Today I take up an offer from my neighbour Charlie to attack the suspected manky offside wheel bearing. Charlie works for BMW GB, and as such is kindly supplying the right ‘special tools’ for the job – and special they are!

I start early and get the car out of the garage.

To begin with the job is straight forward: car up, wheel off, brakes off. Then under the car to loosen the half shaft bolts, and prepare the special tools on the hub.

That adapter holds a winding tool that is used to push the drive shaft out towards the middle of the car.

Now here we have the slide hammer, still attached to my hub that I’d pulled off the outer bearing using it. It’s basically a heavy lump that slides up and down the bar. Once the drive shaft is out of the way this is attached to the flange, and the mass pulled vigorously to the end stop repeatedly until the tool, the flange, and I go flying backwards. Success!

We then have access to the bearing which is winched out with another special tool. Refitting is the reverse of removal, and below there’s a picture of the special tool being used to wind in the new bearing.

While doing all this it became apparent that the rear pads were shot as one of them came away from its backing plate. A quick trip to ECP and £29 later and new pads were fitted (to both sides).

This whole process including a trip to ECP and doing the other brakes took only 2 and a half hours – a tribute to Charlie’s knowledge and having the right tools for the job. I can’t imagine any success at all with my normal tool set.

The most gutting thing about today is that while this all went smoothly, and the old bearing certainly was a bit rough, the noise is still there. This means that my investigation focuses squarely on the differential. First stop, I’ll get the fluid changed, but failing that it’ll be time to look for another or get this one repaired. The wallet quakes in fear.

I get the back of the car up in the air today to investigate the grumbling rear bearing.

‘Driving’ the car while in the air, the grumbling noise is clear to hear if I knock it into neutral at about 50mph. I suspect this is the rear right wheel bearing, so decide to take that out of the equation:

I repeat the ‘drive’ process, and there’s no noise. So if it isn’t the rear right wheel bearing, it’s something very particular inside the differential. I’m certain now that it’s worth changing the wheel bearing.

Finally, a big thanks to Olly Bloxham for sourcing the BMW service spark plug change tool for me shown below.

For anyone who needs one, it’s part number 80.00.0.121.160 and should cost about £20. [Note - it's just the socket on the end of the 3/8" extension bar]

The morning is bright and sunny, and I’m up early to haul the M3 from its pit.

I remember now, I’d left it in a bit of a state…

I start in the boot. The arrows in the two photos below show one of the two offending pipes. The end in the wheel arch is rotten.

This is easily replaced with a length of the Pirteck 5/8″ pipe.

The bigger issue was that the breather pipe from the main tank had also perished, both in the wheel arch, and under the back seat:

At this point Ben Smith arrives to show off his new car, but he is soon helping me with my fuel pipes! I take all of the pipe covers off, and with a lot of tugging between the two of us we get the old pipe out.

Now we find we have a problem, as the new pipe from Pirtek is a fraction too big to fit in the tube that connects the wheel arch to under the back seat. Pirtek in Guildford are unfortunately closed on Saturdays, so we decide to improvise using some 10mm fuel hose I bought on Thursday, using the 5/8″ Pirtek pipe as a joiner at each end.

Eventually the job is complete.

We go for a drive in Ben’s new M3, pictured here with my 330d.

It’s a reminder of how good the E36 M3 is at being an all rounder. Sure it’s not as focused, but for six grand I think it’s an excellent ‘one car’ solution. Understeers a lot more easily that the E30 though, which is of course a bad thing.

Later I go for a test drive in the E30 which I’m pleased to say reveals no clutch or fuel issues. The total bill for the clutch was £24.56 (plus a bit of brake fluid), and the total bill for the fuel problem was less than £20 (plus a bit of petrol splashed around!) – so this episode hasn’t been the disaster I thought it might be last Sunday evening.

I finish off the day by giving the M3 a wash, and take a photo with the 330d. What a fleet!

A bit off topic but my fire suit has arrived which will be useful for any serious track or rally work the M3 may be used for in the longer term future:

As for the car, it looks like I’ve found a source of 5/8″ fuel hose from a place called Pirtek in Guildford. Thanks to Ian for recommending them, and for Ben Hughes for offering to go and fetch the part. I plan to try to get the M3 back on the road tomorrow.

The 330d has seen some decent use over the larger than usual period since my last report. Speaking of “larger than usual”, the Christmas period has yet again had just that affect on yours truly. However, festive it may have been, but it was far from relaxing, and the 330d has as a result been treated more like a mobile home than a cherished car.

I was scheduled to spend the New Year at a hotel in Bridlington, a town on Scotland’s north-east coast, not too far from Oslo. Okay, so it’s actually in England, but us southerners tend to get a bit lost north of the Thames. A friend had recently acquired the hotel, and was opening to friends and family over the New Year. In return for my stay I was going to knock together a web site for him and attach a sports steering wheel to his 330d.

However, I received a call from a desperate chum who was moving from his rented accommodation in the holiday period, and fancied a hand with a bit of deposit saving redecorating. I’m in Surrey, chum is in Wales, Bridlington is somewhere near Aberdeen. Sadly of course I had to explain my other plans, at which point said chum confessed he was calling from a hospital having just come around from an emergency knee operation. This combined with the fact that it was Christmas day and he’d been having his knee rebuilt while his wife managed to give the 3 kids their Christmas dinner in his absence triggered my first ever known bout of a guilty conscience.

In situations like this a man needs two things: an understanding and cooperative girlfriend, and a 330d sport touring. Fortunately, I have had the foresight to prepare both. So the cavernous boot was opened, and the usual selection of shoes, clothes, hair drying, hair curling and hair straightening implements was joined by laptops, cameras, steering wheels, car tools, paint, rollers, brushes, white spirit etc, and of course two large tins of chocolate. 36 hours later we’d got to Wales, redecorated a house, eaten a curry and one tin of chocolate, slept it all off, and driven to Bridlington. No messing around, no need to refill, we just got the job done.

The Bridlington 330d SE received my old sport steering wheel (I changed mine for a new M3 wheel as reported in November 2006), and I’ve now got this process down to a fine art. Just remember to disconnect the battery, and treat the air bag like a nuclear device, and all should go okay! My friend was extremely grateful, and reports a new lease of love for his car as a result.

Since the New Year the car has sailed through an MOT, which is to be expected, but is pleasing nevertheless. I wasn’t so pleased with the cost – £50.35. “That’s the new cost set by the Ministry sir.” I chose not to remind the garage that it’s the maximum they’re allowed to charge…

It is at this point I must let on that I’ve a secret to tell, and perhaps an apology to make. My recent reports may have lacked some substance, and certainly I’ve not been spending anything on the car. I have in fact deliberately let a few things slip, such as an upgrade to DVD navigation, and there’s a reason for this. Like a squirrel preparing for winter I’ve been saving for the New Year. And once it arrived, the 330d was to be found whooshing up and down the country looking for a new stable mate. Eventually it found a suitable new companion near Winchester. It’s another black BMW 3 series, and it came with a spare bonnet that just about fits in the back of the 330d with a rear window down. And yet, despite all these similarities, it is the polar opposite to the fantastic 330d.

I hope the wait and relatively dull reports have been worthwhile – I hope I’ll be making up for it soon with my reports for the other car. But before I tell you all about my new acquisition, answer me this poser: why do girls need both hair curlers and hair straighteners? Incredible, isn’t it?

Total Mileage: 95,842
Mileage since last report: 1,790
Cost this month: £50 (MOT)
MPG this month: 39