BMW 320d reliabillity

All sounds very odd to me Peter.

We've had an E46 320d SE Saloon, in jet black metallic, since September 2004 when we bought it new (it's my wifes car).

The car has now covered 46,000 miles and has been faultless.

My wife changes her car every 3 years without fail, and so this one has been agreed as being part exchanged against her new car, which arrives in the first week of October 2007 with any luck.

The 320d can be summed up very easily for me:

- it's performance is superb

- it's fuel economy is okay, but not the best

- it's drivetrain is excellent

- it's ride quality is fantastic

The carhas returned an average of 41.3mpg since new, compared to the Audi A4 1.9 TDi Avant 130 Sport that I had giving 47.8mpg average.  However, that's where the competition stops - because the 320d was in a different class to my A4.  The A4 is tractor like in comparison to the 320d's engine and drivetrain, and frankly I'll never recommend a 1.9TDi FWD Audi to anyone. 

I'm not aware of any common problems on the car, but acknowledge ours hasn't hit 50k yet (and won't whilst we still have it).  However, I've never heard of any elsewhere either.

You have to remember something else though - the 320d was the best seller of the E46 range.  By a very long way.  There are hundreds of thousands of them out there - so yes, you'll hear of things going wrong, as you would with any car selling in such a huge volume.

If my wifes next car (a Lexus RX400h SE-L) is as reliable as the 320d has been, we'll be delighted.

Not a 320d owner, but have been doing a little research for my folks who are changing their car soon, a 320d is something that has been mentioned, here's some findings

http://www.bavarian-board.co.uk/forum_posts.asp?TID=18359&am p;am p;KW=320d

http://www.dooyoo.co.uk/cars/bmw-320d/1029278/

http://www.bmwland.co.uk/talker/viewtopic.php?p=23389&hi ghlight=&sid=287a5a868567edc97d66fb71efb50369

http://www.bmwland.co.uk/talker/viewtopic.php?p=23389&hi ghlight=&sid=287a5a868567edc97d66fb71efb50369

http://www.dieselcar.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=dr_bmw; action=display;num=1124537799

guess one of these may be off the list, as unless your buying new you never know how the cars been treated, as FSH doesn't seem to count for much as far as the turbo is concerned

As I said above though Peter, look at the volumes the car sold in.

More to the point, name a car and I'll spend 10 minutes on the internet and find you 10 or more reasons not to buy it because of problems posted on car forums....

Try it.  You'd never buy a car again.

Peter Fenwick wrote: This is the problem that attracted my attention http://www.bmwland.co.uk/talker/viewtopic.php?t=53451&hi ghlight=&sid=452462873c6271d83b8206e0ed503141

That doesn't make good reading does it, regardless of the number of cars that have been sold........... I know a friends 2004 330d auto Tourer has had a manifold, was picked up at first service, at 18k ish miles, dealer didn't tell him why it needed changing though.

Sporty1 wrote: Peter Fenwick wrote: This is the problem that attracted my attention http://www.bmwland.co.uk/talker/viewtopic.php?t=53451&hi ghlight=&sid=452462873c6271d83b8206e0ed503141     That doesn't make good reading does it, regardless of the number of cars that have been sold........... I know a friends 2004 330d auto Tourer has had a manifold, was picked up at first service, at 18k ish miles, dealer didn't tell him why it needed changing though.

Edit: Spoke to above mentioned friend, maniflod was on a recall according to him but no letter sent out, just as and when they come in for routine servicing maintenance.