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      01-02-2020, 07:44 PM   #1
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My wife wanted a suv (4Runner to be specific), but I had no intention on buying an suv for the next year or two. One day I happen to be browsing online and found an X5M for a good price. Showed my wife saw a picture of it and actually liked it. Next thing you know I’m messaging the owner to get more details. Fast forward a couple of days and we had two plane tickets to get this X5M.

It had 127.5k with no warranty. Only mod was m colors on the grills and rear badge was blacked out.

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We drove it from NH to SC and everything went pretty smoothly on the 18 hour drive back home. Avg: 15-16 mpg on the way back. Definitely had some good runs into the triple digits. Worst part of the trip was driving through DC/VA at night. Traffic flow was bumper to bumper at 90 mph and everyone is changing lanes every 5
seconds.

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We made an appointment at my local dealership to have the oil changed and look the car over.

Tech came back with:

Oil Leaks (Valve Cover, Oil pan, PVC hoses and Filtered Ducts)
Powers steering fluid was foaming
Feathering on the RFT’s
Control arms were causing some creaking noise

I was going to have rod bearings done just to make sure the engine was good to go for another 100k, but no one at my dealer wanted to do that job. Rod bearing job also was more money than I wanted to spend. I did an oil analysis and everything came back good.

My dealer had a two week wait for appointment so started ordering parts and making a game plan for what repairs I wanted to tackle while my wife drove the SUV in the mean time. Fast forward a couple of days and I had a velos tune on the way with some of the parts needed for the repairs. Then I got misfires on cylinder 7 while making a grocery run while my wife was at home one night. Changed the coil on cylinder 7 and everything was good again.

The next day I went back to the dealership with new game plan.

Labor hours for
Coils and plugs
Valve cover gaskets
Oil pan gaskets
Power steering pump
Vacuum pump
PVC hoses
Totaled 45-50 hours of work

I also wanted to add:
high flow cats to reduce engine bay heat
transmission solenoids
front strut mounts
trans case fluid

That totaled around 70 hours of labor.

After talking with the shop foreman we settled on doing a valve seal job that way engine was easy to access. I could add downpipes, front and rear suspension work without racking up as many labor hours.

Labor drop back down to around 61-62 hours.

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Two weeks passed and I brought the X5M to the dealer to start on the maintenance and upgrades. Long story short I ran into some issues with the shop being extremely backed up with customer work and no one was going to starting working on my wife’s X5M for almost two months (unknown to me at the time).

I started my own project in the mean time. Replacing the headlight plastic lens.
This was the biggest pita job I had every done and upgrading the projector glass to a clear glass lense.

Unfortunately this both plastic lenses covers has seen better days. I really wanted the Led was Adaptive headlights, but they were too expensive even at employee cost. Here was the new lenses before I put lamin-x on
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This was right after I finished installing the Laminx. The haze and bubbles cleared up a day or two later.
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This is how yellow the clear coat was both the passenger and driver side headlight.
I tried a headlight buffing kit from Walmart. Let’s just say didn’t work well. The white spot in the top right corner was my test spot. That took 1 hour and all the sand paper in the kit.
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Next I cut the plastic cover off the headlight that took two nights of working after hours.

A better solution for anyone who might want to attempt removing the plastic headlight lense cover is to heat the headlight in the oven and used a bent screwdriver to separate the headlight lense from the housing. Another night was spent scraping peraseal out of the headlight channel. Finally on the forth night I able to swap the projector lense.

Before
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After: See the clarity and focus
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I went to install the new lense and discovered it didn’t fit. The X5M shares headlight with the X6 and X6M. I order two new plastic lenses from California and finished the lead light one week later.
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Another important note is to order the projector lense after measuring the projector glass lens. The stock lens is 27mm. I ordered a 23mm clear lens based on what I read from the internet.
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The result of incorrect size lense was this.
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The next day I found a good deal on some of LED Adaptive Headlight and picked them up. These are getting installed next week:Name:  A2B1100F-D6B4-4F70-BACC-CDF5822569B4.png
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If anyone is looking for the retrofit cable you can actually order them at the dealership. It took about 10-13 days to arrive on rush order from Germany.

Last edited by X5MBeast; 01-09-2020 at 05:32 AM..
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      01-02-2020, 09:35 PM   #2
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Congrats on new car!

