Motortrend's Cars - Gojira

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hemisport15
This thread is really making me want to go the E39 route... and I'm not mad about that.
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Word of warning: Pretty much any E39 is sort of expensive to maintain especially with a bad previous owner BUT there's a bunch of afftermarket stuff with varying qualities and prices. If you do a lot of work yourself/reputable mechanic, research the forums and buy at the right places it's not very expensive and oh so worth it. If you haven't driven an E39 I suggest you do it. Even though they aren't SUPER heavy they feel like a tank, extremely solid. There is a lot of info on these cars in various forums and a bunch of DIYs which means the only times I've not done something myself is when setting the timing is involved, flushing brake fluid (not quite right tools available and not expensive job) and changing rear struts/springs (again, couldn't have done it well enough myself with my limited tools) but literally every other suspension component, plastic pieces, interior trim, headlight adjusters, engine sensors/VANOS solenoids and a few other things I've done myself without a problem with help from the DIYs
 
Seems the GTP bimmer curse struck me as well, though not as bad as @Clark and nowhere near as bad as @hemisport15
Enter parking lot. No parking spaces left. Leave parking lot. Car in the way of exit. Didn't pay attention to crater sized pothole. This happened:
Untitled by josegt5, on Flickr

Left it parked for like a week until the parts got here and got to work. Bought some fiberglass and resin and fixed the cracks in the bumper itself:
Untitled by josegt5, on Flickr
My dad was helping be out and sanded over a visible area so I took some touch up paint and some wet sanding and it looks good enough for the bottom of the car.
Got everything mounted up again:
Untitled by josegt5, on Flickr
The bumper had a broken rail which we fixed with fiberglass and plastic weld. Fitment ended up better than before, though looking at the car today it looked a little saggy again, will just have to get a whole new bumper next year (this one is probably 50% bondo and fiberglass by now :lol:
Untitled by josegt5, on Flickr

Haven't done much more to the car. It's developed quite a few squeaks and rattles I need to address when I get the time and I ordered a steering wheel to replace my worn one.Also bought a plastic bit for the interior, I'll put pics of all that in the next update. Anyway, washed the car and remembered I've had it for 2 years already so here's a picture from 2 years ago compared to one from a couple of days ago:
Untitled by josegt5, on Flickr

Not much visible difference apart from the GTP decal and the wheels, even though I've done A TON of small stuff to the car.
 
motortrend
Haven't done much more to the car. It's developed quite a few squeaks and rattles I need to address when I get the time and I ordered a steering wheel to replace my worn one.Also bought a plastic bit for the interior, I'll put pics of all that in the next update. Anyway, washed the car and remembered I've had it for 2 years already so here's a picture from 2 years ago compared to one from a couple of days ago:
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Ugh, sometimes my car goes through phases where I hear a different squeak each day. Thankfully most of them aren't persistent, save for the loose plastic covering for the c-pillar on one of the passengers doors. I reluctantly duct-taped it into submission since my last attempt to take apart my interior didn't really do anything. I'd be appreciative if you could mention what you did to fix the squeaks and rattles once you get around to doing it. 👍
 
Doog
Ugh, sometimes my car goes through phases where I hear a different squeak each day. Thankfully most of them aren't persistent, save for the loose plastic covering for the c-pillar on one of the passengers doors. I reluctantly duct-taped it into submission since my last attempt to take apart my interior didn't really do anything. I'd be appreciative if you could mention what you did to fix the squeaks and rattles once you get around to doing it. 👍
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The one I hate the most is the parcel shelf with the subwoofers. I took it apart, removed the foam with the hardened plastic bottom, put some dynamat-like material on and put it all back together. After removing for the springs the rattle went back to being bad so I'll have to take it apart again. You could try checking if all the tabs and screws are in place and check any hardened plastic pieces that could be rattling. Apart from that there's a small rattle from the nav screen which gets worse with time until I retract it and put it back and goes away. The worst squeak is coming from the instrument cluster, I'll probably remove that, check everything under is good, screw it back down correctly and go from there.

hemisport15
Sucks to hear about the bumper, but I'm glad you were able to save it. What steering wheel did you end up going with?
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Ended up with Tainik because LedermanZ didn't have the wheel I wanted. Went with full napa leather, no perforations just like OEM. I'll post better pics when I get it
image.jpg
 
Why no rewarp on the steering wheel. Or are they cheap enough like it is?

