From 120d on the r…

Jeeeeez, that was real fun, I definitely need a race car project. Well maybe there will be some 323ti crossing my way sometime.
This exactly why it’s worth the membership in the Swedish BMW Sport Club, this will surely not be the last race event I’m going to attend to this year.

I recently made my first experience with Mapodo, an online shop for motor oils and lubricants. As most of the high quality motor oils are quite expensive here in Sweden I’m always looking for cheaper alternatives. Mapodo was discussed on various automotive forums such as www.autopower.se or www.bmw-treff.de and the people were always very satisfied with their buying experience.

Normally I shouldn’t care about such things as motor oil changes as the bimmer has this 3 years / 80.000 KM free service agreement such as all new BMW’s have. But the oil change intervals are quite “extended” which means that they’ll change oil first after every 30.000 kilometers. As you might have recognized I read a whole lot of stuff about motor oil in the nearer past and came to the conclusion that I will from now on devide the intervals in two 15.000 KM changes instead. This means that I’ll have to pay for every second oil change myself.

That’s were the money comes into the picture, my E87 needs motor oil with the BMW LL-04 specification as it is equipped with a diesel particulate filter and these require “low SAPS” oils. What “low SAPS” stands for and why cars equipped with a diesel particulate filter benefit from these oils will be clarified in a later post, that’s part of my oil mania. Unfortunately my favorite oil (Mobil 1 0W-40) is not LL-04 classified but LL-01 because of it’s not “low SAPS” and I will go oil conform at least as long as the bimmer is in it’s guarantee period.
I chose the ARAL Supertronic 0W-40 this time because of it’s nearly exactly the same oil as the Castrol EDGE Formula RS 0W-40. Castrol and Aral are both subsidiaries of BP and if you take a close look on the technical specification for these two oils then you’ll see how similar they are. The ARAL Supertronic 0W-40 is LL-04 classified as well so there will be no problem with the guarantee.

But it was not only motor oil for the car I bought this time, I bought some 2-stroke oil (~4€ / L is quite cheap) as well. Now you may ask why did you buy that for, but the answer is easy – for the 120d also. It’s a good idea to blend some 2-stroke oil, in relation 1:250, into each tank of diesel in order to lubricate the common rail diesel pump. More on this in a later post about this issue.

Back to topic then, BMW LL-04 oils are quite expensive ~22€ / Liter for Castrol Edge SLX 0W-30 are quite a normal price at your local BMW dealer. Mapodo currently takes only ~9€ that’s less than the half of the price at the bimmer shop. This immense price difference relativizes the cost for my extra oil service tremendously.

The order process and the delivery from Mapodo were both very satisfying and their customer service is lightning fast. All product questions where answered almost directly and the goods was packaged safely.

Thumbs up for Mapodo – highly recommended!

…should go and find a good source for affordable original BMW brake pads and discs then as well.

Seems like BMW is leading innovation now again, together with Google. Very nice indeed, maybe I should upgrade my Car sooner as planned.