'03 540i 6-speed - timing chain guide abrupt failure, now what?

[Fred in Maine]

Looking for advice - fix or replace?

Last Thursday, as I pulled into a parking lot, I got "low oil pressure, stop engine" message.
I pulled into a space and turned off the engine in less than 15 seconds.
The windows were closed, but I did not hear or sense anything wrong.
I checked the dipstick and found normal oil and wondered if it was a sensor issue.
I started the engine, heard a clatter noise from the engine, got an SES light but no message, and immediately shut it down and towed to dealer.

Today, dealer quotes $6500 [parts and tax 2500, labor 4000] for "replacing timing chain guides and all related required components".
Turner Motorsport quotes $4500, possibly more depending on what they find during job.
Don't know the cost for the tow to Turner, 70 miles from dealer.

Original owner, production 9/02, 155,000 miles, immaculate maintainence - old school.
Have had excellent relationship with dealer for 13+ years now, including $2-4,000 per year since going off warrenty in 11/08.
Have had all the usual issues in this time, and then some.

Love car when it runs but this is in another league when it comes to failures.

Recently test drove a 340i with a 6-speed - good but not as good as mine.
Voodoo in me says current failure is payback for even looking at a new car!

Topaz blue, DSP stereo, in dash CD, cold weather package, V-1 hard-wired, separate winter wheels/tires.
Near mint condition except: mild rust at driver's side read door frame and trunk latch, headliner partial detachment at one C pillar, one rear window actuator making noise but still working, minor damage to both front and rear bumpers, and typical paint chips, minor door dings, and pitted windshield.
Takada airbag recall pending - due for fix this spring/summer per BMW.

Car was driving perfectly all winter - better than usual after I had multiple fluids and worn suspension part replaced.
Feeling guilty that driving it hard in what felt like perfect condition contributed to blown timing chain guides.

So, fix or trash?
If I fix, should I keep it or sell it?
Anyone out there who has done this?

Thanks in advance for advice and comments.

[JimLev]

Welcome to the forum Fred. Did you use to be on Roadfly? Screen name looks familiar.
Get AAA Plus, they have a 100 mile tow, take it to Turner.
A bunch of us have done the chain guides.

[Fred in Maine]

I was on Roadfly back when car was newer and I had some issues that were annoying - funny now in retropect.
I read the forum from time to time but have not hit any big issues in years.

Now I am on the verge of hanging it up and moving on... wife pressure with yet another big repair bill and feeling reliability/trust is shot.
Stranded in NY last spring with a 3rd throttle body failure in 4 years and had to drive a rental home and back [repair was free however!].
Towed for throttle body each of the other two failures, both local to my home.
Towed for alternator failure and for MAF also...
Each time there is the cost, the time, and the sense of when will this end.

But there is nothing out there like this car that I have found, so I haven't changed yet!
I have been looking since the NY thing.
I test drove a '16 340i with a 6 speed, and it is nice, but it just isn't a V8.
I'm also thinking about a '16 M3 or the previous V8 M3, but haven't found a way to test drive one and I worry that might be even less reliable.
Up until last week, my plan was to leave a message begging a test drive or ride on the windshield of an M3 in my garage.

Worried what is next if I go the fix route...
Dealer mechanic who does my car last fall said everything looked great, maybe rear brake lines would need R+R, but no other leaks/rust/wear issues found.
Then this and I just feel aweful.
Was expecting 200 to 250,000 miles after all the care I'd invested in.

Thanks for the encouragement.
How did things work out for you when you did the chain guides?

[JimLev]

Right, nothing like the pull from the V8.
The thing that is not normal in your case is the low oil pressure warning, unless it was idling way below 550RPM.
The oil pump is driven by a separate chain, no guides on this short chain.
I didn't have any issues doing the chain guides, you just need the timing kit tools, parts were sourced from Bill Dodge BMW, and 20 hours if you've never done it before. The following year I did the Vanos, should have done both at the same time as retiming the engine is required for both jobs. The actual timing doesn't take that long, taking the front of the engine off, replacing guides, and then putting it back together is what take time to do.
Did mine at ~137K before any trouble arose.

[capebmw]

PM sent

[Fred in Maine]

I am waiting to hear back for Bill Dodge as to what diagnostics they did to come up with an estimate based on the timing chain guides, since the failure seemed different than what I have read others describe and given the oil pressure light.

There was no low RPM idling - just boom, red light and that warning bell we all have come to learn to despise.
As I noted, this happened right as I was pulling into a small parking lot that was empty, so I was able to shut down safely almost immediately.

Turner thought the oil message was odd also and thought maybe a piece of plastic jammed an oil circulating opening or something along those lines.

There was no message about oil pressure when I briefly ran the engine after noting normal oil on the dipstick.
At that point, for the first time, I could hear noise and got an SES light.