Nice work on the bumper 👍 Really.

Someone started a dangerous trend here. Happily winter is over and hopefully Gtplanet riders will be free of that for now.
 
Ibonibo
Why no rewarp on the steering wheel. Or are they cheap enough like it is?

Nice work on the bumper 👍 Really.

Someone started a dangerous trend here. Happily winter is over and hopefully Gtplanet riders will be free of that for now.
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Thanks! It's actually a rewrap but since I don't want to be without mine for a few weeks I buy the rewrapped one and then sell mine. A fully new one would cost nearly $300 more than the one I bought, though it would come with the wheel controls and trim I'm reusing from mine.
 
motortrend
The one I hate the most is the parcel shelf with the subwoofers. I took it apart, removed the foam with the hardened plastic bottom, put some dynamat-like material on and put it all back together. After removing for the springs the rattle went back to being bad so I'll have to take it apart again. You could try checking if all the tabs and screws are in place and check any hardened plastic pieces that could be rattling. Apart from that there's a small rattle from the nav screen which gets worse with time until I retract it and put it back and goes away. The worst squeak is coming from the instrument cluster, I'll probably remove that, check everything under is good, screw it back down correctly and go from there.
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My car rattles too.

Like you, my non-M Audio rear parcel shelf is rattling from somewhere, though I can only hear it on rough roads in warm weather. It's not the little third brake light cover in the trunk, as I've tried removing that, and that didn't help. I haven't disassembled the shelf yet, but I need to to and fix that really freaking annoying rattle. Also, the center console armrest lid on mine rattles when it's fully slide out to the front, and I hope I'm imagining this, but I think there's now a new rattle coming from the passenger door. :grumpy:
 
Crash
My car rattles too.

Like you, my non-M Audio rear parcel shelf is rattling from somewhere, though I can only hear it on rough roads in warm weather. It's not the little third brake light cover in the trunk, as I've tried removing that, and that didn't help. I haven't disassembled the shelf yet, but I need to to and fix that really freaking annoying rattle. Also, the center console armrest lid on mine rattles when it's fully slide out to the front, and I hope I'm imagining this, but I think there's now a new rattle coming from the passenger door. :grumpy:
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I have the M audio which sounds great but like I said, the sub rattle takes a lot out of it. Some times it gets better when the sunshade is up. Check the foam I talked about, either that, clips or the brake light is usually the issue.
 
Steering wheel got here finally a couple of weeks ago, took it to get installed last week (didn't want to risk anything going wrong with the airbag and being my fault) and while I was there I told them about a whining noise associated with movement. I already had seen that it could be the center driveshaft mount but then they told me that it was best to jsut change the whole driveshaft to get the whole thing fresh and save money on labor instead of replacing parts individually afterwards. Ouch. There goes my mod savings :lol: While it was there they also replaced the accesory belts.

Now the car is pretty much mechanically perfect, except for the radiator which like I mentioned before should probably go within 30K miles, but I'll deal with that when it happens. Also bought E60 windshield washer nozzles because cars here get dirty within 2 days and I want something that isn't shooting 2 weak streams to the center of the windshield. Problem is, the plastic tubes that go to the nozzles were nice and toasty with the engine heat and predictably, shattered with very little force, which means now I need to order those as well :banghead:

Anyway, on to the pics:
Wheel installed:

New vs old:

The box the DS came in, fit in the M3!
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That's it for now. Hopefully nothing else breaks during the year and it's just minor mods and freshening up

Next year, though :mischievous:
 
Question: what adjusters did you use to fix your headlights? Did you find some OEM ones off another set of headlights, aluminum ones, aftermarket plastic ones, or some other aftermarket hybrid ones?
 
Crash
Question: what adjusters did you use to fix your headlights? Did you find some OEM ones off another set of headlights, aluminum ones, aftermarket plastic ones, or some other aftermarket hybrid ones?
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New plastic ones off eBay (I guess aftermarket) and have been working fine up until now. If I were to do it again I'd Go with the metal ones probably because the job is a bit of a PITA I would not want to do again. It's definitely DIY-able though, there's some excellent instructions in a PDF somewhere I think.
 
