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You sound constructive and right to the point. Say hi to your mom from me.

Not sure if I know the right name of it, but this is its OEM number: 13718516240. That's for the heated one. The non-heated one costs 12€ from BMW :)

@@asking_for_a_friend Thanks alot! I guess heated ones have the electric connection in it?

Same things apply to 3l engines. But with 3l you should make sure that the oil change intervals were short over the period of its lifetime (at least every 20tkm, but better every 10tkm) because N57 engines have a well know problem with the bearing failing. It’s more common on 535d (2 turbos) but still. Also, make sure to check the xdrive condition since with 3l the torque is much higher but the car is using the same parts (more or less) as the 2l. Go to an empty parking lot, turn the wheel all the way to one side and press the gas pedal. If you hear clicking noises from the front wheels - a very expensive fix is coming your way (around 800$ per side if you do it right, or 450$ per side for a “temporary” fix)

Hi! Try reaching out to them directly (that's what I did), since I'm not sure whether they are selling just the harness straight from the website, but I'm sure they can sell it to you if you just reach out to their customer service :) They speak perfect English

The spare parts are quite cheap. We are talking about 200$ worth of spares. But the total cost will depend on your location and the price of work. Replacing the rubber bushings for the final drive takes about 3 hours if done right by the service that did it before. In Finland I did it twice, once it took the service 4 hours, the other - 5 hours. And that’s the main cost in my case 😅 But I suggest taking care of it asap since every time you push the gas pedal - you increase the risk of the rubber mounts (differential and final drive) snapping

@@asking_for_a_friend thanks a ton! yep I noticed you live (or lived) in Finland, so do I, warm greetings xD Another phenomenon that I've noticed is there's some lagging between when I press the gas pedal and when the power actually kicks in, ~0.5second, it used to be immediate on my previous manual cars... is it something normal?

@@duyanhnguyen8579 Does it have the same behaviour if you put your gear selector in Sport mode (pull the selector towards you when in D)? If yes - then it's an issue. If not - most likely its a lag since gearbox adapts to your driving and if you don't often push it too far, it becomes "slow" and reacts slower to the gas inputs. Usually in the Sport/Manual mode it's much more responsive so check it our first

@@asking_for_a_friend in sport mode, it seems more responsive but still not as immediate like how I used to drive manuals.. I understand if the RPM is low on comfort mode and that it takes time to accelerate to a certain speed, but unresponsive power input gets me a bit worried..

@@duyanhnguyen8579 since the whole concept of "feeling" is subjective by default, it's hard to guess what could be an issue or even if there is any. I don't know what kind of cars you drove previously, but if they had similar power units (turbo-diesel engines) - then you are comparing apples to apples and one easy way to check whether your car is ok is to find a similar car at a local dealership and take it for a short test-drive. If, however, you drove naturally aspirated gasoline engines before, then it's a totally different feel. Turbo's take time to spool and naturally there is a turbo-lag in the low RPMs before your gearbox shifts to a lower gear. One easy fix (if everything works fine) is to install XHP Stage 3 software for your gearbox, it tunes the gearbox to be much more smooth in comfort mode and makes it more responsive in sports mode. There are plenty of places in Finland that could do that for you

Yes 😊 It was my first BMW so I didn’t know what I missed or what I wanted, wasn’t acquainted with options etc. it was a rear-wheel drive car and all the fun it brings to the table - I hated driving it in snowy highways so my goal was to replace it with xDrive before the following winter. And that xDrive is what you see in this video

Haven’t changed it even once. Checked it at 180k when I cleaned the intake and engine block from all the grime and the chain was in a very decent shape. As far as I know it doesn’t make too much sense to only change the guides, but rather change it all at once. The job is the main cost in the process and if you do all the work might as well replace the chain :) As far as I know, my old 2l diesel is now at 235k km and the chain doesn’t show any signs of giving up yet. If the oil change intervals were around 15k or less for most of the car’s life, the chain can easily go for 250k. I know some people with 2l diesels who never changed it until 290k and it was still silent on cold starts with -20 outside

