[zavy]

hi there,
im new to the world of owning my dream car (1991 E34 M5) and new to
this forum and was hoping that i could get some advice. i have a 1991 M5 which has done 120K miles and is in fair condition, but for one problem. the car smokes when ever you accelerate at anything more than a gentle pace. i dont give my car the thrashing of its life but would like to use some of its legandery performance.

the car has just had the head stripped and skimmed to get it flat, all new valve stem seals and 2 valves replaced which were suspect.

this has cured the problem to some extent, but it still smokes if you try and give it moderate acceleration.

i was just wondering if any of you could shed light as to what could still be causing this problem?

i dont want to get rid of the car...but at the same time im not wealthy enough to take it to BMW to get them to sort it out.

any help would be very much appreciated.

thanks

zavy. :M5thumbs:

 

[Cyrus]

What colour is the smoke?

If the head has been all sorted them you could well have a problem with a broken piston ring or just very badly worn bottom end.

If it does turn out to be this then the best option would be to buy a 2nd hand engine. They do pop up now and then. There are growing number of M5's which have excellent engines but very poor bodywork which are beyond economical restoration.

Dont stress, if your clever then there is a good chance youll get it sorted without spending too much.

Any enine rebuild will go into £4000 + in which u can buy a semi decewnt 3.6 so dont go down that route.

 

[Steve Mac]

these cars are known to give a puff of smoke on hard accelleration(seems worse at night in the rear view)so if this is all then worry ye not...however if this is blue or white smoke then :crying: :crying:

they also burn a bit of oil so no need to worry there either :wroom: :wroom:

hope this helps

p.s.welcome to the board and enjoy the drive cherrsagai

 

[M5e3438]

these cars are known to give a puff of smoke on hard accelleration(seems worse at night in the rear view)so if this is all then worry ye not...however if this is blue or white smoke then :crying: :crying:

they also burn a bit of oil so no need to worry there either :wroom: :wroom:

hope this helps

p.s.welcome to the board and enjoy the drive cherrsagai

I second all of the above - mine blows out load of crud on hard acceleration and has done since I bought it 3 years ago. It came 3rd out of 10 at the legendary M5 rolling thunder shoot out so nothing to worry about there.

Frank

 

[zavy]

hi ,

thanks to all for your advice on my problem. the smoke is not blue but not white.more a sort of gray colour....... when the head was off the pistons were looked at and there was a tiny bit of play in them.....but not enought to warrant it smoking the way it does i dont think.before the work carried out, it was almost smoking totaly..the only way you did not get it to smoke was to drive it realy gently. since the work has been done( am still taking my time.....not taking it above 3000 revs for first 500 miles to let everything bed in).. have tested accelaration once and the car did smoke......was not realy a puff...more like a mini cloud as the car accelarated. as i backed off and drove normaly no smoke. as i drive normaly now there is no smoke unless the car is under a fair bit of load....nothing crazy, but going up steep hill or pulling out of a junction at moderate speed then there is a puff of smoke.

im not realy sure what to do......have been wanting one of these for years and now that i got one its all gone "pete tong".
does anyone know where would be best to take the car for a professional inspection? ( dont want to take it to BMW as i just cant afford there prices)
i am in the midlands in leicestershire so anyone know of a good specialist in my area??
also where would i go about finding a second hand engine and how much would i be looking at price wize?

any help would be very much appreciated.

thanks to all those who have already helped. :cheers:
zavy.

 

[Jahangeer]

zavy

congrats and welcome, I would go to BMW and ask them to give you their opinion on the smoke, maybe it is just normal, but they will be able to tell you, I would take a couple of opinions - as sometimes BMW amongst other such "experts" can be way off target on their diagnosis.
Do you experience a drop in power any where?
Compare your car to another owners nearby.

Regards

J

 

[zavy]

hi there,

there does not seem to be any loss off power...in fact since its had the work done on the head it seems more responsive. as to taking it to a BMW garage.....the closest to me is in leicester. they are very friendly and helpfull ( as i have owned a E34 535i sport before) which i have taken there to have one or two bits done to the car. the work and service has been first rate to my experience..but they just charge too **** much....even for inspecting the car. i would prefer to find a good non-BMW specialist who has a proven track record in M power cars and take it there....but i have no idea where the closest one to where i live is.

also does anyone know of anywhere where you can buy second hand or reconditioned engine parts for M5's????

any and all help is very much appreciated.

thanks

zavy.

