I would say first off, you have'nt got the Adaptive Drive suspension components which causes camber drift and also the lefthand side wheel base is shorter than the righthand side by about 5-7mm on the X5.

The X5 is setup to be driven on the other side of the road (lefthand drive), so when you drive on our side (Australia) on a lefthand cambered road it drives left, its fine on a dead level road.

The X5 has no adjustment, not like the Merc's that have castor kits for Australia. If you drive your X5 on the righthand side of a normal Hwy where the camber goes to the right you will find the x5 will drive straight and not go to the right, thats the castor setup of the 5mm shorther wheelbase on the lefthand side of the X5' wheelbase.

Now when you drive on the lefthand side of the road with a lefthand camber the x5 drifts left, it should stay straight, to fix this you need to lengthen the lefthand side and shorten the righthand side wheelbase, hence a castor kit.

And I have had techs all over the X5 some 5 years ago (RACQ & Fulcrum R&D) and had several different frontend components flown out from Germany by the BMW engineers to try to fix the problem, in the end Fulcrum developed these bushes.

My old X5 (M-Sport 35d) had these castor bushes from the day I picked it up and when I sold it 2 weeks ago it had done 73,000klm, I put new set of tyres on at 69,000klm, the ceramic pads were a third worn and the rotors were still within spec.

As you can tell I am very finicky when it comes to vehicles and expect a car sold in Australia to suit Australian standards, just putting the steering wheel on the righthand side of the car means nothing, you have to take into account that our roads have heavy camber, rotation of the motor and the way the adaptive drive torques and the fact the X5 is shorter on its lefthand side and the brand of tyre.

The average city driver would probably never realise the above, even Mercedes does not advertise the camber problem, and I have owned many Merc's. You drop the Merc off, complain it's pulling left and when you pick it up they stay they fixed it ( they don't tell you they put a $79 castor kit in). They take the chance you don't pick the fault and that not all cars pull or camber left, the average housewife hits potholes and there goes the alignment anyway, there another $150 they can make out of you at the next service.

__________________

X5 M50d White | 20" Rims | Adaptive Drive, Self-Lvl Susp | Act/Steer | HUD | Xenon, Adapt Lights | H-Beam Ast | Rear/Side Camera | Panorama S/roof | Auto Tailgate | Comfort, Active, Ventilated, Heating, Lumbar, Navada Perforated Leather Seats | Comfort Access | M-Steer Wheel w Pdle Shift |Sports 8-Speed | Active Crus Stop/Go | Proff Nav + TV, DAB | 16 Spk Ind Audio | USB |Internet-eMail-SMS-Apps | 4 Zone Air | Speed D/play | Towbar | 20% Tint | 5mm Castor Bushes | Yellow Calipers, Ceramic Pads |