E61 M5 Touring life

[Twistee 405]

Thought I may as well put together a long ish term thread on the wagon, if nothing else it tracks the consumables.

I'll start with the current state of affairs and fill in the past 18 months in the coming days.

At present the M5 is having a holiday at BM Workshop, it went in to get the AC serviced and because I had noticed a noise over the past few days coming from the drivers front. So far the diagnosis is a cracked header, but in the rabbits nest of pipes they haven't been able to confirm it visually yet. So after a smoke test on Monday I should know more. Looking online cracked headers don't seem to be a common issue on the s85.

In a perfect world now would be the time to go to a set of Infinity headers, but I suspect that would void my warranty. 

 

[Vass 701]

Interesting diagnosis. How hard would you have to be pushing it to crack a head?

[aja540i 1896]

Good thing there's not much stuff in the drivers side of the engine bay, they will spot a leak no problem!!

If it is a crack in the manifold and you want to get it welded PM me, I do special rates for fellow E61 M5 owners....

[Twistee 405]

On 12/11/2022 at 7:04 AM, aja540i said:

Good thing there's not much stuff in the drivers side of the engine bay, they will spot a leak no problem!!

If it is a crack in the manifold and you want to get it welded PM me, I do special rates for fellow E61 M5 owners....

Cheers for the offer! Sadly nothing is ever straight forward when it comes to an S85 and after a few days of head scratching and running the car up on the hoist with and without the undertray the source of the noise is no closer to being obvious. On the plus side the A/C is now like having a snow blower on tap, so very happy with that result.

Initially the noise was quite loud, to me it sounded like a rattling pump. As these things go the noise completely departed after driving to BM Workshop!! I spent half of Wednesday with the team trying to get it to make the noise, which it eventually did but in a very diminished way which was frustrating. The engine checked out fine other than the intermittent noise and the decision was made to monitor it and see how it progressed over the coming days / weeks, obviously the next morning at home it noise was back it all its glory.....FFS

So I have gone through all the nightmare recordings of S85s rattling that I could find on youtube, 99% were completely different sounds other than two or three videos that were clearly the same noise. These were old videos also asking for help in identifying the noise, none had any useful answer - but one video provided some comfort in the owner stating that while they never found the source of the noise they owned the car for many years after posting the video and they had no catastrophic failure as a result of what ever was causing the sound. 

Right now I think I have narrowed it down to one or more failing vanos solenoids on the drivers head. Having watched a few videos of the solenoids out the car being shaken it is a very distinct noise, and I think one of the reasons it was not easy to pick up is that the undertray is designed to channel air and sound to exit at the rear and side of the engine bay - leading us to that area. I have a stethoscope that I will try out on the solenoids when it starts to make the rattle again and try to confirm my theory. 

Next time it happens I will grab a video. I thought I had asked for a vanos test, not sure that ever happened in the end. I will be over the moon if it is just the solenoids, which can make a range of noises depending on how they are failing from what I have seen. Certainly some of the hallmarks of failing solenoids ring true, lumpy throttle just off idle, the phantom noise and a lack of low end torque. But I like numbers and without a side by side comparison with a perfect engine to compare it with I could just be imagining things. 

I was going to use ISTA to do a vanos test, but remembered that I either have the wrong cable or have not done the install correctly as I can do most things but don't have the ability to perform those tests. Right now I have the classic mad rush to Christmas, so probably won't try and experiment with reinstalling ISTA and will just aim for a video and head back to the workshop with a better example of what is going on.

 

[Twistee 405]

Went for a drive this morning and the car pretty much confirmed my thoughts, P0022 error code "A camshaft position timing over retarded bank 2" etc. So great that I'm one step closer to getting rid of the noise now that codes are starting to appear it seems like a vanos solenoid is having issues. On the plus side it has a mean idle at the moment. Guess I will book it in with BM Workshop, merry Christmas car  

[GorGasm 561]

Thankfully the solenoids have come down in price a lot.  Used to be over $1k USD each.

[Twistee 405]

Agreed, thankfully mechanical warranty will help cover costs on this occasion. 

[Twistee 405]

Car is booked in for collection at 7am tomorrow by whoever AA / Autosure have chosen for this part of the world. At this point I'm more apprehensive about the transport than the repair. I should at least know if a glitterbomb went off in the sump by the end of tomorrow. 

[Twistee 405]

Transporter arrived on time, no dramas.

Current watercooler theory (as the car won't be touched until BM Workshop clear their current work) is that the Vanos high pressure line shat itself. If that is the case and the bottom end is open it will be bearing time  as well. 

Edited June 3, 2023 by Twistee
broken image?

[Twistee 405]

Big cam idle.

[Twistee 405]

Latest update, vanos line pressure is perfect. Vanos solenoids failing the test procedure, but not in the typical fashion which means it could be something in the electronics. Was also told the BMW NZ price for replacement solenoids .... $2,400 each, which is simply crazy given the genuine BMW unit from any other reseller is on average US$400. FFS And they don't even stock them in NZ. 

