BMW Problems

Your complaint is against the dealer you purchased the car from, so that's where you need to go in the first place to sort it out. Talking to BMW is pointless, they weren't party to your deal to buy the car, so are not involved. Start by trying again to negotiate directly with the dealer, if that doesn't work send them a solicitors letter threatening legal action, or go to the ACCC and make a complaint under the consumer laws.

The PCV valve and the vacuum pump are the most likely causes of the high oil consumption, and although you say they have been done I would strongly suggest you recheck them. The pump in particular is a well-documented cause of oil leaks. I doubt changing oil would fix your problem.

We haven't had any experience with the chip you refer to, but have had some with other chips that have been offered here in the past. Yes they can work, but they do so by taking the engine calibration closer to the edge than the carmaker would dare do with safety. In my view they would clearly affect the warranty.

Generally it was always felt that the air-conditioning of European cars wasn’t up to the task for Australia; that was because there wasn’t the demand for powerful A/C in Europe where the climate is generally milder. But when the European carmakers began to move on to the world market and export their cars to places like America where the demand for good A/C is very high they have improved the performance of the A/C systems in their cars. The cars you say have had good air are cars that are typically built for the US market, those you say don’t have good performance are not. A/C systems soak up quite a bit of engine power in driving the compressor and that has a greater impact on smaller engines than big ones, and again the cars you are critical of have smaller engines, so they will also probably run smaller compressors.

We haven't had any experience with this product, so we can't comment on it, but it's always wise to talk to someone who has used the product before shelling out your own hard earned cash on something that might or might not work. Trying to get a refund after the fact is usually hard.

What a mess! It really began when you signed the so-called 'contract' and paid a deposit before you saw the car. You should never do that, they had you over a barrel the moment you put pen to paper and made off with your money. You need to go back to that contract, read it and understand what it is you signed. Look for an out clause that gives you an excuse to get out of the contract. I think you're being optimistic to hang your hopes on the dealer's description of the car as a demonstrator when perhaps it wasn't its prime purpose. You need to call in the legal eagles to sort this problem out, and it is a problem between you and the dealer. While it might embarrass BMW that one of their dealers has treated you in such an unprofessional manner it's not their responsibility to sort it out for you.

There's no reason you can't fit conventional tyres to your BMW, although BMW people and some industry experts would tell you that you   would affect the handling of the car. The BMW suspension has been tuned to run the run flats, which have a hard sidewall that contributes to the overall springing of the car, so fitting a conventional tyre with softer sidewalls will affect that springing and the handling will be altered to a degree. But lots of people have changed to conventional tyres without any trouble. As far as the run flat sensor goes, the BMW doesn't have one. It uses the ABS brake system to determine when a wheel is running at a different speed to the others, thus indicating a flat.

Some run-flat tyres are marked that they can't be repaired, but that's not necessarily correct we've been told. Run-flats can be repaired providing the sidewall hasn't been damaged by being driven too far after the tyre deflated. There are tyre dealers other than Bridgestone dealers who have the equipment to remove run-flats from the rims and repair the tyres. Bridgestone have an equivalent conventional tyre to your run-flat and these can be fitted to your car.