I appreciate your faith in Turner.
I know they are a class act.
Bill Dodge has been expensive, but they have also been good over the years.
They have also cut me breaks on costs [albeit higher costs than indies would charge].
They have also been generous in their interpretations as to warrenty expiration times.

[mxchris727]

Hi Fred,

I would suggest shopping around at different BMW specialty shops. My car (same as yours) has 137K on it, and I am planning to replace the guides sometime soon. I ordered the parts last summer, but ECS Tuning had poorly pack them resulting in damage. They amounted to about $800. Labor is going to be the biggest expense.

[edjack]

Do you know if they pulled the pan for the diagnostic?

[Mach540]

Turner thought the oil message was odd also and thought maybe a piece of plastic jammed an oil circulating opening or something along those lines.

This seems unlikely to me.

Plastic should drop to the bottom, and to get to the intake, it has to float 1/2 inch up. Then there is a screen on the pickup. Then it gets ran thru the oil pump, which would not even flinch at grinding it to dust. But most likely would pass thru unmolested. And then it is screened out in the oil filter.

I don't know what caused it. That is quite a mystery. Just don't think it's the plastic bits.

[BMW540san]

You obviously love the car, took good care of it, spent bunch of money already on repairs and maintenance so obvious answer is to keep it.
I can see you don't work on cars but your should certainly be able to find good indy to do it for way less that even Turner somewhat still high price.
You could do your homework and with mutiple info on this forum already buy every single part from either Morristown BMW or Fairfax BMW for way less than $2500.
Sure, most places prefer to supply parts so they can make money on it, but if you have alternate transportation, why not get parts yourself and struck a deal with good indy an probably do it for around $3000.

[RRH]

Think about it this way. You know the rest of the car is in awesome shape and your timing chain guides lasted 155k miles. Say you get another 150k out of this next set, and another 14 years. Even if you do spend the maximum of 6500 now, you will absorb that cost over the next many miles and years. And it would be awesome to have a great condition older E39. Would turn heads for sure. And cars aren't necessarily going to get better to drive. Arguably worse.

Why trade a known awesome car for a new mediocre car.

[The Chucker]

It's always easy to spend someone else's money, but I would fix it...especially since you know what you have. Whatever the issue, I wish you well.

[sooch]

I am waiting to hear back for Bill Dodge as to what diagnostics they did to come up with an estimate based on the timing chain guides, since the failure seemed different than what I have read others describe and given the oil pressure light.

There was no low RPM idling - just boom, red light and that warning bell we all have come to learn to despise.
As I noted, this happened right as I was pulling into a small parking lot that was empty, so I was able to shut down safely almost immediately.

Turner thought the oil message was odd also and thought maybe a piece of plastic jammed an oil circulating opening or something along those lines.

There was no message about oil pressure when I briefly ran the engine after noting normal oil on the dipstick.
At that point, for the first time, I could hear noise and got an SES light.

I appreciate your faith in Turner.
I know they are a class act.
Bill Dodge has been expensive, but they have also been good over the years.
They have also cut me breaks on costs [albeit higher costs than indies would charge].
They have also been generous in their interpretations as to warrenty expiration times.

Hey Fred, I'm 1 town over in Scarb. and know a couple indys that are more than capable of saving you a few $. I was more in the ballpark of ~3 for everything said and done. Been using him a lot lately with all my recent maintenance and hes been good in return. Shoot me a PM and I can give you his contact info and you can give him a shot. Let us know what Bill Dodge finds and get back to us!

[bamaboy473]

Re: towing. U-Haul rents tow dollys for about $50/day and maybe they have a 4 hour rate?

[gmak]

Or you can sell the car to someone who will fix it up, or part it out, keep the 6500 + the additional cash and get a superb condition 540i /6 m-sport that has had the timing chain guides done. I mean, that's what it comes down to - where will you get the most bang for the buck? Trying to repair this car for 6500, or selling it and getting a better one for 8000?

[philly98540]

Gotta figure out why oil light came on. You said the oil light came on and you turned off the engine within 15 seconds. Then you checked the oil level and it was fine. Then you restarted it and the oil light did not come on, but there was a lot of clatter. I think I got that right.

Maybe a really large piece of guide plastic broke off and floated right to the oil pump pickup hole and blocked it. Then once turned off, the chunk floated away and oil could flow on the next restart. I think its possible, yet never seen before, lol, and the motor should be fine.

Id get it to and indy and have the lower oil pan removed and go from there.

[Wishin4anM5]

There are a few of us locally that have done this a few times... I'd certainly be willing to lend a hand and do it on a weekend up at your place Fred. Keep us posted.

- Mike

[JimLev]

Maybe a really large piece of guide plastic broke off and floated right to the oil pump pickup hole and blocked it. Then once turned off, the chunk floated away and oil could flow on the next restart. I think its possible, yet never seen before, lol, and the motor should be fine.

