[Turb0Surge]

Most of what OP said was regular maintenance. And why would you go to the dealer? DIY water pump would have cost a LOT less than $1200, heck even going to an indy would have saved you a lot of that $1200. I hope they at least replaced your thermostat as well, while they were in there.


Most of the repairs are quite simple and there's a bunch of write ups and guides to help you out. DIY is the way to go.

[_Sinister_]

Originally Posted by Miller335

You guys realize that the water pumps on other cars get replaced every 60K-90K when the timing belt is replaced?

I bought an 01 Tahoe 5.3 in 04 and soon after the "lifetime" water pump had to be replaced and they are not cheap.

Lots of future Honda/Toyota owners in this thread.

Hell yeah haha my 04 Tahoe was the shit tho easy as hell to work on compared to my 335.

[Bavarian Black]

Originally Posted by Dark_Knight_335

If you think a 2007 328 is a horror story...try a 335 buddy

+100K

[N54B30A]

Originally Posted by Miller335

You guys realize that the water pumps on other cars get replaced every 60K-90K when the timing belt is replaced?

I bought an 01 Tahoe 5.3 in 04 and soon after the "lifetime" water pump had to be replaced and they are not cheap.

Lots of future Honda/Toyota owners in this thread.

yeah but that would apply if we had timing belts. I dont think bmw has used timing belts since the e30 325e

[alexwhittemore]

Originally Posted by sahyoun

yeah but that would apply if we had timing belts. I dont think bmw has used timing belts since the e30 325e

The point isn't that (cars with timing belts as a wear item)=(cars with water pumps as a wear item). The point is that, while modern cars generally have gone back to a timing chain that outlasts the engine, water pumps are still generally a wear item.

[N54B30A]

Originally Posted by alexwhittemore

The point isn't that (cars with timing belts as a wear item)=(cars with water pumps as a wear item). The point is that, while modern cars generally have gone back to a timing chain that outlasts the engine, water pumps are still generally a wear item.

Not sure what timing chains you're referring to. But a timing chain will NOT outlive these motors. Timing chains can go out anywhere between 80k-100k along with the chain guides. The point is that stuff will go out on these engines and anyother engine and the more advanced they are the more money its gonna cost to fix so I dont understand why people keep posting threads about how much money they had to shell out. What did you expect?

[alexwhittemore]

Originally Posted by sahyoun

Not sure what timing chains you're referring to. But a timing chain will NOT outlive these motors. Timing chains can go out anywhere between 80k-100k along with the chain guides.

As per the service manual, the timing chain is a non-wear item. In the first three pages of google results, there are a bunch of "should I replace it? No." posts and a few "320d's have timing chain issues" posts, but few "my timing chain died" posts and none at all that I could find for gasoline engines.

Of course, theoretically the water pump isn't a wear item either, but of course we all know there's maybe a 50% chance of having a pump death within 200k miles.

Well. Even that's probably overstated. Hardcore reporting bias, nobody posts "I'm at 200k and my water pump is dandy."

[pruettfan]

It may be that you are more of a Honda guy than a BMW guy, like it or not they are not cheap cars to own, especially when you don't do your own repair work. If you like to be able to jump in a car, go, change the oil a couple of times a year and not worry about issues popping up this is probably not the car for you. BMW offers a great driving experience but they are complex cars that have a few issues here and there. I have an 06 330i that I love and have 180,000 miles on (drive 34k per year) and plan to try and keep it going to 250k but if I didn't do my own repair work I don't think I would own it. I have not had a huge number of issues with it but they are expensive to repair through a shop, certainly a whole lot more expensive than a honda.

Best of luck

[Eddien123]

Originally Posted by pruettfan

It may be that you are more of a Honda guy than a BMW guy, like it or not they are not cheap cars to own, especially when you don't do your own repair work. If you like to be able to jump in a car, go, change the oil a couple of times a year and not worry about issues popping up this is probably not the car for you. BMW offers a great driving experience but they are complex cars that have a few issues here and there. I have an 06 330i that I love and have 180,000 miles on (drive 34k per year) and plan to try and keep it going to 250k but if I didn't do my own repair work I don't think I would own it. I have not had a huge number of issues with it but they are expensive to repair through a shop, certainly a whole lot more expensive than a honda.

Best of luck

haha trust me i'm not a Honda guy. I can just appreciate how they are.