I have a 2009 320d with 170, 000km all bmw service till 150k so they change oil every 25,000km only. I have herd lots of issues with timing chain on this N47 2l d

@@steliofrasco3455 if the service was done every 25-30k then yes, big chance of issues at around 200k. But my first BMW was the 2010 F10, 520d, bought it with 212tkm, had for a year and sold with 224tkm. Zero problems with the chain over the very cold winter (no noise, rattling etc)

Hi! In my case the wiring was indeed a “plug-and-play”. The hardest thing was to take apart the interior to pull the wires properly but connecting them was extremely easy even for someone who has never done this before. There was a manual included plus the guys at Audiokit were super helpful when I reached out for help (in my case one of the wires was labeled incorrectly which caused quite a bit of confusion). After installation, in terms of connectivity I had zero issues. Since this one is not wired into your head unit, you are basically not changing anything in terms of your media system, just the sound output.

@@asking_for_a_friend Okay, on the ai sonic amplifier, did you connect + and - for subwoofer on ”speaker” and mid and tweeters on ”high input” connectors or how did you connect it in to the amplifier? 😁

@@twebbie4271​​⁠so in my case, on the amp, there were “front” and “back” wire holes with Left/Right channels for outputs. Subs went to “front” (upper connectors) whereas mid/high went to “rear” (lower connectors). Left and right respectively

@@asking_for_a_friend okay thank you very much 😄

@@asking_for_a_friendIn the high-input on the amplifier (the left side of the amplifier if you look how you placed the amp in the trunk) , did you connect on both ”High input Front” and ”High input Rear”? because in the video it looks like it is only connected to ”high input front”

The biggest problem with conversions like this is the value. If this was a 550i that I would plan to keep forever, it would probably make sense to invest 6k into a purely aesthetic upgrade, but I would rather invest 6k into rebuilding the car from scratch and have a mechanically impeccable vehicle :) I was never into visual upgrades since in my opinion they are worthless for most part. I know people who spent 1.5k on M-Style steering wheels but drive on Chinese tires that "look just like Michelins so they should perform just as well". It's kind of like wearing a fake Rolex and even though there is a huge market for it - I'm just not part of it :)

The car was sold, but in short - it looks completely stock but it sounds a bit better than original BMW H&K audio system. The stage is not the same, since HK has more speakers, but this system has more bass and overall more power. I have an F10 with Bang&Olufsen now and I would say that the setup I made in this video is very close in terms of power delivery but it costs a fraction :)

With a 2.0 I would check what was done to the car. If the timing chain was replaced and the gearbox oil was changed at least a couple of times over the lifetime of the car - it's a good sign. Realistically, I would rather buy a car with 340k but with a new timing chain, regular service intervals and good history than a car with 250k without the above mentioned, as 250k is usually when they start falling apart if they are neglected. On 2l diesels timing chain replacement is recommended at around 250k anyway. One thing I would recommend for certain is to put aside 3k€ immediately as there will be something to fix with the cars regardless if it's a 25k€ F10 or 7k€ F10 :)

G30 is good indeed. However, for my own taste, I think the pre-LCI version looks too much like a taxi and the basic leather in the car became worse (they started using some kind of eco-leather on the sides of the seats and those crack already at 50k in some cars). So make sure you find a good leather package if you look for one. As for the engines, some say B58 diesel is amazing, others say it's a time bomb since not a lot of them have gone through 250k km. They have a different EGR system as far as I know which makes them have quite a few issues in cold climates if you drive only short distances. Plus there is a question of depreciation. I was very tempted to buy a solid 3.0xd with approx 100k km on the clock, but the problem was that I would lose somewhere between 5 and 7 thousand € in the first year on depreciation alone (I drive around 30k km per year) so I decided to get an F10 instead. It's closer to its bottom in terms of depreciation compared to G30 which still has a lot to go. But if you plan to keep the car for 3+ years, that's probably a good option. Or if you can buy from a private seller at a very low price

In the set I bought there was a wiring harness designed to take the signal from underseat woofers. So there was no need at all to remove the head unit or mingle with center console in any way. Basically you plug in the original under-seat woofer connector into this harness, and the harness has its own connector that you later plug into the woofers. I highly recommend checking Audiokit website (Finnish company) as they sell complete sets for different cars and existing stereo systems, just to understand what you might need for an upgrade.