How many miles were on the car when u picked it up?
Seems way too many issues to begin with unless u got a really good deal and had decent amount on the side for this game plan!
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      01-03-2020, 02:14 AM   #3
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Quote:
Originally Posted by boneca View Post
Congrats on new car!

How many miles were on the car when u picked it up?
Seems way too many issues to begin with unless u got a really good deal and had decent amount on the side for this game plan!
Around 127.5k when we took ownership and it just ticked over 130k last week.

It was a good deal for me because I work at a BMW dealership. My wife would have a 4 runner if I didn’t work there.

I’ve read every page of build two or more times in the past couple month. It was very impressive. Loved your MCB X5M!
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      01-03-2020, 08:01 AM   #4
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Quote:
Originally Posted by X5MBeast View Post
Around 127.5k when we took ownership and it just ticked over 130k last week.

It was a good deal for me because I work at a BMW dealership. My wife would have a 4 runner if I didn’t work there.

I’ve read every page of build two or more times in the past couple month. It was very impressive. Loved your MCB X5M!
Thanks for the kind words! Good luck with you progress!
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      01-03-2020, 08:26 AM   #5
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Excellent detail on the lenses! M looks great. Are they sealed to the assembly or just mechanically installed? Can't wait to see the rest of your work. Welcome!
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      01-04-2020, 07:57 PM   #6
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Quote:
Originally Posted by argento View Post
Excellent detail on the lenses! M looks great. Are they sealed to the assembly or just mechanically installed? Can't wait to see the rest of your work. Welcome!
Thanks! I'm not sure if your asking about the plastic lense or the clear projector glass. The plastic lense is perasealed to the headlight. Peraseal is flexible but durable rubber sealant that that is used to seal the headlight. The projector glass is just screwed to the housing and held in by tabs.
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      01-04-2020, 08:09 PM   #7
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Quote:
Originally Posted by X5MBeast View Post
Quote:
Originally Posted by argento View Post
Excellent detail on the lenses! M looks great. Are they sealed to the assembly or just mechanically installed? Can't wait to see the rest of your work. Welcome!
Thanks! I'm not sure if your asking about the plastic lense or the clear projector glass. The plastic lense is perasealed to the headlight. Peraseal is flexible but durable rubber sealant that that is used to seal the headlight. The projector glass is just screwed to the housing and held in by tabs.
Plastic lense. I was always worried about sealing humidity in and having condensation. Thanks for sharing!
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      01-04-2020, 08:54 PM   #8
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Picked up a powerdome hood. Fortunately it was vinyl wrapped and in very good condition.

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It took about 2 hours to fully remove the vinyl wrap with a heat gun.

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Here's the beauty installed

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One important note is that the washer nozzles for the windshield are spaced differently on the powerdome hood vs the normal X5 hood. You need the washer nozzles from an X6 unless you want to use 2 washer hose repair kits to cut and splice.

Last edited by X5MBeast; 01-04-2020 at 09:02 PM..
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      01-05-2020, 09:28 AM   #9
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PowerDome hood looks great!

one of my favorite mods I've done.
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      01-05-2020, 10:16 AM   #10
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Awesome!! What a find! The bulge in the view out the windshield took a while to get used to, but worth it.

My shop used my original X5 nozzles wo splicing, didn't really challenge them as it saved me a few dollars, lol.
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      01-05-2020, 10:56 AM   #11
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Quote:
Originally Posted by argento View Post
Awesome!! What a find! The bulge in the view out the windshield took a while to get used to, but worth it.

My shop used my original X5 nozzles wo splicing, didn't really challenge them as it saved me a few dollars, lol.
That’s interesting that you were able to used the original washer hose. One of my sprayers fit in the hood loosely the others couldn’t even reach the mounting hole.
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      01-05-2020, 12:02 PM   #12
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Next mod that I decided to do was the oil cooler thermostat from N63intake.com. My reasoning for the mod was to reduce the heat in South Carolina during the summer and the engine bay gets insanely hot after a short drive. To be honest I was very disappointed with service. I wait over a month no no responses to my email. There website said 13 were in stock at the time.
Secondly. I had to smooth out some of the edges and there was a very small about of metal shaving/splinters on the inside of the thermostat.
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      01-10-2020, 08:45 PM   #13
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The engine came out Monday and went back in the X5M today. Fortunately the engine cranked right up without any problems. The tech did prime to oil pump quite a bit before hand. He also did the transmission solenoids and seals. Just waiting for the Dinan Springs, Rear Suspension and Led Adaptive Headlights to be completed. Unfortunately I did not get pictures of afterwards with the engine details.
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Last edited by X5MBeast; 01-10-2020 at 08:56 PM..
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      01-11-2020, 12:26 AM   #14
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So basically you didn't find nothing wrong with engine?
How much lower is oil temperature with new thermostat?
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      01-11-2020, 11:19 AM   #15
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Quote:
Originally Posted by BigHunk View Post
So basically you didn't find nothing wrong with engine?
How much lower is oil temperature with new thermostat?
There were a good bit of oil leaks and the valve stem seals were hard.

