[mikeoz]

We really like the modern Alpinas in UK, they suite our roads and the suspension is sorted for the UK market. Most people think they work better than full M cars do over here. However they are pretty rare and no discounts or finance deals kill off ownership for most..sadly

[sahajesh]

Alpina alloys are horrific though.

Put decent wheels on and you’re sorted.

[nynd]

Wild Blue:

This has a video on the sky lounge, looks consistent in lighting across both panels regardless of color chosen.

[fkim119]

Originally Posted by LittleJoe

I PM'd a European forum member who has a XB7 on order and he is having a custom Lavalina leather interior installed at the low low price of only $25,000. So I think it's safe to say that most American buyers would not ante up for Lavalina leather at that price. BMW and Alpina likely know how this says well. I've said it before and I'll say it again, the $30,000 up charge for a XB7 is fair for what you get. Some may not agree but that's the price of admission for a tuned engine, suspension, and exhaust.

If the option to get Lavalina leather was there, I would of definitely sprung for it.

[X7FamilyTruckster]

How epic this journey continues to get! The food pics, car pics..

I have a thought that might give you something to try in your down time for your epic forum posts. Have you messed around with the Drive Recorder yet?

I bet you could record some neat little clips of your journey from the BMW 360 degree view around your X7. For instance, cruising down the strip in Vegas would be pretty epic!!

But what inspired the thought was your sunroof. I also wonder if you had this system on "automatic" where it records the predetermined length of video based around an event (up to 20sec back in time and forward from event or manual activation), I wonder if the car has a sensor in the sunroof for "break in" events, and it would have possible recorded the sunroof breaking when it did.

Hey Auricom... I know you're reading this and drooling... Can you link up your BWM Satellites and tell me what inputs, sensors or other things the car uses to "Record an event" with the Drive Recorder (Sidenote, sorry if new homework!!)

[bradythedog12]

Originally Posted by nynd

Wild Blue:

This has a video on the sky lounge, looks consistent in lighting across both panels regardless of color chosen.

I think he was saying that it was fine until he select night driving mode, which is supposed to dim the lights. His issue is that the roof over the front seats is so dim, he can barely see it.

WB- I’ll try to check later and post a pic with and without the check.

[gsobol]

Just verified, even with "dimmed for night driving" checked both panels light up consistently. I checked with headlights off and on - same result - no difference in lighting brightness on both panels. Sorry.

[bhootnath]

It's not complete dark yet, no noticeable difference between the front and rear panel illumination

[Wanderer73]

With and without the 'dimmed for night driving,' both skylight panes have the same intensity. This is with it checked.

[Wild Blue]

Originally Posted by nynd

This has a video on the sky lounge, looks consistent in lighting across both panels regardless of color chosen.

Originally Posted by gsobol

Just verified, even with "dimmed for night driving" checked both panels light up consistently. I checked with headlights off and on - same result - no difference in lighting brightness on both panels. Sorry.

Originally Posted by bhootnath

It's not complete dark yet, no noticeable difference between the front and rear panel illumination

Originally Posted by Wanderer73

With and without the 'dimmed for night driving,' both skylight panes have the same intensity. This is with it checked.

You guys are all awesome. That seems to settle it, that something's off with my sunroof lighting. The small front piece definitely dims with the "dimmed for night driving" to where it's almost not visible.

That's too bad, because everything else is perfect about the sunroof now. That small wind noise I was hearing after the crack, is all gone. It's tight, smooth, and all good otherwise.

I call BMW Genius today to discuss this, and they're digging into their tech manuals for fine print details, but they also believe it should not be working like this.

Thanks for the input, guys!

[Wanderer73]

I'm glad the new sunroof is in, and you can continue your trip. Bummer on the lights. I'm going to keep agreeing with you, I love the Alpina back end, but I still prefer the msport look overall. First-world problems ...

[Wild Blue]

Exactly. And my concern about the LED lights is almost non-existent. I'm sure we'll get that small one fixed.

