Blown motors, Rod Bearing failure S65 Registry.

[///M Power-Belgium]

Originally Posted by Helmsman

Yes please!

Thanks

PM'd Nik .

[SECOND2NONE]

Originally Posted by SenorFunkyPants

The number of engine failures of USA/Canada reported on M3post by the end of August 2014 is 33. That includes any type of failure related to failed rods, main bearings rod bearings etc but excludes supercharged cars. That out of a total of USA/Can production of 30,000 cars.
Of course it seems like there are failures every day with the same core of people commented in every thread and a few posters who go near hysterical every time bearings get mentioned.

Those are the total number of complete failures.. How about the total number of excessive bearing wear to the number of people who replaced them.. Garunteed it will top 75%

Thats like on the e46 counting the number subframes that completly failed when you should be counting the amount of people that had cracks in the subframe

[SenorFunkyPants]

Originally Posted by SECOND2NONE

Those are the total number of complete failures.. How about the total number of excessive bearing wear to the number of people who replaced them.. Garunteed it will top 75%

Its a fair point....I do follow the bearing replacement threads, some are definitely caught just in time while others look fine. There haven't been that many bearing replacements documented (although you would think otherwise as the same photos often show up in 4 or more different threads) but its still a helpful indicator, but then so is the "high mileage 2008" thread showing cars at 160,000 miles.
I don't see the point in getting all wound up about it, its not going to make any difference, BMW aren't going to do a recall and a class action suite is never going to happen.
If a common denominator or combination of factors can be found to explain why the NA market seems to suffer from so many failures while the Northern European market doesn't (they are of a similar size in sales) that might hint at a strategy to fight against the problem.
My own opinion is that failures seem to occur more in warmer climates than cooler ones....which makes using a thinner oil likely to be the wrong thing to do.

[V1.47fan]

Originally Posted by SenorFunkyPants

Can you really be that simple to think that I do?

Over and over you keep downplaying the severity of the rod bearing problems by your typical statements...30,000 cars sold and only 33 cases of engine failures.

Can you really be that simple, some folks replaced their rod bearings, the vast majority of M3 owners dont report their failures here.

This is like a sample polling, if you use this same type of sampling you can reach the conclusion that there's a rod bearing problem, similarly with the N54, that's how people reached a conclusion about carbon build up issues or high rate of HPFP's or evaporators, windshield washer pumps failures on the E90/92.

Engine mounts prematurely failing etc. Not every member reported the problem but by sampling you can easily reach the conclusion there's a problem.

[SenorFunkyPants]

Originally Posted by V1.47fan

Over and over you keep downplaying the severity of the rod bearing problems .

On the contrary I perfectly understand the severity, but I choose not to get all hysterical about it.
Swamp and I both made some effort to try and get an idea from the the sites admin of how many of the over 200,000 m3post members would be E9x M3 owners to give some context to the number of reported failures and this was covered in another thread.
I see that the post I replied to, which stated that cars with failed bearings were being reported to M3post "every single day" has since been deleted making mine look out of context - my mistake for not quoting his post.

[SECOND2NONE]

I do agree.. Their is no need for any informed owners to get hysterical about it.. Alot bmws had a common expensive issue.. However instead of everyone bitching and whining.. We need to get together.. Document all failures and excessive bearing wear. Start reporting to the ntsb. And finally a class action lawsuit. This is the same exact thing that was able to get done on the e46 subframe failures. Bmw had a limited recall period after losing the lawsuit

[Obioban]

Originally Posted by SECOND2NONE

I do agree.. Their is no need for any informed owners to get hysterical about it.. Alot bmws had a common expensive issue.. However instead of everyone bitching and whining.. We need to get together.. Document all failures and excessive bearing wear. Start reporting to the ntsb. And finally a class action lawsuit. This is the same exact thing that was able to get done on the e46 subframe failures. Bmw had a limited recall period after losing the lawsuit

... which was pointless for 99% of people, all they did was "inspect" it, in the typical stealership way.

Real fix for the e46 subframe is to inject it with $150 of BMW structural foam BEFORE you have the issue. Takes all of 30 min to do. You just have to actually do it instead of waiting for (super expensive) failure.

