By the looks of the amount of vanos sprockets available that must be a common problem as well because I'm guessing the vanos seals are not serviceable! sheez! Plus I'm not even considering everything on the intake side! ;) After so many years of trying to find another E53 I finally gave up and bought the E70 but I think it was maybe a step backwards!

Haha, was just browsing parts on getbmwparts and looks like one of the vanos sprockets is on a "safety recall"

I've rebuilt the vanos on m62 but i don't think it's possible on the newer style. You can get knock off vanos for stupid cheap but "yikes"?

So I got an reduced priced offer on a used exhaust cam and ledge on E-Bay. Looking at the pics I would say that there is corrosion happening between the OE metal ring and the cam ledge surface which probably in itself is not the problem but creates the wear when there is any movement between the surfaces. Since the car is about 15 years old this must be all known by some people already but there doesn't seem to be a lot of info on the interweb.

Still just thinking ahead on this. Looks like lots of used timing kits for sale and the new ones are pretty cheap too so that's good :) BUT looks like there are no dowel pins in the cam ledges and the bores are aligned with a milled surface on the outside so an alignment tool is needed which is very pricey and haven't seen a used one ;( Anyone have one of those for sale ?? I guess when you think about it, aligning from a milled surface is the smart thing to do so that a cam ledge can be replaced and not need to be a matched set.

The tiniest bit of corrosion or dirt added to that little gap in the rectangring is a recipe for disaster.

I think the design intends for some weep under the rings to lubricate like it's a journal bearing but anything that slows that oil weep or any dirt gets under that ring and it's over.

Too bad it's so far inside no real way to check. Somebody could make a tool out of an old vanos solenoid that you'd pump oil though the advance/retard channels and learn how much back pressure is normal. Hmm that would not be that hard to do.

I've got a couple N55 and a spare vanos solenoid i wonder if anybody ever made such a thing.


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Part two: any chance an auto parts store has timing tool to rent?

I used to have a hydraulic flow tester which would have worked, I guess it wouldn't be that hard to build something but I think the fact that the lifters are having problems (at least one or two will pump down with the engine idling hot) and with all the info on the interweb about the problems AND the amount of replacement parts (including vanos gears) available I don't think I'm going to spend the time to try to build a flow tester.


Not a chance to rent around here anyway. The timing tools are cheap to buy so that's not a problem, it's the ledge bore alignment jigs that are the problem. I think most don't worry about the alignment or rig some kind of c-clamp and "think" they get away with it.

Right i forgot about that tool. Holds a couple of the valve springs so it doesn't push up on the part, correct?

Yep, that's part of it.

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/202...5801411fab.jpg
I was looking for the "special part" number to see if could find on eBay etc and bumped into this tidbit:

Answering the question of what holds the cam fore/aft.