ZebraBrains

Hey so I have a 2005 545i and just experienced the "charging malfunction" message, so it was diagnosed by the dealer to have a bad alternator, as well as leaking valve cover gaskets & alternator bracket...skip forward a few days and I've got it in my garage up in the air with everything apart and was able to take a bunch of pics.

I was hoping to get some advice as to what else I should be replacing (besides the alternator itself). I know the valve cover gaskets are seeping, possibly dripping oil everywhere so that is a must. But should I be replacing everything the front covers with it? Do they look like the're leaking?

jtbgonesailing

Think I would start with a engine bay cleaning. When you can see what you have without the sand and oil everywhere, the diagnosis of what is leaking from where is made easier. Plus it is so much nicer working on a clean surface and no cross contamination as you go.

E60Japanese

Great! I always love seeing guys have a go and fixing their cars themselves.

While you are doing the gaskets I would just change the oil filter housing gasket too.

Its very simple and while you have it apart you may as well sepnd a few more dollars and an extra 30 minutes for piece of mind.

Good luck with everything and thanks for posting the pictures.

dingolfing

Your upper timing cover gaskets are leaking too, look at pic #4. That is what is causing your entire front engine block to be covered with oil. Are you leaking coolant too? I'm seeing green fluid in pic #5 and #6.

ZebraBrains

Thanks for the reply, I plan on doing VCG's & Front Timing Cover Gaskets after finishing the Alternator bracket gasket which doesn't even seem to be leaking but I'm half way there at this point.

Yes the coolant is leaking down onto the sway bar motor, I wipe it off when I wrap up for the night then come back the next day to more drops. I wasn't sure if it's coming from the water pump (which is the 2nd one replaced under warranty since 2014) or the coolant transfer pipe.

I'll update with more pictures once I clean up more of the messy oil.

DanielFD

I did something similar about a month ago. Did all the oil seals on the bottom of my engine. Upper oil pan lower oil pan, alternator bracket, Oil thermostat seals, Oil sensor seals, Oil test tube lower and upper seals, Front Crankshaft seal. But I lowered the front subframe to be able to work easier which required loosing a lot of CHF11S oil from the ARS tubes, so i replaced the power steering reservoir(integrated filter in it) and did a flush of the power steering fluid. All in all took 2 days of work, half of a day just for cleaning all the gunk from the bottom of the engine (didn't use water, Sprayed Fuel instead). Every single seal i changed might not have been leaking but after holding the seals and looking at them they were definitely dried up. I wished i had done my valve covers first as now all the oil seeping from them ruined my cleaning.. realoem.com is your friend, i used the website to locate all the different sensors/seals. Some seals wont be in the diagrams you would expect so look at ALL the engine diagrams so make sure you dont miss anything. You'll be really proud of yourself when your done! Oh and have a six-pack around because you will definitely be taking a lot of breaks.

ZebraBrains

I'm almost done with the alternator bracket and am going to begin doing the valve cover gaskets over the next feed days & I just stumbled upon a fault report that my coder pulled from the vehicle and sent to me last year when he coded the LM2 module. These codes have been there for at least a year and I'm just now looking at them. I see codes for camshaft sensor, misfiring, VANOS secondary air-injection thing or whatever. Can anyone shed some light on these and see if there's anything I should look for/replace while I'm taking everything apart.

I have INPA setup on my windows tablet but I've never gone actually used it or pulled codes myself. I wish I would have pulled them fresh before I took everything apart.

Motor Control:
Code: 27B8: E electric blower operation diagnosis / Differential air pressure, intake manifold: Plausibility / Tank level, plausibility / E electric fan operating diagnostic / Differential pressure sensor
Code: 27A0 : activation of the E-box fan / SG internal error INJ process control / E-box Luefter control
Code: 2761: Secondar air system / Sekundaerluftsystem Bank2 / Stop the maximum inlet VANOS Bank 2 / Secondary air system
Code: 2760: Secondar air system / Sekundaerluftsystem OBDII fault! / Secondary air-injection system / VANOS maximum support socket bank 1
Code: 27BC: VANOS camshaft control outlet Bank2 / VANOS camshaft control outlet 2 / Fuel pressure regulator, short circuit to ground / unknown fault code
Code: 277F: Crankshaft Sensor / Misfire detection cylinder 2 in 4 Firing order / ERP module electrical activity diagnostic / Crankshaft sensor signal / Engine misfire , cylinder 2
Code: 2909: CAN timeout EGS / CAN signal error
Code: 299D: Battery Sensor: Data transmission / Intelligent battery system IBS / Controller, internal error
Code: 29A9: Power Management / Power Management Battery

ABS / DSC / Brake:
Code: 5F62: AFS exchange DSC signal invalid / Message
Code: 5F76: DME error: invalid values / Speed
Code: 5E2F: Front wheel speed sensor on the left / Temperature Sensor / ECU internally: Rome error / Front left wheel speed sensors / Wheel-VL / Beer temperature sensor
Code: 5F26: ARS ECU error / Brake pad wear VA / Message
Code: D358: CAN error message / PT CAN fault / EGS CAN message / Instrument cluster 1 outdoor temperature PT-CAN
Code: 5F56: Invalid signal / Message / KL 15 failure

Instrument cluster:
Code: A557: Debug Info Combi
Code: A3AA: CAN signal fault transmission / CAN ID failure
Code: 931D: supply voltage failure
Code: A468: Central control timeout

DanielFD

doesn't look like anything that might be where your working on your car. Though i would clear codes and see what pops up before your start the valve covers in case you need to change something there.

ZebraBrains

Any ideas on how to get these ground cables removed? I stripped them with a T25. They're on there pretty good even after spraying penetrating oil. What are these bolts even called so I can order new ones.

3BEP6

I just did my valve covers and had the same problem, I used flat wise grips and it worked for me.