TriggerFish

I wish I had a petrol! As much as my straight piped 330d sounds awesome/terrible (depending on my mood and the situation!), there's nothing nicer than a sublte popping like that - especially when it's not all artificial like 'modern' cars. I finally got rid of the awful Vredestian front tyres in favour of some Nokians (I loved them as winters, so figured that they'd be worth a shot). The tramlining is gone! It's a totally different car!

Mine was mapped at over 200,000 miles. (Albeit it a 184.) It died at 250,096 miles as something somewhere in the injection system failed (HPFP for FPR, I think). I think it was the original turbo 'til the end too. Not had to replace one, but access looks awkward.

The diff will drive both shafts at once, unless the resistance variation between them (one in the air/on mud or something) is greater. Snapped rear springs are a common issue. The rear spring/shock setup on these is really simple, so you can easily jack it up, remove the wheel and have a look to see if there's anything obviously awry.

Oh yeah, crap! Just read your post properly - you'd said that already. sorry!

The wheel speed sensor might have been knocked or something though. Although if that's the case, I'd expect to see the ABS light on too. As said - get it scanned and find out what the faults are. Where are you based? There's various people around with the software/cables to do it (myself included - in Aylesbury, if you're local?).

Mine was booked in to be done tomorrow for the driver's airbag, but they've just cancelled due to a worldwide back order on the parts.

There's clearly more around some of the holes/bungs in the floor pan too, but I couldn't be bothered to poke at those. It was being broken for parts, so it was only a case of mild curiosity at the time

This is what treated me with my rear arches, including their state before I started probing around...

It's easy to get at, but one of the screws is an exercise in contortion to access! You only need to remove one or two pieces of trim to access them though. The sort of E9* you'll get for E46 money is likely to be a whole lot worse, I'd guess. You'll find a good one if you're patient

You can also disable bulb checking with PA Soft/NCS Expert (which is what I did when someone gave me LED bulbs)

Rust! They're mechanically pretty sound (check for knocking etc., as you would any other car), apart from the cooling systems, which are pretty weak. The resistor for the heater blower can fail too, but they're cheap to replace. Rust is the big, hidden problem though. Those side skirts can, and do, hide a multitude of sins, sadly. Welcome along though - and check out the facebook groups for e46s. They seem to be cheaper on there usually (but not sure if that's because they're all awful or not - but I saw so many dog eared ones when I got my first e46. I struck lucky the second time and bought the first one I saw!)

Low fuel pressure, possibly. Hard to say without codes/live data though!

I can't see the video, but it could be that it's had a remap on it that's causing it to smoke more (injecting more fuel), or it could have a boost leak - this was mine when I had a hole in one of the boost pipes... (In the Czech Republic - hence the wrong side of the road - not just reckless!)

Enjoyed an MOT pass with advisories for an oil leak (most likely left over from when the oil filter housing cover split) and two low front tyres.

No, it's worse than that! The person who uploaded them needs to pay (as I understand it). I wouldn't be surprised to see photobucket disappear in a year or two after this...