Mechanic noticed that the issue was between fuel line and fuel filter (as I had already noted myself beforehand) He therefore traced the line up and found the problem.

I am currently waiting for the part which could take forever (Why don't they have a simple fuel line in stock somewhere in the US?)

As of now, that concludes this thread.

Sweet! Looks like I was very close. With that said what was the better method? DIY and buying parts or taking it to a mechanic for them to diagnose the problem?

It is hard to say. Both had its qualities. I got troubleshooting experience by the DIY route, but I still missed steps to find the problem because I didn't think to review the hose at the location of the kink. Seeing as how it took 500 miles to cause an issue, it seemed improbable to have a hose be the issue. But getting a quick diagnosis helped in finding the issue once and for all, and once the fuel line arrives, I will probably have the mechanic replace it because it looks looks a bitch to access and replace, and the mechanic is only charging 1.5 hours labor.


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I think you did fine DIY. Your are very capable and proficient at wrenching.

My personal experience is that there have been several times I concluded logical shade tree troubleshooting was too involved or diagnostics coupled with a BMW Tech experience would save lots of time and money getting to the root cause. Sometimes I have gone to the dealer and sometimes a good indy shop. One good thing about the dealer is they look the entire vehicle over and may catch things I have not noticed I still do the work myself. I don't think there were more than 4-5 times I have felt I needed outside help. Two of those times when I did shade tree troubleshooting to verify their findings they were wrong. In all cases they wanted to replace many $$$$ more in parts.

I now have the needed electronic diagnostics but have quickly found that for me there will be a considerable learning curve. And, so far, I have found the error codes can be misleading as some root causes don't always throw errors so the errors that are there are symptoms rather the actual cause. My conclusion is I need to be able to utilize both methods. I am entirely against throwing new parts at a problem hoping they are a fix. I think if I combine shade tree and electronic troubleshooting and digest forum input, I will minimize trying to justify I have spent $$$ needlessly. In the majority of cases I will start with shade tree troubleshooting. If I am not sure of what is wrong I will search the internet and the forum. Only if it is clear electronic diagnostics or a new thread will save time or be more efficient will I go that route.

Obviously, hindsight being 20/20, I think the shortcoming of this effort was there was not enough troublehooting and what was done jumped around instead of going a logical methodical approach and was broken up by emphatic forum input of what was certainly wrong. That said, we don't know if your problem was just one problem or several contributing problems.

One suggestion would be to do an autopsy on your thread. Draw your own conclusions when and how the problem solving progressed and if/when it got off course why did that happen. Also look for troubleshooting suggestions that you may have missed that would have found the root cause or clearly suggested troubleshooting that would have identified the fuel line issue that weren't addressed.

I don't want to sound snarky but back at the beginning of the month I did suggest this as being a potential issue:

"Is there anything between the fuel filter and fuel rail which may be restricting flow? Perhaps debris of some sort?"

I'm glad you were able to resolve the issue. Often times we see people with problems which are not properly diagnosed, they spend a lot of money on the wrong thing, and then get frustrated and give up on BMWs.

hindsight is always 20/20... and debris was suggested earlier (http://www.xoutpost.com/950307-post53.html), but a kink is not exactly a debris... wonder, how a kink was introduced there in the first place - could this be repeated due to some missing shield? or routing of the line?

I don't think anyone should be claiming victory regarding this thread. It was a disaster and we put Adrian through hell. I don't see where any of us did a good job and I, for my part, apologize.

I don't see it as hindsight. It was suggested, apparently a couple of times, there may be a restriction between the fuel filter and the fuel rail. Given the fuel pressure readings this appears to have been a very likely cause of his problem which was never investigated.

As for a kink not being debris well a kink is:

"Is there anything between the fuel filter and fuel rail which may be restricting flow"

I disagree. Through the results of the troubleshooting steps, specifically the fuel pressure readings when I made my suggestion, the cause of the problem was suggested by at least two people but never investigated.

For some reason Adrian decided not to pursue investigating the suggested cause of the problem. I believe this is why upallnight decided to bow out as he appears to have been frustrated with offering suggestions for which Adrian was unwilling to check.

I pulled a Shark Tank by saying I'm out when I was no longer able to help Adrian, not because I was frustrated.

Would be interesting if Adrian could post a picture of the kink in the line. Perhaps we can speculate as to how the line got kinked.