 

[Phlem5]

Zavy, sound's like your car might be over fueling, have you checked the plugs to see if they have heavy soot deposits ?, like some of the other post's I notice a bit of guff under full accn at high revs, this I'm told is normal. It might be a good idea to go to a good tuning shop with rolling road etc as they should be able to advise you of possible problems / causes for less than the dealer. Have you renewed your dist. cap / rotor arm / HT leads, recently ?, what's your fuel consumption like ?, if the ignition stuff is ok it may only be a duff injector causing the smoke.
cheers,
Phil.

 

[zavy]

hi phil,

thanks for offering some good advice. a friend of mine who is a mechanic did mention to me that he thought the car was running a bit rich......the plugs where looked at when the head work was done and they did look sooty.....but were cleaned and replaced back in. the car did have a new dizzy cap and rotor arm when the work was done ( have done just over 200 miles since work done) but it did not have new HT leads.....one thing i have noticed is that on start up the car makes a wont for a better word..a growling sort of noise..like a buzz which rises in pitch when the revs rise. the car does not always do this but it does happen fairly often.

also when the car was put back together it was run for the first time without the airbox on it just to see if it ran......as the airflow meter was not connected, could this possibly cause a problem with the running of the car. the noise sounds a bit like the noise i heard when it was run without the airbox. but i have checked all the air intake pipes for splits or cracks and can find none.

does anyone know of a good rolling road where i could possibly get the car set up properly??......am in leicestershire in the midlands....and am prepared to travel a bit to find a good place.

oh yeah.....as to fuel consumption...im not too sure on that as i can only compare it to a E34 535i sport i owned previously....and the M5 is very thirsty
compared to that. not sure what the rest of you get..but twenty quid will only get me about 70 miles and that is just normal driving...no heavy right foot at all.

any and all advice would be very much appreciated...and thanks to all who have given their advice already.:byebye:

thanks

zavy

 

[Phlem5]

Zavy, when you ran the motor without the MAF connected you probably caused the ECU/DME to change various management settings, i.e. fuel ratio, timing etc.
Try disconecting your battery for at least 30mins, reconnect it and take the car for a decent drive i.e. 40mins +. Doing this should reset the ECU which might improove your smoke situation. I am not sure if the 3.6 has the same management unit as the 3.8, but it's worth a try.
Also, you should change the H.T. leads if they are over 5/6 years old, and check this web site out if you haven't already - http://bmwe34m5.com/faqs/


Phil.

 

[zavy]

hi,

thanks again phil for your advice. i will disconnect the bat tomorrow for half hour then go for a drive to see if this improves the running. will also pop into euro car parst for some HT leads.

as to the smoke problem i fear the worst. took it for a drive today....nothing above 5000rpm but giving it some decent accelaration...and it smoked ( would give james bonds aston a run for its money in the smoke screen dept.)..also its using one hell of a lot of oil....over one ltr in 320 miles.

so.....i fear its somthing terminal......and expensive..:crying: :crying: :crying: :crying:

im not sure what to do now.

zavy

 

[DrSakke]

hi,

thanks again phil for your advice. i will disconnect the bat tomorrow for half hour then go for a drive to see if this improves the running. will also pop into euro car parst for some HT leads.

as to the smoke problem i fear the worst. took it for a drive today....nothing above 5000rpm but giving it some decent accelaration...and it smoked ( would give james bonds aston a run for its money in the smoke screen dept.)..also its using one hell of a lot of oil....over one ltr in 320 miles.

so.....i fear its somthing terminal......and expensive..:crying: :crying: :crying: :crying:

im not sure what to do now.

zavy

Sorry to hear that. That oil consumption is hard to explain with anything else than faulty oil rings or something in that range....

How long have you had the car? If you werent informed of the problem at purchase, the seller has some responsibility(easier if you bought it from a dealer).

Hope it sorts out
Sakke

 

[zavy]

hi,

i have had the car only about three months.....the problem is....the problem was not apparent when i bought the car. i think its just been my bad luck that whatever it is was going to happen but it was not actually happening when i bought the car. it has happened since i bought it.

i am torn between taking the engine appart to check the pistons and bottom end..( time consuming and hard work..but would save me some money)..or taking it to a specialist who would probably have a fairly good idea what it was and be able to fix it fairly quickly ( but that might cost me a arm and a leg...and right now i not got that much money to lavish on her).

the other option is to find a second hand engine...but i got no idea where to look or how much to pay? and i might be buying something with the same problem or something worse.

oh what to do................:confused2 :confused3 :crying:

but one thing i can say is a big thank you to all who have taken time to try and help me out...it is very much appreciated :cheers:

thanks

zavy

 

[yewcorner]

Zavy,

Wouldn't a compression/leak down test identify what your fault maybe? I think you mentioned sometime back that when you had the head off the mechanics indicated that there was some play on the piston rings?

