[msej449]

I've had my M235i Convertible since early 2016 and the top is still doing well.

There was one minor recall to replace a spring, but this was only for a very small proportion of 2016-17 cars and was done during the next service. The VIN will identify if a car needed the work done. If the dealer says your car wasn't one of them, then I'd trust what they say.

I use the BMW soft-top cleaner and soft-top re-proofer products to treat the fabric every spring and autumn, and then usually a couple of further times in the year if the roof has had bad bird-strike or tree sap incidents. There are lots of similar products out there, but the BMW ones are quite concentrated and have lasted me about 4 years.

Note the recommendation not to store the roof down for prolonged periods. This keeps the tension up and stretches the fabric so it doesn't crease. BMW also recommend not storing the roof when wet i.e. leave it to dry before folding it down.

Vacuum-cleaning the roof regularly helps a lot as well. I use the brush attachment and clean along the bias of the fabric, and this picks up a lot of dirt. Just beware that if you have High Gloss Black trim, most vacuum cleaner brush attachments have too hard a bristle for the varnish, and can leave micro-scratches.

Other than that, the current generation of soft tops are a massive advance on those of even 10 years ago. Both in terms of cabin noise insulation and durability. And I think that being able to drop the roof at speeds up to 30mph at all is also a big advance.

One recommendation I would make is to read the Owners Manual and understand how to manually put the roof up if there is some failure of the mechanism. I haven't had a problem ever, but the prcess is quite involved and if it ever hapened, I wouldn't want to be trying to read the instructions for the first time if I was stranded by the road in the rain.

The other thing you should note is that you need to be careful if you partly-retract the roof in order to clean the storage bay/bodywork. The hydraulic pressure drops after a while and the whole mechanism will move of its own accord. If you have the ignition on, and the top is only part-folded, the manual says it'll drop fully after about 10 minutes, but if it's off, it'll happen after about 5. You don't want your hand to be inside the levers when it folds down. This is all described in the manual.