My wife only drove for a week with the new oil thermostat in and the temperature as been in the 40-70s here. So far the oil has been sitting around 10-11 o clock when driving. It’s gotten closer to 12 when sitting in traffic if I remember correctly. That’s probably because there’s no air moving through the oil cooler. I’ll have to see if my app records oil temps when we get the truck back.

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      01-13-2020, 03:37 PM   #16
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Quote:
Originally Posted by X5MBeast View Post
Worst part of the trip was driving through DC/VA at night. Traffic flow was bumper to bumper at 90 mph and everyone is changing lanes every 5
seconds.


NO kidding. I just came back from NYC to WPB in the 35d (round trip) and this was the craziest part of the trip.

Nice Beast, looking forward to your updates!
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      01-14-2020, 08:55 PM   #17
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Well everything is almost done and went on a 10 mile test drive tonight. The Dinan kit is still comfortable in my opinion. All the creaks from the suspension are gone.

Just waiting on my last two orders to arrive and the coding of the headlights.

The headlight unofficially work well enough to drive. Angel eyes are not working and the high beams flicker when on. Will be taking the X5M to another shop to finish coding if PA soft isn’t able code them.
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Last edited by X5MBeast; 01-15-2020 at 02:24 AM..
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      01-14-2020, 09:34 PM   #18
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Nice. Did you only have the motor out to do the valve guide seals and oil leaks? No connecting rod bearings?
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      01-14-2020, 11:49 PM   #19
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Quote:
Originally Posted by X5MBeast View Post
Well everything is almost done and went on a 10 mile test drive tonight. The Dinan kit is still comfortable in my opinion. All the creaks from the suspension are gone.

Just waiting on my last two orders to arrive and the coding of the headlights.

The headlight unofficially work well enough to drive. Angel eyes are not working and the high beams flicker when on. Will be taking the X5M to another shop to finish coding if I can’t PA soft isn’t able code them.
Really enjoying your thread.
For the headlight coding ask the dealer to code the retrofit coding in ISTA P.
Also check if you have the upgraded FRM.
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      01-15-2020, 02:27 AM   #20
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Originally Posted by Nyc Dito View Post
NO kidding. I just came back from NYC to WPB in the 35d (round trip) and this was the craziest part of the trip.

Nice Beast, looking forward to your updates!

Thank you.
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      01-15-2020, 02:39 AM   #21
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ForceFedX5M View Post
Nice. Did you only have the motor out to do the valve guide seals and oil leaks? No connecting rod bearings?
Pretty much. I bounced around between three different techs before i picked who I wanted to do the job. We did three oil changes over 1000 miles to check for metal. Plus oil analysis. Almost all the seals and rubber gaskets were replaced. Transfer case case and front dif was drained, transmission drained and solenoids changed and valve body seal changed. The the suspension was pretty much completely replaced with the exception of the struts added Dinan spring. High flow cats were also added. Once he got in the bottom of the motor he didn’t see a need to change out the rod bearings. We had two s63 motors the the shop for rod bearing issues recently. They were were because of long oci or oil being contaminated.

Last edited by X5MBeast; 01-15-2020 at 02:48 AM..
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      01-15-2020, 02:55 AM   #22
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Quote:
Originally Posted by RichardH View Post
Really enjoying your thread.
For the headlight coding ask the dealer to code the retrofit coding in ISTA P.
Also check if you have the upgraded FRM.
Thank you.

The foreman tried coding yesterday. The original frm would did not show the option for the conversion. The new frm told him to change the seat modules to a different part number and did not code. However almost all the functions for the headlights worked. Build date was 9/10 so it should not have the updated frm module and I didn’t see that it had been replaced in the vehicle history.

I think the problem is the build date and vin is used to pull conversion options. If I coded a newer build date (01/12) then the conversion should show up in ista. I think. Lol

Last edited by X5MBeast; 01-15-2020 at 03:00 AM..
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