Death by Rod Bearings (again)

[Xavier7]

Another one bites the dust. Sorry for your troubles.

Are you sure you're not over-reving or something. Grenading 2 engines seems unusual.

[SenorFunkyPants]

I guess this is why its worth paying a little more to get a car from a main authorised BMW dealer and get a proper BMW warranty.

[ellekz]

Originally Posted by Xavier7

Are you sure you're not over-reving or something.

I'm always very cautious about RPMs etc. when the engine is still cold. I always make sure only the best liquids and oils are used and that the oil level etc. is correct. Every car I've owned I treated it like my baby and have never ever experienced any issues related to user error, let alone two blown engines in one vehicle.
Even when the engine is all warmed up, I very rarely go over 5-6k RPM. And when I did, I damn well made sure everything is at optimum operating temperature and well lubed. Half the cars on tourist days at the NOS are E92 M3s, all being constantly beat between 5000 and 8400rpm all day long.
To me it just seems higly unlikely a non-high-milage and well maintained engine is just gonna blow out of nowhere.

Also, if you're living in Germany and drive a somewhat decent car, it's very possible you'll be driving at full speed for several hours on the Autobahn, i.e. high RPMs for a very long time. You usually only slow down every once in a while for some turtles in the left lane, but as soon as they're out of the way, you go WOT again.

[ellekz]

Originally Posted by SenorFunkyPants

I guess this is why its worth paying a little more to get a car from a main authorised BMW dealer and get a proper BMW warranty.

Yeah, this was also my plan back then. Unfortunately almost all M3s are in the south and I live all the way up north in Berlin. The selection of M3s in Germany is relatively limited. After about a month of searching, I only had three cars on my list. Two were directly from BMW, they were both in the south and both of these cars had no pictures online (even after calling them for several weeks, they couldn't be bothered to upload some pictures). The third one was this car, which had not only the benefit of being very close to me but also had most of the options I was interested in. But since it wasn't an official BMW dealer, I bought an extended warranty.

[aussiem3]

Sorry to hear about another mishap.

Talking about comfort rpm zones in the V8, the temperature in Perth, Western Australia hit 38 Celsius and I thought to go for a long drive - over 120 km non-stop. I redlined the car most of the time and maintained a speed limit of 110 km/h. The engine was purring and it was a sheer pleasure driving this car. The oil temp at times maxed at 102 Celsius ... I could confirm it because my performance steering wheel was showing it.

[aus]

Sorry OP.

And many still feel there's nothin inherently wrong with the motor. :/
.

[BMRLVR]

Originally Posted by aus

Sorry OP.

And many still feel there's nothin inherently wrong with the motor. :/
.

"No doubt! We've heard it all now from all of the naysayers."

"High RPM's are at fault."

"Low octane gas from the US causes all the issues due to detonation."

"Improper break-in."

"Colder climates cause the issues since all the wear occurs at start-up."

"The S65 was meant to be track driven and higher oil temperatures prevent bearing wear."

"All of the S65 failures are occurring in the US."

"BMW knows how to set clearances and pick oil viscosity in their engines better than some independent engine builder"

"The S65 was designed for TWS 10W60"

I could go on and on.....

Listen guys, I too didn't believe that the S65 had a rod bearing issue until the oil and side clearances issues were brought to light on this website by Regular Guy and then confirmed by many of us in the engine building world. It is plain and simple and right in front of us all, the numbers don't lie. The S65 (and S85) has oil and side clearanced set to tight on the rods end of story!

[///M Power-Belgium]

Originally Posted by s85e90

The pic of the motor and slight oil leak is normal

Sorry man but I've never heard of a normal oil leak .

[///M Power-Belgium]

Originally Posted by skru_fase

Brutal, and as others have said, I would definitely push for a new engine replacement.

Even a S65 built end of 2013 with only 6-7K on it with bearing failure and warranty covered will not have a new engine replacement .
The new engine is actualy a rebuilt BMW S65 from a previous bearing failure .
Sad to see how OP is F@cked up...not once but twice by a mistake of BMW !
Worldwide this happend several times that S65 had 2 x bearing failure in the same car .
A better name for our S65 would be..."The lottery" !
Hope that you guys can count on here because OP is having hopefully "Lottery nr: 3" !
Who's next....maybe I'm next... or you ? Who knows ?
Still love my car...no doubt ! But it's the last BMW !
Saw and know to mutch of this 5H1T !
Damn I feel realy sorry for OP . (Imagine his situation ) !

[4corners]

"Engine of the Year!" How about, engine FOR a year!

