M56 valve cover swap

[Caryalon]

So this weekend I finally got around to installing an M56 valve cover on my 2006 M54 X5.

I combined these jobs:
Valve cover swap
Spark plug replacement
Vanos seal replacement

A couple of learnings:
1. Radiator shroud top cover interferes with adding engine oil on M56 valve cover.
2. e46 coil wiring harness has different pinouts in the 9 pin plug. Power plug in e46 harness is white, and is keyed differently than the black one on e53 harness.
3. I reused the e53 harness - was plug and play.
4. E46 harness is way longer than e53 harness. (Makes sense - ebox is on driver side in e46.)
5. E53 plastic wiring housing (sits on valve cover) has indents for the 2 clips from the e46 harness, allowing housing/harness to be mounted to M56 valve cover using 2 small boots just like the e46 housing.
5a. Grounded the ground strap from e53 harness to the housing mounting bolt.
6. The Vanos unit has lots of oil in it - have a suitable container to put it in to drain when removed.
7. Once the 2 ~1 inch covers are removed, the small plastic sealing cup on the exhaust side (and the Torx screw) sit much further back than the intake side and are much harder to see. This made me think that the plastic cap and screw were not there, and that someone had been in there and didn't replace them properly. Was a relief to find them further back.

Hope this helps someone...

[ahlem]

What prompted you to do this project?

[Caryalon]

Not a huge fan of the m54 CCV system. Seems like an elegant upgrade.

I did similar upgrades on my e39 - e38 comfort seats, European center sliding tilting armrest, rearview mirror w/compass (now in my e53), f60 windshield washers, etc.

It's cool finding these upgrades, and generally pretty inexpensive.