[V1.47fan]

Originally Posted by SenorFunkyPants

On the contrary I perfectly understand the severity, but I choose not to get all hysterical about it.
Swamp and I both made some effort to try and get an idea from the the sites admin of how many of the over 200,000 m3post members would be E9x M3 owners to give some context to the number of reported failures and this was covered in another thread.
I see that the post I replied to, which stated that cars with failed bearings were being reported to M3post "every single day" has since been deleted making mine look out of context - my mistake for not quoting his post.

Of the 200,000 m3post members, the majority don't own an E9X M3 since give or take, 66,000 E9X M3 were produced worlwide. And of the 66,000 M3 owners the vast majority arent M3post members.

[V1.47fan]

Originally Posted by SECOND2NONE

I do agree.. Their is no need for any informed owners to get hysterical about it.. Alot bmws had a common expensive issue.. However instead of everyone bitching and whining.. We need to get together.. Document all failures and excessive bearing wear. Start reporting to the ntsb. And finally a class action lawsuit. This is the same exact thing that was able to get done on the e46 subframe failures. Bmw had a limited recall period after losing the lawsuit

+1

A good example is the icv failures, it has a high failure rate. It'll be silly to say,well, on M3post there are less than 250 reported cases, that's out of 33,000 cars in North America and then reach the conclusion icv failures are extremely rare.

[douglee25]

I think another reason why this issue is so 'glorified' is due to the severity and expense of the issue. We're not talking about a $50 module or some mindless part that people replace and never bring any light to. If the engine blows, we're talking a huge expense to have replaced. Even the 'preventative' measure to drop the pan and replace bearings isn't cheap at $2500. Sure it's 'inexpensive' in the grand scheme of a $75k car, but most people don't just plan on dropping $2500 one month to do something like a rod bearing inspection/replacement.

Doug

[4corners]

Originally Posted by douglee25

I think another reason why this issue is so 'glorified' is due to the severity and expense of the issue. We're not talking about a $50 module or some mindless part that people replace and never bring any light to. If the engine blows, we're talking a huge expense to have replaced. Even the 'preventative' measure to drop the pan and replace bearings isn't cheap at $2500. Sure it's 'inexpensive' in the grand scheme of a $75k car, but most people don't just plan on dropping $2500 one month to do something like a rod bearing inspection/replacement.

Doug

100 cars at $1000 a piece is $100,000.....

If we could line up 50 or 100 cars at a time somewhere and assembly line rod bearing replacement with dissassembly/assembly teams working up and down the line.

Recruit BMW techs, vendors, etc.

BMW can kick in the bearings, bolts, gaskets....ya right.

[douglee25]

Ha!

[aussiem3]

Here in Australia we hardly hear about bearing issues. My car is a September '07 build and delivered in November.

This hysteria is becoming a joke. The model has been superseded and BMW is not going to come to the party except at times with goodwill. Hope and pray that happens.

I think there is a lot more to this bearing issue like I have repeatedly said. One of them I believe is uninformed cold start abuse. Please note the word uninformed. I also believe some have joined this forum after they experienced bearing issues to find out more. Until the bearing issue came to ahead no one seriously took how important it was to keep the rpm down when the engine was cold.

I know an Australian member who abused the hell out when the car was cold, and when pointed out to him, he was surprised, but continued to drive the way he used to. End result... suspected bearing failure. Haven't heard from him since. Just a short case study

It's easy to claim I have religiously adhered to the cold start sequence but I still I ended up with bearing issue. I think that BS. Period.

I am not saying there isn't an issue but there are contributing factors to acerbate the problem.

Every time I drive the car, I drive it hard, but I know from day dot, I have followed the warm up sequence. I also know in the first three years when the car was at the dealership for various services, those idiots never respected others' cars and redlined it when cold. It could have happened to mine too.

If sh$t happens so be it.

[swartzentruber]

Originally Posted by aussiem3

I think there is a lot more to this bearing issue like I have repeatedly said. One of them I believe is uninformed cold start abuse. Please note the word uninformed. I also believe some have joined this forum after they experienced bearing issues to find out more. Until the bearing issue came to ahead no one seriously took how important it was to keep the rpm down when the engine was cold.

I kind of wonder the same thing. When you live in a colder climate, you tend to pay more attention ot the cold start cycle, because there are many months of the year when it's not trivial (i.e. when it's 0 F, I can drive all the way to work without ever getting properly warmed), whereas in warmer climates I would guess there's a tendency to not think about it as much since it's virtually always warm. Certainly not saying everyone is like this, but could be enough to explain what has been observed as a trend for warmer weather cars to have more failures.

