ericono

Got a call from the wife saying the low tire pressure warning came on and she had pulled over. I didn't want her to ruin the tire so I figured out where she was and headed over with my son to see what the situation was.

When we finally got there a little bit of air was still in the tire so I had her jump into the e39 and I limped the e61 to the nearest gas station a little over a mile away. Put some air in the tire but could hear the hissing so I knew I didn't have long. I hoped I could make it home where I could more easily assess the situation. Unfortunately, I got the dreaded warning within 5 minutes and pulled over. I sent her on home and my son and I proceeded to swap over to the miniature spare.



I figured I wouldn't get much chance to ever use the factory warning triangle so I showed it to my son and explained the purpose of it and we set it up. Do all e61s come with the warning triangle? They're like easter eggs in the e24 community, at least in the US, as we didn't get them over here. I found one for my M635, but the e39 doesn't have one either. I was surprised to see it on my e61's options list, and even slightly more surprised that I then found it in the car!

Once I got the wheel off I could see the damage was not repairable, inner sidewall slashed. Found a tire place open that carried Continentals so I could match my other 3 tires as they are not that old. After a few extra hours we finally made it home. At least my son got to see what to do with a flat tire...

Eric

ericono

Hello all. Been away for a little while, but still enjoying the e61. I've been too busy with other stuff to do much else than drive it. Having said that, I did make 1 modification to the car. After reading about all the oil that gets into the intake and cakes up on the intake valves, I had been looking around to see what, if any, solutions might be out there. After searching various forums I came across a kit on N54tech that had been developed to help severely lessen the amount of oil going in. Not sure what the rules are about links to other forums. Someone let me know, and if it's ok, I'll post a link to the other thread that gives all the details. Basically it replaces the factory internal PCV with a replaceable PCV and provisions for an oil catch can. This system is set up for low pressure, no boost which is a good bit of where my wife is driving the car. Here's a shot of it installed. I was looking for a clean, somewhat factory look and somewhere with good access so that I can dump it out easily.


Here's a shot of what I found in the can after a week of driving.


I am happy with the installation and think it will help increase the intervals between valve cleanings. I was waiting to do this and will now see about performing a valve cleaning on my car.

Separate note, but I was able to take a couple of shots of my two wagons nose to nose.



Hope all is well with everyone else.

Eric

pocholin

Wow, that's a lot oil for one week. I put a catch can as well, but haven't accumulated that much oil in 3 months! I wonder why.

ericono

Which OCC did you install, the BMS OCC? If so, my understanding is that this is for high load situations (under boost) only. What I installed is for low load situations which is where I understood most driving to be in.

Ideally I'd have both installed, but for now I thought the low side solution was more pertinent to my wife's driving habits (assuming she isn't challenging 'vettes to races at stop lights).

Thanks,

Eric

pocholin

I was not aware of being two choices of where to put the OCC. You did it at the PVC valve outlet, right? See below picture of mine.

ericono

That's interesting. I assume the CC is the carbon fiber canister on the right. Where did you get that kit, where the hard lines part of it? Where is it coming from and going to?

Here's a link to an installation DIY: Low load OCC installation

Here's another link talking about the kit: Low load OCC kit

Just came across this review of the system as well: Low load OCC review

I am not related to the originator of the kit, just a satisfied customer to this point.

Hope it helps,

Eric

pocholin

I followed Burger tuning's instructions, which do seem to be for high load installation
BMS Turbo Double Baffle Oil Catch Can

The carbon fiber can is from Mishimoto, I made the hard lines bending stainless steel tubing and used swagelok stainless steels fittings (the tubing and fittings cost much more than the cat can..."leftovers" from the place where I work LOL!!)

I think it is worth the second catch can because, as you correctly said, we are not constantly under full load.

Thanks,
Alfonso

ericono

This is why I keep buying used BMWs: yesterday, while running errands (so warm engine), we jumped in the car, started it up and got the "Engine Malfunction - Reduced Power" message on the iDrive screen and a picture of an engine cut in half on the gauge cluster. The official line explaining the message said we could continue driving, but to head to our local BMW dealer asap. So i headed home. Thanks to the P3 Cars vent mounted multi gauge, I could read the error codes (2A7C and 3100). After a quick search it looked like something related to the vanos solenoids. After another quick search it turns out these are on the front of the engine. ~30 mins later I had pulled them out, cleaned up and reinstalled. Fired the car back up and drove around a bit and no more error messages. Hopefully I am good to go, but will keep a close eye on the situation.

All the DIYs that people take the time to post online make owning a luxury car possible for us mere mortals.

While I had the hood up, I checked my OCC and found a little less oil and it was not milky like the picture above, looked like solely oil this time.

Notmelo

New to the site. Love my wagon, but, at over 140,000 miles, I would like a new one. Has anyone ever tried to bring one in from Europe. I keep hoping BMW will start importing again, but, no word.

ericono

Realistically, since BMW didn't perform all the testing required to legalize the latest 5-series wagon for the US market, I believe it would be prohibitively expensive to try and do it yourself (I believe you would have to crash test 1 or 2 examples on your own dime). As far as I know they do still offer the 3-series wagon here. They even offer it with a diesel option if you are looking for better fuel economy. They keep making cars bigger so the current 3 wagon looks about the same size as my e39 wagon. Speaking of which, my e39 has over 215k miles on it now and feels great so 140k isn't too bad.

Don't know if this is of any help, but I hope so.

Eric