[Petros]

Originally Posted by SenorFunkyPants

I guess this is why its worth paying a little more to get a car from a main authorised BMW dealer and get a proper BMW warranty.

Doesnt matter. New or old. Certified or not. The design of the car is crap. Just the usual unreliable german crap. OP should cut his losses and get a real performance car like a corvette or gtr. Cars that dont blow their engines up anytime you push the start button.

[Petros]

Originally Posted by 4corners

"Engine of the Year!" How about, engine FOR a year!

Goes to show you that all those awards dont mean a damn thing.

[SenorFunkyPants]

Just to recap:
This car was originally a "total loss" USA vehicle sold with unknown mileage as salvage and exported to the Netherlands and then to Germany.
The engine failed in the car after the OP had owned it for 2 hours...this engine was replaced with another of unknown provenance and without certified mileage - most likely from another wrecked car.
These may not be the most reliable cars in the world but the lesson is, buy from a main BMW dealer, get a BMW warranty and if the engine lets go BMW will put in a new/remanufactured one and if that one lets go they will put in yet another one - on their dime.

[Helmsman]

Tend to agree. Yes the design have clearly issues, need much more maintenance and care than specified and yet some blows.
However OPs first car history including "the Camp" in Holland in my eyes could have ruined any car. God knows how that engine have been treated.

Still, obviously nothing that OP can be blaimed for. The dealer is a thief and one can only hope he gets what he deserve, as well as the OP which is complete financial recovery. He will still have spent a lot of time and suffer from the bloody frustration and stress a thing like this cause.

Wish you all luck in beating this down OP.

Cheers

[SenorFunkyPants]

Definitely....I do feel for the OP having been through a similar nightmare with a Porsche 911 and that was from a main Porsche dealer! I had to get the importer involved in the end and the dealer eventually bought the car back.
The used car market is a bit seedy...but at least with a main dealer you have some leverage through the importer.

[///M Power-Belgium]

Originally Posted by 4corners

"Engine of the Year!" How about, engine FOR a year!

Not even for a year...
OP had blown engine at 29/8/2014 .
And now the second blown engine .
So it's more how about... "Engine for 4 months" !?!?

[ellekz]

Originally Posted by SenorFunkyPants

Just to recap:
This car was originally a "total loss" USA vehicle sold with unknown mileage as salvage and exported to the Netherlands and then to Germany.
The engine failed in the car after the OP had owned it for 2 hours...this engine was replaced with another of unknown provenance and without certified mileage - most likely from another wrecked car.
These may not be the most reliable cars in the world but the lesson is, buy from a main BMW dealer, get a BMW warranty and if the engine lets go BMW will put in a new/remanufactured one and if that one lets go they will put in yet another one - on their dime.

True on all accounts. But I wanna add that the car has been to three shops since then and all three mechanics there correctly guessed the mileage of the car after looking at everything from below. I didn't even know it was such an exact science, lol. So the milage on the car was more than likely real.
Two other people test drove my car (one mechanic from a ///M sports team garage and a petrolhead who owns an E92 M3 himself and does touring races with an E36 M3) and both said the car drives totally fine and both could definitely see some parts were replaced but all in all nothing that looked even close to a previous total loss vehicle.
It's actually a real mindf*ck for me - by definition a total loss is a car that's not worth repairing because costs would exceed the price of a new vehicle, unless it's a really shady repair job. But since it doesn't seem to be shady work (all parts are OEM), it must've been either a very good repair job (but why would the car be declared a total loss then?) or it wasn't really that damaged (again, why declare it a total loss then?).
Of course none of that has anything to do with the then state of the engine, it could've been badly maintained or whatever. But when I bought the car, I had no suspicion whatsoever about the car.

I feel very thankful for all your wishes for the best. I gotta admit though, having gone through all of that before, it's not really bothering me as much as the first time, at least not yet. On Friday I was just like "oh, of course this happens" as if I subconsciously already expected something to happen. I guess after the first time you kinda get desensitized about a blown S65 and your state of mind is no longer a slightly fearful "hopefully that'll never happen to my car!"

[Rupes]

Originally Posted by SenorFunkyPants

Just to recap:
This car was originally a "total loss" USA vehicle sold with unknown mileage as salvage and exported to the Netherlands and then to Germany.
The engine failed in the car after the OP had owned it for 2 hours...this engine was replaced with another of unknown provenance and without certified mileage - most likely from another wrecked car.
These may not be the most reliable cars in the world but the lesson is, buy from a main BMW dealer, get a BMW warranty and if the engine lets go BMW will put in a new/remanufactured one and if that one lets go they will put in yet another one - on their dime.

