N55 turbo failure on 2011 X5 at 40K miles!

[muleskinner]

So, I've had this 2011 X5 35i for only a couple of months. Bought it from the original owner with 37K on the clock. Got all the BMW service records and all the service records from his indy shop after the warranty expired.

The "engine malfunction" light came on the other night, and the car lost a lot of power, but is driveable. I took it to my local indy shop, and turns out the turbos are blown. At 40K miles! I called my local BMW dealer, and they tell me the 8 year/82K turbo warranty only applies to the N54 engine.

Total cost to replace by the dealer is $7,600! My indy might be able to do for $5K. Still in disbelief that this happened at such low mileage. I'll be calling BMW USA on Monday, but anticipate they'll probably tell me there's no warranty. I've owned more than 20 bimmers over the years and never had a true lemon like this appears to be. I guess it's time to ditch this car.

[robnitro]

Get ista-d/rheingold or someone with it to scan the codes. It could be a sensor or vacuum line that causes no boost and some mechanics are sometimes clueless. A lot of vw tdi got turbos when it wasn't the turbo that failed for example.

[muleskinner]

The charge pipe blew off, and there's oil inside the turbo as well as the intercooler. That sounds like turbo failure to me. I found a remanufactured turbo on German ebay for $786 with 24 month warranty.

[AlpineX]

Originally Posted by muleskinner

The charge pipe blew off, and there's oil inside the turbo as well as the intercooler. That sounds like turbo failure to me. I found a remanufactured turbo on German ebay for $786 with 24 month warranty.

Think about your turbo oil feed and return lines as well.

Coking of the return line is a possible cause of oil in the turbo

International warranty sounds like a nightmare after the nightmare of uninstalling what you installed. Looks like you can get a lifetime warranty part for about twice the price, and relatively local.


Overall sounds like too long of oil change intervals or habitually heating up the turbo prior to shut down.

[pshovest]

.....or at least a leaking oil seal. If the charge pipe didn't blow off, would you have noticed the oil consumption?

[muleskinner]

The car has had 5K mile full synthetic oil changes its whole life. It's been babied. I don't even stomp on it that much....well...OK...every once in a while, but that's what it's built for. BMW service adviser told me he's seen them blow at 30 and 40K miles, but that it's rare.

[robnitro]

There's always oil there because of ccv system. If you were losing oil enough to be low on dipstick then yeah probably a turbo.
I don't know why the charge air pipe would blow off when a turbo dies... When it dies it can't make boost, so I'm confused....

[muleskinner]

Apparently a seal was leaking. The morning of the catastrophic event, I got a low oil warning light. It told me "add one quart of oil". I thought that was a little odd, but some of these cars do burn oil. Anyway, the car ran fine all day, then the "Engine malfunction" light came on, and it went into limited power mode.

[ard]

post up the last 7 of the VIN.

[muleskinner]

Last seven of the VIN: L740419