Will the repair bills ever stop on this thing...

[mpe50]

I've found this forum, and it's members, incredibly valuably in diagnosing and repairing my vehicle. But I think it might be time to tap out and sell my beloved X5.

Bought my '08 3.0si at 45k miles, and on the way to my now 89k miles, it's had practically the entire cooling system replaced, valve cover gasket, valve cover, and misc electrical components done. As it sits it needs a new oil pan gasket (10hrs labor), and has a leaky active sway bar.

All of that I could live with and repair, but it's also been in the shop for the past month, on and off, with power and rpm issues related to vanos faults. My mechanic has cleaned the solenoids, but the check engine light and fault code comes back within 300 miles. So we replaced the solenoids. Still came back with a 2A82/P0012 code after 2 weeks. So he ran all the procedures to test the vanos and flush the system, swapped the solenoids, and updated the software. Codes still came back after a day along with power loss and rpm issues.

After reading and talking to my mechanic, seems the likely culprit is the camshaft bearing ledge issue on this motor. And apparently when it's the intake side, as in this case, it's a whole new cylinder head to the tune of 24 hrs labor and a new head.

Even if my independent gives me a deal, still roughly a $4.5k repair on a car worth $12-$14k. And then I need to address the oil pan gasket, sway bar, and whatever else might creep up.

I love my x5, but does it even seem logical to keep it at this point?