DIY Articles/advice on repairs
 

Hi everyone, I haven't posted here in a few years since my X5 has been mostly maintenance free (a good thing), but in the last few months i've had a number of problems develop. Ironically just 6 months past when my warranty expired....Shocking I know, lol.

Here is the list of items the dealer came back with:

Thermostat failing
AC recharge
Transmission sealing sleeve leaking*
Oil and filter per your request
Oil leak from two shaft seals at cyl. head
Oil leak from upper timing cover gaskets
Two pulleys making noise
Instrument Cluster Pixels burned out
Sunroof weather stripping

The bummer here is that my dealer/service manager is good and trustworthy. I can also verify that all of the above needs to be done from symptoms I am having and visually inspecting it myself. Now, I am quite mechanically inclined having rebuilt old fords, and work often on e28/e34 M5's, but I have never had to turn a wrench on this X5. I searched the site and did not find any DIY articles on any of the above except for the dead pixels.

Does anybody know of any DIY articles for the rest of the list? Due to time I may have to suck it up and have the dealer do the work, but if I can avoid some of it i'd like to!

Many thanks in advance


Andy

It's a 2006 X5 4.4i w 76,000 miles. It only sees 5-6k miles a year of in town (sub 3 mile) driving per trip. I have to imagine the stop and go short trips are whats killing it. I bet the engine never even warms up before it gets shut off!

Instead of having a dealer do the work I would look for an Indy with a good rep. from the BMW owners in your area. I found my Indy through Yelp, and I read the comments that the reviewers posted about him. Turns out he was a mechanic at one of the largest BMW dealership in my area and he just wanted to open his own shop. Dealer trained, but no dealer prices. I bring the X to him when I don't have the equipment to perform the work or because the job is too much work for me or it the dead of winter with sub zero temp outside.

For the transmission sealing sleeve for the electrical connector check out this Youtube video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkpuYnaeWUg

Alrighty, after reading through the some DIY's I decided to go it myself. Just picked up most of the parts and will be tearing into it this Thursday.

:)

Good luck! If you run into any problems, we'll be here!

This may help:

Car repair Manuals

It used to, until it was taken down for copyright violations.

Ohhh oops i just realized BMW was gone. ehh time to remove it from my favorites

Thermostat / pulleys
Remove the intake hood - (4 plastic retainers).

Remove the airbox - Remove the ring clamp engine side of the MAF and disconnect the MAF plug, then you should be able to bend the pipes up at the joint so and they should disconnect leaving just the last tube to the throttle, you should then be able to jiggle the airbox and MAF out (Don't lose the rubber feet from the airbox x2).

***** This saves you having to remove the engine plastic cover - if you want to remove the cover that will give you access to the throttle connection and you can remove that first and pull all the air tubing out. The above is just a shortcut******

Remove the aux fan - Remove the two plastic cross clips off the top, remove the top plastic box (that has wires coming out of it - it slides one way to release one end then the other), Unplug the fan plug just near the power steering container. Now the fan just pulls straight up and out (careful as there are two water pipes clipped into it - a total of 3 clips - make sure you don't bugger the pipes as you're pulling it out - the bottom clip will catch on the top pipe halfway out.

Now you have access to the thermostat bolted right on to the water pump from the left, remove the pipe from it first as its a bit of wriggle (you can either drain the system first or just let it piss out once you get the pipe off), once the pipe is off 3 bolts will remove the thermostat.

While you're there loosen the tensioner wheels for the aux belts, once they're loose remove the belts and replace them.

Then it all goes back on in reverse order - when putting the fan back in make sure that you get it in place, lift it an inch push the top and bottom hard towards the radiator and then let it drop into place.


When you're removing the valve covers (big job) don't slide the covers forward initially. You need to lift them straight up and get a small torx bit in from the back to the eccentric shaft sensors (pic below), you'll recognise them by their plug fitting and there are 3 bolts on each - you will snap these sensors off if you jiggle the valve cover too much before removing them and at $315 each not really a good idea

http://c1552172.r72.cf0.rackcdn.com/203713_x600.jpg

Can't help you with the burnt out cluster and the sunroof seal seems pretty straight forward.

Main thing with the cam covers is take your time - there are a lot of bolts and a lot of things to remove - it's not hard it's just time consuming and you can break things (which I did the first time) by trying to rush it.

Don't forget to plug the MAF back in, I always forget for some reason - maybe because the thing looks complete with the airbox back in and so my brain is halfway to the beer fridge

Got the whole list done. Started up first time fine while we topped off the trans fluid, but now it won't start. Running out to get a code scanner....

Hey guys - I could use some advise on this one. After we got everything back together the car fired up and ran fine so we shut the engine off. The next time that we went to go start the car it was a non start situation. We have power to cabin, the headlights, radio, all accessories, etc, but when you turn the key it won't crank, click or do anything. The computer is not giving off any codes. I've checked both fuse panels (front and rear) and all the fuses are good. I thought that I maybe tripped the BST cable on the battery, but I am getting power (12.5volts) to the positive terminal in the engine bay so I do not think that is the case (right?).

What should I be looking for? Any help would be greatly appreciated!

The car is up on jack stands ~ Is there any reason it would start because of that? I know its a long shot, but I thought i'd ask....

Thanks,

Andy