newbie, any advice welcome

[mark hamster 28]

Hi all. Just joined after reading site for last few days and looks very good.

My question is, I pick up my X5 09 reg m sport 3.0D next week from stratstones. Its a 1 owner car with full bmw stratstone history and 70k. Its an bmw approved car. Now I use to have a range rover sport a few years ago, great car but very pricey to run and maintain so I got rid.! Must admit I really missed it badly and although I bought a brand focus st3, I just could not stop thinking how much I missed the range rover sport.

So I bit the bullet and decided to get another 4X4.! I use to drive my boss's X5 years ago and liked that also, so after some checking on figures and stuff I think the X5 is going to be cheaper car to run or I hope so now as deposit is paid lol

Now my question to you folks who have owned them for a while. Is there anything I need to look out for before I sign all the paper work ?? or any good advice welcome please.

The last owner owned car for 5 years and had a 5 year service pack on it.! It had last service about 15k ago and stratstone are going to do an oil service which they told me is due shortly but will do before i pick up which is good I thought. Also im going to buy the £399 service pack which will cover the services required in next 2 years and 2 M O T's. Was told by sales guy that the car could need services worth around £600 in next 2 years, so I thought this would be a good buy BUT rang there competitors in other town and was told the car tells you when and what needs servicing on this model and they said highly unlikely it will cost £600.??

Also because its an approved car, is the year warranty I get there own which I presume is a good one and does anybody know how much it will cost me in a years time to renew it for another 12 months.??

Last question, Honest lol We will only do about 5k miles a year mainly local but do have an 8 mile drive to work, so any advice on this ?? I use to put premium diesel and forte addative in the rrs, any advice on this with the x5 ??

Thanks in advance Mark

[martin33100]

Did your RRS have a DPF? because the X5 does and they don't like short trips. The engine temps need to be over 75deg to start a DPF regen. We have a 3.0d and my wife does do short trips during the week but we do long trips on weekends and when I take the car when I am on nights.
Some times I wonder if we should have bought the 4.8l V8 as they are much cheaper to buy.

[mark hamster 28]

Hi Martin, no it didn't have DPF on mine. Just EGR valves which stick and is common problem but that's another story if you want me to tell you about it ?? ( had new ones )

I will take the my X5 about every 2 months for a blast down motorway about 15 or 20 miles and back. Like with the RRS I filled it with premium diesel and put in forte addative and then sat at 70 ish in about 4th gear so revs are high.!

Do you think this will do job ?? Does it give you any warning also if it needs it ?? Cheers

[martin33100]

They need a motorway blast every other week to make sure the dpf doesn't block.
If your short trips don't get the coolant temps over 75deg it won't go into regen mode and the dpf could get blocked, in the winter it takes a few miles to get the 3.0d up to temperature.
As for the warning unless you have a scanner and can see whats going on with the dpf you will only get a warning on the dash, if it's the same as our E91 3 series you get a picture of a blocked dpf come up on the dash.

[TonyX5]

Hi Mark, try and get a second year warranty out of Stradstones (this might not be easy now you have paid a deposit) if not ask them to provide a second year warranty at cost, this should be around £400. 

The aftermarket BMW warranty can cost over £1000 depending on cover and excess, all the info and a quote can be found here https://www.bmw-warranty.co.uk/

Check all the tyres they are not cheap to replace.

Good luck, hope you enjoy your new car.
Tony

[mark hamster 28]

Thanks for that Tony. I have rang up stratstone since your advice and they said I can not purchase a 2nd year warranty until the year is up and then they write to you then with a price.! Told me about £900 although on the link you sent me it was more.! Hopefully they will move on price at time but car will be 6 years old then with about 76k on it.! do they still do bmw warranty at this age and mileage ?? 

[martin33100]

One thing to think about is I doubt BMW will warrant any DPf issues caused by short trip driving.
My mate was a master tech at Audi for 15 years and Audi were having to educate there sales guys not to sell diesels to people that only do a trip to the shops and back because they were getting many DPF issues and Audi wouldn't cover it under warranty due to not driving it on regular runs.

[TonyX5]

Stradstones are talking rubbish,  they can offer you a 2 year warranty with an approved used BMW, they don't want to because it costs them money thats why I suggested you offer to pay for the extra year.  The warranty the garage give you is better than the one you will have to pay for after a year is up and should be considerably cheaper. I believe the garage pays £500 for the first year and £300 for the second year but I could be wrong.  Most people end up paying about £400 for the second year.

I know this is true, I bought my approved X5 two months ago and managed to talk the garage into giving me 2 years warranty (at no cost).  Several people on here have managed to get a second year warranty by offering to pay the extra for the second year. 

Good luck
Tony

[mark hamster 28]

well picked me X5 up today and I am very impressed so far.! can see what people say about the m sport being a little hard but I'm sure I'm going to be ok with it tbh. 1 question I need to ask is, can you just have the sat nav on the whole screen without having to put a destination in ?? So far I have only managed to get it on the smaller screen on the right hand side of the screen with other info on the left hand side of the screen if you know what I mean ?? still playing with everything at mo and trying the comfort seats in all the many positions trying to find my best position  :'(

[X5Sport]

I just turn the split screen mode off via the iDrive on mine.  It's under 'options', or push the controller down.  You can choose a number of displays for the split screen.....

Richard

[mark hamster 28]

thanks X5 sport, will give it a go when wife back from work.

[petert]

The manual tells you all about the iDrive but if they didn't give you one you can download one from here:

http://www.bmwusa.com/Standard/Content/Owner/dgh.aspx

might be an American version but should still be useful.  Hope it helps!

Peter T