008 were very reliable... the E39 which are a fanstatic car are being pretty much given away. personally Id want an auto in this car. The bro has an E39 530 auto and it definitely suits the car better than a manual, in my opinion....

ongarite

Idbatterim wrote: »

they will be far rarer, but try get a 525 if you can, exact same motor tax, good bit more bhp...

LCI 525i is a 3.0L I think so higher tax..
What year are you looking at?
Pre 07 or 07 after LCI face-lift version?

Idbatterim

no the 525 up to late 2007 was a 2.5L, you are correct that from 08 on , the 525 and 530 were all a 3L block, to the best of my knowledge

Veloce

ongarite wrote: »

LCI 525i is a 3.0L I think so higher tax..
What year are you looking at?
Pre 07 or 07 after LCI face-lift version?

Was looking at the 2.5 litre option for tax reasons. So the 523 or 525 up to 2007.

Idbatterim

You still get your nice straight 6 with the 523, but it has 163 Bhp. 215bhp in 525 engine from 2005 on. Be careful though. , some 2005 might have life 192bhp engine that I have...

bmwguy

I was looking at them last year, drove a few just decided to stick with my e39 in the end.

Nice cars though and the petrols don't have the timing chain problem.

Post 08 the 2.5 e60 tax is 750 Euro instead of 1080 but you won't get the bargain basement price of an 06 or 07 so stick with the older cars. Anyway, there are only 2 of them on done deal.

Assuming they are more or less the same as my 2004 e39 you should get about 25mpg in mixed driving, motorway speeds would be mid to high 30s mpg

Don't pay anything close to asking prices on them, people cannot give these away nowadays so get yourself a bargain.
And get yourself a sport model with automatic, will pay a bit more but worth it for the improved looks as opposed to the SE.

If you want a real bargain, buy a late e39 which many consider a better car overall. You are talking 03/04 cars but 2k would get you any of them no problem.

Veloce

Only 160 bhp from the 523? Jeez I haven't done my homework. That's quite poor.

I must take a look at 525s - most searches pull up the diesels.

bazz26

This one looks clean:

https://www.donedeal.ie/cars-for-sale/bmw-5-series-525i-se-ne52-4dr-auto-e60-saloon/14043719

Idbatterim

yeah the engine is detuned. Sure the engine 2.5L engine from 01 onwards was putting out 192bhp...

there is an E39 being literally given away here, 2.2L so only E950 motor tax

http://www.bmw-driver.net/forum/showthread.php?t=133946

bmwguy

Idbatterim wrote: »

yeah the engine is detuned. Sure the engine 2.5L engine from 01 onwards was putting out 192bhp...

there is an E39 being literally given away here, 2.2L so only E950 motor tax

http://www.bmw-driver.net/forum/showthread.php?t=133946

Yeah my e39 is 192 bhp. That's a nice e39 spot for someone apart from the bad spray job mentioned might add a few quid on if you want it right. Still ok though.

Mister Jingles

Idbatterim wrote: »

You still get your nice straight 6 with the 523, but it has 163 Bhp. 215bhp in 525 engine from 2005 on. Be careful though. , some 2005 might have life 192bhp engine that I have...

Are the early e60 523i not 175bhp and later ones 190 no ?

Even the old 2.2 was 170bhp.

unkel

It really makes very little difference if you get the earlier 520i / 523i / 525i cars in terms of performance / fuel consumption and yes they are 170bhp / 170bhp / 190bhp. The 520i is 2.2l hence €951 tax, the others are 2.5l hence €1,080 tax

You'll have to go 530i with a €1.5k tax bill to have significantly more poke...

And there are plenty of E60 bangernomics smooth straight 6 petrols (under €2k) about now and they are a lot of modern car for the money!

Had mine for over 3 years, sold it when it was just over 13 years old. Very reliable car, never let me down. Biggest bill I had was about €100 and that was to fix an oil leak the car already had when I bought it!

bmwguy

Great value and overall cheaper motoring than buying a newer car many segments below, providing you get a good one that only requires regular servicing.

They are still dearer than an e39 of the same age back in recession. I bought a 525 sport 2004 in 2013 with 90k miles for €2,400. It had just gone 9 years old but it's the equivalent of buying an 07/ 08 e60 now. Bring back the recession!

Ok it was 2 generations back (e60, f10) but the e60 is 2 generations back next month.

Bought it as a stop gap, flirted with e60s, f10s and even financing a 330e last year but still have the old 5 series to this day.