Are your adjusters broken again?

I need to do my headlight adjusters, and I've been reading recommendations to either go all aluminum or go a hybrid plastic/metal one. A lot of people, and a lot of the ones on eBay are plastic ones, go plastic, but I haven't heard how well they've stood up to the heat and time, so good to know.
 
Crash
Are your adjusters broken again?

I need to do my headlight adjusters, and I've been reading recommendations to either go all aluminum or go a hybrid plastic/metal one. A lot of people, and a lot of the ones on eBay are plastic ones, go plastic, but I haven't heard how well they've stood up to the heat and time, so good to know.
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No, I'm saying that I'd probably Go metal if they did break again or if I had to do it again. I've taken a few potholes and where I live it's pretty hot always so the conditions are not ideal at all, but I've had no problems these two years. If they had them from the factory and it wasn't a problem initially I bet that they will last me at least another 2-3 years *knock on wood* but if I were you I'd probably go with the metal ones, not a ton of money compared to some other stuff and it's one less worry, just like the sway bar brackets.
 
I've done a couple of small things to the car, which the people that follow me on instagram already saw. Here it is in more detail:
Polished/detailed the car and applied a ceramic coating:


Sin título by josegt5, en Flickr

Sin título by josegt5, en Flickr
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Sin título[/url] by josegt5, en Flickr[/IMG]
Sin título by josegt5, en Flickr

And this weekend I did the headlight lenses:
Sin título by josegt5, en Flickr
Sin título by josegt5, en Flickr
Sin título by josegt5, en Flickr
Sin título by josegt5, en Flickr
Sin título by josegt5, en Flickr
 
So, first time out on the track yesterday. got ready the day before, took some coolant, PS fluid and oil with me. Took my cameras and left with a full tank of gas.
Got the car inspected early and took a few pics:
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Had something to drink, got all my stuff over to my friend's car and started waiting in line. The first heat was super fun. I drove with confindence from the beginning because even though the track has almost no runoff, it is very wide so it's forgiving if you go too wide or kick the tail out a bit. Drove another heat about an hour after that (each is about 10 minutes and 10 cars on track) and in general I wasn't really concentrating on times or the driving line, just going out and learning the tricks of the track while having a good time. I got a video of the second heat and you can see some mistakes and things that need to be improved upon. The main "mistake" is my hand positioning which switches a lot because even though in the sims I always drive at 9 and 3, I'm used to driving my car hard in thighter roads that require a lot more lock than the track . Apart from that, there's a couple of corners where I could have gone wider before entering, a hairpin the I should be apexing later, braking later in all of the turns and revving it out more (didn't go over 5K very frequently to keep oil temps low).

Apart from some tire wear, a tad of spilled PS fluid and consuming half a liter of oil (yes, I know that's a lot) there was nothing wrong with the car and it performed flawlessly, which makes me very happy. I hope to go back to an open track day next month. Will update then. Here's a video of the second heat:



Some pics by other people from the event:
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I'll post more if I find them
 
Like like like. Can't like enough. Isn't it just incredible on track, especially given what it is?

Sounds like you had a great time. Will this be the start of the track day bug for you?
 
Crash
Like like like. Can't like enough. Isn't it just incredible on track, especially given what it is?

Sounds like you had a great time. Will this be the start of the track day bug for you?
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It was a ton of fun. Had the DSC off from the first lap and it's just such an easy car to drive with the long wheelbase and low end torque. Surprisingly, even though I was messing around, my times were pretty consistent. If I switched to better tires and drove seriously I probably wouldn't have all the hot hatches doing better times than me :lol: but that's not what it was about, and I don't expect such a good lap time from this heavy beast in such a tight track.

From the moment I left the track I wanted to go back, and I'll probably go to the next event in July. However, as much fun as it is driving my car on the track, it can get very expensive very fast because it has big wide tires, the oil changes are $140, and it's a heavy car so the brakes take a beating so I probably won't get too serious with the lap times. What I might do instead is switch my priorities from buying a SC for the car and go buy a cheap light car that I can drive hard without worrying too much. Then again, I'd probably still take the M5 out from time to time on the "tourist" laps with passenger because it is just a hoot to drive around.
 

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