Well, I certainly wouldn't call a 9 month update "fashionably late" but here we are!
I'll start off by saying that this has been the best ownership experience I've had. This car is rock solid, dead nuts reliable and I spend most of my time convinced that the odometer is lying to me. Supposably we're just a few thousand miles away the 200K milestone but the car act's and drives like it shipped out of Munich last week.
So being a BMW, it's probably fitting to cover the maintenance and repairs in the last year. With the exception of an inner tie rod that I killed in Compton, I've not had the slightest issue. Here's what I've done:
-A deep cleaning, where I went through the car and removed every piece of corroded hardware and either polished it or replaced it. I'm a bit obsessive so I spent a total of ~20 hours cleaning 190K miles of debris out of every crevice I could find.
- This deep cleaning included a full "detail" where I shampooed all fabric and corrected the paint. I'm really impressed with how this pain has worn for the past 16 years. A light cut following clay revealed a nice, new layer of healthy clear coat. I then sealed the paint with CG Jet Seal, which I reapply after every wash. Honestly, I just need to go down the ceramic road because Colorado is f*cking brutal on paint... and everything else.
- Right after this cleaning, I decided I'd drive the car across the country to SoCal for a few days because the Angeles forest has smoother roads than we do. Compton roads are not as good however, and after driving through what felt like 14 miles of rally stage, I could tell there was a tiny bit more play in the steering. So after the 1,000 mile drive home I replaced the worn out Meyle TR's with a fresh Lemfoerder(sp?) TR's. Alignment was set back to kill mode and off we went. Here is the aftermath of 2,400 miles in five days of driving. Fun fact; we encountered a surprise snow storm in the Utah mountains IN LATE MAY. PS4S's and icy roads led to countersteering down the shoulder of 7% grade for over a mile. DSC actually proved it's worth, as did the perfect weight distribution!
- I changed the oil with Mobil 0W-40 at 189K and am getting ready to switch to Rotella T6 (now at 194K).
- I've neglected changing the old rear diff fluid because I want an excuse to go Wavetrac.
- I know some people are going to be upset with me not properly evacuating the A/C system, but I hooked a can of A/C Pro up and topped off the R134a. Vent temperatures are now 34* out of sunlight @ 95* ambient. This was done in March and the A/C is still just as efficent. One of the most enjoyable parts of owning this car, weird I know, is the stellar A/C performance despite lack of window tint. To my knowledge, the system is original and it's as healthy as can be.
- I've worn through 2mil of PS4S on all four corners in about 8K miles. This is damn good given the heat cycles and slip angles seen by the tires. A. LOT.
- The TMS monoballs were regreased during the last oil change and I've enjoyed every minute on them, I'd still recommend them to anybody who puts their E46 through the ringer on less than perfect roads.
And that's all I've done. Last November I picked up an '84 MB 300D to restore and drive daily. I'd finished the mechanical restoration by January and deemed it "my daily driver", pulling the BMW into the garage. That lasted for a solid two weeks before the two cars traded places. This ZHP that I bought as a weekend canyon carver has became my everyday car, damn it! But I just don't care to drive anything else. When I wake up in the morning, I have to decide whether I'm going to drive a stock 2011 Civic SI, the diesel Benz or the Darkness. The Darkness wins almost every single day. The only fault stored in the DME has been an occupancy sensor (which I couldnt care less about). That's it. Nothing more.
This is what the future holds:
- OEM engine and trans mounts from FCP should be here this week. I'm replacing these preventatively because I like keeping things in perfect order. The rubber is cracked but there's no movement under the hood, I could probably get away with these for another 60K miles if I didn't drive like I meant it.
- I'll be switching to Rotella while I'm under there, and will also put some fresh Redline in the rear diff.
- A proper short shifter. I've never loved the E46's shift characteristics, I wish it felt like as good as the '11 Civic SI's. How do you guys like Rogue Engineering's Octane SSK? I've heard great things about them, I just hope it isnt TOO short. I like my shifter to be positive and confident and too short of a throw increases the likelihood of a pricey shift.
- A Wavetrac LSD. This is what I want more than anything, but it's also the most expensive. This car is super competent with an open diff, but it'd be so much better. I've dialed in the alignment to be as neutral as can be but I'd like a slight oversteer bias. I don't want to induce the understeer geometrically, thus an LSD is my only option. I'm not interested in the OS Giken or clutch type LSD's because of the added maintenance, the Wavetrac just seems like a great plug and play.
- Either BC Racing BR's or KW V3's. Obviously there's a huge price gap between the two, so I'll choose based on my choice to go LSD or not. The Bilstein HD's are still hanging in there, as are the H&R Springs, but I've lost some dampening as the setup is almost 60K miles old now.
- 2 of the VMR's are slightly out of round, so I'll be in the market for some stronger 17's as soon as these 18" PS4S's are spent.
Most ZHP owners fit adjustable sway bar's in an attempt to increase turn-in or induce oversteer. With an open diff, I think you're better off chucking the rear sway bar. Once I tie both rear wheels together with a Wavetrac I will re-evaluate.
Fuel Economy is consistently 25-26mpg while commuting, and 30-32 on the highway. I've been really impressed by this, because I think the pre-cat O2's are original so I'm not sure how they're still doing so well.
I want to note, for any prospective E46 owners, this is what happens when a car lives (most of) a life of religious maintenance. The PO coughwhammycough composed the most beautiful maintenance spreadsheet I've ever seen. The PO doesn't know this, but I thank him every single time I wake the M54 up just to see and hear it's perfectly quiet, perfectly smooth, perfect operation. I don't want to jinx myself by saying this, but having a 200K mile E46 be Honda reliable never gets old.
Here are some more festive photos
Somewhere in Angeles National Forest
Edit (8/7/2019): I forgot that I replaced the main tensioner pulley with an INA unit for $10. Also, I'm on my second set of PFC Z-Rated pads. I'll run them until they're no longer sold, I'm convinced they're the best pad on the market for a street driven car that does light track duty. Only on a HARD downhill run on very few roads will I experience fade. I'm talking about repeated threshold braking, downhill, high altitude from 100+ down to 40ish. However, if there was an S54 under the hood, I'd need more friction area and a torquier pad.