It's like an old Corolla that won't die

MarcusP12

I have an 08 523i se and i like it a lot. Got it when it was 4 years old and paid about 14.5k for it from a garage which was about 3/4k cheaper than the cheapest 520d with high mileage. What i will say is i had a bit of an issue with a breather valve or something which took ages for the garage to fix. kept going into limp mode. Eventually got sorted and has been fine since apart from needing a couple of coils replaced. Its a lovely smooth, very comfortable car. Very solid build as well, not a rattle out of it and its 8 years old. Mine is the 190bhp version so whilst not breakneck fast, for its size, it can move. Fuel efficiency isnt bad either and can get high 30s on a long spin....

wersal gummage

Hi there,

I have a 2005 e60, 523i. I bought it four years ago and haven't really had any major problems with it (although I've only put around 20k kms on it).

The water pump went on me recently, that's the only issue. Apparently the cooling system is a weak point in the e60 and a known issue around the 100k mile mark (which is what my car is at).

I also have an issue with what appears to be a failed oil lever sensor (there's no oil gauge/dip in the e60).

I would recommend, if you are buying one, to have it fully diagnosed by one of these lads with the laptop and relevant software, doesn't need to be bmw. They can show up not only warning messages, but also if warning messages have been switched off. For example, I have a 'restraint system failure' messages on the car for about two years now. During a service, the mechanic checked the seat belts and said they were fine and reset the warning light, it came back on about a year later. So it would be easy to hide these kind of things when selling a car. When I bought the car I did not do this. I bought it from a garage. When I was replacing the battery a few years later, I noticed that the intelligent battery sensor had been disconnected, when I reconnected it, it was faulty so I replaced it.

I also wanted the 525i but couldn't find one when I bought (there was one for sale but guy was asking 4k more than the price I paid for 523i and he would not budge, same car was still on sale nearly a year later!).

I personally think the sport one looks a lot better and wouldn't buy a non sport model. I get around mid 20s in town and touching 40mpg on longer runs when I stick to the speed limits, but then the car is a manual. The car is very comfortable and is a nice place to be. Servicing costs etc have all been quite reasonable - even first service in bmw main dealer was not too bad.

Finally, I regret not paying a bit extra for an example with a few extras in it. In hindsight, having kept the car for so long, I wish I'd found a model with things like comfort seats but this is probably rare enough.

PS, if you are still searching for a car in a month or two let me know if you are interested as I will be offloading mine, new car arriving.

Veloce

wersal gummage wrote: »

Hi there,

I have a 2005 e60, 523i. I bought it four years ago and haven't really had any major problems with it (although I've only put around 20k kms on it).

The water pump went on me recently, that's the only issue. Apparently the cooling system is a weak point in the e60 and a known issue around the 100k mile mark (which is what my car is at).

I also have an issue with what appears to be a failed oil lever sensor (there's no oil gauge/dip in the e60).

I would recommend, if you are buying one, to have it fully diagnosed by one of these lads with the laptop and relevant software, doesn't need to be bmw. They can show up not only warning messages, but also if warning messages have been switched off. For example, I have a 'restraint system failure' messages on the car for about two years now. During a service, the mechanic checked the seat belts and said they were fine and reset the warning light, it came back on about a year later. So it would be easy to hide these kind of things when selling a car. When I bought the car I did not do this. I bought it from a garage. When I was replacing the battery a few years later, I noticed that the intelligent battery sensor had been disconnected, when I reconnected it, it was faulty so I replaced it.

I also wanted the 525i but couldn't find one when I bought (there was one for sale but guy was asking 4k more than the price I paid for 523i and he would not budge, same car was still on sale nearly a year later!).

I personally think the sport one looks a lot better and wouldn't buy a non sport model. I get around mid 20s in town and touching 40mpg on longer runs when I stick to the speed limits, but then the car is a manual. The car is very comfortable and is a nice place to be. Servicing costs etc have all been quite reasonable - even first service in bmw main dealer was not too bad.

Finally, I regret not paying a bit extra for an example with a few extras in it. In hindsight, having kept the car for so long, I wish I'd found a model with things like comfort seats but this is probably rare enough.

PS, if you are still searching for a car in a month or two let me know if you are interested as I will be offloading mine, new car arriving.

Great info - thanks

wersal gummage

By the way, in case it's important to you, I think the model of car I have is 177bhp and not 160 or whatever was mentioned before. I wouldn't bet a lot of money on that now, but pretty sure.

The car definitely has plenty of smooth poke for a family vehicle. However, I have found that when the car is full of people and loaded (i really mean massively overloaded for a few weeks holiday in France), it can be a bit gutless when you need to go up a really steep hill if you don't hit the hill at a good pace. You'd never notice a lack of power under normal conditions mind you



Edit, I should say that I mean gutless relevant to normal performance, can't imagine what it would be like trying to get the equivalent weight up the same hill in a modern 1.2tsi or 1.6 diesel yoke