My bet is the multi switch is messed. The fuse was pulled so the PO could use just the front.

Getting more work done on sound deadening the front doors. Almost done with that and have the woofers installed in the OE housings. Waiting on some tweeter capacitors and the door handle carrier to put everything back together so I can hear this thing.

Hah, now worries.

I did give that a thought. If you notice in that pic I picked up a couple of spare dash mid grills from the yard. At the end of the day these mids (others might cooperate more) are very wide all the way around the back side. They don't have a basket that tapers in. Without raising the speaker 1/2"+ I could not clear the plastic "box" that BMW built for the mids. You can see the plastic in the pics. Other mids might work, these won't without cutting that plastic in there.

Edit: Here's a better shot of the plastic enclosure that's in there.

Attachment 80957

Changed tie rod ends and found out that the rack is leaking in to dust boots... Servotronic racks aren't easy to come by. Only one brand seems to rebuild them.

added new side lights, bought a used map dome light, getting my oil filter housing gasket replaced tomorrow, the rebuild on the 04 e53 3.0i slowly coming along. can't wait for the finish product.

oops, operator error!
 

Tried it today with better results...I had been operating it yesterday leaning into the truck from outside, and must've exerted pressure on the stalk to activate both systems. When seated, after reprogramming the delay interval for front & back separately, they operated as I had expected them to.

Fresh oil change at 150560 miles. Wow, it sounds different with new oil. For only 5k miles, it was dirty. I bet the previous owners pushed the oil to the limit! It' not easy finding Castrol A4/B3 oil here. It's like $11 a quart. A 5 quart bottle is cheaper on line. A new bottle is on order to keep it topped off over the next 5k miles.

Plus, installed two blind spot mirrors. Looking straight out the side and seeing the mid pillar is not good.

Instead of bind spot mirrors I bought European style panoramic mirrors they are incredible. No blind spot at all. I can see the hood of a car that passes me before it leaves the mirror. There also is a line printed on the mirror to mark where it curves that works perfect as a lane change guide. When the line crosses the center of a car I just passed, the car is about 1 car length behind me.

Interesting. Ebay mirrors? My plan is order new folding mirror sensors. The fix worked for a while. Now they fold and open back up. The metal clips keep falling off. $30 for each is not compared to other parts.

Unless you get an analysis, you can't tell just by looking at its color. The oil gets "dirty" within 500 of an oil change. This appears to be a characteristic of the M54. However, the inside of the engine (at least mine) is very clean without any oil stain the last time I seen it opened up for a valve cover gasket changed!

blind spot mirrors(aspheric BMW mirrors are crazy expensive)
 

I'm too cheap to try to retrofit/modify my X5 to better side or interior mirrors. It has the base mirrors with two small spot mirrors added, no blue tint, heating, or folding function. If I find the need for more blindspot coverage, I might add a non-BMW-ish "Wink Panoramic" mirror, like I once used on my '66 Chevelle Malibu 2-dr., when I used it on the street.

I drove 120 miles round-trip diagonally across Tarrant & Dallas counties (into Collin Co.) on my daily commute, through some of the worst traffic in the state of Texas (for over 30 years). When I occasionally drove the Chevelle, its' small mirrors and huge C-pillars made for extreme blind spots that I needed to overcome.

I added a Wink (I think, or Pilot, or Rally) Panoramic mirror just under the regular rear-view mirror. Its' five panels helped me see the devious swerving and lane-changes made by women putting on their make-up at high speed, so I could avoid car carnage.

Once I quit street-driving the Chevelle, and dedicated it to dragracing only, I gave the mirror to another guy (not much need for a blind spot panoramic mirror on the drag strip; lane changes are frowned-upon).