Stupid stupid California highways!!!!

I was going north on 405 and all of a sudden a piece of plastic got kicked of from the back of the car that was in front of me and went straight into the kidney grill!!! I was going at 80 mph so I had no chance to avoid it!! I checked it once I got home and found out that it has scratched the kidney grill but when I looked more closely I saw that my freaking radiator got damaged as well and is leaking!!!!!! Imagine how i felt since I got the car only 3 weeks ago. So to cut the story short, I took it in and they hit me with a 1640$ bill just to replace the radiator and another 200 or 300 to get a new kidney grill !!!!!! I am really frustrated since I don't know who to blame at this point! The fins for the new x3 grill are just too far apart! I don't know whether this is just a cosmetic thing or they really needed this much airflow since the engine is pretty much he same n55 which is being used on the 335 and you don't see this huge gap on 335's grills!! Is there a way to prevent something like this to happen again?? I bet it will be much easier and more destructive for a small stone to get in! I don't want to call this a bad design yet but if the reason behind the design of this grill was purely cosmetic, BMW dropped the ball on this one!

I know you are frustrated, but I don't think it's bad design at all.

It was an accident on the hiway, and if the bars were closer together, the object might have deflected off and into your windshield or hood. It's an accident, that's it.

Insurance should cover it, but I don't know the kinds of insurance you have on it nor the State of Calif regs regarding that. Bummer, but that's what insurance is for.

OMG!!!! I am so sorry!

I hate the 405 in LA county, let alone talking about bad traffic, 405 is just down right dirty dirty

I'm making you some tea...





Feel better


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Its an insurance job -- don't blame the freeway. Perhaps if you weren't driving over the speed limit the damage would not have been as great, or it would have been avoided entirely. Being realistic however and having driven the 405 it is either 5 mph or 85 mph depending on the time of day and how many wrecks have snarled it. Just be happy it wasn't a 55 gallon oil drum falling off the back of a pick up and smashing into the car behind it!

Well first of all thanks for tea!!!!! Although a double shot of tequila won't hurt either at this point

My insurance company ( ameriprise) is covering most of the damage! I only have to pay my deductible which is not that bad after all. The adjuster did a hell of a job and brought down the total cost to 1440 instead of 2000

As for the speed ... I really really hate it when people say if you hadn't done that this would have never happened !!!! If I was driving at 90 I COULD have avoided this! If I was driving at 65 it COULD have hit the windshield!!! I can go on forever!! My point being instead of thinking "thank god a boat didn't fall on my car" someone needs to clear all this s**t out of our highways! I lived in Germany for two years and drove around a lot and the likes of 405 or 5 freeways are dirt roads compared to their autobahns!!!! I also think those huge gaps between the fins on the front grill are unnecessary and down the line if you drive a lot of highway miles something similar is bound to happen!

Well, I guess the State could hire a bunch of ppl to clean up the hiways, but your taxes would go up, and I suspect ppl in CA don't want to pay more taxes......

I lived for a while in Houston, Tx back in the late 70s and the freeways were full of garbage, pieces of tires, cans and even bottles back then. Not a new problem.

What the state SHOULD do is round up all the miscreants who are currently languishing in the various county lock ups and put them out on the shoulders picking up junk like they do in Sheriff Joe's Phoenix area!

Originally Posted by No12

Well, I guess the State could hire a bunch of ppl to clean up the hiways, but your taxes would go up, and I suspect ppl in CA don't want to pay more taxes......

I lived for a while in Houston, Tx back in the late 70s and the freeways were full of garbage, pieces of tires, cans and even bottles back then. Not a new problem.

They still are full of garbage, tires, cans, bottles and all sorts of other hazards. It's amazing and at times scary how many pick-ups and trailers I see that are full of junk with nothing tied down.

+1 on the Texas roads being loaded with Hazards. I've lived in California where the roads are no dream, but Texas bro...jeez. I drove through the entire state a few months ago and was constantly dodging crap laying on the road. Saw a huge baseball-sized piece of asphalt be kicked up by a pickup truck at one point.

"Perhaps if you weren't driving over the speed limit the damage would not have been as great"

Come on - who buys a bmw to drive the speed limit? That's what Hyundais are for

Right, like the new Genesis 50R spec with 429 hp and below 5.0 0-60 times, or the Genesis Coupe with the new 333 hp V6 both with a new 8 speed transmission. Those new offerings should keep the pesky Hyundai drivers in their place -- at the speed limit!