Engine crapped out today.
 

Have a 4.8i. I was going full throttle on a steep uphill and I suddenly hear/feel this crackling and crunching sound from the engine bay. Then it begins to smoke and I hear fluid rushing out. Luckily, there were no cars behind me when I pulled to the side of the road. We all got out of the car and the engine oil was just streaming out until nothing was left. The dealership wasn't open so I'll have to wait till Monday to hear the official diagnosis. Any ideas what might've happened?

on an e70? man i am speechless.

Yes, E70, delivered 1-24-2008 :(

Wow I hope everything turn out OK...

If they have done any recent work on the car...you never know...I've had plenty of bad luck with a dealer... and if the car gave no warning ... Could be numerous things.

Keep us updated and Good luck with your situation

We topped off the engine oil about a month ago at the dealership but that's about it. I'll keep you guys posted.

Check the oil lines and oil filter canister. Also check the pan at the bottom of the engine. Sounds like too much oil blew a line out. Sadly, if you topped off the engine as indicated, the warranty isn't going to cover a possible messed up engine.

Even if it was the dealer that screwed up and added too much oil? (assuming that is the problem)

Do you guys out there have a routine you do for your oil top ups?

I have 12,000KM and apart from the oil change I did at break-in @ 3-4k I have not done any kind of check to the oil (Since a 3.0 does not have a dip)...

Do I rely soley on what i-drive tells me from the e-dip-stick?

He never said the dealer filled it up, he said "we topped it off at the dealership" not "the dealer topped it off" those are two entirely different scenarios. If the dealer did it, then yes the dealer would be responsible.

As for the "e dip stick", yeah..you would most likely have to rely on it. I'm not sure of another way you could measure the oil.

Yep, you are correct..I did not read it that way...

I read this thread http://www.xoutpost.com/x5-e70-forum/...l-warning.html only assosciated with the 4.8... but why would BMW take out the real dip stick in the 3.0, it appears the 4.8 has one? Just one more thing to keep me up at night :-)

Wife took it to the dealership and they topped it off, but there's no written record of it.

Well, topping off could mean different things. If the computer stated that it needed more oil (I guess it says +1 litre?), then filling it back up to the "OK" point is fine. I doubt anyone would overfill the oil on purpose. It definitely sounds fishy.

You can't blow oil lines from adding too much oil. Oil pumps have pressure relief/regulatory valves. The worst that can happen is the oil gets a little frothy in the pan, but that's not going to cause the kind of failure he described.

Should be interesting to hear the cause of failure on this one. I'd guess that maybe the oil cooler/line leaked (in a large way lol).

In line with that...

wow I can't wait till the verdict on this one. Keep us posted please!

I completely agree with that. However, an oil line blowing as you described can't happen with low oil pressure.

Moreover, why I said that what he's describing isn't in line with low oil pressure is that if there's a low oil pressure condition, he isn't going suddenly start leaking oil; in fact, an oil leak won't result as an effect of that. The bearings would start to spin, and eventually the rotating assembly would sieze or the crank would crack in the most extreme condition.

The first thing to happen with oil pressure low enough to cause damage is spun bearings. If bearings are starting to spin, he'd hear knocking. However..if the oil was topped off too high, it wouldn't cause an acute loss of pressure. The knocking would've progressively gotten worse. What he described was that things went south extremely rapidly. Which means oil pressure became critically low very rapidly. -> Oil left the engine rapidly.

wow I feel for you man,I have a 4.8i too, I full throttle it a lot of times, this is worrying, keep us posted!

:confused: I had just agreed with you being right :)

crap :)

:bustingup

Contacted the dealership today and the service rep said a connecting rod punctured the engine, so the engine will be replaced. I didn't ask him what might've caused that to happen, but this definitely smells of bearing failure. However, I had never heard any knocking from the engine except right before the failure happened and the car only has 6200 miles on it. Hopefully this was an isolated incident.

Bearing failure was not the root cause. If the bearing indeed failed, it would've been due to sudden lack of oil pressure. If the bearing was the root cause, you would've heard knocking (and definitely would've noticed it) well before this happend. They simply don't fail that quickly (ie. without any prior warning) on their own. Did the oil pressure warning light turn on before all this happend?