[derryck]

My 07 E90 335 is over 100K and has been FBO since about 1K miles and has had zero problems and my 09 E92 (also FBO) 335 has 42K on it also with zero mechanical issues. That being said my 01 MDX has over 300K on it with just a tranny rebuild around 240K and my 07 MDX has 120K on it and I've had to replace the HFL (bluetooth) module and a couple of fuses. I'm a firm believer that if you take car of your cars they'll take care of you. Insert plug for Mobil 1...

[JamesAC83]

Originally Posted by Miller335

You guys realize that the water pumps on other cars get replaced every 60K-90K when the timing belt is replaced?

I bought an 01 Tahoe 5.3 in 04 and soon after the "lifetime" water pump had to be replaced and they are not cheap.

Lots of future Honda/Toyota owners in this thread.

since when has GM referred to any water pump as lifetime? any since when are they not cheap??

[alexwhittemore]

Originally Posted by JamesAC83

since when has GM referred to any water pump as lifetime? any since when are they not cheap??

I don't know of any belt-driven pump that would be considered lifetime. The whole point is that the lateral pressure of the belt causes wear.

[7daysaweek]

Originally Posted by pruettfan

BMW offers a great driving experience but they are complex cars that have a few issues here and there.

I agree with part of this but totally disagree with some of it as well... yes BMW offers a great driving experience BUT there's nothing that should be that "complex" on these cars. Every car has gaskets, water pumps, wheel bearings, window regulators, in other words I carpool with a guy in a Honda CRV that has all of those things and guess what... they don't break. And it's older than my car. No it isn't as fast or fun to drive but it keeps working. The parts that I'm complaining about aren't anything that isn't on every other car on the road. If it's a computer system that not every other car has that somehow makes it better then fine, I get it. But it's not. It's things that never went bad for the 250k miles I drove my truck before I sold it to get this car.

I understand that performance comes at a premium but at some point it just isn't worth it. I'm quickly approaching that point with this car.

Oh and btw, since my last post a few days ago my check engine light has come back on.

[Miller335]

Originally Posted by JamesAC83

since when has GM referred to any water pump as lifetime? any since when are they not cheap??

That's what I remember being told, and yes the waterpump was much more expensive than the ones on the 5.7's the 5.3 replaced.

[alexwhittemore]

Originally Posted by 7daysaweek

I agree with part of this but totally disagree with some of it as well... yes BMW offers a great driving experience BUT there's nothing that should be that "complex" on these cars. Every car has gaskets, water pumps, wheel bearings, window regulators, in other words I carpool with a guy in a Honda CRV that has all of those things and guess what... they don't break. And it's older than my car. No it isn't as fast or fun to drive but it keeps working. The parts that I'm complaining about aren't anything that isn't on every other car on the road. If it's a computer system that not every other car has that somehow makes it better then fine, I get it. But it's not. It's things that never went bad for the 250k miles I drove my truck before I sold it to get this car.

That's actually not quite true. I'm firmly in the "it shouldn't break all the time" camp rather than the "I'm rich and paying money for stupid shit doesn't bother me" one, but it IS the case that luxury cars often have complexity that others do not, resulting in decreased reliability.

For example, the water pump. Traditionally it's just an impeller, shaft, bearing, and pulley on the accessory belt. The housing is cast into the engine block itself, so there aren't a ton of parts. Advantages: few parts, cheap. Disadvantages: lateral loading on the shaft from the belt causes a lot of wear, more than can easily be designed around. The sum of those two things means it's easy enough to just say replace it after X miles. Often times it's on a timing belt so that you can just replace both at the same time, saving on labor overhead of doing each separately (including if they were in different locations).

Apparently, BMW decided that the pump needed to be able to run even after the engine shut off. Disadvantages: can't use the simple reliable (if service oriented) design above. Advantages: electric motors don't deal with the same stresses (bearing loading) and generally have service lives long in excess of the motor itself. In theory, that means an electric pump can be designed to outlast the engine. Additionally, if it runs after the engine, you can have the residual heat function (which many here quite like!).

That said, the electric pump is much more complex than the effectively 3-part mechanical pump. If something goes wrong, it's not cost-effective to only replace the individual piece that broke, it's not a wear item so kinds of wear inherent to pumps but longer-term than the bearing that drives a mechanical pump's replacement interval still apply but may go uncorrected, etc.

tl;dr: they had a good reason to increase complexity, but increasing complexity ALWAYS increases possible points of failure. The same is true in lots of other systems in the car, ESPECIALLY the electrical. The same is true for turbo vs NA engines - there's a good reason to turbocharge an engine, but it's a complex system that adds lots of failure points.

