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There is a new car in the garage ....

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    Various events culminated in my making a bid on publicsurplus.com. On what? A retired police cruiser. A 2017 Dodge Charger. Maybe it was the Duluth, MN location, Labor Day auction ending, or the winter tires. I was the high bidder. I had previously bid on similar cars in Cheyenne, Wyoming, but was not successful. A quick search showed that some folks use 33miles/idle hour for wear calculations. Even by that metric, this one wins over others — an order of magnitude fewer idle hours than the average of ~3000.     What's next? A trip to the bank to get a certified check, then mail it. Scour airfares and find a reasonably priced route to Duluth, on a bus from Minneapolis. They sent over a scan of the title and told me that the original will be in the car. Earlier, a conversation with the motor pool selling the car gave me some confidence: this would be sight unseen. I had a few questions about the photos in the auction and they allayed my fears.     Kudos to Minnesota for a good pu
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"CHECK SIDE LIGHT" - A literal Hack!

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If you have a later model E39, you might see this alert on the lower middle display, as it did for me. After some walking around the car and the requisite reading online, the problem seemed because of the driver side angel eye (USA, 2003 525i). Generally, I tend to understand, then ignore these lights if warranted. However, the "red corners" on the display - making this a more critical warning, and the pings during every turn on and off, grated on me enough to try to replace the light. Thus started another saga. As always, please treat this as entertainment. And not Dialysis. To paraphrase the legendary Nelson Pass. YMMV and assume your own risks...... One thing about the E39's headlamp is that the bulbs are accessible without removing the wheels or the bumper, unlike the E90 which took me 4 hours to change a similar angel eye bulb. I digress. I yank on what looks like the right part. And it comes out. Or atleast something comes out. 2 out of the 3 parts of this "ass
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Introduction or The Pilot

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Might as well keep track of what I did. The inspiration for the title is from The Hack Mechanic . Other than oil changes, headlights, angel eye bulbs, wiper fluid pump (which were all suprisingly involved on a 2006 BMW 330i), the following are a few things that come to mind, when I think DIY. No notes about wipers and air filters. Getting the right parts is invaluable. Having the right tools is even better. In my case, DIY guides or youtube seldom had exactly the correct procedures, or the folks who previously worked on those cars, took a few liberties. Many thanks to friends and neighbors for help.   1999.5 VW TDI Oil pan gasket , ebay part from turkey. 3/24? bolts are tricky.      (1) Rotate wheel to move flywheel to correct position     (2) Use a round edged allen key - straight won't fit Brake pads: BMW E9x, F31 2006 Early E90 had slight different sized and number of fasteners. Hawk pads work great with stock discs for HPDE. But are loud and dusty. Akebono pads with stock disc
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