Coolant flowing out of resovior after parking. Hissing/bubbling sounds. Puddle.

[jeremym]

Welp, I picked up my X5. It was exactly what I stated before; coolant expansion tank cracked and was replaced. CPO covered it. All I paid was a flat $50 for my deductible.

[Nick3753]

If you had any significant distance to the dealer it was good that you got a tow. When my reservoir cracked it was pissing coolant as I was filling it, but I had less than 15 miles to get to dealer so I just drove it. Unfortunately it was less than a year later that coolant was leaking from somewhere else....The joys of X5 ownership! I hope you have better luck.

[jeremym]

Originally Posted by Nick3753

If you had any significant distance to the dealer it was good that you got a tow. When my reservoir cracked it was pissing coolant as I was filling it, but I had less than 15 miles to get to dealer so I just drove it. Unfortunately it was less than a year later that coolant was leaking from somewhere else....The joys of X5 ownership! I hope you have better luck.

My service center is only about eight miles away. However, as I said in an earlier post, driving it in 20 degree weather, and risking having to sit on the side of the road with no heat was not something I wanted to deal with.

[cravin]

I had a cracked rad as well. Did you tell Richy I said hi?

[jeremym]

Originally Posted by cravin

I had a cracked rad as well. Did you tell Richy I said hi?

Ha, sorry, I didn't.

My radiator was busted about a month after I purchased, back in Jan 2011, so they replaced it and some hoses. I think the cooling system should last the rest of this X's life, at least with me as its owner, given all of the components replaced thus far.

[cravin]

One would hope, but they're replacing them with the same parts that they originally put in the car, so I'm preparing for them to happen again over the life of it

[jeremym]

Originally Posted by cravin

One would hope, but they're replacing them with the same parts that they originally put in the car, so I'm preparing for them to happen again over the life of it

Yeah, sure. My logic is that they'll last another 50k miles, give or take... That's a long time for me, given my 10 mile round-trip commute each day.

It's funny to think that I know a bunch of people with non-BMW vehicles and they've never really had these problems. From what I've read/heard, it's a "normal thing" for our coolant expansion tanks to crack around 50-60k miles. Meanwhile, I have had other vehicles, and know of other vehicles still in service today, which have over 200k miles on them and have never had a single issue with such a part cracking.

"You get what you pay for," I guess is not always accurate. One would think that a coolant expansion tank on an "expensive" vehicle would last forever, like its Honda Civic counterparts. But no, it doesn't.