The whole point is, BMW's design decisions are all based around the idea that increased complexity in return for functionality is a good tradeoff, whereas a budget manufacturer's design decisions strongly avoid increased complexity in avoidance of cost, with the ancillary benefit of simplicity and reliability.

[JamesAC83]

Originally Posted by Miller335

That's what I remember being told, and yes the waterpump was much more expensive than the ones on the 5.7's the 5.3 replaced.

you got told wrong. and of course the pump is going to cost more than one that was essentially the same piece for decades, that doesn't make it expensive overall, it just makes you cheap.

[Miller335]

Originally Posted by JamesAC83

you got told wrong. and of course the pump is going to cost more than one that was essentially the same piece for decades, that doesn't make it expensive overall, it just makes you cheap.

Well you sure showed me there Mr badass.
The 5.3 was still farely new when it happened so ya when a pump costs three times as much as a previous gen pump that was used forever on the 350's you take note.

And I'll take your "cheap" comment directed at me as a compliment thank you very much.

[7daysaweek]

Originally Posted by alexwhittemore

That's actually not quite true. I'm firmly in the "it shouldn't break all the time" camp rather than the "I'm rich and paying money for stupid shit doesn't bother me" one, but it IS the case that luxury cars often have complexity that others do not, resulting in decreased reliability.

For example, the water pump. Traditionally it's just an impeller, shaft, bearing, and pulley on the accessory belt. The housing is cast into the engine block itself, so there aren't a ton of parts. Advantages: few parts, cheap. Disadvantages: lateral loading on the shaft from the belt causes a lot of wear, more than can easily be designed around. The sum of those two things means it's easy enough to just say replace it after X miles. Often times it's on a timing belt so that you can just replace both at the same time, saving on labor overhead of doing each separately (including if they were in different locations).

Apparently, BMW decided that the pump needed to be able to run even after the engine shut off. Disadvantages: can't use the simple reliable (if service oriented) design above. Advantages: electric motors don't deal with the same stresses (bearing loading) and generally have service lives long in excess of the motor itself. In theory, that means an electric pump can be designed to outlast the engine. Additionally, if it runs after the engine, you can have the residual heat function (which many here quite like!).

That said, the electric pump is much more complex than the effectively 3-part mechanical pump. If something goes wrong, it's not cost-effective to only replace the individual piece that broke, it's not a wear item so kinds of wear inherent to pumps but longer-term than the bearing that drives a mechanical pump's replacement interval still apply but may go uncorrected, etc.

tl;dr: they had a good reason to increase complexity, but increasing complexity ALWAYS increases possible points of failure. The same is true in lots of other systems in the car, ESPECIALLY the electrical. The same is true for turbo vs NA engines - there's a good reason to turbocharge an engine, but it's a complex system that adds lots of failure points.

The whole point is, BMW's design decisions are all based around the idea that increased complexity in return for functionality is a good tradeoff, whereas a budget manufacturer's design decisions strongly avoid increased complexity in avoidance of cost, with the ancillary benefit of simplicity and reliability.

That's a fair point. I guess in my particular case it was more the frequency of issues than it was the issues I was having. Not a problem anymore, I traded mine in yesterday and I'm covered for 6 years/120k miles.

[alexwhittemore]

Originally Posted by 7daysaweek

That's a fair point. I guess in my particular case it was more the frequency of issues than it was the issues I was having. Not a problem anymore, I traded mine in yesterday and I'm covered for 6 years/120k miles.

What'd you get?

[7daysaweek]

Originally Posted by alexwhittemore

What'd you get?

I got a 2014 vw gti.

[alexwhittemore]

Originally Posted by 7daysaweek

I got a 2014 vw gti.

Good choice! My roommate has one, great car. The only bummer is FWD. The Nalgene holders make up for it.

[JamesAC83]

Originally Posted by Miller335

Well you sure showed me there Mr badass.
The 5.3 was still farely new when it happened so ya when a pump costs three times as much as a previous gen pump that was used forever on the 350's you take note.

And I'll take your "cheap" comment directed at me as a compliment thank you very much.

someone's touchy... point here is you called the pump expensive when the bmw piece is more than 3 times the price.

And you can take the comment however you'd like, but the amount of whining when you have to replace the pump on your 335 should be decently amusing.