[Wild Blue]

Day 18 of Road Trip
"Stationary" in Los Angeles area
Total Miles: 4,432


What a day. Now that I'm several weeks into the trip, I keep wondering if the trip has peaked, and it'll start getting less interesting for you guys following along on the next day, like if I won't have many interesting pics or things to share. But then I somehow get more pictures and stuff than ever.

For sure, after 18 days, 22,500 views, and 14 pages of content, I'm sure several people have road trip journal overload burnout, and have tuned out. Can't blame 'em. For those reading, I appreciate the support!

Did a big round-robin around Los Angeles today. Given the size of the area, this was no small feat. Lots of driving, tons of traffic, lots of great sights. From where I'm staying in Dana Point in the South, I went up north to start in Irwindale, where I had made an appointment with my new buddy, Ben, known here on the forums as r33_RGSport





SAN DIMAS HIGH SCHOOL FOOTBALL RULES!!!!

(Please tell me people are getting these movie references I keep throwing out. I'm a movie and music nerd)

(and there's so many movie/TV locations here in SoCal. You could spend months visiting various sites. Heck... anyone remember what happened in West Covina, location referenced in that picture?)





Ben is well known here not just for his SoCal automotive shop RG Sport, where his portfolio includes modifying several forum members' Bimmers, but also shipping parts to people, providing great advice, his customer service, and especially his ability to code Bimmers, which he can also do for owners remotely over the internet.

When I arranged my X7 purchase, I knew there were a few items I just had to get coded. But instead of having Ben code my car remotely when I picked it up from the factory, I did one step better, driving the car clear across the country to take it to him in person. (ok, not the only reason I drove this far) But it gave me a couple weeks to get familiar with the car and decide what exactly I wanted to have done, before getting here.





Ben's shop is similar to shops gearheads all over the world are familar with, the semi-industrial setting, with vehicle lifts, boxes of parts, big Snap-On tool chests, etc.





The first thing that Ben did for me was put in the crystal volume knob insert. When BMW started cutting features and options on MY2021 cars, one of the very small things they did was remove the crystal volume knob, even when the shifter, start button, and iDrive knob are all crystal. That's a stock "before" picture above.

So, buy the $20 part, and put it on yourself. Rather silly. It's a DIY thing, but I haven't had tools on the road trip, and wasn't able to get it off with my fingers. Asked Ben to do it for me, and glad I did. Was a little sticky.








Just a hair too sticky, actually. The volume ring surround accidentally broke as it came off. So Ben pulled his ring piece off his own personal X5 and put it on my X7 with my new crystal insert.

Yes... that's right. Seriously? Who does that? Those who have worked with Ben will confirm that his customer service is top notch, just like that.

The final product is just a tiny more bling, looks nice.








Then, up on the lift the X7 went, as I next asked Ben to put in my BMW door "puddle" projector lights. Nice to have room to get at it from underneath the doors.

Again, largely a DIY-level project. But as has been noted in the X5 and X7 discussion forum threads about this mod, BMW doesn't make this part installation easy. The part is a BMW OEM piece, but doesn't fit right in. It requires a little cutting.








... or so we thought. We discovered that there's actually a metal bracket up inside the door cavity that prevents the new projector casing from going up where it needs to go. Ben had to actually do a little grinding with a dremel to get it to fit.

Again... BMW OEM part. This is not some cheap Chinese knock-off. Silly that it requires that kind of modification to put in. But... yields a nice result, adding just one more little gizmo to an already loaded, cool car. Here's the "before" pic at night, notice the "carpet" lights illuminating the ground to the sides of the vehicle to assist you when you get out of the car.





And here's the "after", with the door projector lights added. The kit includes a //M logo, roundel logo, BMW logo, or "X" logo. I went with the Roundel. Kinda spiffy.





Now, while the car was up in the air, I took some various pics, as we don't get to see our X7's from that vantage point very often. Thought people might find it interesting.





Interesting to see what's back behind the bumper, inside the exhaust surrounds.