[GorGasm 561]

From memory the Vanos solenoid test isn't particularly good.  All mine failed the test but the car ran fine, although the funny cold start pulsing noise might have been related?  Someone in the US was trying to re-manufacture them at their price peak but wasn't having much luck as they would always fail the test.

Wait for the mechanical insurance to call you to say they want to charge 4 excesses since there are 4 solenoids.  May end up just replacing the solenoid that is causing symptoms?

 

 

Edited January 5, 2023 by GorGasm

[Twistee 405]

I believe the solenoids have been removed and scoped on the bench, waiting on results. I'm not overly worried about insurance at this point and will deal with them if / when that comes around. To date they have been fine with a single claim covering related issues. 

[Twistee 405]

Bit of piss poor comms from BM Workshop, had no info for a week. Finally called today and found that they are waiting on two solenoids from overseas. I'm annoyed as I would have purchased another two out of my own pocket and just had them all replaced at the same time. I have enough real things life to get stressed about, a lack of comms and planning here shouldn't be one of them 

Anyway it's not their usual style so I'll just put it down to start of year- itis. I still might try and get another two solenoids.

 

 

[Neil McCauley 248]

A bit piss poor, but the new workshop in chch might be taking up their attention.

[Twistee 405]

Got a call this morning, waiting on the solenoids still. Possibly end of the week or next now. On the plus side I only have to pay one excess for the replacement of the two solenoids. Glad I had the AC sorted for summer..... As much fun as the 116i is to blast around in as a loan car, I do feel it's a bit down on the M5s power. It does throw just as many codes though which is a bit of a worry for a loaner. 

[Twistee 405]

Solenoids installed and it sounds like it should, smoother idle and happy me. On the down side the original noise that it went in for before it threw codes is still around. I'm just happy to have it back and it got a ragging on the way home to make sure everything was done up nice and tight. So time to enjoy it until the clutch / flywheel get done in the near future. I was very happy that Autosure only charged the one excess for the job. 

So other than a small comms hick-up at the start of the year BM Workshop continue to provide me with great service.

[Twistee 405]

Nothing amazing to report as we've been dealing with very minor storm damage rather than playing cars. I did notice that the WOF expiry date was only 6 months from the date of issue, I thought for a 2008 car it was 12 months? The last WOF was 12 months on the car. Any ideas?

[balancerider 702]

29 minutes ago, Twistee said:

 I did notice that the WOF expiry date was only 6 months from the date of issue, I thought for a 2008 car it was 12 months? The last WOF was 12 months on the car. Any ideas?

Definitely should be 12 months. pre-2000 is the current cutoff for 6 month WOF

[Twistee 405]

Cheers, add that to the list of stupid things to deal with. Thanks VTNZ.

[Eagle 1517]

Could be the inspector wrote the sticker wrong. Its probably 12 months in the system.

[Twistee 405]

I hope it is a simple fix

[Gaz 1042]

On 2/18/2023 at 7:20 PM, Twistee said:

Nothing amazing to report as we've been dealing with very minor storm damage rather than playing cars. I did notice that the WOF expiry date was only 6 months from the date of issue, I thought for a 2008 car it was 12 months? The last WOF was 12 months on the car. Any ideas?

Will 12 months in the system as it automatically calculates the new date. Just written out the sticker wrong, happens from time to time

Edited February 19, 2023 by Gaz

[Twistee 405]

Good to know.

[Twistee 405]

Been a long time since I've put anything in here, life / work has been the priority. Other than the ticking from the maybe clutch / flywheel driving me nuts at low speed the wagon has been great and still scares me sh*tless if I feed it all it will take (on a closed private road in Mexico). I've been polishing out the water stains on the glass, noticed that one of the black window trims is in need of replacement as it has corrosion coming through. I noticed that after the huge amount of fresh road paint that has been applied out my way over the past few months the wagon has a good number of white spots that I've had to remove, thanks AT for all your hard work resurfacing roads that don't need it while neglecting every pothole and repainting all the linework multiple times in the space of a month. 

I typically use Oakwood leather cream, this was recommended to me by others on here when I first got the car and the stuff has been great. That said, I don't seem to be able to find anyone who has stock and have depleted my reserves. What other hydrating leather conditioner has anyone used that they would be comfortable recommending? 

Here is a beauty shot of a minor engine bay clean, I don't know if you can really call a stock S85 engine beautiful though as outwardly it has a huge amount of plastic. 

Second question, the fire retardant hood / bonnet liner - has anyone ordered a replacement from the likes of FCP and had it arrive in one piece and not folded in a such a way that it is unusable? I'm guessing that at some point mine was washed down and has shrunk, at present the tabs that slot into the bonnet at the font and back not longer have any purchase and while functional it just bugs me and they are not very expensive to replace.

This coming week I'll be contacting BMWorkshop to book in the major surgery, clutch, flywheel, bearings and sundry items replacement time.