Catch Can 2007 Z4 N52 3.0si worth the effort

[cbpip]

Curious if it's possible and worth the effort to install a Catch Can in an 07 Z4 w/N52. Sounds like a positive out come to reduce blow by reintroduced back into intake. Have found only a few posts on the subject. Looking for help from those who may have installed one. Pictures, location and units used are helpful. Found a Mishimoto unit for an N55 out there but a bit pricey. Also found cheap units on Amazon.
TIA

[GuidoK]

You don't reduce blow by back into the intake unless you plan to vent into the air.
At most you catch some oil in the blow by that passed the oil separator.
But as long as your oil consumption isn't high there is no need to (and if it is, check your ccv system).
The n52 is not direct injected, so there is no real intake port contermination to speak of (the intake valves are constantly sprayed with gasoline), and it's not an FI engine.

So unless you have mounted a supercharger kit, I don't see the point (and even then it's a matter of how and why).
BMW I6 engines have pretty limited crank case pressure anyway.

I use a $15 chinese clone of the n55 burger motorsports catch can that I slightly adapted for mounting. But I have a supercharger install (m54 engine though) where the complete oil separator system is deleted.

[grannyknot]

I put a catch can on the back of my S54 and after a full season of driving there was only about a 1/4" of muck at the bottom of the can, not even enough to reach the bottom of the dipstick.
In my case it just kept the intake box and velocity stacks clean, hardly worth the effort.

[Efthreeoh]

Here's my thoughts. So just to qualify, I have two N52 engines, one in my '06 E90 325i single-stage intake, and the Z4 3.0si with the 3-stage intake. The E90 has 416,000 miles on the engine and uses about 1 liter every 2,500 - 2,800 miles. The '08 Z4 has 115,000 miles and doesn't yet burn a liter in 10,000 miles. The E90 saw 9 years of 35,000 per year under a 175-mile round trip commute. The Z4 picked up some of that commute, usually 2 days a week for about 5 years. The E90 when new never used oil, even over the BMW CBS OCI, which averaged about 16,000 miles for the first 15 oil changes.

Late in the 220,000's the engine started consuming some oil. So around 380,000 miles I decided to see if replacing the CCV system would help reduce oil consumption. At that time I also looked into installing a catch can instead. I replaced the CCV and did not install a catch can. When I pulled the intake manifold I found it really wasn't much contaminated with oil. The valves were dry and brown. The oil consumption never improved, and virtually stayed the same.

Of course, the plastic-head N52 in the 3.0si uses a slightly different CCV system than the metal-head N52 of the '06 325i, so a catch can could collect some residual oil in the intake stream, but as someone said, the engine is not direct injected, so the valves stay clean, as evidenced by what I found after 380,000 miles of running top-tier gasoline with zero additive.

The N52 is a hell of an engine. I have a lot of experience with it. My opinion is just leave it be.

[cbpip]

Thanks for the input everyone. Looks like it is best left as is.