The "Charms" of OBDII. Or Do you really think that...

[Warren N.CA]

Do you really think that getting an E39 would be "moving up?"

My friend's '97 Z3 2.8 started running very badly. No power, poor accelleration, Check Engine light was on.

Bentley said to read the codes. But there is no stomp test. Need to use a BMW code reader or generic code reader, neither of which was available.

Turned out the CAT had failed, and the OBDII system not only lit the check engine light, but also put the car in LIMP mode, to be sure the driver would bring the car in for service immediately. The car was just barely drivable in the artificially induced LIMP mode.- Just one of the great "improvements" included with OBDII.

The dealer replaced the CAT under the federally mandated 8 year 80K warranty. Only 6 months left until 8 years- YES!

They also discovered a leaking steering rack $1700.

[DueyT]

Warren, even an OBD-I interface is decent if you can actually see everything that it's reporting. I figure that about 40-50% of the cool stuff I see on my Jetta is OBD-I...the rest (setting injection timing, setting central-locking mode, etc...) is VAG-proprietary.

Cheers,
Duey

[winfred]

short answer no, i am less impressed almost everytime i work on a e38/39, ill admit i really like the seats in the newer cars for comfort, espcially if it has the bending mid backrest adjustment (the backrest breaks in the middle and changes the angle at the mid point) but i hate the crappy plastic that breaks off of the seat and is avalible only as a complete set for the whole seat, the non din size radio in the e39 sucks ass to a degree as yet unherd of in a $40+k car, the e38 has a ok radio, and you haven't had fun till you deal with the quick coupler style cooling hoses on the later e39s, did bmw forget how to design a cat converter?! all of the later stuff disolves and gets blown out the pipe or clogs up the muffler, the older cars the damn thing lasts the life of the car if it doesn't get dammaged by a outside sorce. rant suspended for now, but not over

Do you really think that getting an E39 would be "moving up?"