[bspears]

I have had this car for about six weeks. It already has over 2500 miles on it and is well broken in. I have had a chance to drive the car reasonably hard and I thought I would put some of my impressions down on paper for others to read.

It is a 2009 E93 Monaco Blue over Saddle/ Aluminum. It has every option available except Logic 7 and the Smart Phone Package. I ordered very early and neither my broker nor I knew that Logic 7 was not included in the Premium Package until it was too late. More on this later.

The Monaco Blue paint looks great. It is not show car quality but I do not see any evidence of the “orange peel” I keep hearing about with these BMW paint jobs. The paint glows a deep metallic blue under the California sun and looks black at night. It must have some sort of clear coat or factory wax because the water just beads right off the surface. The Saddle leather interior is gorgeous. I have conditioned it once with Zaino leather conditioner. The color of the leather got just a little richer after the conditioning. I plan on doing this once a month and hopefully the leather will remain nice and soft. There are now two or three small scuffs/tears in the leather on the passenger seat side bolster. I am pretty sure my teenage son did this flopping into the seat. I will need to keep an eye on this. The drivers seat is pristine. I am pretty careful about getting in and out but the side bolster has seen my butt on many occasions and so far no abnormal wear. The aluminum trim provides a cold hard contrast to the warm soft leather and works very well. No dents yet.

The sport seats are not the most comfortable I have ever seen but will do. I wish that BMW would provide some sort of lateral seat adjustment control. I would like to be able to move my seat about one half inch to the right. I am still playing with the seat adjustments and perhaps I will find the perfect spot. The seat heaters are great. I think you could roast a turkey on one if you had a mind to. They get much warmer than the seats in my Infiniti M35 did. It would be nice if BMW would add ventilated seats as an option (especially in the convertible) but sadly it is not available. One thing I do miss (that I have had on other cars) is the ability to have the seat move back and the steering wheel move up when the door is opened. I am trying to train myself to do this every time I exit the car but it was much easier when the car did it for me. The center console in my Infiniti would slide forward to give me a comfortable spot to rest my right elbow on for extended driving periods. The E93 does not do this. Another small thing that I wish BMW would provide.

The sport steering wheel is very comfortable. Audio and accessory controls are well laid out on the wheel and the heating feature is much appreciated on crisp mornings. All of the stem controls are well located and after using them for a few weeks they have become second nature. I like the lane change feature on the blinker and the turn signal will turn itself off after making a less than 90 degree turn. There were a few turns on my normal routes that would leave the blinker running on my previous cars and cause me to perform what Seinfeld called “the eventual left turn”. I thought the rain sensing wipers would be a joke but they perform very well here in northern California where we can get rain in intermittent spurts. I just hit the button and the wipers time themselves beautifully. The window controls are comfortably located on the drivers door and I like the fact that you can control all the windows at once with one button.

Realistically the glove box is too small for anything other than registration and insurance card. I do charge my iPhone 3G with the USB port in there. The center console is more than adequate to hold sunglasses, mints, wallet, and iPod. The valet feature works well (see below) and I use it all the time. I think it would take a crowbar to get into the center console when it is locked. The cup holders work well for my daily small Peets cappuccino although I have to lose the extra paper holder to make the cup fit. They do look flimsy but so far no problems with them.

I am not going to do an extensive review of the new iDrive. You can find those elsewhere. I just want to say that mine works very well. I have found it to be very driver centric. It allows me to get the things done that I want and yet stay focused on the road. The manual sucks and the learning curve is somewhat steep but if you put in the time and use it daily pretty soon using all of the iDrive functions will be second nature. The navigation package is excellent. The woman providing directions sounds hotter than the woman inside my Infiniti package. The iPod integration is flawless. The voice recognition works very well (although I have been unable to create a voice dialing phone book). My iPhone 3G paired easily and the contacts synced well (although there are a few stubborn contacts that refuse to sync). I have had intermittent problems with a slight echo when using the phone but it has gotten much better since the upgrade to the 2.2 software.

