re: Power corrupts! My BMW X3 xDrive30d M Sport. EDIT: 2 years & 28000 km update Second Service Update : 18,000 Kms
All BMWs in India currently follow an interval of about 12,000 kms for oil change. My last oil change was at 7,000 kms. I had done it about 1,000 kms early last time. Every oil change service costs about ₹ 24K. So I wanted to squeeze the last drop out of this interval and waited till the last minute before I booked for service. This time the iDrive called for oil change after 11,000 kms. I've got extended warranty and the card clearly says that service has to be carried out at prescribed intervals with an allowance of maximum 10%. If you delay service beyond that, you risk invalidating your warranty.
Service was done at Navnit's Airport Road facility again. I got the appointment for the very next day I called them. Nice clean and large facility and the service experience was overall good.
This time they gave me 2 cans of BMW OE diesel additive. Each can is about 100 ml costing about 900 bucks. You need to pour it into the tank before tanking up diesel. The ratio is 100 ml for 40 to 65l of diesel. I've used one can so far and can confirm the mileage I got was about 5 to 8% more than normal for my Belgaum drive. Increased mileage could be due to fresh engine oil and air filter rather than the additive. Will use the other can a few months down the line. It supposedly cleans the injectors and carbon deposits and keeps the engine healthy.
They did not change the AC filter this time as the system only recommended it to be cleaned. This time, after service, the engine felt really smooth. It was really hard to believe from inside that you are driving a diesel car.
The service advisor this time was quite pushy was trying hard to market all kinds of accessories which they seemed to have stocked up at the facility. Sadly they did not have what I really wanted - BMW all weather mats for X3. One accessory that I did buy though was BMW Advanced Car Eye. Basically a BMW OE dash cam. The system comes with 2 cameras, one front facing and one rear facing. A 32 GB micro SD card stores all the data. Ever since I bought the Bimmer, I wanted to get a dash cam. In India driving a BMW is almost considered villainesque . A dash cam is good to have , but I hate the clutter of wires on my dash and like to keep it clean. The biggest advantage of this cam is that it is BMW OE and installed at the dealership. So there is no danger to warranty. Installation is clean and there are no wires dangling anywhere. The camera draws power from the mirror assembly and rear camera installation is also clean. It starts up every time you start the car and shuts down when you turn off ignition. There is also a parking mode where it records even when the car is parked. It comes with a G sensor so if it detects any movement or impact it records the video in a separate folder which does not get overwritten. You can download the videos onto your computer and view it with the help of a separate software that has to be downloaded from the internet. It also has a GPS sensor that records speed and also shows location on a map. Videos are clear and crisp. Front camera records in 1080 and rear in 720 resolution. This is my first dash cam, so I don't have much experience to rate it. MRP is about 35K. I managed to eek out a 10% discount.
Summarizing it.. Pros- Front and rear cam.
- BMW OE Product. Car warranty intact
- Professional installation by BMW Auth dealer.
- Clean installation. No wire clutter.
- Does not block or impede driver vision while driving
- Integrates well with car ignition and shut off.
- Event mode saves 30 secs before and 30 secs after in a separate folder and prevents it from being overwritten.
Cons- G sensor is too sensitive even at its lowest setting. Gives out beeps at almost every speed breaker and records it as an 'event'
- Each video length is only 1 min. System records about 100 videos of 1 min each and then starts overwriting. So if you've had an 'incident' and want to save it, better remove the card from the camera.
- Pricey
The Package View from driver seat View from passenger seat How it looks from outside The rear Cam Screen Shots of viewing software
The woofer on the dashboard is creating a bit of a reflection for the front camera. Maybe I need to adjust the angle or position a bit.
Last edited by Santoshbhat : 10th January 2017 at 18:17.
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