Off the shelf cheap ATE brakes are crap. I had them on 2 cars and they always squealed in winter. Can't say anything about ATE Ceramic, I heard good things about those but didn't use them. There are spare parts where you can save money and there are those where you shouldn't save money. I don't put off-the-shelf parts that are under heavy load on my cars. But every time I buy a car I have to fix everything that went wrong because the previous owners had a philosophy of "this is just as good as an original". Might work for some people, doesn't work for me. This is not a video about "what's the cheapest way to own a BMW before it falls apart". It's about how to maintain its original condition as well as I can.

First thing I would check would be the fact that the km are correct. It is not impossible but quite rare that cars have 100.000 km in 10-11 years. If it is correct - make sure the service history is good, oil change was done properly, and get the car on the lift to check the suspension. Depending on the model you might get more advanced suspension types that age and might be falling apart just because they are old. It might be an expensive fix. All else would be more or less the same as with an F10 since they are a lot of common parts and issues :) 18k€ is a very good price if everything is fine with the car

@@asking_for_a_friend kms are genuine however soft close motors for both front doors are not working properly. Oil change / break pads are done at the intervals at least this is what I can see in vehicle information screen.

@@SairajPawar09 soft close is a great feature (in my opinion) but if it is broken - it's not cheap to fix. Used motors may cost anywhere between 250 and 500 per motor depending on your location. You may want to try and negotiate the price to consider these expenses. The easiest way to check if the motors work (sometimes the doors are misaligned which causes the issue as well) is to use a thin screwdriver and "move" the locking mechanism while the door is open, the same way it would be engaged if you would lock the door. If everything works well, you will hear the motor engaging and trying to pull the door once. If it makes several attempts or weird grinding noises - it's definitely dying.

The fact that you got one with a new timing chain and gearbox oil is a solid saving. Timing chain alone will run you at least 1.5-2k depending on the price of work (3.5k in my location) so that's a very good thing to have covered. My 530 Is currently undergoing final cosmetic procedures, will make a video right after that is done :)

I know it varies from market to market, but in a lot of EU countries you could indeed order it with Base stereo

I live in a country that's covered in snow for 5 months in a year :D My first F10 was a rear-wheel drive and I even though I loved it in the city, I hated highway driving and overtaking trucks on a fresh powered of snow. xDrive kills a bit of BMW fun but brings a lot of confidence

@@asking_for_a_friendxDelete is great for that, RWD for economy and fun, 4wd for regular winter driving.

Hi! Born in Ukraine :) You got yourself a bargain deal, I must say. The one I used in the example above I paid 20k€ for the car, invested quite a bit to make it as good as it gets and found a "better" car. Still couldn't make a proper review of it due to a lot of work and moving around but maybe during Christmas week I'll update the channel with a "riskier" buy I did couple months ago.

They are amplified automatically in this case. So no need to wire the door speakers to the sub. The only thing you will see, would be if you change the balance between front and rear dramatically (e.g. 90% rear) you would have almost no bass. So bass kind of remains "in the front" and the more you drive it back - the less you would feel it. I always kept my balance around 40 front 60 rear so it worked perfectly fine, but just a thing to consider

Moi! I bought all of it from the guys at audiokit. Feel free to reach out to them, they are super helpful in recommending the right package based on your car

Based on what I see on the forums, gasoline engines on these are a lottery. If previous owners took care of them - it’s a good option, but if they didn’t - gasoline seems to be way more problematic. But that’s based on what I read. I don’t have any personal experience with gas engines from bmw.