If the secondary cause was bearing failure (as a result of no oil pressure), the rod would've siezed and then broken before leaving the engine. Any chance any (or all) of the rod is still there?

If there was no oil pressure problem, there are only two things that could've happend. 1. Rod bolt wasn't tightened properly and/or failed. 2. The rod failed.

If the rod is still in one piece, it's def a rod bolt failure. If not, it's one of the other two.

No, the oil pressure warning light came on right after this happened, never before. The service rep says he'll give me more details tomorrow, so I'll ask him what happened to the connecting rod.

My sympathies SpeedTriple,

No one wants this to happen to a new car - but obviously it does. I was concerned when I first read your post, because there is only one way an engine can leak oil when it is not running, and that is having a hole in it!

I have had similar experiences with two leading brands of machinery, one dropped two valves and the other seized the transmission. All fixed now, but still leaves a nasty taste in your mouth.

Make sure they fix it right and start your warranty again.

That give one pause to think about BMW.

I haven't heard of a new engine throwing a rod in a normal street car for years... that sort of failure just doesn't happen to engines any more with modern manufacturing techniques and QA.

Thanks for the tip on restarting the warranty. This problem hasn't affected me as much because my wife drives the X5, but it has made her more nervous (it doesn't help that she's pregnant too). I tried to get the service rep to tell me the exact cause of the problem, but he wasn't very forthcoming. He would only verify that they've sent pictures back to engineering and have started the engine replacement process. I guess he doesn't want to say anything that could later by false.

Any car can have a defect and even though I'm an Audi diehard, I still believe in BMW. So Penguin, until we hear more of these cases, I wouldn't sweat it.

anybody who knows anything about operations management knows that in the extreme case (japanese manuf) in regards to defects they use the 6 sigma approach which means, they will have 3.4 defects in every million products.

In US/Europe manufacturing defects are a little more dont remember the exact figure but things like these are statically bound to happen.

We won't ever know what happened to that motor, but it doesn't cause me any more pause than any other defect. Sh*t happens as they say. How many motors did Porsche replace because of block problems with the 986/996 variants...tons.

Trust me, no manfacturer wants this to happen...they're out big bux.

The e46 M had a bearing recall. I believe it covered 02-certain dates of 03. It does happen.

But it could just be a freak thing. One little shard of metal from the machining finds its way into the rod journal's bearing lube hole, clogs it up, then spins the bearing on a high rev uphill climb. Sounds reasonable to me. Sucks...but reasonable...

> they use the 6 sigma approach which means, they will have 3.4 defects in every million products.


Six Sigma sound quite impressive. But one can do better. Did you realize that if the aircraft industry settled for six sigma there would be one plane crash every 3.4 days in the United States?

Seriously, when is the last time you heard of an engine throwing a rod under warranty for any manufacturer?

E46 M3 :dunno:
All first of the run engines go through their shakedowns. Granted, throwing rods through the block is a nasty slap in the nuts. But is also why alot the consumers aids whatchmacallits, recommend not buying the first year of productions.

This is the first one that I've read about. It does happen. I know there is no way that there are more airliners being punched out of the production line, than e70 X5's. :cool:

I believe you cannot have any better than six sigma (If I am not mistaken) The japs follow it religiously and they have their ways of implementing quality control since they use a PULL (Just in time) system. Way better than the US/European mostly operating PUSH (MRP). And it is in regards of every product they make, they have their ways of knowing how to catch a defect too so I think the 3.4 day theory is far fetched.

It is not just about the six sigma approach. It is the whole manuf. system. There was this incident with Boeing where in a production batch of 3 airplanes they had overworked their workers in over time as to meet their deadline. And what do you know, one of the planes crashed (the other crashed too but it was ruled out pilot suicide, the third was grounded until they fixed the defect.

So who knows, the worker on his x5 might of messed something up because of a simple reason like that.

I like European cars the most, I just hope one day they will learn something from the jap. manf system as a whole.

BMW would have to be using a justintime system. They couldn't produce the custom orders if they didn't.