Customer Reviews

BMW 3 Series (E46) Service Manual: 1999-2001

5 star:		(33)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

The manual looks good until you actually have a need for information. The electrical diagrams are crude, inaccurate, improperly drawn, and actually very limited with almost nothing about the engine or fuel system (what you need the data for most).

Have a question about the steering rack? Want to rebuild one yourself? Want to see a parts break-down before tearing into it?? Forget it, there is little mention of the rack other than telling you to buy a new one from a BMW dealer. How much fluid does the power steering pump hold? No data. Want to see a photo of under-carriage parts? Forget it. Want to know which wires run to the fuel pumps? Forget it. Ignition switch data? Ha! Want to trouble-shoot your ignition or fuel injection? Forget it. Anyone who has ever spent much time at all servicing their own vehicles already knows more than what this book contains.

Over and over the book purposefully avoids giving information, totally skipping the topic entirely by stating things like "...we recommend that this be done by an authorized BMW dealer...". It is personally insulting that the author deems everyone who buys the book is not competent enough to service one's own vehicle. A service manual should be just that, a service manual, one that supplies technical information. This book fails to live up to that need. I now recommend avoiding the Bentley book. A Chilton should suffice as well and cost half the price.

I am a 25 years+ experienced electronics technician whose specialty is trouble-shooting everything from basic house wiring to the most complex computerized security access systems. This morning I wasted almost 3 hours tracing down a bad fuel pump relay, but could have found the problem in less than 5 minutes if the manual had given correct information. (In the afternoon it took me less than half an hour to trace down a faulty CPU chip connection on a circuit board I've never seen before, one that caused two separate main security system controllers to malfunction, and with my having no data whatsoever to go by. Obviously, I would have been better off not using the Bentley manual at all while working on my BMW.) If you cannot trust a manual's diagrams and writing, then it is of no value, actually a liability. I personally will from now on avoid anything from Bentley. Yea, I'm ticked at Bentley!

If you are (or are considering becoming) a home mechanic whowants to work on your own car, this is the essential volume - farbetter than Chilton or Haynes because it's much more specialized. Ifyou'd rather pay a professional for a particular job (or foreverything needed on your car), this book will give you the knowledgeyou need to not get fleeced.

It's pretty good with the step-by-stepwalk throughs, though it depends a bit too much on cross-references toprocedures that are described elsewhere but seem to belong *here*,in-line with the rest of the work you're doing *today*.

One weaknessis lack of detail on changes through the model years. For example, itdescribes the power steering pump and coolant plumbing location on6-cyl cars from mid 88 on, but doesn't discuss the earlier locationthat permitted the PS pump drive pulley to saw through the lowerradiator hose...

This is a good book. Has good information on specifications, maintenance and mechanical work. However, the book has no information on working on the factory wiring for a a car stereo replacement process, which is probably a very popular thing to do on an older car. There was no wiring diagram or instructions on how to work it. It also had no information on pulling the on board computer.

Another area of disappointment was removing interior and exterior body pieces. Very minimal information.

Almost nothing specific to the convertible model 325ic.

I found the information contained in the book to be of great help and most useful; however, having said that, the quality of the book (how it is put together) is in need of great improvement.

I've had the book less than one month and within the first two weeks, the binding started to come apart so pages started to come out; I will be contacting amazon.com to request an exchange and hopefully, they'll stand behind their product.

This book does not contain proper electrical wiring schematics like other automotive repair manuals do. I have found more useful diagrams posted by kind people on the Web. This book is too pricey to have such a deficiency. Does have other useful information (which should go without saying) however, such as on the fuel delivery system.

For the most part this was a good manual for the 325i, but there was a shortcoming that I had due to it missing information on 325iX driveline components. I thought it would have covered this info as there are quite a few 325iX cars around and many of the owners do their own work. The rest of the book was complete and close to what is printed in factory manuals.

Not as good as the excelent Bentleys 5 series and Fuel Injection manuals. I was disapointed to find that it does not cover the later M40 engines as fitted to E30 cars from 1989 onwards.

Still a valuable tool in the 3 series library

This is a very thorough book with a very useful troubleshooting section. It has plenty of detail though because it appears to be BMW backed it refers to the use of BMW special tools and doesn't give many alternatives

I've a 325es (1986), it's been with me for the last 20 years. I do almost all the mechanic. I bought this book from Amazon, years ago, the book is great it explains you a lot of things and also gives you a lot of helpful tips, even if you've change a specific part before, and know how to do it, read that part on the book, you'll be amazed of all the tips that are there and you were missing (you could have save time).

There are a few things you must know about this book before you buy it.

1. You must have previous mechanic experience (I'll say more than average); not that you're a mechanical engineer, but you do need mechanical knowledge. If you're one of the people that don't even know how to change a tire or change the oil and filter or the spark plugs, then this book is not for you, save your money.
2. You need a good tool kit if you're going to do your own work, if you only have a monkey wrench, a hammer and a screw driver, forget about the book, save the money and buy a good tool kit (craftsman/snap-on).
3. You have to be patient and a good reader, otherwise, you'll not follow the instructions on the book, and again, you'll be wasting your money and probably end up making a mess of your car.

With all that said, this book is a must for every 3 series owner.

There are a few things that might have frustrated some of the other readers, and is the fact that since the book covers from 1984 - 1990, models from 318i to 325ic, sometimes it will show a picture of another model, but very similar to yours. That's understandable; otherwise they'll have to publish almost one book per car (model) per year. So, that's why my first bullet says, previous mechanic experience, if you've that, even if you don't have the exact picture of your model, you'll have the idea (and knowledge) and will get it done.

Maybe there are other areas that you'll want more information, like the electrical chapters, and the book will not cover them deeply, but at least you'll have the basics.

Remember, no matter how good the book could be, probably you'll always have to take it to the technician, no book is that good, and besides, that's why there are technician around, not everything is written.

There seem to be a lot of reviews which gripe about various problems with this manual, however, they all fail to suggest anything better. That's because there isn't a better printed manual. BMW has not offered printed shop manuals to customers since the era of the 2002 (the car, not the year) and while some bootleg electronic documentation (TIS/ETK) is available there are times when a printed manual is the best choice. The Bentley manual is head and shoulders above the others available.

If you work on BMWs you want the Bentley manuals. There's plenty of stuff they don't cover, but for the most the TIS doesn't cover that stuff either, like how to rebuild differentials. For electrical troubleshooting you can use the ETK.