80's and 90's BMW models have long been known as great handling cars. Part of the reason for that came from innovations on the rear of the cars, in particular the multi-link rear suspension introduced on the E31 chassis called Integral III Axle. What's the job of rear suspension? Ideally it...
It's not uncommon for RWD and AWD cars to exhibit driveline vibration at some point in their lives. Specifically, European vehicles can start to show failure at the giubo flex-joint. Pronounced "Gew-bo" though often misspelled and pronounced as "Guibo" (Gwee-bo). As I understand it, the name...
The lower front ball joints on the W220 and W211 chassis can take a real pounding, and are often the first thing to fail on the front-end suspension. A creaking noise is the usual giveaway but you may detect handling problems before this, usually in cornering. You can use a prybar to check for...
Battery keeps going flat? It could just be the battery is damaged, and unable to maintain the proper charge, or it could be the alternator is not working properly and the battery is not getting recharged as it should. There is another potential cause, one that is much harder to diagnose and...
A while back I had to replace a lower (lateral) control arm on my E31 850Ci. Whilst it's not a very complex job, I feel you can never have enough pictures for reference, so let's take a look at it. The lower arm is sometimes called the lateral arm as it faces along the width of the car rather...
Angel Eyes, or halo light rings around the headlights were a very popular upgrade for many BMW enthusiasts 5-6 years ago. I’ve not actually heard much talk of them in recent years but I thought it may be worth a post about them as they are definitely one of the more tasteful mods that can be done...
This week I wanted to do a shorter post, and hopefully instead stimulate more discussion via comments. The topic is ‘copper grease’ - have you ever heard of it, much less do you use it on wheels or brakes? It’s my experience that this is much a more a European thing than American so I’d love...
For a vehicle with such a prestigious heritage of chauffeuring, buying my Mercedes S500 with a stuck trunk was a bit of a disappointment. It would not open from either the button on the trunk or the button on the drivers door. Apparently this is a common problem as these cars age. There is a...
I once had 2000 BMW 740iL with a problem that wasn't immediately apparent, but was causing my oil to disappear into thin air. Large clouds of blue smoke after starting the vehicle were not fun. The internet and its dog will tell you this is a classic problem with the M62 V8 engine – failure of...
The MAF (or Mass Air Flow meter) is an important part of a fuel injected engine, as it essentially estimates the amount of air going into the engine so the correct amount of fuel can be injected to match. If a MAF sensor reports more air than there is, then too little fuel will be injected and...