Car died while driving and now won’t start

[johnnylud3]

Bimmerforums don’t fail me now. Was driving the other day and car just stopped running without warning. Tried restarting and no luck, just one thunk each time try and start the car.

Had it towed home and replaced the alternator. I then tried jumping the car to get it started and it made horrible grinding sound but would not start.

I then assumed starter was to blame and replaced the starter. I also had the batter my tested and recharged. Upon trying to start the car again it was back to the one clunk. Same thing if I try jumping from terminals under the hood.

Next I replaced the engine to chassis ground strap which was green and frayed when I grabbed it. I replaced with generic 4ga strap. Upon trying to start still same issue.

I then hooked up multimeter at battery terminal under hood and negative to engine. It reads 12V but when trying to start car it blips down to 4V. My thought was maybe the connection from this to the starter was restricting flow due to poor connection and used jumper cable from post to starter and tried again with same result.

Anyone have some words of wisdom?

[X3456]

Did the car throw off any codes and have you used a bmw code reader...I keep one in my car continuously

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[johnnylud3]

No check engine light or anything but ran with PA Soft and had a few, nothing that seemed relevant.

-Power window open circuit jam protection strip or lost of scaling
-a bunch of shadow codes related to SRS, prob from battery
- oil pressure switch signal unfeasible

[johnnylud3]

I have reviewed some wiring diagrams and it seems EWS provides the 12v signal to engage the starter via pin 1 and gets ignition signal from pin 2. Other than that it gets power from jumper terminal which I already tried to bypass using a cable. I tried putting fuse between pins 1 & 2 of EWS but same clunk when trying to start the car. I am going to check with a test light white wire on starter that comes from EWS to ensure it’s delivering signal.

[EmeraldBeam]

Did you try to turn crankshaft/ engine by hand with wrench?

[johnnylud3]

Can turn about a quarter with wrench before too much resistance. I did not pull the plugs to relive pressure and cannot get a lot of leverage without removing the fan and getting breaker on there.

[johnnylud3]

Alrighty....removed plugs and they had sludge on them. Cylinder 6 plug was fully soaked. When turning car by hand the oil came up from cylinders. It hydrolocked. Someone please tell me there are cases (not uncommonly) where this has happened and rod was not bent.

I was planning to cover the cylinders with rags and bump the starter to clear them out. Then replace the ccv and run it with fingers crossed everything is ok.

[e30luv318i]

I’ve seen the PCV freeze with ice and hydrolock with oil.. but normally after you turn the car off and try to restart it. Chances aren’t good if you were at high RPM’s. I’d still try to free the motor up, worst case you lose some of your time.

[jclausen]

If it hydrolocked well driving and does not have a bent rod I'd be surprised

[johnnylud3]

Removed main relay and cleared cylinders. When removing old pcv the line that returns oil to dipstick tube was backed up. When I cut the line trying to remove it A fair amount of watery oily fluid dumped out. When I removed dipstick tube it became evident that the double wall it drains through was clogged causing everything to back up. Waiting on one part before I slap it back together and see if it sounds ok.

[johnnylud3]

All is well....giant smoke cloud when first started, couldn’t see 2ft in front of me. Had to drive around to clear it all out and then threw in fresh plugs.