Complete Timing Chain Failure

[ZStig]

so they did give you a loaner. stop whining

[just2talented]

Well with a $65k sports car whose engine basically ate itself I think they should atleaste give me a 328. Which they promised to do for me on the 2nd day considering I'll be without my car for a month.

[SCHMOUPE]

think of all the savings you'll do in the gas department. Not to mention, getting back in the m after a month is just like falling in love all over again. Beater is a beater, 3 series or a civic.

[chickdr]

Originally Posted by just2talented

Well with a $65k sports car whose engine basically ate itself I think they should at least give me a 328. Which they promised to do for me on the 2nd day considering I'll be without my car for a month.

From what I understand the loaners are at the discretion of the dealer. Some don't give loaners at all. Mine always gives me a BMW, but when I had a Boxster, sometimes I got a Cayenne and sometimes I got a Mazda 6(the dealership had almost all makes under their roof so had various loaners). The Audi dealer of the same franchise always gives me an Audi. Just luck of the draw unfortunately for you. At least they gave you a car to drive. Lot easier than bumming rides or walking....

[just2talented]

OK apparently my service advisor is a complete moron and mis informed me of my car. After 5 days of trying to get a straight answer on what cause it it turns out that all that happend was a VANOS failure. No blown engine. DISREGARD THIS ENTIRE THREAD. I spoke to the head tech and he basically said vanos failed which cause the exhaust cam to stop. All i need is new valves on cylinder #4 THATS IT! No idea why my service advisor would start telling me all that nonsense but whatev. Ill have my car back in a few days. BMW Service loaner tomorow!!!

[r4gs]

^great news. can't actually imagine saying a vanos failure is good to hear, but at least there's no timing chain failure. the latter's supposed to be built to last forever!

[Rick Hunter]

I wouldn't hold my breath about the BMW loaner... you should have gotten it days ago.

[nmulax]

Yeah, glad to hear it was not the timing chain, and your car will be back to you soon.

[pokeybritches]

Originally Posted by nmulax

Yeah, glad to hear it was not the timing chain, and your car will be back to you soon.

Me too, especially since I don't want to have to wonder about mine. I'd never heard about one before this, and I'm glad it turned out to be something else.

[O-cha]

Originally Posted by just2talented

OK apparently my service advisor is a complete moron and mis informed me of my car. After 5 days of trying to get a straight answer on what cause it it turns out that all that happend was a VANOS failure. No blown engine. DISREGARD THIS ENTIRE THREAD. I spoke to the head tech and he basically said vanos failed which cause the exhaust cam to stop. All i need is new valves on cylinder #4 THATS IT! No idea why my service advisor would start telling me all that nonsense but whatev. Ill have my car back in a few days. BMW Service loaner tomorow!!!

Unless you're misquoting him then he's equally as retarded. Vanos doesn't fail and cause camshafts to stop, if the solenoids fail they simply don't advance or retard but still spin with the engine.

Either way, "Just" replacing the valves on cylinder 4 is no small job, and there's maybe 1 bmw tech per dealership that would be able to do it right, I await your post about how they can't figure out how to re-time your motor properly after taking the head off. Seriously, they don't know what they are doing.

Also, are they planning on replacing the piston as well? Valves don't just smack pistons and cause no damage, if you were paying it could be your discretion, but the piston should always be replaced in a collision and the dealership should be doing it.

[mhughett]

Originally Posted by O-cha

Unless you're misquoting him then he's equally as retarded. Vanos doesn't fail and cause camshafts to stop, if the solenoids fail they simply don't advance or retard but still spin with the engine.

Either way, "Just" replacing the valves on cylinder 4 is no small job, and there's maybe 1 bmw tech per dealership that would be able to do it right, I await your post about how they can't figure out how to re-time your motor properly after taking the head off. Seriously, they don't know what they are doing.

