2007, 530D Sport, 18" non RFs, active steering.

I seem to get a lot of road surface feel thru the steering wheel, its seems ok on smooth surfaces but on certain rough surfaces you can really feel it in the steering wheel - is this acceptable/normal, anyone else feel it, or maybe you just dont notice it.

It's going to be really hard to get any agreement on this. Every car has steering wheel feedback, and with different suspension and wheel setups across the E60, there are different ranges of how good (or bad, depending on how you look at it) the feedback is. I have a 530d SE with 18" run flats, and definitely get good feedback. On harsh surfaces some may find it gives too much feedback, but I think it's great. Whether your car is like every other 530d Sport, or whether there is a problem, cannot be determined through posts on a forum - as there is no way of measuring your experience against ours unfortunately. As your car is 2007, maybe you could pop to your dealer and just ask them to check it out, or ask them if you can take an identical car for a 5 minute test drive to compare. Only that way will you know if there is a problem.

I get nice feedback (IMO). I'd expect a BMW to be communicative, but not harsh. I guess it's all relative... the expectations that govern where that threshold is will be different for everyone.

Naturally, road irregularities can make things seem odd. Brand of tires, age of tires, flat spots on tires, uneven tire inflation/wear, wheel damage, etc... all contribute to the overall feel.

I drive a US sport package with Dunlop runflats (with 18600 miles on them). I still think it's fine. I let a buddy of mine drive my car the other day, he has owned and driven many luxury German cars and BMWs and he commented on how smooth the car was - so go figure. :)

I get too much of road feel every day.

My old Dunlop 18" 245/40 RF's gives a tramlining feeling :thumbsdown:

The old RFL's really sucks. It's on my loaner, and even though it's only 16" standard wheels the ride quality is worse than my own 19" non-RFL:s. Not to mention the noise! :nono:

But, back to the original question - IMO you should feel a difference when changing road surface, that's the way a BMW should "communicate" with the driver. But, you should be counting metal strips, coins and other things that you run over with your car. That kind of communication it's for a car prep'd for a race track and would be a genuine nuisance on a "normal" road.

Hello,

You should perhaps consider new tyres? Doesn?t make sense to spoil a wonderful car with wrong tyres...

Greetings

There's "road feel" and then there's "unintended vibration" & they are 2 separate things. I am currently having steering wheel shimmy/vibration problems that the dealer cannot fix (that occured from day 1 of purchase in May of this year & also post H&R springs install)....had it in today for the 3rd wheel balance and 4th alignment...still not fixed. They have another identical '07 530xi that is having the same problem. BMWNA replaced the tires & wheels on that car, with no success. We are all waiting for a "true" BMW engineer to try and diagnose the issue. Once they figure out his car's problem they are going to relay the fix to mine, assuming it's the same issue. BMW-NA will turn their back on mine due to the springs, but the dealer is willing to try and fix it regardless, since they know it was there prior to the drop. I'll keep everyone posted once this gets resolved...if ever.

I agree. Its night and day. get new tires... or get BMW to swap them out.

I'm feeling the road quite hard too. Well, it might be these Finnish rough roads though.
It?s hard to tell am I feeling some kind of vibration on front wheels setup or just the road. The steering wheel shakes just a 1 mm when not holding it. And this is not all the time, only on the roughest surfaces. I feel the road on my ass too. I just came back from a 800km weekend road trip so I really had some time to analyze :rolleyes: .

I'm running new Kumho Ecsta SPT KU31 245/40 R18 (not runflats) and new M5 replicas. The setup is balanced correctly and wheels are straight. Not very much weights were needed in balancing procedure. So, I don't know...
Am I demanding too much or what is it?
Maybe Ricracing could share a thought with me, I guess you're Finnish too and know how rough roads we have :wacko:
And everyone else too of course, please tell me it?s just me... I have had this car (530D 2004) for this summer only and I just love it besides this issue!

I remember the first time I switched from a "cheap, boring, normal" car to a Jaguar. I took the car back to the garage three times about the wobble and shaking. The head engineer went for a test drive and then just said "this is the XJ-Sport. It's meant to be like that. It's perfect". I got used to it and realise I was feeling quality components, rather than spongy cheap parts that I had been used to. My E60's feel very similar to the Jaguar, but even more sporty. I have had two E60 SE's, and have a 535 M-Sport on order - and jumping to 18" Run flats from the 17" run flats from the two E60's so far. So I am expected a "harder" ride once again!