[edy_ocdtt]

Hi guys!!

I am from Brazil and i have been thinking about replacing my E34 M5 3.8L for an E92 M3, but after searching the web about common problems with the M3 i´ve found the "s65 bearing problem" threads... well after reading so many threads (i lost the count of how many threads) to the point of Regular_Guy, SenorFunkyPants, kawasaki00 and BMRLVR became familiar nicks, i got to the point to add the amount of replacing the bearings with WPC bearings (also reducing the oil change interval and switch to M1 0W40, having the oil analyzed by Blackstone labs will be kinda difficult since i am in Brazil) and keep this as a maintenance item or machining the crank as a real fix, to the total amount for the new car (it´s a 2007/2008 M3 with 28,000 kms)

This was the only thread saying something about order a batch of custom bearings from Clevite, this would be much cheaper than have the crank machined down to the correct specs. so how is it going? the custom bearing order is going to happen? i am pretty sure i want the M3, even with the know problem and i would be interested in buying this custom bearing set, so add one more to the list of buyers (if this goes ahead).

[IMG]

Originally Posted by edy_ocdtt

This was the only thread saying something about order a batch of custom bearings from Clevite, this would be much
cheaper than have the crank machined down to the correct specs. so how is it going? the custom bearing order is going to happen? i am pretty sure i want the M3, even with the know problem and i would be interested in buying this custom bearing set, so add one more to the list of buyers (if this goes ahead).

My buddy's working with Clevite right now to make this happen. It takes about 12 weeks from the time the order is placed. This should be ready by mid-2015.

[Petros]

Originally Posted by IMG

My buddy's working with Clevite right now to make this happen. It takes about 12 weeks from the time the order is placed. This should be ready by mid-2015.

Is this a given that it will happen? I wanna replace mine and would be interested in them.

[kawasaki00]

Originally Posted by edy_ocdtt

Hi guys!!

I am from Brazil and i have been thinking about replacing my E34 M5 3.8L for an E92 M3, but after searching the web about common problems with the M3 i´ve found the "s65 bearing problem" threads... well after reading so many threads (i lost the count of how many threads) to the point of Regular_Guy, SenorFunkyPants, kawasaki00 and BMRLVR became familiar nicks, i got to the point to add the amount of replacing the bearings with WPC bearings (also reducing the oil change interval and switch to M1 0W40, having the oil analyzed by Blackstone labs will be kinda difficult since i am in Brazil) and keep this as a maintenance item or machining the crank as a real fix, to the total amount for the new car (it´s a 2007/2008 M3 with 28,000 kms)

This was the only thread saying something about order a batch of custom bearings from Clevite, this would be much cheaper than have the crank machined down to the correct specs. so how is it going? the custom bearing order is going to happen? i am pretty sure i want the M3, even with the know problem and i would be interested in buying this custom bearing set, so add one more to the list of buyers (if this goes ahead).

Originally Posted by IMG

My buddy's working with Clevite right now to make this happen. It takes about 12 weeks from the time the order is placed. This should be ready by mid-2015.

Originally Posted by Petros

Is this a given that it will happen? I wanna replace mine and would be interested in them.

99% sure funds are now available and the ball has started to roll. RG and I have been in communication with Clevite and that is about all the info I can give right now.

[edy_ocdtt]

Originally Posted by IMG

My buddy's working with Clevite right now to make this happen. It takes about 12 weeks from the time the order is placed. This should be ready by mid-2015.

[edy_ocdtt]

Very nice kawasaki00!!

well, when the time to collect the money comes, just let us all know!!

Originally Posted by kawasaki00

99% sure funds are now available and the ball has started to roll. RG and I have been in communication with Clevite and that is about all the info I can give right now.

[edy_ocdtt]

I forgot...

The bearings will be for the rods only? or crank/rods bearings will be made ?

Originally Posted by kawasaki00

99% sure funds are now available and the ball has started to roll. RG and I have been in communication with Clevite and that is about all the info I can give right now.

[kawasaki00]

Originally Posted by edy_ocdtt

I forgot...

The bearings will be for the rods only? or crank/rods bearings will be made ?

Rod bearings only, you do not even want to know how much custom main bearings are.....