Hi! The car in the thumbnail has its original 2016 suspension with 19' M5 wheels and as you can see there is still some space. If the car is sitting low, this might be because of two things: previous owners lowered it, which means you need to re-build the suspension to its original form (if you want to) and that's not a cheap thing to do. Depending on your location and price for work and parts may be between 600€ for the cheapest parts to around 1,9-2,1k€ for something close to OEM. Second reason could be if your car has air suspension and if that one is dead it's definitely over 1.5k€ in repairs. I strongly advise you to take a car to any workshop that has a lift, pay them 30-50$ to lift and inspect the car from below. It might save you few thousand €.

Thanks for fast answer :) If the suspension are ok, i think i will buy it for 15k eur. Only 2 owner@@asking_for_a_friend

My pleasure

It’s a BMW mystery. Yes, it’s all aluminium but for some reason it also rusts. I assume it has something to do with the paint they chose or painting technique. I just picked up another F10 and it has rust in the door corners under the paint (going to the workshop to fix that)

@@asking_for_a_friend A mystery indeed. Looking forward to see the new car in another video.

It's the best praise one could hope for :) Next one is also an F10, 530xd. It's going through initial small fixes and soon will be on the channel

That’s true. However, in most cases these are very small repairs (unless it’s something major that’s causing leaks, but those you will see regardless)

I feel your pain. I'm now collecting all the data for my annual "cost of ownership" and I can honestly say that it would be comparable to leasing a new 530e :) But with only 15k kilometres per year instead of mine 40k.

@@asking_for_a_friend Not what I want to hear to be honest. If that's the case I will be leasing to save my self the headache of buying used in the future. Time will tell, I am hoping I can get 3 years "cheap" use out of my 520d F11.

@@raalaa121 if your goal is 1-2 years of ownership and 15-20k drive you will definitely be able to have it on absolute minimum cost. For example in my car nothing actually broke, all of the maintenance was preventive. I guess I could’ve saved 4-5k easy if I “waited” and sold it in the end of its lifespan :)

I agree, suspension overall is tricky, especially EDC. Mine has EDC and it will cost few thousand when it's "done". But if you live in the area with nice roads and test the car in warm weather, unfortunately it's not easy to check the condition of the suspension elements by driving the car for 30 minutes on the highway :) Unless it's completely destroyed, of course. Otherwise you need a lift or a stretch of bad road to "rock" the car side to side and feel the work of the suspension

I had xenon on a previous car and I can say that adaptive LED (make sure it’s original as many owners put Chinese replica instead) is hands down one of the best options you can get. It’s extremely bright, very good adaptivity of high beams and as a small bonus it also makes the car look better :)

Keyword is "cheap" ;) There are ATE pads that sell for 40€ and those are nowhere close to the original pads. Same goes for Brembo and many other manufacturers

​@@asking_for_a_friendyes, we got Brembo brakes and discs on our ford edge and they are very squeaky, they are only goodifyou are getting the premium versions

always a pleasure

So in terms of snow: Comparing 520d and 525xd back to back I can honestly say that for winters (if you drive a lot of highways outside the city) i'd get an XD. It's a totally different beast in the snow and gives much more confidence in higher speeds, especially in overtaking. If you drive 99% of the time in the city - i'd get a rear-wheel drive. It's much more fun in the corners and I only got stuck once with it over the whole course of winter when the car was parked outside for a week in spring and the snow below it basically turned into perfect ice. Tires will play a major difference here. I used Conti Viking Contact 6 on my XD (no spikes) but I plan to buy Michelin X-Ice North this coming winter to get even better traction. In terms of reliability - honestly, I think F10 is one of those cars that if you take care of it, it will never let you down. I had the car outside for a week without starting when it was -30 on average and it started instantly. In summer I had it parked in the airport for 35 days (note, the battery was 6 years old), and it started instantly. I drove my 525xd in winter from Finland to Austria (14-hour drives, 2 days in a row) - zero problems. No oil leaks, no coolant leaks, zero issues. Everything that I fixed on a car would be the same on any other brand since it's just wear & tear. But the level of comfort is much higher that in any competitor I drove. I think the only thing that actually "broke" was my webasto. But that's a 200€ fix (by the way, I'd highly recommend this option as it makes your life in winter so much more comfortable). My suggestion is as follows: set aside 2k€ when buying an F10, ensure that all of the major issues are taken care of before buying, then take it to a good BMW workshop and fix everything you can. And then forget about any fixes for a couple of years.

