AchtungE60

No, I'm not kidding. Gave to my cousin a like 298K and years later he's still driving it. I don't see him much but we do keep in contact from time to time.

AchtungE60

Sorry, I don't have/drive car anymore. Car is with my cousin and only see him every 4-5 yrs or so.
But why is that so hard to believe? You never seen an engine go this high? lol
As far as "lifetime" I would never consider any fluid on a BMW lifetime...besides differential. Lifetime of any car for me would be about 300K..which is an average I guess.

AchtungE60

I had a MT which was the car I drained the fluid on. It was not an SMG. The differential fluid and MT fluid were the same weight. The tranny fluid did not look like the differential fluids. I would not say the tranny fluid is "lifetime" just like I would never say a clutch is lifetime. The fluid in the tranny was different than the differential and both are assumed to be original fluid because I bought the car CPO at 62K miles.

Wolrab

The SMG is essentially a manual with hydraulic shifting. It takes manual transmission oil. I use RedLine MTL, but you can pick other synthetic oils and be fine. It's probably time you had the SMG fluid changed too (the hydraulic fluid that does the shifting).

Most people (notably excluding Achtung) think you might as well change the diff oil at the same time. It's going to cost you 1.5 quarts of oil and 2 O-rings.

subterFUSE

OK, so I need to take my car in for new spark plugs in about 2000 miles.

So do we think it's a good idea to ask about changing my transmission oil and diff oil?

Wolrab

My opinion: Yes, if it's been 50k miles or more since the last change. And the SMG fluid if you're pushing 100k.

AchtungE60

Well I have been there and done that. I have 3 bimmers now and have owned probably about 10. I am experienced mechanically and have done every major thing to a car one can think of. I took this E60 from my brother in 2008. hamdulilah i never had an issue which I couldn't fix myself with a bimmer physically or logically. Change your differential fluid if you want it's up to you but chances are that your car will be long gone before the fluid life is up. You can only bring the horse to the water....

In addition, I would never recommend anyone to buy an SMG transmission.

Wolrab

Why am I not surprised? Fortunately, there was nobody around telling me that before I bought mine. It's been one of my better purchase decisions.

AchtungE60

I've done major repairs to 4 SMG tranmissions. Which include dropping it, opening it, and fixing,,,,, so I have a solid foundation for my take on the SMG and it's failures. It is not a reliable transmission. Things may have changed from 2003-2009, I don't know but I would never buy one.
I have driven the VAG version of SMG on a gallardo and it was great but i do not really pay attention to Lamborghini or any other VAG vehicle so I couldn't tell you about the problems they have. Because the sample size for the VAG's R8 and Gallardo would be small I doubt anything would be widely known and not that I would care to know anyway.