[Kamando]

Pray it wasn't too late:







My third party extended warranty covered the single injector and BMW covered everything else. Glad to have my car back finally. (Took 1 Month)
Happy Camper once again

[Timujin]

wth thats alot of sheet. 1 month? yikes.

[FormerRotor]

Yikes indeed

[Kamando]

Originally Posted by Timujin

wth thats alot of sheet. 1 month? yikes.

It's a LONG story lol. Most of it was trying to figure out the cause. They brought in a Master Technician that figured it out.

[TDIwyse]

Wow. Glad you got your car back.

If it's not too much to ask, I'd be interesting in knowing some info about your driving style, normal drive cycle (city, hwy, how many miles, etc.), which fuel brand(s) you normally used, how many miles you have on the vehicle and what if any modifications you had on your car. That info could be useful to others who may run into similar situations.

[Timujin]

Originally Posted by TDIwyse

Wow. Glad you got your car back.

If it's not too much to ask, I'd be interesting in knowing some info about your driving style, normal drive cycle (city, hwy, how many miles, etc.), which fuel brand(s) you normally used, how many miles you have on the vehicle and what if any modifications you had on your car. That info could be useful to others who may run into similar situations.

yes please.

[335dFan]

Hi Kamando, sorry if you already explained this earlier, but how many miles do you have on your vehicle? And why did you need a third-party coverage? Wouldn't BMW 4-year maintenance have picked up the whole tab? If not, which part would they be denying?

[GreekboyD]

I see carbon build-up and removal of the air intake manifold. Same thing happened to me and they replaced my air intake manifold.

[Kamando]

Originally Posted by TDIwyse

Wow. Glad you got your car back.

If it's not too much to ask, I'd be interesting in knowing some info about your driving style, normal drive cycle (city, hwy, how many miles, etc.), which fuel brand(s) you normally used, how many miles you have on the vehicle and what if any modifications you had on your car. That info could be useful to others who may run into similar situations.

Where to begin...Current Mileage as of this post is 54,083

My car is a 2011, bone stock no mods (unless you count the rear fog light switch). I took delivery March 2010 in Germany (I was stationed there with the Army) and for the month I had it over there it was driven HARD [after break-in of course]. (Between the unrestricted autobahn and Nürburgring) It saw a TON of highway driving all over Germany and the neighboring countries. It saw 155mph often. The fuel was primarily ESSO diesel. Probably 80%hwy 20%city

Fort Rucker Alabama was next. There were opportunities to open up the car off base but on base it was usually 30mph. The trip to base was maybe 5-10 minutes one way then another 5-10 to get across base where I needed to go. Also our closest dealership was 80miles away in Montgomery and going to Dothan for shopping on the weekends resulted in a lot of highway (relatively constant speed) trips. The car wasn't driven nearly as hard here. Probably 50/50 split. Murphy was the fueling station closest to home without going out of my way. When out in Dothan and elsewhere we would look for shell/chevron.

Fort Hood Texas was by far the worst. Lots of daily slow drives on base and massive traffic jams trying to get there. (It was maybe 5 miles to work yet some days it would take 30-40mins to get there.) We would do trips to Austin and the surrounding ares where we could open the car up a little bit about every other weekend/2 weeks. The mix here was about 40%hwy/60%city. Fuel was a mixture of all the name brands and the occasional Walmart fill-up when shopping.

While I deployed to Afghanistan in 2011 my wife took the car to her parent's house in California for the year I was gone and drove it over there in the Orange County area. She drove back when I came home to Texas.

We drove back to Orange County where we reside at the moment in July 2012.

Really couldn't tell you the amount of miles driven in each location but just know we broke our warranty mileage at just over 2 years into it. So we drove ALOT.

Luckily the Cetane rating of California Diesel is a lot higher than most other states so that should help over here. I also take time to drive the car hard where I can. I think I will stick to Chevron now.

Originally Posted by OldMan335dOwner

Hi Kamando, sorry if you already explained this earlier, but how many miles do you have on your vehicle? And why did you need a third-party coverage? Wouldn't BMW 4-year maintenance have picked up the whole tab? If not, which part would they be denying?

*Please see above for current miles and why 4 year warranty wouldn't cover the repair*

Prior to us receiving our emissions recall in Texas the car was solid as a rock (more so than either the '06 330i or '08 335i I owned) but I got uneasy the more I read about the emissions recall and at this point I was out of warranty. I decided to get the extended warranty after driving our car out of warranty for awhile when more and more emissions stuff started to pop up on here.

Unfortunately during the process of getting my car fixed my Service Advisor told me that the extended warranty probably wouldn't cover the repairs aside from the one fuel injector as there weren't any other actual part failures or fault codes to justify the replacement of parts. So at this point I was essentially warranty-less. That's when he suggested we could ask BMW if they could do anything to help out. Luckily they did.

Now for the symptoms:

Mildly decreased fuel economy (which ironically started after the EGR replacement & programming) and never recovered.

The fuel economy eventually got noticeably bad to the point that for the mileage per tank I was getting I might as well have been driving an M3.

Next was noticeable engine vibration in all gears moving or stationary when the tach climbed to about 1k rpm.

I even got engine hesitation to the point it took work to get moving from a stop.

My theory is that the carbon build up resulted from the first EGR but due to the rate at which we put miles on the car, the damage was already done by the time we got the new EGR & programming. We drove faster than the recall could catch up.

To combat future carbon build up my advisor said drive the car hard and that I could also use the dealership's intake port cleaning every 20/30k miles. ($180)

[35mphgolf]

What about an oil catch can? Personally I've always been on the fence about 'em..

Carbon build up is a big problem for FSI engines (fuel sprayed directly into the cylinder).

