Best Tune Up Parts

[nousablenames13]

Hi, I bought a 1996 328i recently and I want to know what the best tune up parts are for general street use. My last car as a Nissan S14 Zenki 240sx, and as far as that car goes, I had NGK Iridium IX Plugs with NGK Wires, Hawk Ceramic Brake Pads, and a K&N Drop in air filter. Would these be good options to go with on my E36?

Edit: Oh and K&N Oil Filter too. I'm thinking Mobil-1 Full Synthetic 10-40W Oil and it sounds like I have to go BMW antifreeze. I'm wondering if any phosphate free anti freeze will work. Is Zerex G-05 good enough?

Seems like NGK makes plugs for E36s but not wires. Also Hawk makes 318i brake pads but not 328i. Is there a difference?

Thanks

[Manolito]

Sounds like you have done your homework, because what you list are very good products with the possible exception of the oil and air filters I would go OEM (Mann) for those and save yourself some money. I avoid oiled permanent air filters.

You pretty much can't go wrong with NGK or Denso plugs. I'm have not observed that the expensive ones work any better than the standard plugs in an e36 (and I have put several hundred thousand miles on e36s) but they last for years, so the cost difference per mile is negligible for the high-end plugs. I tried low-end Bosch Super Plus FR7LDC in both e36s last year and neither car seems to idle or run quite as well with these as it did with the NGK BKR6EKs that I took out. I will probably pull the Boschs next summer and go back to NGK.

You don't have plug wires, but the connectors between the coils and plugs in a '96 are just about due for replacement. I would do those when I put in new plugs. Not much choice in brands there.

I won't discuss brake pads because that is a whole thread in itself and is very subjective.

If you go to the store looking for non-phosphate non-silicate anti-freeze, you will likely end up with a DexCool formulation like Prestone 5/50. I had really back luck with that, (two radiators in three years) which was confirmed by a mechanic acquaintance who had seen factory bulletins warning about DexCool, and some posts on line. I bit the bullet and went with BMW dealer antifreeze in all three of my Bimmers.

Don't forget to change your brake fluid and your tranny and rear end oil. Hard to know how long it may have been since those were replaced.

[nousablenames13]

Thanks. haha, yea. I forgot the E36s have individual coils. Is that connection part something I'm going to have to go to BMW for? I'm going to change all the other fluids. I didn't think there was as much variance in diff and transmission oil, and brake / clutch fluid.

[Manolito]

I put in Bremi spark plug connectors, $5.50 each. I never heard of Bremi, but they look OK and seem to work fine.

Although I am fortunate to have a excellent BMW dealer here in town (Neillo BMW in Sacramento) I get most of my parts (BMW and Volvo) at Autohaus Arizona. Autohaus is as careful as they can be to carry good quality OEM or OES parts. That is no small feat in today's marketplace where American and European companies are constantly being bought out and off-shored

Autohaus ships quickly and they very rarely screw up an order, and when they do, they make it right immediately at their cost. Their prices are always lowest or very close to lowest on the web. I have had good experience with several other suppliers as well, but I don't want to turn your thread into an Ad.

As for tranny and rear end oil, automatic or manual? Limited slip or standard differential? BMW says that the automatic transmission fluid is permanent. I guess it is if your car only lasts 100k miles. I go a lot farther than that. I change tranny fluid in the automatics every 100k miles, and I probably should do it twice that often.

I hear good things about Red Line lubricants. I have not tried them.

You should change antifreeze every two years because the rust inhibiters are exhausted by that point. You should change brake fluid every two years because its ability to absorb moisture has saturated, and you will start getting water dropping out of the fluid, which causes corrosion and possibly boiling if it is in a caliper. Not good.

I forgot motor oil. From what I have read, Mobile 1 is very possibly the best consumer motor oil you can buy BUT, as I have noted before on this forum, if a car has run dyno oil for over a decade and you switch to synthetic, the oil seals might not tolerate the change very well, and you could get leaks. I have not seen this happen on an e36, but it has happened on other cars, so I would tend to be hesitant about switching from dyno juice to synthetic on an older engine. If the car has been running synthetic, or if you do a complete rebuild, Mobil 1 is a great choice.