Behind the front wheel, with the chassis up in the air.











Silly me, I didn't realize that the brake controller ports on the tow hitch package actually included both the flat 4-pin and round 8-pin plug types.

Cool.





Looking at the rear axle from below, there's just a ton of stuff there.

Hope none of it ever breaks.





The front axle shows less.








The last thing I asked Ben to do was code. Did several features, staying away from anything that would modify engine performance (which isn't codable, anyway) or would have any chance of affecting the warranty.

Probably the biggest thing I wanted to code was the anti-dazzle matrix lights. The car's capable of it. Works everywhere else in the world. But inhibited here in the USA, because the NHTSA is soooooooo slow in approving new technology, even when it adds safety and performance.

I think this will be very, very helpful for me, driving in rural Alaska, keeping an eye out for moose near the road with high beams, even while there's another car in front of me.





Ben showed me the stock X7 capability of playing video on the front entertainment screen, which I hadn't played with before.

And then we coded a bunch of other stuff. The top items I was most interested in were:
- Anti-dazzle headlights
- Default driving mode at startup set to Adaptive
- Auto Start/Stop remembers last setting
- Close trunk from key fob

Thankfully the guys helped me unload the summer wheels/tires from the trunk, and we were able to find a more efficient packing method. Three wheels stood up across the trunk, with the final wheel turned sideways in the back. This allowed both 2nd row seats to be fully upright, and even slid back a good amount, instead of one of them collapsed forward.





While the wheels were out, I checked on the trunk mat.

It's still not the best of quality, but it's definitely doing its job, and holding up well, for carrying four massive wheels and tires halfway across the country. As previously noted, the cover on the back of the 3rd row seats doesn't stay in place when they're upright. But I'm going to keep the 3rd row down 99% of the time.







And that was it at RG Sport! Ben's team was awesome, not only with customer service, but also great suggestions for when I left, of places to go for food, and hero photo spots with the car.

She looked great coming out, with some new goodies inside, ready for the rest of the trip.








Got lots more opportunities to use the Extended Traffic Jam Assistant. This thing really works awesome, and is perfectly made for LA traffic jams, which are all over the place. Matter of fact, when I hit multiple traffic jams throughout the day, instead of getting stressed, I just turned on the ETJA and relaxed to music, while it helped me work my way through the jam.

One point today, I had the ETJA engaged, nothing drastic, and the person behind me got rear-ended. Hard. Don't think the person behind her was paying attention. Thank God I wasn't one car back at the time!!!

When I left Ben's shop, I headed over to the famous Holllywood sign.








The final part of the drive there is really dramatic. Several miles of tight, steep, narrow roads, winding up the mountain, really expensive houses clammed in on both sides. The road at many points is only wide enough for one car. Extremely winding. I can't imagine what the homeowners go through, every time they drive to and from their houses.








Fun to take the pics. Then, I was off to a recommended eatery on the coast.





Lots of fun sights along the way, not even seeking them out. And then I turned off the highway, taking Kanan Dune road over to Malibu. I'm periodically reminded around this area of the world in "Grand Theft Auto V", being that the landscape is somewhat modeled after Los Angeles.

Nice foothill driving, winding roads. Overlooks, tunnels. I popped her into "Sport Plus", and had a blast, tearing around curves. And remember, I still have the winter Blizzak tires on!








Reaching the coast, I turned onto the well-known Pacific Coast Highway, or California Hwy 1. Beautiful, riding all along the coast with beachfront and ocean views. Came to Neptune's Net, a great little seafood diner along the PCH.








So, my BMW Sales Advisor, "BMW David" Aviles, actually flew in from Maryland to California, in part to meet me. We sat down at Neptune's Net and feasted on their sampler plate, full of yummy treats from the ocean.

Sitting literally right on the side of the Pacific Coast Highway. Blue skies, nice and warm. Good food, good drinks, good people. Awesome time.











Not only is David a great guy, turns out he just won his 7th annual top M Sales award, competing with BMW salesmen from all around the world. Very impressive.