This is very possible, I've seen it on the last 540 I did the guides on. In this case it was a piece of the guide that stayed lodged in the pickup, didn't block enough of the screen to limit the oil flow enough to drop the oil pressure.

Fred, open up an account at Bill Dodge (very easy) and you can purchase parts for 25-30% off.
Later today I'll dig up what I paid.
Bought my M5 front bumper from BD too.

[sooch]

This is very possible, I've seen it on the last 540 I did the guides on. In this case it was a piece of the guide that stayed lodged in the pickup, didn't block enough of the screen to limit the oil flow enough to drop the oil pressure.

Fred, open up an account at Bill Dodge (very easy) and you can purchase parts for 25-30% off.
Later today I'll dig up what I paid.
Bought my M5 front bumper from BD too.

I feel like I should take advantage of the account over at BD, they are right down the road from my work... Definitely interested to see what you paid for an m5 bumper there!

[Darxide]

I got the Oil pressure warning when my timing chain guides failed. In my case, the damage was done. It ended up being cheaper to simply replace the motor with a rebuilt one (about 4500 total).

[mbonder]

I had the same issue with mine (2000 540iT). Except this was about 1000 miles after purchase. I pulled one valve cover and realized that the PO hadn't changed the oil at correct intervals and there were mountains of sludge all over everything. At the time I was pissed because I found some receipts from his local dealership which pointed to him knowing about the situation but never disclosing it before the sale. I found a wrecked 540i with an engine that had the chain guide replacement documented and swapped that into the car (well had an indie do it for $3800 among several other repairs). Car has been bulletproof since over more than 10k miles since the install.

I'd find an indie to do the guide repair as it seems as though you've got great maintenance history and that's something you can't have faith in over the long run. My belief is that the e39 is one of the greatest cars BMW ever built, the new cars, although nice because they are new or newer, but they can't compare to models like the e39 or e30 for simplistic comfort, driver feel, and ownership experience. Keep yours on the road and you'll be happy for another 100k miles.

[JimLev]

I have 3 pages of parts from BD for the chain guides.
Page 1 has 19 different items, most of the gaskets needed, O-rings, tensioner, etc. That came to $270 with shipping.
Page 2 are the 3 guides, $228 w/shipping.
Page 3 a few more gaskets and the main timing chain, $204 w/shipping.
So roughly $700 in parts.

The M5 bumper order included everything.
Bumper, porkchops, fog lights and frames, trim, moldings, lower mess grill, every screw, etc.
All of that came to $785

[AquilaBMW]

I am in the camp that says either fix the car or sell it someone who. You have one of the rarest of M-Sports, (Topaz Blue). Whichever way you decide to go, certainly don't trash it.

I can also appreciate the thought of moving on at some point with any car. If you are at that point, then again, selling it on to another enthusiast would make tons of sense.

Out here, TCG jobs are around $3K - Parts and Labour at most indys. I know that you took it to a dealer, so that price is not exactly surprising.

I took wondered about oil issue that came up. At the least, I would pull the oil pan and in addition to looking for the dreaded pieces of plastic, I would check the oil pump bolt to see if it backed out. While rare, it has been known to occur.

We are of course members of an E39 forum, so you know which way we are going to lean as far as the choice on the car Make the decision that is best for you first.

[aspensilver540]

Hey Fred, I'm 1 town over in Scarb. and know a couple indys that are more than capable of saving you a few $. I was more in the ballpark of ~3 for everything said and done. Been using him a lot lately with all my recent maintenance and hes been good in return. Shoot me a PM and I can give you his contact info and you can give him a shot. Let us know what Bill Dodge finds and get back to us!

Fred, I'd look into suggestions of sooch. $3500 is a common going rate, $4500 sounds too high. I suggest fixing the car, a 2003 Msport in Topaz is simply beautiful. Don't go back to the dealer except to buy parts with a discount.

[Plattus1000]

Doing the chain guides allows you to get all up in the engine too. You can address some common weaknesses in the assembly. Water pump if it has the plastic impeller, new gaskets, new valley pan, repaint your valve covers, new o-rings for your cooling system, the ccv on the back of the intake manifold, new vacuum lines etc. If you pull the engine out for the work, exhaust headers to really add some hp would be a great win.

Getting a new car that's as rewarding to drive is possible however the cost to do so can be insane.

Smiles per gallon.

Good luck and take advantage of the guys in here. They've been there, done that and know a ton that can save you a ton.

I recently had this work performed on my wife's 4.6is X5 and my 4.6 e39 wagon. I'm so thankful that I'll not have to repeat it for 13-15 years or so.

Look at your car and ask it what it would do in your shoes. I think you know the answer. Crack on and good luck!