That trim restorer looks great. I’ll pick some up next time I’m at the parts store.

I recently pulled my roof rails to replace the middle and front seals which were in terrible shape. BMW only parts, and they took quite a while to arrive from Germany (I presume), but I feel better that water has less of a chance of getting into my x5. I hit the rails with some flat black while they were off to cover up 23 years of dings and roof rack marks.

Also in the cosmetic department, I had the door cards and rear seats cleaned and redyed recently. Wholly crap what a difference. The rear leather is in very good shape, but was very dirty. The center console and arm rests were very beaten up. The guy I used did an amazing job. It looks almost brand new. So good that I took my 2015 grand Cherokee to him too, before it gets sold to my daughter. The front seats in the X5 are unsalvageable, but I’ve got reupholstered ones in work…hopefully. It’s taking for ever, but the guy who owns the shop had to have heart surgery.

Just when I was feeling good about the X, I put the left rear window down so my dogs could enjoy a ride yesterday and heard the flap-flap-flap of the regulator unspooling. Good times. New URO regulator and clip on the way from FCP. I’ll look in my log to see when this one was replaced, but I thinks it’s been many years at least. I opted for the URO since the BMW part is twice as much, and this one will have the FCP warranty.

I ordered both engine and transmission filters for this weeks "let's work in 47c" marathon, but I am thinking of switching over to 20w-50w synthetic for the summer. Without trying to start up the war of oils again, what do you all think?
[emoji848] [emoji848]

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Monitor your engine oil temp. It's prob not much different than mine so there's not much advantage going thicker oil. One grade higher perhaps as the engine wears but too far off factory spec you risk affecting vanos.

You def shouldn't need W (winter) viscosity so I would be curious what people in hot climate have experienced with straight weight oil. SAE 30 or 40 no W for cold temp start

Hell yeah CeraKote is amazing. That one application will last at least 6 months before you need to re-apply - even on a car parked outside.

Thanks I will and I will be running more than just viscous fan soon to, so that will help greatly I'm sure.

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front right driveshaft
 

Swapped out front right driveshaft.
45mins from start to finish on the ground.

About to do an oil change on a lawn tractor and it calls for 10w30 if you use in ambient below 50f=10c and above that temp it calls for 30 straight.

Straight weight is always better than multi viscosity. The wider the spread the more "viscosity modifiers" (stuff that's not oil and likely to turn to sludge) in the oil. I always ( since synthetic first came out) go with 1/2 synthetic and 1/2 Dino. My 2 cents ;)

I did my Volvo 240 with it and it still looked fine almost two years later after I totaled that old lady... the black body trim on the X was so faded and gray and now it looks soooo much better. The strip under the driver's door had partly turned white, and the stuff didn't work there so maybe there was some kind of chemical damage in the past.

Can also vouch for their headlight restorer. Ended up replacing both xenon headlights with ebay cheapies and they both cleaned up really well. Step 2 of the process is to sand them with the provided sanding discs and oh shit it looked horrible! But step 3 is applying the magic wipe. Looks almost new. Almost.

The ebay parts were not terribly oxidized as I've seen far worse, so I don't know the limits of this kit, but the price is decent, no power tools needed either.

https://cerakoteceramics.com/cerakot...storation-kit/

So it's been a little over one year into this E53, and I guess the "hey this thing that was happening last week isn't happening anymore" thing has finally reached the point of acceptance.

Driving to the workshop last week there was some obvious loss of power just cruising along in town at about 45mph. Just for maybe half a second. But it happned several times early in the week. No codes thrown.

But it's gone now. So are the thermostat and fuel trim codes. For now.

Move on!