I have the car set to automatically lock the doors when I drive away and this makes it necessary to pull the door handle twice in order to exit the vehicle. I am guessing that this is a safety feature that keeps the doors from being prematurely opened by a child while the car is in motion but I don’t particularly like it and wish there was a way around it.

The sound system (although not Logic 7) sounds great. All of my listening is either Sirius or iPod and I can find no fault with the standard stereo system. It gets very loud and does not distort (even at volume levels that allow listening at highway speeds with the top down). I am not sure what Logic 7 would add but feel free to chime in and let me know.

Comfort Access is great. With one exception it has been working great. Using the key fob to raise and lower the top is a lot of fun. The door handles respond quickly to the presence of your hand if you have the fob in your pocket so opening a locked door is almost seamless. The only key fob issue I am having is with the valet function and this just started today. I formally was able to lock the doors using the key fob and then remove the hard key from the fob. This would allow the valet to unlock the doors and start the car using the fob but the center console would remain locked. For some reason the center console is no longer remaining locked. Sounds like I need to talk with the service department about this issue. Is anyone else having this problem?

The car is small. Backseat room is limited but I have had four adults in it for a night out with no complaints from the people in the back seat (two women both about 5’2” tall). I would not want to be a tall male in that back seat for very long. The trunk is very small and changes to tiny with the top down but the fold down rear seats help make up for this.

The top performs beautifully. Never a hiccup. I even managed to try and drop it with that thick set of manuals in one of those lateral trays in the trunk (that are supposed to remain clear when the top in in use). The top hit the stack of manuals and just stopped. I raised it back up, moved the manuals, and lowered it again. No muss no fuss. The car has been thru several hard rains and a touchless car wash twice (Classic Car Wash on Prospect for those of you in the south bay) with nary a leak. I got a few small scratches on the door panels at the car wash and will not be doing that again. This is my third convertible and by the far the most comfortable to drive with the top down. It is easy to have a normal conversation and I have even used the phone with the top down at highway speed. I think this will probably get even better when I get the windscreen. On cool nights I can even get my wife in for a ride with the top down if I raise the windows, turn the heater on, and use the seat heaters. It provides a very comfortable and warm cocoon for cool nighttime cruising. I have not had any issues with the dreaded convertible flutter other than a single incident at about 1400 miles. On smooth pavement I detected a slight resonant booming at about 60 mph that quickly went away as I sped up and I have not heard it since. I have tried to repeat this and cannot. The headliner on the convertible top is a thing of beauty. Dark black and rich looking it is far better than I expected on a convertible.

I have heard some complaints about poorly functioning heaters and air conditioners. Both my heater and my air conditioner perform very very well. For some reason BMW has you perform an additional step if you want to switch from heating to cooling or vice versa. In my Infiniti all I did was set the desired temp and the computer did everything else to achieve that temperature. If I lower the temp with the thermostat in the BMW I also need to remember to move the switch located in the center of the dash from warm to cool in order to get cool air blowing. Both the front and rear defrosters work rapidly and well.

The car came equipped with Bridgestone Potenza RFTs. Here are my impressions. On smooth pavement they provide a soft and quiet ride. On rough pavement they are noisy and transmit a great deal of the road feel right to your butt. I would call it a rough ride. It is not pleasant but worth it because there is just no room for a spare tire in this car. I would not think of driving it on anything other than RFTs. Fortunately most of my normal routes are on a smooth surface. For some reason there is a lot of grooved pavement here in the bay area and I have found that these tires tend to hunt and wander a little more than I am used to on this type of surface. The Bridgestones are wrapped around BMW style 230 wheels that look great. They are almost the same color as the copious brake dust produced by the brake pads so they do not show dust as much as some other wheels might. I washed the car myself the other day for the first time and found these wheels to be very easy to clean. There are no nooks and crannies to clean and all the surfaces are broad, flat and continuous.

This car is a great deal of fun to drive. It inspires confidence even in less than ideal conditions. I have yet to drive it with DTC or DCS turned off so I cannot comment on that yet but with both of those systems engaged the car is smooth. With the recent rains I drove the car hard enough that I should have induced wheel spin and some loss of control but this car remain cool, calm and collected. I could feel it working but no matter how hard I tried I could not induce wheel spin.

