NE1 else worried about buying an early X///M?

[TTBear]

I've been reading a few posts here, and a few of them had me worried. Several posters have put up posts regarding test drives. Most of them stated that they redlined the demo vehicles, or at the very least, drove them well up into the rev band.
This is exactly why I would NEVER buy a demo. I am fairly sure none of these demo vehicles had had their 1200 mile service completed - they would be far too new for that.
With my own dealer, when I test drove a brand new e46 M3, and then the e92 M3, I was thrown the keys and given free reign of the car. It was tempting, but I stayed within the break-in rev limit.
I don't mean to sound holier-than-thou, but c'mon, people...... some guy has to buy that car you just bagged on, in direct conflict with strict recommendations as set out by BMW. These recommendations are put in place for a reason, I should think.........

Flame suit on...........

[SandmanTR]

I think that's a very VALID concern. I was fortunate enough to locate a dealer that just received an X6M that had 6 miles on it, no test drives and was in the showroom. This dealership never allows test drives like a lot do. My local dealer included.

I know how a lot of people test drive vehicles and would have ordered the X6M before I would have bought a demo vehicle that was test driven multiple times. A dealer in the greater Los Angeles area has an X6M with 66 miles on it already. No way I'd buy that...

[B-Line]

It's my opinion that you guys are over worrying.

The theory on break in procedures vary anyway. Some people say break it in gentle, others say, break it in you like stole it.

My vote goes with the later theory. Smash that throttle, stand on those breaks, stress that vehicle to the near breaking point (not that there is a breaking point..)

Cause if something is going to happen to the car, I'd rather it happen when the car is brand new. Let it happen when the dealer is standing behind the car and the deal.

Breaking in cars slowly was a technique of old. But with synthetic oils, computers, drive by wire, etc. I've heard many people say that I trust, that breaking in a car slowly can do more damage than good and the car should be broken in the way you plan to drive it.

Matter of fact, when I get in a new car that is mine, one of the first things I do is put a heat cycle on the brakes. Get em so hot that they smell and smoke, to bed the pads and create a chemical bond between pad and rotor.

And again, if anything is going to break on the car, i'd rather it break when the car is right off the lot or before it's turned over to me.

[LeMansX5]

I don't buy demo cars. If I am spending that kind of money I build it to my taste and a few weeks later is not life threatening.

My concern is with first year bugs. I have been bitten with E60 TT+facelift bugs, so cautious. These Ms have very new TS-TTengine. I want to wait and see.

[chefwong]

B-Line -

I learned a new bed in procedure. Kinda crazy but BREMBO recommends slow cycles on their pads/rotors system
.
60-30, 3 sec brake , 1/2 mile , repeat and rinse 30X. Kinda crazy.......but this was something I learned this week.....

[B-Line]

What I usually do is,

about 30, threshold stops.

60-5mph x10
50-5mph x10
40-5mph x10

Without letting the brakes cool.

The method you use to bed the pads isn't as important as the idea of bedding them. As long as you get them good and hot, they should be smoking and the smell should make you gag, then you have put a good cycle onto them.

The process you use to get there should really depend on your environment. But companies like Brembo and Stoptech will give you instructions for people who don't really understand how to get them hot, so they have a sort of checklist to follow.

But once you understand the method, you can alter it to fit your roads, parking lot, etc.

Basically it's..
Drive real fast, stand on brakes, repeat.
Do this about 30 times, no limo stopping from varying top speeds and you should be fine.

When you do finish, don't use e-brake and drive a little bit to cool the brakes, but be careful cause you will get a lot of travel in the pedal so avoid areas with people and objects.

You'll know if you done it right if smoke is billowing from the car and you can taste the brakes.

[B-Line]

BTW, this is also a great technique if you have brake noise/squeal.

Sometimes you just need to reintroduce the chemical bond between pad and rotor and "clean" the crud between them by getting em hot.

[King]

There are very few dealers that will hand over the key and let you loose. Most will have a salesman accompany you. I took the new X5M for a drive and while I stomped on it around the curves and down the highway, I certainly didn't push it into the red line. I wouldn't mind buying a demo as you can often save several thousand $$$ and besides it's under full warranty if anything were to go wrong, it's covered.

[TTBear]

Originally Posted by B-Line

It's my opinion that you guys are over worrying.

The theory on break in procedures vary anyway. Some people say break it in gentle, others say, break it in you like stole it.

My vote goes with the later theory. Smash that throttle, stand on those breaks, stress that vehicle to the near breaking point (not that there is a breaking point..)

Cause if something is going to happen to the car, I'd rather it happen when the car is brand new. Let it happen when the dealer is standing behind the car and the deal.

Breaking in cars slowly was a technique of old. But with synthetic oils, computers, drive by wire, etc. I've heard many people say that I trust, that breaking in a car slowly can do more damage than good and the car should be broken in the way you plan to drive it.

Matter of fact, when I get in a new car that is mine, one of the first things I do is put a heat cycle on the brakes. Get em so hot that they smell and smoke, to bed the pads and create a chemical bond between pad and rotor.

And again, if anything is going to break on the car, i'd rather it break when the car is right off the lot or before it's turned over to me.

Perhaps, over-worrying. It's not that I expect that the car would be at any higher risk of damage with either method of "breaking in"... I am simply stating that if I am buying a car for 100 rather large thousand dollars, I want to be aware of the nature of each and every mile that went into the car. It's just me - same reason that every one of our cars has had a paint finish better than the vast majority of brand new cars sitting on dealers' lots - no matter at what stage of its life span they are.

Sure, you can opt to break-in a car using the theory that one should drive it like you stole it - but, and to me, it is a VERY big but - using this method, there is STILL a method to breaking it in. One should cycle the engine utilizing the entire rev range, in a methodical manner - not just driving the car hard for ten miles (i.e. - on a test drive, lasting a very short duration of time), then having the car being driven sedately for the next customer... etc., etc.

Simply, I guess I was just making the statement that in light of the fact that BMW does recommend a certain break-in procedure, then those who test drive the cars, should be respectful of this. The car logs this info - I sure wouldn't want this info to be coming back to bite me in the ass, should anything go wrong.

Let me this way put it. Say you just picked up your brand new, zero miles M3/M6/X5M/X6M. We just meet for the first time. Would you be happy for your car, if I jumped in your new M, and bagged the crap out of it and then just said "thanks - see ya".

Likely, nothing is going to go wrong with the car. I'm just saying that there are potential caveats to buying such a car, and also, that those test driving the cars, should respect this fact.

Rant off

[B-Line]

You seem to think that only launch cars get test driven.. Hate to break it to you but so do custom spec cars, cars sitting on the lot that you may purchase, etc.

We all whine about dealers who won't let us properly test drive a car and then whine about dealers that have 30 miles on a car we want to buy.

Guess what, we can't have it both ways.

And seeing that I'm a track guy, high performance driving instructor, racer, etc. I can tell you this, accelerating a car hard is not damaging, braking a car hard is not damaging.

The engines on these cars are run on Dyno's before they are ever installed. They are RPM tested, quality controlled, etc.

If you think some guy accelerating hard for a 10 mile test drive is going to break your soon to be purchased car, I have to snicker.

I'd be more worried about the careless transport guy who curb rashes a wheel or knocks a bumper.

A 10 mile or even 60 mile spirited drive ain't gonna break nothing that's not already broken.

And there's nothing worse than a douchey salesman/dealer that won't let a perspective buyer "test" the car with a little acceleration and braking.