Another newbie M3 driver-I a few questions.

M

mdhaynes

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#1
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Location
Albuquerque, New Mexico
#1
Greetings!
This is my first sports car and I'm pretty excited. I'll be the 4 owner with 84K miles
on the ODO. I traded in a 02 Jetta VR6 pretty much straight across. Car payment went up a few dollars and my insurance went down! Go figure.

1. Difficult shifting. Tranny was stiff from the beginning but 2 days ago I could not get it into 1st sitting at a stoplight. I had to go for 2nd but the effort pulled the shift knob off (yeah, ha ha..."That's the way it works, sir"). The next morning I could not get it into any gear at all. When the tow truck came 2 days later, I started it to pull it out into the street and "pffft", into gear it went! [?|] Mech says it worked fine for him and his 2 techs (uh huh...like, I'm sure they just wanted to drive mein auto). We'll see what a fluid change does.

2. I've been reading on mods (danger! danger!) and I'd like some information on removing the drive fan. I live in Albuquerque, NM and I'm concerned about the freezing part of the coolant/antifreeze equation.

There. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
Looking forward to many years driving BMW's. (and not just the killer M3 GTR in GT4 [:p] )
 
selavia

selavia

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#2
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5
Location
Maryland
#2
Welcome! [welcome] Beautiful car + color! Post some pics of your new joy.

Regarding the transmission; (I'm no expert at all with transmission, but if it wouldn't go into gear, it would make me think that your clutch might need to be replaced. Put your car in 3rd gear and try and get it to go; if it just dies, it's not the clutch, if you're able to get it going, you might need a new clutch. 84k miles is low for a clutch replacement, unless it was really abused; mines going on 130k and no problems; I've heard some members on this board have their clutches go to closee to 150-200k.
**PLEASE someone correct me if I'm wrong.

Welcome again [welcome]

Sean [welcome]
 
T

ThatOneGuy

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#3
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Location
San Francisco Bay Area
#3
Clutch could be the issue, hopefully you got something on the service history. You may want to find a good independent BMW shop in your area and talk to them about Redline or Royal Purple synthetic transmission lubricants.

The stock transmission/shifter are notchy from the factory. I have a new M3 with about 8K miles on the clock, notchy shifter. It get better once warmed up, but it's not a smooth or snicky as my old Acura.

Welcome to the family.
 
M

mdhaynes

2
#4
Messages
6
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Location
Albuquerque, New Mexico
#4
A good flushing and refill of the tranny with full synthetic Amzoil has completly solved the problem. I thought it was the clutch at first too but the mech said clutch and assoc. hydralics in good shape. It looks like clutch and/or tranny replaced at some point 'cause the exhaust has been cut and welded back together (guess how I figured that something was amiss). Good excuse to upgrade at some point. First thing is to pre-emptorily replace the H2O pump and the thermostat housing. I'm still looking for feedback on the fan delete idea.
 
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