When driven hard I can detect no turbo lag. The car has plenty of power for high speed merges and on a spirited drive up the twisties on Big Basin toward Skyline it felt like it was on rails. Good visibility coupled with rapid throttle response and tight steering make driving in the high speed heavy traffic in the bay area a joy. The brakes are phenomenal and I can detect no sign of fading under hard but not track conditions. On the long commute to work each morning I use the Active Cruise Control. It improves my mileage and lets me arrive to work feeling fresher. It is an expensive option but one that I like and I would get again. The one problem I foresee with this is that if I elect to put on an aftermarket front bumper I am not sure how the sensor for the ACC will fit. The car came equipped with rear PDC which works well but I would trade it for a back up camera if I could.

The motor sounds wonderful. It is not the banshee scream of the 383 stroker torquebeast I had built for my ’69 Camaro but it does have a nice rumble at start up that builds to loud growl at WOT. It is very pleasing to the ear. Unlocking the car as you are approaching it from the front is fun because the angel eyes illuminate when you pop the locks and it looks like your car is waking up for you. This feeling is enhanced when you get in, start the car and the autoleveling headlights slowly rise into position. You are also welcomed by a lovely soft chime.

Overall it is one of the best and most complete automobile packages I have ever owned. I plan on a few mods eventually but right now I am very happy with the car the way it is. It sure turns a lot of heads where ever I go. I am not sure what it is the ECU learns about the drivers habits but the car does seem a little more responsive the more miles I put on it so maybe it is learning a little something about the way I like to drive. So far I am averaging 21.1 mpg. No service lights have come on yet so I have not had a chance to meet the folks at Stevens Creek BMW but I will report on that as soon as it happens.

[GregL]

Nice write-up, glad you're enjoying it! As for the center armrest you can buy an original replacement unit that does slide forward for the driver, I changed mine about a year and a half ago. Here's a post I made at the time with photos (just ignore the couple of the strut brace): http://www.e90post.com/forums/showpo...4&postcount=14

[roadkillrob]

Long with no pics!

[e93burner]

Nice write up and congrats on the car!

I have a Montego e93 with the 230 style wheels in the bay area as well so you might see your twin sometime in Saratoga.

[bspears]

Originally Posted by roadkillrob

Long with no pics!

fixed

[kar335]

You can order this split arm rest through Tischer and save a few bucks. there is a DIY in the DYI section, just search. Seems to be relatively painless. I would call Tischer as it might not be readily available in the Saddle, but they will order it from Germany for you, might have to wait a week or so.

I plan to order mine very soon. I have the Oyster and plan to get it in black so the center console is one color!!!!

[Barmats]

As an alternative to having the seat move back when you exit the vehicle -- you could program memory 2 for this and just press the button when exiting the vehicle. The E93 is an awesome car, and you'll love it even more a year down the road. Now... let's see some pics!!

[AlanQS]

You think the 230 alloys are easy to clean?! Behind the spokes gather a lot of dust and dirt and to clean the inside surfaces of the wheel is real fun when you are trying to clean the inside adjacent to the brakes.

I suspect damp, wet, cold Scotland dirties wheels a lot more than California

[roadkillrob]

Originally Posted by bspears

fixed

still long still no pics - dying to see your car!

[bspears]

Originally Posted by roadkillrob

still long still no pics - dying to see your car!

I think I found the problem. Take another look. Anyone else having problems seeing the pics?

[Barmats]

Very nice - love the color!!

[mmm def]

Nice review. Your car is one of the nicest I have seen, absolutely beautiful. Thanks!

[Rugs]

Congrats bspears, still enjoying mine!

[Mk23]

Nice review, love your car (obviously).

[CyberGypsy]

Love it and no wood!

[SPACEMANRICK]

Beautiful!....... what a great color combination

[bspears]

Thanks for all the kind words. I will be looking into getting one of those split arm rests soon.

[bsamoul]

That was an outstanding write-up. Enjoyable read.

[Deda]

nice review,thanks!