M57 used buying guide

[Lukas239]

Forgive me if this has been done before.

Considering a 325/330d (E90 I believe) as a next car which will be a used car purchase for circa £8K. At this price I'm mostly looking at 70k miles and above.

In as few words, is this a wise idea? They seem to have depreciated massively and thats maybe cause for concern. I'm happy to do basic maintenance myself and keep up with servicing but I'd really rather avoid massive, unexpected bills.

I've heard these are relatively reliable bar the cheap-to-sort swirl flap issue. Is this correct or best coming up with another plan?

Cheers

[AI1694]

For that budget you can get the LCI 325d with the newer N57 engine.

But if you insist on the M57, I put up a recent thread asking for buying advice, it’s got good info in it. Recently bought a 2005 E90 330d and it is a great car.

[Lukas239]

AI1694 said:

For that budget you can get the LCI 325d with the newer N57 engine.

But if you insist on the M57...

Absolutely not insistent on the M57, was under the impression it was the more reliable of the 2 based on a brief search.

[helix402]

N57 is less reliable than the M57 but not too bad reliability wise.

[AI1694]

I’m guessing you mean the timing chain. How common is that on the N57s?

[JWH]

N57 is notably more powerful and a bit more economical. With the observation that the experience of 1 person alone is virtually worthless in the overall scheme of things I have a 2009 330D touring manual, bought 5 years ago on 56k currently on 183k. Only issues have been a cracked oil filter housing ('they all do that sir') which was a simple fix, a replacement thermostat and an ABS sensor on the front nearside. Other than that faultlessly reliable and has averaged a real 43mpg over that period, much of which has been spent on the motorway cruising between 85 and 90.