F3* hopeless design

[Sharkfan]

Whilst quite a pleasant car to drive there is a couple of hopeless design details that make the car a timebomb for electrical or electronic failure. One is the drain holes that are to small in the boot and rear three quarter areas which allow boot mounted electronics and electric window motors to drown and die - there is actually an internal BMW bulletin about this which dictates the drain holes should be made bigger.

The other crap design is the scuttle area at the lower edge of the windscreen and into the engine bay - despite some half assed grills to stop leaves this area fills full of leaves which turn to mush and bock the white drain grills and then flood the area and its electronics again killing the car.

I spent an hour pulling leaves out, vacuuming leaves out, scraping knuckles, pulling mush out - it's just plain stupid they've designed it to fill and fail.

[duncan-uk]

Nothing is built to last now i don't think, I've said before most cars are just white goods. Drive for a few years on a PCP contract and dispose.

[Sharkfan]

Well, the car is now on 75k miles at 7 years old and because SWMBO wants to keep the car rather than keep changing we have, despite there being nothing in the BMW servicing schedule, had the gearbox oil and filter, transfer box oil, front and rear diff oils all changed.

The engine oil and filter was also done (as well as setting the future changes to 10k miles instead of the silly 18/20k as dictated by BMW) and the front discs and pads were changed now rather than in 2/3 months time - then we noticed the front tyres were down so they're getting changed today - so all in an expensive month but considering the cars is set for transmission oils and front discs for the next 70k miles and front tyres for about 30/35k miles I think it's worth the investment, and peace of mind.