Oil Everywhere - BMWNA Pickup!

[FSETH]

Originally Posted by 1stE53

Does it have to fail for them to replace these parts, or can it be done as a preventative measure?

If you could get BMW to replace this as a preventative measure, then I would say go out and buy lottery tickets immediately. Highly doubtful. 99 out of 100 times BMW won't even touch this if it fails when the car is out of warranty. Sometimes you can get lucky with a goodwill repair, but not the majority of the time.

[330]

i replaced mine with the winterized OS but it still freezes up. If you degrease your engin and change the oil you might not have any problems. replacing it with a new one won't prevent it from happening again. If nothing broke since the oil cam out of the oil cap you could get away with just an oil change.

You must park it outside?

[1stE53]

Thats what I thought. I was hoping it would be a recall type issue. O well. I will keep it doing what I'm doing to help prevent this from helping: Keep it in the garage, drive the loooooooong way home, change the oil before cold weather then as soon as the freezing weather is over, and take it on a long trip once a month St. Louis or Kansas City.

Thanks 330 for opening my eyes to the obvious. :-)

[oxyleak]

An update - I spoke with the SA at the dealership last night and there was a team of BMW guys in a meeting to triage 3 vehicles at the dealership with the same problem. The team consisted of a BMWNA rep, a field service assessor, the dealership warranty guy and the service manager. Three vehicles in for the same problem had 65K, 93K and 125K miles...all X5s. The SA told me that they were making a determination in the meeting if BMWNA would cover the repair and he said he would call me first thing this morning with the verdict.

The SA also stated that BMW is coming out with a heated oil separator in addition to the heated wrap that is installed on the plumbing to the OS. This part is not available yet but if the work is covered by BMWNA, when the part comes in they will install that one as well.

I will update the board as soon as I find out what the decision is. The SA thought I had a fighting chance at 93K.

[1stE53]

Gracias Amigo!!!

[oxyleak]

Talked to BMW today and they are picking up the $4000 tab for fixing the X5. I will have to pay for any maintenance issues that they due as a result of the repairs (which will be minimal since I told them I would do the oil and spark plugs myself) but it will still be in the $300 range. They are replacing quite a few parts and they will be calling me back in a couple of weeks to swap out the new part they are installing for an updated "heated" oil separator coming out from BMW later this month.

The are doing valve cover gaskets, the oil separator and plumbing and the heated wrap. In a couple of weeks they are calling me back in to take out the new part they put on to replace it with the heated oil separator that I guess is a new part to permanantly fix the problem.

Good luck to you all....

[330]

Thats great news.

I love the way they say $4000. The same job cost me $600, so what they really mean is they will pick up the $600 and not stael the remaining $3400 from you.

[oxyleak]

I agree that they are inflating the costs but they can charge $40,000 as long as I don't have the pay for it. I know the parts alone for the oil separator are about $600 with the heated wrap. To have the dealer do a VC gasket is another $1100 so they are a little high but they are doing work that they absolutely don't have to do to an 8 year old vehicle. My faith in BMW has once again been restored (first time was the E46 subframe).

[HPIA4v2]

Originally Posted by oxyleak

I agree that they are inflating the costs but they can charge $40,000 as long as I don't have the pay for it. I know the parts alone for the oil separator are about $600 with the heated wrap. To have the dealer do a VC gasket is another $1100 so they are a little high but they are doing work that they absolutely don't have to do to an 8 year old vehicle. My faith in BMW has once again been restored (first time was the E46 subframe).

Good deal,
I am going to replace my leaky VP gasket this summer, BMW is lucky to have an owner like me

Try my best to be ahead on regular maintenance, but nice to know from time to time if common problem exist BMW step in.

BTW, is there any symptoms on oil-separator, like hard crank when cold, noise etc. I always change my oil @6month and garage my car; so not too concern about it but always good to know if there is any obvious symptoms.

[cheappc]

wow.. that was nice from BMW, incredible, they did a goodwill gesture to me too for a e36 with like 85,000 miles...

Since then I bought 5 BMWS! do you see how a $600 to $1000 item can bring you way more? I also recommended them to so many people!

GOOD FOR US! GOOD FOR BMW! YEY!