@@asking_for_a_friend Thank you so much for the very detailed reply! That's very helpful! Good to hear that they aren't that unreliable, I guess it really does come down to how well has the car been taken care of maintenance-wise. I'll only buy it when it has full-service history, not gonna take any chances with that. Going with the XD for sure with some decent tires. I'll try to find one with Webasto too. I'll also try to set aside as much as possible for repairs and hope it won't bankrupt me :D

@@tuulik6588 full service history is great, but remember, that BMW has an electronic service book so most of the basic repairs are never reflected there :) I would try to find one from the owner that kept all of the service receipts to prove that for example oil change was done more often than every 30,000km (as BMW suggests). If you buy a car with less than 150k milleage, official dealer's history and regiment would be ok, but get ready to change all of the technical liquids (e.g. gearbox oil, transfer box oil, etc.) as these are not part of BMW official service. If you go for more than 150k - better find a car that had a fanatic owner that changed oil every 10k, maintained the car well and kept the receipt :) This would save you a lot of effort and cash. My previous 520d (2010) I bought with 210k on the clock, but with rear-wheel drive there are less potential issues. I drove that one for 15k, replaced front suspension as it was basically dead, as well as most of the parts mentioned in this very video. So you could say I spent extra 3k€ to drive 15k :) Not the cheapest purchase. I'll make a cost breakdown for 1 year of ownership in a couple of weeks to summarize how much did it cost me to own this for the last year.

There was none. The whole video is about installing the amp to the base audio system that doesn’t have the amp by default.

There was a very slight "kick" when going from 4 to 3rd but nothing else. Compared to how Mercedes of a similar age drives, I'd say shifts on the ZF gearbox (mine is the 8HP45) are much more noticeable. I have heard that with higher series (8HP70/75 etc) versions it may act a bit smoother but can't confirm from my own experience. I did the gearbox oil change (as well as all other technical liquids in the car) immediately after I bought it with 172k at the meter which helps a lot. One way to get rid of these kicks (at least it worked for me very well) was to instal XHP Stage 3 gearbox software. The car started to drive much smoother in the comfort mode

@@asking_for_a_friend thank you

My pleasure :)

So even in the base audio you already have soft foam inside the triangles that should hold the tweeter in place. So even if you order a chinese Harman Kardon replica from Ali you would be ok. But I decided to order original HiFi triangles with new foam for this. The easiest way that I found to remove these is as follows: open the window fully, use a thin plastic trim removal tool and try to stick it between the triangle and the plastic door frame from the inner side of the door where the it would normally meet the pillar. Just press it in and you will see that is starts to come out. Then it's easy, just take it off and replace with a new one. The only tricky thing is installing the outer side of this triangle as there is a small plastic "hook" that has to go in perfectly in order for the triangle to fit.

I've been living in Finland for a while now :) Audiokit are the best for these! For the winter I simply made a "temporary mount" from a piece of plywood, covered in with STP damping material and just inserted 2 screws to hold down the amp so it doesn't slide around. It's currently located under the floor of the trunk (still) since I plan to do some soundproofing of the trunk plus I just ordered new speakers to replace my HK in the doors/rear shelf, so will need to re-adjust the settings on the amp. I think the final install will only happen in spring when the weather is nice to be able to work on the car outside :)

So I used this system (except for the door speakers): www.audiokit.fi/tuote/audiokit-bmw-perusaudion-paivityspaketti-premium The wiring came with it, which definitely made my life a lot easier. The wiring was effectively "plug&play" where my only job was to plug in the "left/right"/"front/back" in the marked holes in the amp and that's that. Afterwards just tune the sound a bit, play with crossovers and it's a done deal

Thanks a lot! Hopefully not a lot of work awaits :)