kabal said:
I must come for a drive with you next time we meat up and you bring it with
my #1 so far is def 540i, nice power, and I think they look great too
what is good mileage, and what you gotta look out for?
We will definitly go for a drive next time we meet up
Under 175000 Km is what to look for, though I've driven a few with 250K and they are still fine.
There's three choices of these 540i's all with pro's and cons 95-97/98-2000/ 2000 and up
The 95-97 pre-vanos cars are my preference, they are loaded with features and a bit more reliable than the later stuff. Radiator expansion tank bottles tend to crack and leak, the old ones are black top and clear bottle, the replacement is all black and don't break anymore. Very few hasles with these cars, problems are limited to radiators and suspension component wear. Expect to pay 30 - 75K
After 98 they added vanos, power went up a tiny bit, also some extra head airbags reliability went down. Post 98 cars have a water cooled alernator that repeatedly fails (up to 12K to fix) and the inside door handles changed from chromed steel to chromed plastic and break, front PDC was an option, and some features were not standard anymore. The two speed electric fan was ditched and a variable speed electric radiator fan was added which has a tendancy to catch fire and burn the car. On the post 98 cars the top new style clip on radiator hose likes to break off the radiator as well. After 98 the 540 was a bit pricy, I havn't seen many of them around. Expect to pay 55 - 105K
2000 came the facelift, LED tail lights color coding all around and angel eyes, more standard features stripped off and became optional, most 2000 and up cars are quite basic due to cost of options, Xenon headlights were quite common as an option, most have trim options apart from the wood, and many have satnav, many of the relaibility issues were sorted by now. Most of the post 2000 540i's have the factory option Mtech kit and various nice wheels, havn't seen too many standard ones.Expect to pay 100 - 135K
When you finally go hunting for one, give us a shout I'll tag along I know the E39 well and what to look out for.
