[repete]

Hi all! New to this forum here, been a long time lurker but figured I’d finally introduce myself.

I’m Peter, I’m a student studying mechanical engineering and working as a aircraft ground support equipment mechanic, fixing fuel trucks, tugs, and the like.

My BMW journey begun when I bought an ‘06 330i 6mt with 194,000 miles, not realizing how much of a moneypit high mileage BMWs can be especially when not taken care of!

I knew nothing about these cars at first, previous owner just told me “it just leaks oil.” Sure, it just leaked oil, maybe like a quart every 500mi!! Turned out the aluminum head bolts up front all had snapped so I replaced them, that stopped the worst of the oil leaks.

I did the VCG and forgot a ground strap, which popped the DME and caused it to melt my #6 coil. I had a local BMW specialist clone a replacement and that fixed that issue.

I’ve had my fair share (or probably more) of trouble with water pumps, the OG failed, I replaced that, didn’t get a fitting on all the way and it popped off, pump ran dry, and failed again. Yeah, it overheated a couple times, I’ll come back to that later.

Later on my clutch started slipping, so I figured why not replace that! Popped the transmission out and replaced the DMF with a single mass since it was cheaper, machineable, and the NVH doesn’t bother me. Except…I put the clutch in backwards. Silly me. After a second replacement the clutch was all good. Did the oilpan gasket as well while I was under there, except it still leaks. Oh well.

One day I was driving home from work when all of a sudden I saw a huge plume of smoke behind me. Nice! Turns out the overheating previously warped the head just enough that over time the head gasket finally gave up (the block was fine though surprisingly!).

I pulled the head off, sent it off to get machined, and got to work cleaning everything and threw a new head gasket in there. Got the head back and popped it all back together, it’s been running great ever since! I’m just over 211k now, hoping it’ll last even longer.

I’ve learned a ton of lessons with this car, I know some of you may wonder why I dumped so much time and money into a turd. Cause it was fun! That’s all.

My plans now are to buy a 335d and manual swap it like a few members on here have. I’d like to do some experiments with trying to get cruise to work with the swap, but I know that will be a tall order.

I’ve got a lot to learn, but I’m looking forward to doing some fun stuff with BMWs and sharing it with you guys. Nice to meet yall!

[whyzee125]

Originally Posted by repete

Hi all! New to this forum here, been a long time lurker but figured I’d finally introduce myself.

I’m Peter, I’m a student studying mechanical engineering and working as a aircraft ground support equipment mechanic, fixing fuel trucks, tugs, and the like.

My BMW journey begun when I bought an ‘06 330i 6mt with 194,000 miles, not realizing how much of a moneypit high mileage BMWs can be especially when not taken care of!

I knew nothing about these cars at first, previous owner just told me “it just leaks oil.” Sure, it just leaked oil, maybe like a quart every 500mi!! Turned out the aluminum head bolts up front all had snapped so I replaced them, that stopped the worst of the oil leaks.

I did the VCG and forgot a ground strap, which popped the DME and caused it to melt my #6 coil. I had a local BMW specialist clone a replacement and that fixed that issue.

I’ve had my fair share (or probably more) of trouble with water pumps, the OG failed, I replaced that, didn’t get a fitting on all the way and it popped off, pump ran dry, and failed again. Yeah, it overheated a couple times, I’ll come back to that later.

Later on my clutch started slipping, so I figured why not replace that! Popped the transmission out and replaced the DMF with a single mass since it was cheaper, machineable, and the NVH doesn’t bother me. Except…I put the clutch in backwards. Silly me. After a second replacement the clutch was all good. Did the oilpan gasket as well while I was under there, except it still leaks. Oh well.

One day I was driving home from work when all of a sudden I saw a huge plume of smoke behind me. Nice! Turns out the overheating previously warped the head just enough that over time the head gasket finally gave up (the block was fine though surprisingly!).

I pulled the head off, sent it off to get machined, and got to work cleaning everything and threw a new head gasket in there. Got the head back and popped it all back together, it’s been running great ever since! I’m just over 211k now, hoping it’ll last even longer.

I’ve learned a ton of lessons with this car, I know some of you may wonder why I dumped so much time and money into a turd. Cause it was fun! That’s all.

My plans now are to buy a 335d and manual swap it like a few members on here have. I’d like to do some experiments with trying to get cruise to work with the swap, but I know that will be a tall order.

I’ve got a lot to learn, but I’m looking forward to doing some fun stuff with BMWs and sharing it with you guys. Nice to meet yall!

Welcome and super cool intro! You're more hardcore than most here and if you enjoy this sort of work, you will find e90 and esp 335d ownership super rewarding.

Great job for sticking with it and now with what youve learned you'll have a much better time going forward! Got any pics of the 330?

[repete]

Thanks whyzee! I definitely agree, these cars can take a lot of dedication to keep them going after so many miles, but it’s definitely been rewarding.

Here’s a couple pics, she ain’t nothing special but she’s definitely my favorite daily driver I’ve had so far!

[jsunma]

What Whyzee said...I admire your dedication and willingness to solve problems and troubleshoot. More than many people would be willing to do.

I am curious about:

<blockquote>I did the VCG and forgot a ground strap, which popped the DME and caused it to melt my #6 coil. </blockquote>

This is not something I've heard others talk about. How did you manage to short out (I assume that's what you mean by "popped") the DME while doing a VCG?

Also...you now want to move to a diesel? Seems that you'll be squandering much of your earned knowledge about gas engines when you do that.

[repete]

Originally Posted by jsunma

This is not something I've heard others talk about. How did you manage to short out (I assume that's what you mean by "popped") the DME while doing a VCG?

It was a pretty weird (and probably rare) situation, I had disconnected the ground strap on the passenger side right next to the coolant reservoir and forgot to put it back before starting the car.

It wouldn’t start obviously due to missing the ground strap for the coils, but I made the mistake of reconnecting it with the battery on (and ignition on if I remember correctly). It sparked which was definitely not a good sign, when I tried to start it again it would start but was misfiring pretty badly. My #6 coil started smoking and when I pulled it out it had melted itself right into two pieces!

After some diagnosis I found that one of the MOSFETs that controls the coils had been overloaded by the surge caused from reconnecting the ground with power applied, and it became stuck on essentially shorting the coil out and thus melting it.

I had a local BMW specialist attempt repairing the DME by replacing the coil MOSFETs, but I ended up having problems down the road with the BSD bus. I had ruled out all of the components on the BSD chain and I figure the ground strap situation probably killed some other component in the DME related to the BSD, so I just had it cloned and replaced it entirely. No more issues since!

Originally Posted by jsunma

Also...you now want to move to a diesel? Seems that you'll be squandering much of your earned knowledge about gas engines when you do that.

I don’t see it as squandering anything, I’m still very much into the gas engines! I don’t plan on getting rid of the 330i anytime soon, I just love diesels as well (I’ve done my fair share of work on interTRASHional and freightliner trucks at work). I’ve heard lots of good things about the M57 platform, in my eyes a performance diesel car would be a really fun project especially since you don’t see many cool diesel cars in the US (let alone kansas, it’s all just lifted truck bros out here ).

I love learning new things and I think a diesel project car would be a great way to try some new stuff. If I ever have the money for another project car though, I’d definitely like a 335i or M3 to mess around with!