[Quasimodem]

They replaced the cylinder head and all the injectors?

Any idea how much the parts alone for this job would have cost without good will?

Any idea why they replaced the cylinder head and couldnt just clean it?

[Kamando]

Originally Posted by 35mphgolf

What about an oil catch can? Personally I've always been on the fence about 'em..

Carbon build up is a big problem for FSI engines (fuel sprayed directly into the cylinder).

I dunno, might be something to look into. I know the EGR played a role in all of this since it recirculates exhaust gases back through the intake manifold (where the carbon buildup started). I'd personally like to do an EGR delete if there were kits for US spec d's.

Originally Posted by Quasimodem

They replaced the cylinder head and all the injectors?

Any idea how much the parts alone for this job would have cost without good will?

Any idea why they replaced the cylinder head and couldnt just clean it?

Yes, Intake manifold too

Looking at just shy of 3 grand on injectors, 3 grand and change for cylinder head, and intake manifold is around a grand. I think I came out around 7k before gaskets, nuts/bolts, labor, etc. when I added it up the other day using prices I found online. Service advisor said he estimates probably 9k for everything.

I was told they tried cleaning it and sent pics back to BMW who decided just replace it rather than trying to clean it again. (So the build-up was pretty bad)

[TDIwyse]

Thanks for sharing the details.

[Kamando]

Originally Posted by TDIwyse

Thanks for sharing the details.

No problem. I wasn't the first and unfortunately won't be the last to have this happen. Just wanted to let everyone know the issue is out there.

[elester12]

Hello everyone! I just wanted everyone to know this has been done twice on my car!

[cssnms]

Originally Posted by elester12

Hello everyone! I just wanted everyone to know this has been done twice on my car!

Before or after the recall was performed? Details please.

[cssnms]

Komando thank you for sharing your story. Needless to say it is disconcerting... Hopefully the recall provides the solution we are all hoping it does.

I just do not understand why BMW can't build a more reliable car/engine??? It boggles my mind with all of the engineering they put into designing their cars to ensure they are the "ultimate driving machine" why they do not spend more time on the engineering mechanics to ensure they are putting out an engine that does not have potentially catastrophic problems. If it's not the x series, 7 series, it's the 3 series,,, I just don't get it... Very disappointing...

[GreekboyD]

Holy fuck @ 9K!, Kamando.

That's why I NEVER thought twice about getting the extended warranty.

One month after I got it was when the air intake manifold incident occurred.

[kbsilver]

Originally Posted by cssnms

Komando thank you for sharing your story. Needless to say it is disconcerting... Hopefully the recall provides the solution we are all hoping it does.

I just do not understand why BMW can't build a more reliable car/engine??? It boggles my mind with all of the engineering they put into designing their cars to ensure they are the "ultimate driving machine" why they do not spend more time on the engineering mechanics to ensure they are putting out an engine that does not have potentially catastrophic problems. If it's not the x series, 7 series, it's the 3 series,,, I just don't get it... Very disappointing...

BMW does build very relIable Diesel engines, they have been doing it for decades. What BMW is challanged with are the new Pollution controls. Give them a few years they will get it. Fortunately I have not had any of these issues so far at 25,000 miles.

[cssnms]

Originally Posted by kbsilver

BMW does build very relIable Diesel engines, they have been doing it for decades. What BMW is challanged with are the new Pollution controls. Give them a few years they will get it. Fortunately I have not had any of these issues so far at 25,000 miles.

We shall see if they get it "right." I was being very general when describing the probelm. Fact is, their is a problem with their design - pollution challenge or not, that's what I expect when I plunk down $45k+ for a car.

More to my point, BMW has a history of engine and or transmission related problems that have nothing to do with "pollution controls." Point being, being BMW should have gotten it "right" during the R&D phase, not after the fact.

In the mean time we are the guinea pigs.

[fjcjr]

My 2011 335d has 30K miles on it now, and it, has run perfectly. I have never before owned a car that has so completely exceeded my expectations (except the run-flats that lasted 22k miles). Because I like this car so much, I paid $2800 for the extended warranty, as I will probably keep it. That said, if I had to pay $9000 for a repair like this, which should not happen after 50k miles, AND they have my car for a month, I'd spend an extra grand to take out a full page ad in a newspaper to let the world know exactly what was happening with my BMW. Fotunately, they did the honorable thing, and covered this repair.

Nine grand and a month????? That is nearly criminal.

[Kamando]

Originally Posted by fjcjr

...Nine grand and a month????? That is nearly criminal.

The narrative on the invoice makes it seem like a nice cut and dry case that should have been an easy fix. The truth of the matter was anything but. The single injector issue was found relatively easy due to the fault code. The other repairs took MUCH longer to diagnose and fix. I won't go into the day by day details of what happened as I'm not posting this thread to trash my dealership or BMW in anyway but rather alert owners to an issue that is out there. I will say there were more than a few days spent on work/trouble shooting Just to get to where the SES light illuminated in the narrative. Also had to wait for a Master Technician from BMW NA to come out and help find the ultimate issue (After he came out it was determined to most likely be carbon build-up.) More waiting was involved with the back and forth getting authorization from BMW NA to proceed with cleaning and eventual repairs. Finally a technician came out from BMW NA at the end to QC the work that was done.

I fully believe BMW took the necessary steps to fix this issue with the emissions recall they did and that I just happened to have put too many miles on my car before the recall came so the damage was already done.

I am thankful to BMW NA for covering the cost of this repair. Would I have liked to get my car back much sooner than what I did? ABSOLUTELY! Ultimately though, I can't really b!tch about a month, after they stepped up for me.