Article written by 'Zedonist'. Detailed instructions on how to change your standard BMW Z3 headlights for Angel Eye versions. These particular angel eyes are made by Sonar

The older BMW gearboxes were filled with either normal 75-80 EP gear oil or automatic transmission fluid, this being denoted by the use of either a brown or orange label near the filler plug, and owners of such cars therefore accept the need to change the oil from time to time. Many have found that the use of a more modern synthetic lubricant improves their gear change action, but if following this route, first find if your gearbox requires the use of GL3/GL4 oil only, or the modern GL5 standar

The Z3 must be the most-maligned sports car ever built, most of the motoring press and television presenters pouring scorn on it, particularly for its use of ‘old fashioned’ semi-trailing arm rear suspension from the E36 Compact. The same people, of course, are full of hysterical praise for the E30 M3, which has the same suspension, but which is set up for a more specialised task.

How to remove the rear bumper on your BMW Z3. In this case the paint along the surface at the side of the bumper where it meets the wing on my car was flaking away, probably due to a respray at some time in the past. Anyway, wanted to try and rectify this before the flaking reached the main external surface of the bumper.

The Service Indicator system operates the SI lights, which lose one of five green lights at a time, in response to the amount of fuel used – hard driving and/or cold running uses more fuel – changing to orange (Service due) and red (Service NOW!). The system also operates a two-year timer, which illuminates a clock symbol indicating that the coolant and brake fluid should be replaced.

As is the case with most of the BMW Z3, the heater controls are ‘borrowed’ from the E36 series, but in their new home there is far less space behind them than in the original application. This, coupled with the tight fit of the bulbs in their mountings, makes replacement less than easy.

[B][U]Subject: 3G EWS remote fob programming Background[/U][/B] I have a ’98 1.9 Z3 with the old style `house-brick’ remote and had problems with it not operating. I sought help on the zroadster forums and as is usual, there were lots of useful comments and links to previous...

A common complaint with leaks on the BMW Z3 seems to be in the boot and specifically around the third brake light – the root cause for this is because the gasket perishes over time.. it’s a fairly cheap and straight forward process – but I couldn’t find any guides for it so thought I’d throw one together as I’ve just done mine.

BMW Z3 Sills are prone to rusting from the inside outwards, so this article shows you how to remove them and protect the bare metal on the insides.

Here's my step by step guide to fitting BMW Z3 parking brake cables. You can see in the pictures that both of the outer sheathes of the cables had completely split in half. Whilst this isn't a reason to fail the M.O.T. it is sensible to change them as water ingress can cause them to fail.

Many owners regard the presence of a brake pad wear warning lamp as an excuse to ignore the condition of their pads, but the warning is only given when the friction material is worn to 3 mm, when there is a risk that damage to the discs will soon occur, particularly if the owner leaves replacement until the next service.

Article reproduced with the kind permission of Mike Fishwick A BMW Z3 Buyers Guide. This article gives out general information on what to look for when choosing your BMW Z3.

Finally got my headlights de-tango’ed, big thank you to Myredzed for helping and showing us the way. Not so scary to put headlights in the oven, once you have seen it done.

This must be the cheapest and quickest repair for a broken seat belt guide. I also carried it out on the unbroken one as well to add strength.

After reading various posts regarding the retrofit of cruise control to the various models of Zeds I decided to give cruise control a go on my car. My car is a 2002 M54 3.0i build date nov 2001 with a fly by wire throttle. As far as I am aware this guide is applicable to all fly by wire throttle...

Back in the days when cars had a separate chassis it was not unusual for the driver to see that the radiator and bonnet were moving relative to the scuttle – the front of the body’s rigid area, on which the windscreen was mounted – as the chassis flexed. This phenomenon was known as ‘Scuttle Shake,’ and largely passed away with the advent of monocoque body structures.

This article is to give a basic BMW Z3 history. The overnight success of the Mazda MX-5 throughout the USA was probably the deciding factor in BMW’s decision to produce a small sports car. It was decided that as the majority of sales would take place in the USA, the car would be built by the new BMW factory at Spartanburg, South Carolina.

How to remove your BMW Z3 Fuel Sender Unit, which is accessible through the cabin of your car. There are a variety of reasons why you would want to do this, but the most common is that your fuel gauge doesn’t work correctly or at all.

I’ve seen a lot of posts on here whilst browsing regarding the factory fitted option alarm on early Z3′s – the 3G EWS (the one with the large house brick key with red and grey buttons). I think most of the issues are because the supplemental instruction booklet that BMW provided with the install is next to useless.

In this case I am replacing the standard low quality BMW Z3 OEM Business RDS head unit for a Sony MEX BT3800U head unit. This new unit provides better sound quality, and a host of extra features such as – Bluetooth Audio and Hands Free Phone, USB Socket, Auxiliary Line In socket and so on.

Problems with the electric roof on my BMW Z3 and I identified the problem to be a faulty microswitch, I decided I would finally cure the problem and replace the switch. It is a fairly simple job but does require a little modification from the old switch to the new switch.

Brake bleeding is one of the most cost-effective maintenance tasks you can perform, an annual operation removing most of the impurities which accumulate in the lowest parts of the system. These include moisture, rubber particles worn off the piston seals, and metallic debris from cylinder bores. Moisture is absorbed through the rubber hoses and into the hygroscopic brake fluid, reducing its boiling point, and as the “wet” fluid is denser than when “dry” it will gradually find its way down and i

I fitted my fitting kit and hardtop a while ago now – but it wasn’t really perfect (I was about 95% happy with it).. It was weather tight – but I was getting a slight clunk from the rear when going over bad roads/potholes etc and a very slight wind noise. I always said I’d get round to sorting it out once and for all once time and weather permitted! and low and behold it was actually sunny here today for a change!!

I am always amazed by the number of BMW cars on which the body work is regularly treated to expensive polishes, yet the engine bay and underside is totally neglected. Cleaning this area is not difficult, and even on a neglected car it can be recovered with regular attention. A morning’s work every week for a month will make a dramatic change. Do not worry about getting water on the engine and its ancilliaries – just use an open hose pipe and common sense.

This article will show you how to manually move your seats forwards if the back/forwards motor has failed. It's all too common that either the seat motor fails, or that the seat jams in the rails because it has been adjusted too far back. Using this procedure you can move the seat forwards...