M54 Engine Vanos Seals
 

Searching "vanos" key word in this forum, not many of us here concerning about M54 engine 3.0 double vanos piston seals (rebuild). In another E46 forum (also M54 engine), many E46 owners are dealing with vanos issues.
Is this because of E53 vanos is better than E46? :)
Did anyone ever replace our E53 Vanos piston seals? What happens before and after replacing vanos seals?

It's because they and the E39 (530i) crowd want to eek out anything they can to supposedly raise a few enigmatic results that may or may not actually be realized once changing them- or you know- maybe sometime later after the seals 'set' or whatever. While those of us in E53's (especially the i6's) are as happy as I was with mine for 7 years and 100k miles to have a reasonably peppy SAV that just works every time.

And before we go too far down the path of this perception, I'd like to also make clear that my wife has driven an E46 330 since new for 10 years and ~75k. Neither one of us feels a need to rush out and replace these things.

I can offer advice in the other direction..

My 528i rolled 183,000 the other day.. Starting about 30,000 miles ago I noticed a big drop in fuel economy as well as a stumbling idle when it was cold. No engine codes at all. I replaced CCV, ICV, Plugs, etc.. Still didn't fix the problem (although I solved other unrelated things).

Then I rebuilt the double Vanos with a kit from Beisan Systems

MPG went from 23ish up to 27.5+
Idle problem solved
More Power below 3,000 rpm
Generally smoother

Moral of the story, if you have less than 120,000 miles I probably wouldn't do it yet. Any more and I would. The gas mileage savings alone will pay off quick. Now if I could only get 4 more mpg out of my X5 somehow.. :)

so why not just replace it with the whole BMW part that lasted 150K miles to begin with?

Dude, i never replaced my former 1999 528i vanos/seals, I only replaced oil separator at around 145-150K miles. And it rolled until 214K miles without an issue.

PropellerH, we have the same M54 eninge, my X5 is almost 8 year-old and 91K miles in it. It's running great and i don't see/feel it's losing power at all.
M54 enine vanos rebuild procedure is not too difficult and about $60 parts compare to ~$500 the the whole BMW vanos unit. BMW don't sell just Oring/Seals for vanos and most people get vanos seals from Beisan systems. Beisan claim that their vanos seals is much better than the Buna seals that BMW install in our BMW vanos unit and last only for 20K miles!
I have Vanos seals kit here but i hesitate to replace them.

That there is exactly my beef- the claim that the seals last only for 20K miles- Total BS meant to get people to buy before they need anything- it just expands his market that much more. It's a sales and marketing claim that people have chosen to believe despite what is right in front of them. Your car has 91K miles and is FINE. The marketing around this thing is that it's cheap enough that pretty much anyone can spend the $ and feel like it was worth it- whether it actually was or not.

I'd hesitate to replace them too. $200 snake oil on sale for $100 is still snake oil.

does the vanos on the X 4.4 2001 have similar problems?

Single Vanos in that motor.

Yep, single vanos.

Any Oring failures known on the v8 engines? I believe the 6-cyl engins have more issues on this, maybe because of the double vanos system?

Koody, "I believe the 6-cyl engins have more issues on this, maybe because of the double vanos system? "

Not sure 6-cyl engins have more Vanos issues, however, if you do key word search in forum "Vanos" most of search results display vanos problems of 4.4+ (N62) engines.