At close to 150k miles, Bimmer went in the shop Monday for all the long term stuff needed to hopefully get at least another 100k out of it by the time it reaches true unicorn status. I scaled back attempting much more than the light-duty car stuff myself in 2019.
Interesting twist on the story – they didn’t remember me from the coilover job a few years ago, so I got the “new customer” treatment. As expected, after getting it opened up and evaluating the box of parts I provided, they were terrified. There’s any number of factory parts missing with custom stuff they’ve never seen before added. Some of what they were going to be doing involved significant tear-down to replace most of the vacuum system, so they’re rightfully skeptical. I get that. Took three phone calls with the service manager to get through it.
This most recent maintenance episode stands in stark contrast to when I drove down to Atlanta for the exhaust update. There’s a little small business performance shop in the Dallas suburb, not unlike Bimmerhaus here in CO. Drove around back and parked on a lift, popped the hood for Andrew while he looked it over and started pointing at things asking “what’s that?” Numerous times. I’m just standing there thinking “crap, he’s not gonna want to work on it.” After about a half minute he said “Cool. You’re gettin’ the new 2.8 rev. This car’s gonna be fast.”
Nothing against Bimmerhaus. To be fair, Andrew had a little better idea what he was getting into. This is just an example of how the same type engagement can work very differently with different people. Bill ‘n the Bimmerhaus gang seem like a great bunch, and they have my respect for doing things right. I’m sure we’ll be seeing them again sometime. Just not for quite awhile – but I bet they remember me next time. 😉
Go ahead and send the EPA. I need a new M-Car anyway.
