RoberMC

Hello, i just had a problem like that, and i am going to post how i solved it.

My car is a 2005 530d, remapped and with 130K Km on the clock. One day i noticed a massive loss in power at low revs, and moderate loss at high revs, and a lot of black smoke coming from the exhaust when accelerating hard. Then i started to make tests disconnecting/connecting the MAF, driving hard uphill, to see the cloud, etc, and this leaded to a clogged DPF. The car lost all power at any revs as the turbo was not working because all that backpressure. The DPF would not regenerate itself because of errors stored in DDE, so forcing regeneration was of no point.

Then i started to check things and i notice my exhaust manifold was cracked, i had traces of black soot in my engine bay and below the car. then i started thinking about it. A cracked exhaust manifold will give a higher O2 lecture to the O2 sensor before the DPF and the car will think she is burning poor, so the car will inject more diesel to compensate and this will lead to the black clouds coming from the exhaust, responsible of the DPF clog.

Replacing the exhaust manifold solved that black smoke issue, but i had still a clogged DPF and with my tools, and without an elevator, it was impossible for me to remove it for cleaning and i gave up this way.

BMW diesels have two way of regenerating their DPFs; passive regen, and active regen.

Active regen: This is the forced one, the one you force through DIS, and the one that make you hear your engine as if you had a subwoofer in the trunk. This is the one that requires 75º coolant temperature, 240º exhaust temp. etc... and it takes place forcedly every 500 Km or when the system detects the DPF is getting full because of too much mixed trips and/or unneffective passive regen. This can take place even at low speeds / low revs, and it takes about 20 mins to completely clean a DPF

Passive regen: This happens in long trips, it does not require any special conditions in the engine/exhaust, you simply drive for like 30-45 mins ar constant rpms, and because of high temps at the exhaust the DPF starts reacting and slowly burning everything that is inside. This requires only high temps on exhaust, 1700 - 2500 rpm held for long time is enough, more rpms would generate more soot than the filter is actually cleaning, so keep calm on the right foot here. Depending on how clogged a DPF is, it may take upto 3 hours to clean it. But.. the car is not doing anything special while this passive cleaning happens, it is only the DPF passively burning the soot, so it works even with DPF errors stored in the DDE.

So.. i bought a bottle of "3cv diesel particulate filter cleaner" at a supermarket to help with the process (i didn't even care to buy a good branded and expensive product), poured it into the diesel half full deposit, and started my cleaning adventure. The maximum backpressure allowed to clear the DPF error 480A stored in the DDE, which prevented the engine to enter in regeneration mode, was: 25 mbar at idle, 150 mbar at 2000 rpm, and 250 mbar at 4000 rpm. So i had my objectives clear and i started making long trips, one each day, at night with low/no traffic with these results:

Starting values: 65 mbar idle, dont remember mbar at 2000 rpm, about 900 mbar at 4000 rpm

- 1st trip: 45 minutes - 100 Km/h 4th gear ( 2200 rpm), Tempomat enabled. Values went to about 40, 300, 600 mbar (the values lowered but still not enough)

- 2nd trip: 40 mins - 120 Km/h, 5th gear (2000 rpm), Tempomat enabled. Values went to about 24, 200, 400 mbar (Wohoo!, idle backpressure maximum was met!)

- 3rd trip: 30 mins - 110 Km/h, 4th gear (2500 rpm), Tempomat on (i am a lazy guy), Values went to: 16, 136, 360 mbar (idle and 2000 rpm backpressure were met)

- 4th trip: 40 mins intended - 100 Km/h, 4th gear (2200 rpm), Tempomat ON... i was about to get home to check backpressure values, and when speed hit below 50 kmh... when revving up, BOOOM, i heard the engine was doing the active regeneration by itself!!!, that means the error 480A had dissapeared by itself and the DPF active regeneration was allowed again. Of course i didn't stopped the car and continued driving for about 30 minutes more til i didn't hear the regeneration noise anymore. I went home, read values and... 2,5 mbar at idle, 12 mbar at 2000 rpm, and 25 mbar at 4000 rpm. Better than brand new!