Also, are they planning on replacing the piston as well? Valves don't just smack pistons and cause no damage, if you were paying it could be your discretion, but the piston should always be replaced in a collision and the dealership should be doing it.

I agree that failure of the Vanos should have nothing to do with a piston hitting a valve. On the other point about the dealer not being able to repair the damage, I too had some concern when I had my cylinder head replaced on the 3.0si since this would require re-timing of the engine, etc. What I was told is that the dealer has to buy certain assembly fixtures (very expensive tools) that take a lot of the guesswork out of this type of work. It turned out to be a non-event for me and hopefully, will be for the OP as well.

[onebluemcm]

Originally Posted by O-cha

Unless you're misquoting him then he's equally as retarded. Vanos doesn't fail and cause camshafts to stop, if the solenoids fail they simply don't advance or retard but still spin with the engine.

Either way, "Just" replacing the valves on cylinder 4 is no small job, and there's maybe 1 bmw tech per dealership that would be able to do it right, I await your post about how they can't figure out how to re-time your motor properly after taking the head off. Seriously, they don't know what they are doing.

Also, are they planning on replacing the piston as well? Valves don't just smack pistons and cause no damage, if you were paying it could be your discretion, but the piston should always be replaced in a collision and the dealership should be doing it.

^ 100% agreed except it might be 1 tech per dealer if your dealership values highly trained techs that is. The points about vanos failure and valve-piston contact are all totally valid and worth you getting a thorough explanation from the dealer on. Just adding another affirmative comment that you seriously need to question the dealership as to what specifically, exactly they are going to do with your motor.

[O-cha]

Originally Posted by mhughett

I agree that failure of the Vanos should have nothing to do with a piston hitting a valve. On the other point about the dealer not being able to repair the damage, I too had some concern when I had my cylinder head replaced on the 3.0si since this would require re-timing of the engine, etc. What I was told is that the dealer has to buy certain assembly fixtures (very expensive tools) that take a lot of the guesswork out of this type of work. It turned out to be a non-event for me and hopefully, will be for the OP as well.

Timing the s54 is much more difficult than any of the other BMW engines.

Also you CANT do it without the tools, it's not like the tools they buy does it for them.



For instance a lot of checks cheat on using the BMW machined locking pin and use substitutes, that means it wont be timed right by a mile. If they rock it backwards, wont be timed right, if they don't properly do the revolutions to provide tension, wont be timed right, if they don't preload the helical gears, will rattle like crazy. If they don't rotate the cam to the stop properly, wont be timed right.

They aren't explicit things, easily missed and the care and detail at the dealerships is piss poor so I guarantee they will go "close enough" close it up and the customer loses. It's happened to 2 people on this board alone, and this board is tiny.

[just2talented]

ocha what do u suggest i tell them? right now they are awaiting parts so no rebuild work has begun yet. if they dont have these tools or a tech that can do what do i do?

[Z4-VILLA]

Get a new motor.....

[O-cha]

Originally Posted by just2talented

ocha what do u suggest i tell them? right now they are awaiting parts so no rebuild work has begun yet. if they dont have these tools or a tech that can do what do i do?

They probably have the tools, it's just weather or not that particular tech has used them properly before. No way to know what to push without knowing what really happened, sounds like you still don't have the correct story. Get what happened to your car in detail, in writing or something. "vanos failure" means nothing. Vanos solenoid failure means it could no longer advance or adjust (but would not cause your problem) vanos gear bolt failure would make more sense, but I would expect more damage.

If a valve got bent by a piston I would not rest until they changed out the piston too, but I wouldn't trust them to change the piston either, so it would be tough to be like here add something else I don't think you're going to do right to the list.

They wont want to chnge the piston though, it's a lot of additional work that doesn't share labor with the valve.

