Picture of ODO before I do repairs

[fujioko]

Hey folks!,

Once again I’ll thank everyone in the past all the help I received this year.

Anyway I’m about to embark on a winter long project to fix all the electrical gremlins in the ‘ol fiver.

I snapped a photo of the ODO to record the actual mileage.. just a precaution in the event something sinister should happen while I repair the instrument cluster.

As I recall, my E34 is the second highest mileage car on this forum.. great for bragging, however is doesn’t help resale. I guess I’m stuck with this car for a long time.

Here is the ODO!

[Dave M]

Good luck. Better you than me (for more than one reason) fixing 'lectrucal stuff'. Butter fingers

If there's enough oil, I'll be buried in mine.

[fujioko]

Success!,
The instrument cluster rebuild is finally finished.
I had to replace four of the 1.5 watt bulbs (BMW dealer @ $5.00 each)
One of 3.00 watt bulbs was bad so I replaced all of them with generic bulbs.
The tachometer fascia was peeling so I got a used tach from Vines via Ebay ($30.00)

All capacitors were replaced with new EL units rated @105C. The original 1000uf cap was blown up. The rest appeared OK but they were replaced anyway. ($6.00* via Digikey)

The total cost of the repair was in the range of $60.00

I installed the cluster yesterday and powered up the car. Everything is back to normal.

CAPACITORS… hmmm. Digikey in my favorite source for this kind of stuff. The proper capacitors are NOT available at radio shack. While you may be able to find the correct values at RS, they will not be rated for the temperature.

Anyway I got enough capacitors left over to repair 3 more clusters. If anyone is interested I’ll send them a set of caps for $6.00 (includes shipping in lower 48)

The set of caps are all the EL units required for a cluster. As I understand there are early e34 clusters and latter ones. This cap set is for the late model E34.

[whiskychaser]

I've got a spare cluster you could have had but it wouldnt have been any fun just swapping it would it? :-) What I really want to know is how the hell you get 27 mpg!

[fujioko]

Yeah, fixi’n the cluster wasn’t really cheap. The main thing I wanted to preserve was the actual ODO miles. I guess the ODO chip could have been swapped to a better cluster.

Now the 27 MPG is a real average the car gets when I commute. If your car is in good tune and you religiously drive using the silly swing meter then you can certainly get decent mileage. Not really much fun though

[whiskychaser]

Now the 27 MPG is a real average the car gets when I commute.

Ok, I only drive about 4 miles to work but if I dont cheat and set consum 1 from the moment I set off, I probably average half that over a week. Dont tell me what you get on a long run cos I will just sulk more :-)

[etcetera]

I drove mine about 350 miles on a trip over the weekend and the average for that tank was 30. Cruise control at 75-80. I think it would have been better but I drove north over the grapevine, and then back. Most trips around town it barely warms up, kills the mileage.

I bet some of our members from the midwest get stellar mileage on a road trip.

[Ross]

I'll take some of those. PM sent

[Phatty5BMW]

I live in Illinois and a 45 mile commute to work. In the 535 I get 16-18mpg....
thats why i got the v-dub

[SC David]

My car has less than half the mileage of some of you guys. I get 24mpg in this rainy season on my 65 mile round trip commute averaging 70mph, and 26mpg during the summer on the same trip. I can get 28mpg if I stick to 65mph, but that's the best it'll do. Around SF I get anywhere from 15-18mpg. Seems like my car should be doing better than this...