What did you do for your ZHP/ BMW / MINI today? #2

Thanks Alex for the response.
When I took her for inspection at a local indy german shop, I was quoted $500 for replacing the oil pan gasket. The mechanic told me, the oil pan leak was minor so I'm just saving up and taking care of other little cosmetic issues for now. He didn't mentioned anything about the valve cover gasket, I'll check tomorrow to see if there's any visual oil leak. I'm not familiar with bad Vanos I'll try to record some audio and post it on youtube to see if somebody can notice anything strange. I also have in my list to check and replace if the car has a plastic pulley.

$500 for oil pan gasket is good. I think my quote was $700 in the north Bay Area.

Vanos rattle very easy to tell, you either have it or not. And yup, nice to get the list from the dealer so you know what to DIY.

I did the oil pan gasket myself. Not a bad job if you have a way to support the engine. No way would I pay that much money to have it fixed.

Met a friend of a friend who picked up a butchered 2005 6MT ZSP (it had lambo doors on it :shifty) for real cheap, and wants to fix it up for a fun DD. It needs a hood, trunk linings, and fenders (they were cut for the lambo setup).

We then made friends with a mechanic at the dealer who was on his lunch break. He gave us his number for $50/hr weekend side jobs :thumbsup

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Any pics of the lambo doors? Lawl

Quote:

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Originally Posted by stephenkirsh

Any pics of the lambo doors? Lawl

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They were pulled before he got the car. But PPI showed the bent door frame and the cut fenders haha. We're trying to track some down but it's hard to find if they weren't active on forums!

Wow! GL w/that one. Glad you're saving it! Lambo doors. :rofl

Where do I start for today.

First I am working overnights this week and thus have not had a lot if sleep.

After leaving work at about 7:15am headed to class I pulled up my shift lever while maneuvering in some crazy traffic. This is the 3rd (or more) time this has happened throughout ownership. So I had to be rough with it to get it into a gear to not get hit by a semi.

http://tapatalk.imageshack.com/v2/14...940397f279.jpg

On the way to class I removed the knob, boot, foam and rubber gasket. But was in too big of a hurry to take the time to attempt to get the bushing clicked back into place, but she did go back down correctly.

Then a guy at a stoplight told me he was going to come back and get me and take me to jail for driving too fast after he dropped his daughter off at school. My response was "good luck with that, I'm not a 10 year old like your daughter, I'm in my 30's." Laughed it off.

Got to school earlier than I thought I would (road construction is so hit or miss lately near school). Messed with the bushing got it clicked back in for now, changed clothes, scratched my front window tint putting my belt on the dash, probably took 10-15 minutes. Started to go to class and saw what I thought was a huge transmission fluid leak. Started texting my good ZHP buddy. Went to class.

Sent him a pic he was surprised at how big the now soaked into the concrete puddle was. Called a tow truck.

http://tapatalk.imageshack.com/v2/14...ca9d6d5c22.jpg

Rollback dispatch said the truck wouldn't get into the garage so I rolled the car out, curbed an already curbed wheel in the process. Waited with the car running and AC on, more fluid on the ground.

Rollback driver was pretty rough with the car. Kept telling myself it's just a car, a 11-year old car. It's going to be ok. E46 M3 passed us and then led us nearly all the way to my house.

http://tapatalk.imageshack.com/v2/14...b98e5995b0.jpg

Car dropped off into my garage at home, let the dogs out. Got the car up on two jack stand and could find anything. Water on the trans cross member though. Surely it wasn't just AC condenser water. Put the car up semi-level on 4 jack stands, removed fill plug, and trans fluid started coming out. Transmission was clean and full of fluid, the "fluid" I saw must have been AC condenser water mixed with something already in the garage floor at school. Awesome.

Live and learn, I'll be more careful to watch for paranoia when on overnights in the future. At least the tow was covered, well most of it, they had to charge me $2.50 because the distance was over 11 miles. Showered and went to bed finally at about 12:15pm, about 3 hours late.


--Marcus

Wow, that sounds like a pretty rough series of events. So glad nothing was majorly wrong and that all was sorted out for $2.50! ...And hey, you can call it "paranoia" but I see it as more of a testament to how much we care for our cars, and the lengths we are willing to go to ensure their well being :)