It seems like people on here were operating under the assumption that the OP's engines blew shortly after driving a brand new car off the lot. Thats obviously not the case. It then sounded like a brand new second engine failed, but that doesn't seem to be the case either. So in reality, a totaled US car blew an engine, and the replacement engine, pulled from god knows what car, also failed. That changes the tone a bit, doesn't it?

It doesn't change the fact that bearings are clearly the weak part of this motor, but a little perspective does help. Moral of the story - don't buy a totaled car and then replace the bad engine with another used engine with an unknown history.

Best of luck OP, sounds like you're taking this in stride!

[///M Power-Belgium]

Originally Posted by Rupes

It seems like people on here were operating under the assumption that the OP's engines blew shortly after driving a brand new car off the lot. Thats obviously not the case. It then sounded like a brand new second engine failed, but that doesn't seem to be the case either. So in reality, a totaled US car blew an engine, and the replacement engine, pulled from god knows what car, also failed. That changes the tone a bit, doesn't it?

It doesn't change the fact that bearings are clearly the weak part of this motor, but a little perspective does help. Moral of the story - don't buy a totaled car and then replace the bad engine with another used engine with an unknown history.

Best of luck OP, sounds like you're taking this in stride!

OP didn't knew he was buying a totaled car,that's why he took a lawyer !

[8600RPM]

I put nearly 100 k miles on my new e92 m3 and almost constantly redlined the engine, tracked and beat snot out of it. To add I had it tuned from day 1 with 8600 rpm redline which I hot all the time. Warmed it up, oil changed at 5k. Never a single issue.

I don't believe in this as more than a relatively rare problem when engine is cared for. I'm onto f80 where a couple bad cylinder heads already reported!! Lol do now we have that to get everyone worried. I just continue to go beat the snot out of my car and not worry

[vsix]

Originally Posted by ///M Power-Belgium

OP didn't knew he was buying a totaled car,that's why he took a lawyer !

That's not the point!
He wanted to clarify, that this car here is not brand new!
You know since I'm here the more post's I read, it feel's to me people start to freak out because of these mystery ( all at once, almost like timing ) upcoming
engine failure's all caused by the infamous rod bearing's.
I have a very good friend at BMW Service and he told me by all the S65's he had for service NONE of them EVER had these rod bearing caused failure's.
Eventhough OP is in a shitty situation doesn't mean all of you sit on a ticking time bomb!
Treat your car with respect, warm it up and let it even cool down properly and some of you will achieve mileages beyond 200k...and even after such an mileage some of you can freaking supercharge the car and it will also hold another 100k's! Maintain it the way it should be maintained and you for sure will have a bulletproof car with a much more bulletproof engine!

[///M Power-Belgium]

Originally Posted by vsix

That's not the point!
He wanted to clarify, that this car here is not brand new!
You know since I'm here the more post's I read, it feel's to me people start to freak out because of these mystery ( all at once, almost like timing ) upcoming
engine failure's all caused by the infamous rod bearing's.
I have a very good friend at BMW Service and he told me by all the S65's he had for service NONE of them EVER had these rod bearing caused failure's.
Eventhough OP is in a shitty situation doesn't mean all of you sit on a ticking time bomb!
Treat your car with respect, warm it up and let it even cool down properly and some of you will achieve mileages beyond 200k...and even after such an mileage some of you can freaking supercharge the car and it will also hold another 100k's! Maintain it the way it should be maintained and you for sure will have a bulletproof car with a much more bulletproof engine!

Sorry man that's wrong...
I follow OP from last year,and was helping him with the Oem. exhaust mod.
I know...we know his car was not new ,it was actualy Mike (Mike-Benvo BPM/Tuning) he was helping OP in his first thread of 29/8/2014 .=>http://www.m3post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1029385
So Mike got OP's VIN nr and was digging after the car history and saw that the car was registered and totaled in the US .
After the US the car was imported to the Netherlands were the car was repaired and put back together in area with a very bad reputation and I posted a picture of that area ,it's about 30miles from were I live.
After that the car was imported to Germany were OP was buying the car and after only 2 hours the engine was blown ! (he didn't knew the car was totaled)
After the first blown engine he got the info from Mike that the car was totaled in the US.....ect .
After this he got second engine from dealer and after 4 months...second blow engine !
As for the bulletproof ticking time bomb..You realy don't have any idea what's going on my friend , if you only would know about the Worldwide numbers !
At my BMW/Dealer they are saying exactly the same thing => 0 bearing failures . (all are saying this because thinking about value)
But in Germany they know better !
Conclusion....
Bulletproof my a$$ !