I never would have expected my car salesman to fly across the country in part to meet little old me, but he did. Talk about establishing a customer relationship. Geez. What a great time.

Something I shared with David, there's good portions of this trip that become rushed, getting to places, sometimes trying to pack multiple things in a day. But I'm trying to slow down and pause the good moments, with good people and/or awesome views, and just appreciate the moment. That lunch definitely was one of them.

Afterwards, I did a nice little drive on the PCH, back towards LA, stopping at various spots for scenic pictures.

















Some gorgeous mansion/homes along the PCH that are likely in the 8-digit price range.

And then to end the day, I went to the famous Santa Monica Pier.








Some people there, but a majority of things on the pier were closed. Trying to be safe regarding COVID, I avoided people.

The Santa Monica Pier is significant and symbolic in this journal, as it is the end of Route 66, the classic USA cross-country highway that people most think about. It symbolizes the end of a journey, the closure of the Great American Road Trip. You may even recall Forrest Gump stopping here on his running tour across the country.

But, like Forrest, I'm not done yet. I'm just turning around, and keeping this journey going.

The sunset from the Santa Monica Pier is not to be missed on a road trip, including everything it symbolizes. From starting with a sunrise on the east coast, to sunsetting on the west. Beautiful.

A big thank you to r33_RGSport and BMW David for an awesome day with good new friends.

I hope you stay with me for more!

[MashinBenzin]

Potential thread burn out? You have to be kidding!

I dread the day that you reach home will be suggesting that you take a short rest and then cross the northern states/Canada. Alaska to Newfoundland for a service or something?

ETA - this thread is an essential visit every day, when I am sure I have time to read the post properly and savour all the details. I usually finish wanting to go for a long drive and eat something!

[isleaiw1]

Santa Monica, my favorite place. Stayed in a beautiful hotel there called the Huntley, and enjoyed a relaxing beer or two at an Irish bar a block or two away. And my screen saver is still sunset, Santa Monica style!

[MystroX5]

Now that is the weather I am missing here in the north east. So glad you are stopping to smell the roses. It’s nice to stop and take a good look around.

[LittleJoe]

I'm not getting tired of your daily updates and I'm sure I'm not alone. Thanks and keep them coming.

[r33_RGSport]

@Wild Blue Thank you for your visit and the shoutout.
Glad to finally meet you in person and able to personalized your car.
Enjoy the rest of the trip. I have a feeling that your west coast trip will be much more interesting.

[pawlie]

Please keep the thread going...there's no danger of road trip burnout!

thanks Wild Blue

[X7FamilyTruckster]

No burnout here!!!! When this is over you need to figure out a way to Print the entire forum post into a book!!! One day 50 years from now when watching Mecum on the Moon or BarretJackson Mars edition, they will talk about the "provenance" your X7 has documenting its birth and epic first road trip!

PS, not sure if you saw my idea about using the BWM Drive Recorder to record tidbit of the rest of your trip. I posted it arbitrarily in the middle of all the sunroof diagnostic pics

[Techno 9000]

Thread burnout? Nope, not around here.
Keep it going Wild Blue. Great reading.

[BklynNYBMW]

Hey Wild Blue. Love the modifications on the car. I definately know what you mean about the little details. I love the welcome lights on the floor and the logo. WICKED. The the pic are spectacular and thank you for showing me the Pacific. I am dying her eon the east coast and cannot wait to get back there this summer. yes please be careful in public over there as it relates to COVID. A little bit to free with not using masks over there.
On another note if you get a chance visit Petersen's Automotive Museum and do the Vault tour. Also If I am not mistaken you are a pilot. If you have not been Visit the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley. This has nothing to do with politics. It is the only Presidential library with an actual decommissoned Air Force one IN the building. You actually get to walk through it. There is also a Marine 1 there too. Did I mention it was in the Hills - Lol. I think you would enjoy both of those places. I hope you get to visit them. Please stay safe and I am looking forward to the next posts and more great pics.