x5, What year? Reliable?

[Ricky Bobby]

Originally Posted by PropellerHead

Or yeah. Buy a Lexus.

what Prop said, and please don't buy yourself a Lexus RX, those are meant for dropping the kids at soccer practice and going to get mani/Pedi's at Kimmy Nails with your housewife friends.

[upallnight]

If I had come on this forum before buying the X, I probably would have brought a Cadillac SRX instead.

Trifecta of light issues, torn CV boots, air bags that leaks, CCV issues, can't drive the car in the winter on short trips because of condensation problems and the milk shake in the oil, and the list goes on and on and on.

I think the engineers at BMW have a new design philosophy and it's called planned obsolescence. Instead of designing a product that will last they are designing the product to last as long as the warranty is in effect. Plastic gears in the transfer case actuator could have been designed with a better material. Oil seals that get hard over time and starts to leak, my 31 year old Porsche is still leak free.

End of RANT.

[THE VEIN]

Originally Posted by upallnight

If I had come on this forum before buying the X, I probably would have brought a Cadillac SRX instead.

I was split between the x5 and q7 but I didn't get the q7 cuz I didn't wanna spend the money. but ill try to keep my x5 till the wheels fall off unless I get a good deal on a q7

[roym01]

[QUOTE=bpowa;952351
What are 4.4 owners really getting for mpg? pre and post 2004 models with "normal" acceleration?[/QUOTE]

My 2005 4.4 Sport with approx. 150000 Km's goes 550KM before the light comes on. Combined city/hwy in 'granny' mode.

[Doru]

Originally Posted by roym01

My 2005 4.4 Sport with approx. 150000 Km's goes 550KM before the light comes on. Combined city/hwy in 'granny' mode.

After the tune-up I got 13.5l/100 Km city driving (17.4 mpg), or almost 600 Km/tank city driving (370 mi).
Before I was at around 14.4 l/100 Km (16.3 mpg). Again, city driving.

2004 X5 4.4, N62

[Doru]

Originally Posted by upallnight

Stuff deleted

I think the engineers at BMW have a new design philosophy and it's called planned obsolescence. Instead of designing a product that will last they are designing the product to last as long as the warranty is in effect. Plastic gears in the transfer case actuator could have been designed with a better material. Oil seals that get hard over time and starts to leak, my 31 year old Porsche is still leak free.

End of RANT.

The old Porsche engine was an air cooled engine. Fast forwarding, to keep up with competition and changing the engine for more performance, they (Porsche) switched to liquid cooled engines. To keep up with competition, more electronic gadgets were introduced all over the post 2000 vehicles.
BMW as well had to improve performance. Also, the bean counters had a word to say about materials. meaning that in order to keep a model sell-able, you have to implement lots of plastics instead of let's say titanium, or other exotic materials which are very durable, but would bring the price of a car to astronomic numbers. This has spurred the aftermarket community to build a few bits of parts out of "real durable" materials.

Actually, the BMW's are quite reliable pieces of machinery, and quite frankly, on ANY car make forum, you will see questions & rants about that particular make, because you would NOT start a thread titled: 'hey, my car is problem free. What's your problem free issue?" These forums in turn will scare some people away from buying that particular model, especially, if one issue is surfacing for more than a few people. This means that that particular issue "could" be a problem, but is not necessary to affect your ride.

I have a very good indy - ex master-tech from the BMW Gallery. And, for example, I checked my X5 with him, and asked what problems this N62 specimen has. His answer startled me: "It's probably the best. All I have seen with model is that blue smoke issue, which frankly is more a cosmetic stuff, than anything else. if it goes really bad - which I haven't seen yet- we will take a look and fix it." I also asked about the notorious BMW cooling issue, and again he said he saw the least cooling issues with this N62 engine so far. So I asked again" What issues can I expect with this vehicle", at which he replied: "Actually, there are none. The worst are the 100k rear ball joints & control arms". This is from a guy who wants your business. And is very reputable. And I can live with this.

Also, you guys can check some Honda & Toyota forums to see their problems. You will be amazed at the issues those "reliable" cars have.

[bpowa]

Is it safe to say. That there are more issues with the earlier year models?

[epdarks]

There are 2 types of BMW owners.

The first type wait until after failures to get things fixed. Those are the people that get left stranded.

The second type are the ones who do preventative maintenance, before a failure. Costs more, but peace of mind and is worth a lot.

In 4 years of BMW ownership, I have never been stranded.

[bpowa]

.

[JCL]

Originally Posted by bpowa

Is it safe to say. That there are more issues with the earlier year models?

No. It is safe to say that there are more issues with the first year of production, including following the mid-cycle refresh (LCI). So the 2001 (E53), 2004 (E53 LCI), 2007 (E70) model years had more issues, statistically. However, these issues tended to be early production issues, and while they are a reason for many of us not to buy a first model year, the issues tend to get worked out during the warranty period and at ten years of age, I don't think the first-year issues are a reason one way or another to select a particular vehicle.