I am aware or bmwoems track records. I have not looked at what the repair procedure is, but certainly, there seems to be a 16+ hr difference between 2 Indys who have quoted around 4K and up....

in speaking to my local guy, it became immediately clear that there are those who do this job with some regularity, and those who are just familiar that is needs to be done. I trust my local a lot, but wouldnt for this job. He didnt even have any idea what it would cost. When asked about it, he went on about needing a special tool from Germany. He ALSO mentioned that he has seen the job need to be repeated within 18-20k miles...

in other words, find someone who has done a bunch of them.

my opinion only of course

The gent in LI is a dealer tech so I'm sure he's got a couple of shortcuts. My indy is a BMW OEM Master Tech ....and does a couple of engine rebuilds almost every month. There must be a parts difference as I certainly still don't see a 15hr difference....Not trashing the guy. Just was seeing if someone had the quick answer on the routes taken on the N62 - whether there is 1 route that has like at least 8+ hrs less on labor

I've got 111k on mine and no signs of smoking at all! I've owned the car since May 2011 and then it had 73k miles on it.




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From my understanding, most of his customers drop off their vehicles Friday night and he begins working on it that night and finishes Sunday mid afternoon. With me, I dropped off New Year's Day morning and it was ready Saturday late afternoon.

I do not profess to know all the ins and outs of this procedure but I believe BMW instructs the dealers to remove the heads for the valve stem seal job. I guess that's what add a ton of hours to the job. I believe the LI kid does the "All German Auto" route with their tool which you can see on their website. That saves a ton of hours to the job.

thats what I was getting at. Using the AGA tool cuts loads of time off the process. If the shop is not familiar, well, $$$

At around 98k miles heavy smoking & 1qt oil/250 miles. Valve stem seals & new seals and gaskets all around fixed it, but I did the repair.

The normal rate for this job when I was searching is around $2000 - $3000 range. That seems to be the norm for doing it with the AGA Tool. Anything higher than that they are probably removing the heads which is more time intensive.

Its not a massively hard job to do but can be a bit intimidating so you just got to jump right into it! Ask questions this forum has a lot of people who has done it and is more than happy to help! I did! Its more of a tedious job than anything really!

My valve stem seal service is scheduled for next week through a local indy shop. In talking to a couple of shops, I found some pretty big differences in pricing.

The shop I chose is owned by the former service department manager at a local BMW dealership. They use the AGA tool and charge $2500 for the service (shop rate is $105/hr). They're going to have my X for a week because they're doing a couple other things and are going to run them through my warranty which will probably require an adjuster to come out and look.

We talked about removing the heads and the owner said that allows for cleaning of some ports and tubes in the head while they're at it. But it's a significantly more expensive service ($5k-6k+ if I remember right).

Another reliable and highly rated (and also a little expensive) indy shop I went to also uses the AGA tool. They said to budget $5000 for the service. They quote the job at 10 hours of labor at a rate of $115/hr and said that while they're in there, they would do all sorts of other things too.

I was going to talk with the local BMW dealership about the service until they told me their shop rate is $190/hr. :wow:

And for what it's worth, my X5 started smoking around 75k miles...after the 1st oil change I did. I think the previous owner might have used an additive of some kind. :(