540iT trailer hitches and towing cross country?

[ChronoGN]

My progress stalled a bit too. The hitch is all installed but I've been putting off the wiring....

i didn't realize the e39 is classified as a "Two wire" brake light setup, since the brake lights are illuminated as the turn signals (3-wire means a dedicated turn signal bulb) so i connected the red "stop" line on the modulite to the brake light signal line on the car. this caused the left light on my trailer to not illuminate, whenever i turned on the left blinker, the right light would blink instead, hah.
Once i un-tapped the red line everything worked totally fine.
i'll upload pictures of the wires later.

What do you mean by this? You can't hook up the stop line to the brake light wire?
I was just going to connect the stop line to the Pin 1 on left rear taillight connector.
https://www.newtis.info/tisv2/a/en/e39-525i-tou/gYYIsGz

[joekitch]

i mean, you can hook it up, it'll just screw up the signaling, as i discovered
2 wire means the brake lights ARE the turn signals, they use the same bulbs
3 wire means there's a dedicated turn signal bulb separate from the brake lights
basically, just leave the red wire from the modulite unit off anything, dont need it

[JimLev]

Figured I'd paste this here so it wouldn't get buried....

virginia, birmingham al, hattiesburg ms, little place in texas called columbus, roswell NM for kicks, phoenix, winslow AZ for meteor crater, then i turn north to ridgecrest CA, go on a scenic drive through the national parks up there and turn west over the mountains to livermore CA.

So your taking the southern route and pulling a trailer. Hope your cooling system is pretty new, it's already hot here in the SW, OK in the mornings but hotter in the afternoon. Phoenix will probably be in triple digits when you get there.

Roswell is OK if your in the area, I wouldn't drive 200mi out of my way to visit it. Carlsbad caverns are worth seeing.
Meteor Crater is privately owned and will cost you to see the big hole in the ground. You can't hike down into it, the guide will take you to the the edge and tell you about it. Sort of worth seeing.
Winslow is good, small town, statue and flatbed Ford are parked across the street from the tourist gift store.
All of the national parks are good, we've been to most of them.

[joekitch]

i'm a space nut so meteror crater is great, i've actually been before.

cooling system should be extremely robust, i think the oldest part is the water pump but that has another 20k on it at least, with brand new seals from the TCG job
brand new electric fan, brand new mechanical fan blades and clutch, got that aluminum zionsville fan shroud + expansion tank
on 90 degree days here in mass the thing REFUSES to go a smidge higher than 210F according to Torque

[JimLev]

You won't be staying at 210F towing a trailer when you get out this way, especially when going up to 5000+ ft elevation.
Stock radiator? Bring coolant/water just to be on the safe side.

[joekitch]

oh yeah, i'm bringing two gallons of coolant mix
and ye, stock radiator unfortunately, don't quite have the budget for a $700 zionsville since that's probably the be-all end-all

[computiNATEor]

oh yeah, i'm bringing two gallons of coolant mix
and ye, stock radiator unfortunately, don't quite have the budget for a $700 zionsville since that's probably the be-all end-all

RK Autowerks makes a very nice all aluminum $500 radiator for the M5; and the factory M5 radiator has a thicker core for about $150. Not sure if you have any heat exchangers and whatnot built into your 540i's radiator, though.

[joekitch]

$500 is...more palatable...i need to take stock of what i have left to purchase and if that can fit into it. need to leave a good $5000 left for just first month+security in SF
this is also assuming they can ship it to me pretty quickly
edit: looks like any shipping other than ground is $120+, and ground is $44, and considering they're in texas it might not make it in time
BUT! fcp euro, which always gets things to me within two days, has a behr m5 radiator for $180, way more in my price range, i think i'll do that

double edit:
oh, looking at my records, i think i'm still on the stock radiator, or it hasn't been changed since at least 100k. oh dear

[geargrinder]

M5 rad would be a good call Joe. All things considered w your rig and plan. And not a budget buster.

[JimLev]

Visions of Joe's cross country trip with the trailer......
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=-RvzVCU1wIo#

If you make it this far I've got almost every spare part for the cooling system from my 6 speed including the radiator.
I'm sure Danny does too.

[joekitch]

those trailer issues are 99% caused by two issues:
1) not using trailer safety chains
2) improper loading (the tongue weight should be 10% of the trailer's overall weight, or 60% of the weight should be in the front half of the trailer. NOT in front of the axle, in front of the cargo volume)

[dannyzabolotny]

Let me know when you're coming through Phoenix! I have a 2001 540it and 2000 540i/6 parts cars in my backyard if you run into any trouble.

[ChronoGN]

I made a writeup for my install including my wiring schematic.
Check it out here.
https://steemit.com/car/@chronogn/in...ring-bmw-525ti

[scottieducati]

That link is dead...


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[JimLev]

Worked for me, maybe he fixed it??
Here's the complete link.
https://steemit.com/car/@chronogn/in...ring-bmw-525ti