[4wheelcycle]

I have finally found a use for the over-sized cup holder that came with my 135i.

Since my lifestyle does not include a morning commute with a big insulated cup of coffee, I had taken the cup holder out of the car and stored it with the rear seat headrests - also not needed since I never have any passengers in back.

I recently bought a Garmin NUVI, the new 755T, and I have been worried about mounting the disk base permanently in a location that could be seen by potential thieves when I am away from my car. I thought about several places to mount the NUVI so that it would be removable with no trace of the mount when I am not using it.

I finally thought about the big cup holder as a possible base. When I looked closely at the cup holder I realized the bottom of the holder, where the cup sits, is actually a separate plastic part that pops off easily if you stick your thumbnail or a thin knife under the edge. Once you pop off the bottom (the part with a round nickel-sized hump in the middle), you will find three T10 screws that firmly mount the upper part of the cup holder to the base.

Remove the screws with a T10 allen-type wrench or a T10 screw driver bit, and then remove the upper part of the cup holder from the base. Save the screws in case you want to put the cup holder back together when you sell the car!

Now you can use whatever creative instincts you may have to mount the NUVI suction base on the cup holder stalk. I used 3M Super 88 electrical tape, but I bet someone can come up with a more attractive solution. Whatever approach you use, you'll probably need to do it while the cup holder base is mounted in your car in order to get a stable work set-up. Or you can do what I did - wrap the bottom of the base with several layers of duct tape and then put it in a vise in your basement workshop.

Note that I put the bottom piece from the cup holder (with the little hump on it) back onto the base before I taped on the NUVI suction base. Also, I did not use Garmin's disk base at all, I just taped the suction base directly to the cup holder.

Finally, the cup holder stalk is very hard to remove if I push it in all the way each time I use the GPS. However, I have found it is sufficiently stable, and also very easy to remove, if I only push it in firmly, but not all the way. I take the NUVI with me and hide the base under the seat when I am away from my car.