[just2talented]

ok it was the vanos gear bolt. I went there personally and spoke to the head tech who has the car. He explained to me that it was the vanos gear bolt, It broke because the studs that hold that particular piece on snapped due to poor quality metal. and caused the gear to break and the piston to bend the valves. So i then said well what about the piston is that going to be replaced? he said it wasnt damaged. He swore up and down it wasnt damaged. it wasnt such a catastrphic rupture, it happend at very low rpms. The valves did get bent but very slightly. however they are being replaced. These are his words. I explained to them that i dont care how long it takes to rebuild as long as its done right. the tech also told me that becuase it was such a rare failure and BMWNA got involved if any car was going to be fixed properly it was going to be mine. i said ok thats fine but i promise you if this motor isnt timed right or if its not correct in any way I will be back every single day until it is fixed. And if that dosent work i will have to get my lawyer involved. He was also saying that bmw has something called PUMA where they send all the data of the problem straight to BMW germany and NA? i dunno maybe OCHA can spread some light on that. The tech was pretty sincere hes promising perfection and he knows how upset i was so hopefully i get it back and its fine. I was able to take some limited pictures of the motor being worked on. Theyve already rebuilt most of it by the time i got there. From the looks of it they seem very professional however maybe a more trained eye (OCHA) might see something else. btw the last photo is the service loaner they gave me. Somebody smashed the window on it tonite in brooklyn. FML

[O-cha]

Professionals don't use your radiator cowl as their work bench in my opinion. Once of those tools is begging to fall off and scratch your bumper, or just the cowl itself, but I am going to talk crap about a dealer tech almost no matter what they do. But it's just something that is a poor habit and should not be done.

I do it on my own car but not customers cars.

Additionally, this is an 8k rpm engine with HUGE piston speeds (as in it needs to be balanced properly, not that it hit at high speeds), weather it not it was "damaged" it was struck by a valve, the integrity of it is something to question.

BMW might not warrant the replacement, but he should at least try.



I don't even want to know what he's needing those needle nose pliers for...

[inTgr8r]

just2talented - I hope you got this resolved to your satisfaction?
Any updates?

Also, what is the production date of your car?

[just2talented]

Originally Posted by inTgr8r

just2talented - I hope you got this resolved to your satisfaction?
Any updates?

Also, what is the production date of your car?

well they had the car just short of a month. The day i went to go pick it up it had a scratched rear driver side wheel and the front bumper was scractched in a few different places. Im assuming one of the idiot techs dropped a tool just like ocha said they would. I bitched and complained and they finnally agreed to repair it. It came out to my satisfaction. When i picked up the car nobody told me anything other than all new valves were installed along with new piston rings and some other installs. Forgive me i dont have the invoice with me. They swear up and down the pistons werent damaged. Yea right. So when the work was done i took the car. i couldnt stand having it at the idiotic service center (BMW BAYSIDE SERVICE IN GREAT NECK AVOID LIKE THE PLAGUE). So ive been driving the car for about a week and a half now and today was the first time i drove during the daytime (i work nights). I had been noticing a strange smell as ive been driving it. didnt think anything of it just new parts breaking in. Since there was still light out today when i parked the car i had noticed a big oil stain in my driveway. Hadent noticed all week because i drive the car at night. I flipped. Its been leaking oil this entire time ive had it back now. So after that i ran inside to check my garage where the car is normally stored when im not driving it. Oil everywhere. A call to my service center(not bayside) ensued and shortly after that the car was towed to Habberstad BMW of Bayshore. Great place if your in the tristate area to have your bmw serviced. And the absolute icing on the cake after all this, as the tow truck guy is pulling my car on the flatbed, he didnt put any scotch blocks down and scrapped the whole bottom of the freshly painted bumper, danm near tore the thing right off the car. I made a claim with bmw roadside and corporate but well see what happends. Prod date i believe is 12-30-06. im not 100% on that

[james33]

What a nightmare! Please keep us posted on what they did to screw it up again. Totally sucks.............

[krnnerdboy]

holy crap...sorry you're dealing w/ all this. For the rest of us s54 owners are there any counter measures?