Danny’s Imola 2000 BMW M5

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I was contemplating doing a video of the car and recorded one only to realize that my spoken English isn’t what it once was (Swedish sing-a-song-accent haha) so I’ll make a written post of my recently acquired M5 instead. I found out about the car a few months ago via a friend and I loosely knew the previous owner before as I were childhood friends with his brother.

 

PO bought the car in oct 2014 and drove it the 100 miles south from Stockholm to his home, and a week later a 500 mile round trip to get the pixels fixed, that it, he hasn’t driven it any more since. Instead he has been fixing and tinkering with it, some things you may like and some mods may not be to everyones taste, but I got the car like this, and some things will stay, and some will be put back to stock. It has however have more then $15000 spent on it, engine has new chains, guides, main bearings, every gasket bar the headgaskets since the heads haven’t been removed.

 

Gearbox has had every seal replaced and new oil, same with the diff and the rest of the drivetrain. brand new oem lights front and back, and yes, I know the rears are pre-fl and the fronts are fl, I have a mint set of rear fl’s to go on. Brand new steering wheel, gearknob, gaiters, handbrake, waterpump, all pulleys and belts etc etc. Everything bought over the counter at our local dealership. It’s also been cleaned to a level seldom seen in cars this old. There is also a brand new Bilstein B14 fixed rate coil-over kit and a Borla cat back fitted. The only thing that isnt 10/10 on the car is the paint, it’s been re-sprayed fairly recently I think and not very well done. I’ll have a friend attack it with the machines and see if it helps,

Anyway, the car is an early ’00, so rattly vanos and rubbish piston rings 😉 but it doesn’t seem to burn any oil yet anyway, and the vanos isn’t that bad, sounds a little like a diesel at idle when warm, but they all do that sir, is what I’ve been told, so I’ve stopped worrying about it. It was sold new in Sweden and is a rather low-spec example, and I like that. No sun-roof and no foldable rear seats, the latter I particularly like since it looks better than the flat bench that is the folding one, it’s also way more comfortable, If I need to fit something bulky I’ll just use the Volvo wagon that I have.

 

I really like the interior, as it turns out it’s rare (maybe for a reason) but it’s the F2AT code, black nappa and M-texture Alcantara in the middle, only 312 euro-spec cars have this, and mine is likely the only imola red Swedish sold one with this interior out of just 17 imola out of the grand total of 166 e39 M5’s sold new here.

 

The car has 138.000 km’s on it or 88.000ish miles. It’s missing it’s original style 65’s, and I’m on the lookout for a good set or maybe some forged 18″ BBS’s of some sort. It sits on a brand new set of some Dotz of some variety, and they look ok, but they are no style 65’s…

 

Some pics:

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This will be put back to stock even tho I like the looks, will also acquire a 16:9

 

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Interior:

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Bilsteins, pre-cleaning of the wheel-wells

 

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Cat-back

 

Very red and very clean engine. when/if I need to re-replace valve cover gaskets or something of the like this will be but back to the standard black.

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S62