Customer Reviews

BMW 3-SERIES/Z4, 1999-05 Repair Manual (Chilton's Total Car Care Repair Manual)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

If you need to find the engine... or know whether your battery is under the hood or in the trunk of the car... then this is probably the right manual for you - but as with most Chilton manuals, it covers too many different cars too superficially to be any real use. It's only marginally more helpful than the owner's manual that comes with the car. Poor value. Haynes is much better. Robert Bentley (though costly) is far and away the best.

This is useful for doing simple things like changing oil or removing lug nuts. If you are doing any serious work or disassembly, you will need something with a lot more substance. There is probably some good information and diagrams in this manual, but I haven't found them yet.

I would go online and by the BMW Tech CD's, if I were to looking into this manual. I bought this manual and had to look for something with better technical material anyway.

Covering too many models and years to be much use. Poor quality pictures.

I bought this book for my '01 330Ci cabriolet, because it was listed as a model which was covered. However the coverage is almost nothing, and the electrical diagrams are not even complete, no convertible top circuit, no heated seat circuit, no windshield wiper circuit, etc, etc. Very disappointing. Nice coffee table book but not much good for the DIY mechanic. RFT

This book is very generic and could apply to almost any car. I was hoping to get a useful wiring diagram but what there is is not adequately labeled. I should have saved my money and used the data available on the web.

While they claim this manual covers the Z4, in fact it is a 3 series manual with virtually nothing on the Z4. Since the Z4 uses a lot of 3 series components, it is not totally useless, but, for example, it does not even recognize that the Z4 has electrical Power Steering (EPS), not traditional hydraulic, as the 3 series has.

Even its instructions for the simple task of removing the engine covers is incorrect for the Z4, as it only addresses the 3 series and tells one to do some needless tasks if you have aZ4.

They have obviously take the 3-series manual, added half a dozen sentences about the Z4, and added "Z4" to the manual's title.

This is more of a review of Pbshopus, the vendor, because it turned out that the book did not cover the particular car model I own. That was found out after opening the book and looking at the sub title that excepted all wheel drive vehicles.

But Pbshopus provided very good customer service from it's US operations in Illinois. The were courteous and responsive by e-mail and promptly refunded me for the incorrect book. Thank you.

As usual, very comprehensive coverage of repairs and maintanence.