rob2388

2009 535i 52k miles.

I'll try to make it quick, mostly looking for opinions from you guys. Was driving two nights ago and iDrive msg: Engine running hot please drive moderately! The message was gone after 20 seconds, so I was like ok that's weird, I don't have any check engine or anything. Next morning same message appears, keep driving waiting for the message to go away and is not going away so in a red light I try tuning off the car, when turning it back on I see coolant smoke coming out of the hood and a sound like something broke/blew inside so I turn it back off again and say to myself: shit shit shit shit.

Anyway, dealer called me today and said my fan broke and that was the sound I heard and that's why the car was getting hot.

Thing is, they replaced my water pump, hoses, turbos, and gasket less than 2 months ago and I would hear the fans going crazy even when the ac was on low. I'm in Miami so it has been about perfect weather lately.. how can the fan just break? They told me I was getting a 75% discount on the fan because the milage and some bs I don't believe so I'll end up paying only $470 (they said it was almost.. wait for it.. $1500).

What do you guys think?

twh

What does fan broke mean? Did one of the fan blades break off? If that was it, they may have done it. If it means the fan motor burned out, I'm not so sure they had anything to do with it.

turboawd

its hard to tell what they found. and if they're telling the truth.

tonyb635

Almost all of them are not honest and jack up cost then give you a discount... $1200.00 quote for my 535 valve cover gasket with a discount! I laughed...

metalicnight

Was the fan running very high when you first got overheat indication? If so that strikes me like bad water pump even if it's new. The car should have gone into limp mode. Was the expansion tank empty? Where was the smoke coming from?

KyleB

If your car is like my 530i (likely is), the fan blade, shroud, motor, etc are all serviced as a singular unit. So if any of those parts failed (usually the motor craps out), you get a complete assembly.

1-$470 is pretty reasonable, but at the upper end of the 'reasonable' spectrum. $1500 is a joke. seriously. that's robbery.

2- any part on any car can fail at any time. it's likely coincidence.

3-i'm in FL too. at least this didn't happen in july...

4-dont take your car to the dealer unless you absolutely have to. they are insanely expensive compared to a competent independent.

5-motortrend.com is showing that a small number of '09s had a recall for the fan assembly. don't know any more than that, or if there's any truth to it. i'd ask.

rob2388

Yes I guess that's what he said on the phone.

I was thinking the same, I was thinking it was the water pump from reading around the forums.

Ridiculous, I took it in for them to replace my turbos under warranty, and they said I needed to change the water pump since it looked cracked already and its common for them to go out, also since they were there to change hoses, and gasket leak. paid $1700 for all of the above. Tought I would be problems free for a while, guess I was wrong.

That's what I was thinking, smoke was coming from the coolant I guess, when I heard the "bang" after i turned on the car all the coolant came off.

1- True
2- True
3- True haha and luckily I had a bar next to where all this happened so I left my car there and had a few beers til the tow truck came.
4- I know, it's just that since they did all this work on the water pump etc. about two months ago I was going to make them pay for it.

Thank all for the replies