Conclussions:
- You don't need to remove the DPF to clean it.
- Usually a clogged DPF is caused by another problem, first fix the root problem or it will be clogged again soon.
- I don't know how much credit is due to the cheap "3cv" bottle of DPF cleaner, but you won't loose anything trying this or a similar product.

I hope this helps someone

pigment

Thanks for everyone contributed in this post.. After reading so many replies and research on internet. I have got my E61 2006 reg 520d sorted. I want to share a bit of my experience to help the people who may have the same issue as me.

My particle filter warning light was on about 1 month ago. Mine is a 2006 E61 520d, pre-LCI morel and 128,000 miles done already. I read some article on internet and learn the basic knowledge of DPF, I know I need it get regeneration. So I arrange several trip on motor way, after about 4-5 times try on motor way, I notice this car do not regenerate at all. The warning changed from "1000 miles due to a service" to "100 miles overdue".

As most of the people did, I watched the video on youtube and get into the hidden manual and I noticed my engine temp was only 75 degree, and never get higher than this temp. To fix this issue, I changed both main and EGR thermostat.

After this done, I test it on motorway again. No regeneration. I go to ebay, brought a BMW OBD cable and software (DIS GS1). I get into the error msg, and notice all the 4 glow plugs are having fault. It is because the thermostats do not let the engine get to the right temp, so the glow plugs have to working all the time and they are done. Also the back pressure of DPF is too high.

I bought 4 glow plugs and get the garage I have used for 5 years changed for me. I also brought 2 cans carb cleaners. To change the glow pug, the EGR valve has to be removed as well. You can clean them at the same time when the glow plugs are changed. After I change the glow plugs, the only error is the back pressure. After I done the research. I know there are several solution.

1. remove the dpf and clean it. 99% change you need buy new bolts and gasket from the main dealer.

2. use a special DPF cleaner from the thermal sensor socket. You can find it here in Eurocarparts. Normfest DPF Cleaner 400ml

3. Cut a small hole or small crack on the air pressure sensor intake pipe, this will give the back pressure leakage but not make it to 0, which will cheat the ECU think the back pressure is fine. And this will trig the regenerate.

4. Use the GS1 software to clean the error in DDE all the time while driving on motor way. Basically every 5 sec to clean once. This need 2 people.

I am sure all these 4 solutions will fix this problem. My plan is try them from No.4 to No.1.

After 25 mins driving on motor with keep cleaning the error memory, the DPF regenerated itself, which means I do not need try the other 3 ways.

After that, I check the error msg. No more glow plugs or back pressure error. And the back pressure is 8 mbar while idle. But the Particle filter service warning light still on. I tried all different ways to reset it. None of them works. I read some articles said the pre-LCI E60/E61's DPF are designed to be used for more or less 120,000 miles. So I contacted the local dealer for the price of change it. 1200 pounds including VAT is the price I got.

Well, I check the price on ebay. I decided not change it. I may buy a after market one sometime later. What I have done was make a change new DPF service on the GS1 softare. After this "service" done. The warning light is gone and the DPF mileage is reset back to 120,000 miles. You can also make a regenerate request at the same time in GS1. So next time on motor way, the DPF will regenerate again.

I calculate the money I have spend 50 pounds on 2 thermostats, 48 pounds on 4 glow plugs,25 pounds for the BMW cables, 5 pounds on new coolant, 5 pounds on carb cleaner and 140 pounds to the garage. Plus the fuel I used on motor way, totally about 300 pounds to fix all these. After change the thermostats, new glow plugs and clean the EGR valve. The car feel much "lighter" and full of power now. I will make a DPF regenerate request every 5000 miles, I bet this will prevent this error from now on.

Tigr

I am having simillar problem: after 1 hour driving engine is only 72-73 deg C warm. Only when I am long in a trafic jam, it can get upto 97-98 deg C. Could you please tell me what is the normal operating temperature?

I know that the original termostat is openning at 88 deg C...

Tigr

I replaced both thermostats. The car is running stable at 93 deg C now.