Just bought my first Z4 Coupe 3.0si SE (Black, Red Leather, 142k)

[Fred Smith]

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[pvr]

Welcome aboard, this is a bit of a Hotel California though

Your plan sounds good, but within no time you will have spent 100% of the purchase price. Within 10 months I had done that

Obviously you made a mistake in buying a coupe but at least you don’t have to worry about the roof

[Fred Smith]

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[Zedebee]

Ignore pvr, he’s a perfectionist and bought a Scottish car by mistake. These cars can be maintained cheaply if you’re happy to buy second hand or aftermarket parts and you are reasonably handy with a spanner.

[paddy wright]

Looks great- welcome along!

[Mr Tidy]

Hi and welcome to the forum, as well as the exclusive Coupe club.

I think those wheels look great, but so many Veeman wheels do!

I took a couple of 17" alloys to MyAlloys in Basingstoke last week for a refurb and they are charging £81.50 inc. VAT per wheel to acid strip and powder coat. They were recommended by a couple of forum members and did a great job on my Coupe wheels in 2021.

Most wheels seem to sell on here in the range of £200 to 300 with a few exceptions for something special, but it's hard to tell from that photo quite what sort of condition yours are in.

I can see the appeal of 18s, but personally really don't like black wheels because you can't really see what they are especially on a black car.

Leaks from the cam-cover gasket (and oil filter housing gasket) are common on these N52 engines which tend to use a bit of oil anyway. If it leaks onto anything hot you often get smoke and can smell burning, so really replacement is probably best done sooner rather than later - it's not like you'll need to do it again for a long time so why not get the benefit of no leaks?

Anyway good luck with your plans.

[Pondrew]

Ignore pvr,

That is the best advice I have heard on here in a long time.

[Pondrew]

Stick some pictures up of the wheels. It is quite easy to refurb wheels as a DIY, if they are not smashed to bits. Takes a bit of time, patience and a quite a bit of wet and dry, but is do-able. Generally can be done without removing tyres aswell!

[Scubaregs]

Welcome.

[Fred Smith]

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[1536Z4]

but I quite like the "stealth" all black look, and could even be tempted to remove the 3.0 si and Z4 badges as well as leaving the black grill and getting / keeping black wheels

A definite welcome from me . A man after my own heart

[darich]

Welcome....from a fellow coupe owner.

[coldel]

Welcome along. Big miles does not automatically mean big bills, if you bought something well maintained and had remedial work done as and when it was needed its purely a case of carrying that on. I presume at that mileage its had some of the bigger jobs done like the water pump.

I am in Twickenham so maybe not a million miles from you, also my mate is around the corner also in a Z4 and we are both tinkerers with our cars fixing stuff ourselves

[Fred Smith]

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[coldel]

If its just perishables around the edges rather than anything big, certainly something you can crack on with. I changed the cam cover gasket on my previous E86, £45 BMW gasket and two sets of hands made short work of it. Gaskets get brittle as hell on these cars, its all normal stuff. You might want to also check the valvetronic gasket (the metal tube sticking out the side) as that leaks too and leaks oil down into the spark plug wells, but again only costs about £15 for a replacement and takes literally 30 mins.