rice_rocket88

Just getting a little restless with the car and thinking about ideas to liven my life up a bit. I know here it's usually mild or wild.. nothing in between. Anything small or trivial that you thought would intrigue you more about your car?

I've already done a few little things over the years:

LED angel eyes
M5 spoiler
19" wheels with spacers
HR lowering springs
some programming
Window Tint
Pedal covers
quad exhaust

So.. anything else.. small and relatively cheapish?
I don't want to change my rear bumper.. maybe eventually the front bumper just so I could get a lip.. I wish they made one for the LCI stock lip. But still I think that might be just on the "too expensive" side for me now.

I've thought about changing the side marker fender lights for LED.. although I just polished my stock ones and they are sparkly again.

Thought about interior LED lights.. but I hardly even notice them I figured it might be just a waste of my time.. maybe in the winter when it's dark more I'd notice them.

Thought about putting in a boost gauge.. but it's a tiny bit tacky for the car and the fancy one cost waaay to much for me to bother.

Also thought about a backup camera, but the real integrated pieces are also out of budget.. as with any CCC upgrade or nav upgrade.. If I needed it that badly I'd put my own screen somewhere before I bothered with all the $$$ to get it to work with the stock nav screen.

I rather like my interior wood trim, so I don't feel like CF wrapping or anything.

Maini

All interior LED lights..
Back up Camera integrated into the screen.. love it now..
This is what I installed for my CIC
http://www.aliexpress.com/item/New-c...858514285.html
You might need something different... Works great!! and pretty cheap..

Phone integration to the screen.. Looking to do this soon..

rice_rocket88

Did you find a reasonable way to get the integrated backup camera? The only thing I saw was modmynav which I think the last thing I remember is I need a few modules which will add up to about $800? Yeah not that interested

KyleB

I see only one 'performance' mod there, and it's the H&R kit. I'd go for every suspension upgrade imaginable, that's what makes a BMW a BMW

rice_rocket88

Oops..my bad. I totally forgot about my jb4, dci, charge pipe with bov.

I think I was going to hold off on more performance goodies since now that I'm a family man I don't have much time for the racing and track days.

As for suspension I saw that in some cases an m5 rear sway bar might work... I'm not sure if I'd take advantage of it since my daily drive has few high speed corners. It's always the xi fitment thing that gets me, not a lot of parts for it. ( ie exhaust and springs part..and downpipe)

Kasmo

I got a 2006 BMW 525xi, although im slowly doing the cosmetic mods I already know ill be getting into performance mods. If I dont I see a 545 or a 535 in near future lol

For around 2000 bucks i can get a stage 3 intake with all the hardware needed to just swap it out (from BMW) and a tune. People are saying i might be able to jump to 230-260 with that on my N52 motor. I got the detuned version of it... because AWD.... lol. I wanted to go crazy I can spend 5k on a supercharger... but thats way too much money.

Booyaazaa

+1 on suspension and traction improvement mods. Of course they aren't cheap but help tremulously with putting the power to the ground in and out of corners.

KyleB

ah, ok then

Sway bars make a huge difference, even in a car that doesn't ever see a race track. That's what I'd do next.

rice_rocket88

Kasmo, I hear you on the power thing! I think that with my age and past experiences racing cars I've gotten a lot of the "go fast" bugs out of my system. It was my goal back in the day to have a 10/11 second car give or take.. but I did it. I stopped when the rules stated 11.49 or quicker must require a roll cage (I made it to 11.3 and got kicked out). I've done the motorcycle thing as well, but all that got put behind after having kids. The idea is to hold off until they get older to help enjoy some of these things.. plus school and child care is freaking expensive! I think a 300+ HP 5 series is good..(yeah JB4 says 400 but I'm realistic I don't think it's there). It handles amazingly well for a big car, and with the AWD I have no problems putting the power to the ground without more than a few scuffles of the tires.

The suspension part also is not super appealing anymore, because the springs already tightened up the ride a bunch. On some of the large sweepers I see/feel the tires breaking when I hit them at around 60mph, but sure on my Evo or my heavily modified eclipse I could almost do it at 80mph. I am happy with what it can do, and there's not much I feel that I could do in order to rival that speed without going nuts with the $$ and mods that would not help the daily drive commute comfort.

I had a thought about the rear view camera though yesterday. I was in someone's car that had a dashcam with a rear camera included. I could certainly use something nifty like that... unfortunately that model is not sold anymore, so I will have to look further into that.

The M pedals I put on the inside is pretty pimp and sharp. I think I want these little appearance things to just look at while I'm driving to and from work. The angel eyes are exterior, at least I can see it when I unlock my car to get in.. and in the reflection of cars.

Anyone have other suggestions?

KyleB

M dead pedal if you haven't already done it, it's a nice piece and only costs around $60