If you've had the top end done then I think you would be well advised to have the 'leak down test' to identify the worn piston rings; and then have the rings replaced and have the crankshaft bearing etc. done at the same time.

You would then have a pretty much overhauled engine good for another 200k miles (if properly maintained!!)?

hi,

i have had the car only about three months.....the problem is....the problem was not apparent when i bought the car. i think its just been my bad luck that whatever it is was going to happen but it was not actually happening when i bought the car. it has happened since i bought it.

i am torn between taking the engine appart to check the pistons and bottom end..( time consuming and hard work..but would save me some money)..or taking it to a specialist who would probably have a fairly good idea what it was and be able to fix it fairly quickly ( but that might cost me a arm and a leg...and right now i not got that much money to lavish on her).

the other option is to find a second hand engine...but i got no idea where to look or how much to pay? and i might be buying something with the same problem or something worse.

oh what to do................:confused2 :confused3 :crying:

but one thing i can say is a big thank you to all who have taken time to try and help me out...it is very much appreciated :cheers:

thanks

zavy

 

[zavy]

hi there,

having the piston rings changed and the bottom end checked to see if there is anything wrong is an option.....but how much would this work cost?

i cant afford the price that BMW would charge for this.....so does anyone know of a good specialist who could carry this work out for a resonable price?

any info on a good specialist would be very much appreciated.

thanks

zavy

 

[Jahangeer]

hi there,

having the piston rings changed and the bottom end checked to see if there is anything wrong is an option.....but how much would this work cost?

i cant afford the price that BMW would charge for this.....so does anyone know of a good specialist who could carry this work out for a resonable price?

any info on a good specialist would be very much appreciated.

thanks

zavy

-----------------------

A compression test is not expensive, sorry I cannot elaborate but what 50quid? Anyone know the price at BMW?

 

[zavy]

hi

lol i was actually thinking how much would it cost to have the piston rings changed and the bottom end looked at...... i could afford a compresion test ok...its just the work that would need doing after that which is the issue.

so if anyone knows of a good specialist who is ok on value i would be most interested in hearing from you.

thanks to all.

zavy

 

[yewcorner]

I would guess from my own experience that it is going to be upwards of 20/25 at £45 an hour, plus parts (rings, gasket sets, bearing sets etc.). I believe the most labour intensive part would be doing all the plastigauge stuff to ensure the new bearings fit onto the crankshaft properly. It would also be advisable to have a new clutch fitted at this point also propshaft donut. So I would guess the total cost including clutch is going to be £1500 - £2000 plus VAT.

I could recommend Munich Motors (Wokingham, Berkshire).

Be prepared to have other parts replaced, as it makes sense to have these done whilst the engine is out.

If you go that route please call Steve Edwards at William Jacks BMW, Sunningdale 01344 630420; he will give you maximum discount (20/25%) dependant on parts and what margin he has in the part.

Hope that helps

hi

lol i was actually thinking how much would it cost to have the piston rings changed and the bottom end looked at...... i could afford a compresion test ok...its just the work that would need doing after that which is the issue.

so if anyone knows of a good specialist who is ok on value i would be most interested in hearing from you.

thanks to all.

zavy

 

[zavy]

wow!

£1500 - £2000 plus vat...and thats just an estimate.!!.....thats to rich for me...
i could probably scrape £1500 together but that would be the tops...and as you cannot put an exact price on the work..it would be pointless to to say yes to have it done...

looks like its going to be a "for sale" moment.....:crying: :crying: :crying: :crying:

am going to take a big loss i think...

thanks to all who have helped out with my troubles..

zavy.

 

[zavy]

hi all,

..............ok now that i have recoverd from that little supprise..and i got my brain back in gear...after a bit of sorting out i will have approx £3000 to hand in the next few months.

the question is.........do i have the work carried out to this engine to bring it back to proper working order..............or do i look for another engine to drop into the car.......bearing in mind..that if it goes into the garage for work its going to need at the very least new front suspension ( by the way.....are the front shocks on the M5 self leveling as well or are they just standard shocks? )

am still in a quandry..........
zavy