E91 Straight Six Bearding
Discussion
AmirGSXR said:
Edited to add, that I have just updated my Creator 310 to the latest software which now gives me battery registrations functionality and some other additional features!
Good to know, I didn't realise that was an option with the Creator.Edited by AmirGSXR on Thursday 25th July 23:18
bmwmike said:
I really like the look of this. If it were mine, I would revert the grill, side indicators and wheels to silver and take off the silly mirror covers. It also reminds me I really need to clean my Vermilion red E92! Such a nice colour when it's under good light.
MajorMantra said:
Good to know, I didn't realise that was an option with the Creator.
Yes, I followed the instructions in the link below using my creator C310+ attached to my laptop.https://www.obdii365.com/service/update-creator-se...
Another update...
The new battery solved my issues. The old battery was in there since 44,000 miles (probably 10 years old), and I fitted my one at 120,000. Interesting information, the old failing Yuasa battery was an 80Ah, and I replaced it with another 80Ah Yuasa battery. When I went to register my new battery using Creator, it was showing a 70Ah battery in DME registry. What must have happened is that whoever fitted the battery at 44,000 miles did not code for the Ah change from 70 to 80. However, this did not seem to affect the battery as it performed fine for ~80k miles/10 years.
I wanted to code the correct battery Ah, so I downloaded Bimmercode to code the battery to 80Ah (I used a Vlinker FS OBD 2 connector I have for my Ford). Bimmercode was £40 for the basic licence but allows me to adjust lots of other features if needed. The Creator C310+ was then used to register the battery. So Bimmercode is needed to code battery, but registration can be done using Creator. Hopefully this info is relevant to others that come across it in the future.
Court_S said:
JakeT said:
Fingers crossed. And lots of time caning it! 
No check engine light on today. We had a fairly spirited drive to C&M tonight and it was fine, even on the biting bits. I’m still going to chuck the Cataclean in once I’m down to a quarter of a tank.
Hey All,
OP checking in for a rare visit…at some point in the last few years I kinda massively reduced my forum usage and er life stuff. But this thread is a part of me so I like to check in. I still have my E91, my annual mileage has massively reduced, but I am now on a handful of miles short of 245k
.
To join back in with some content, I’ll post a few updates of things that have happened…can’t remember the last update I gave, I’ll jump back to mid 2020 so at least there’s some interesting stuff…)
September 2020, I fitted some Brembo 4 pots from a F32 435i with 340mm discs, they just about sneak behind the 17 inch wheels. I had to do the most minor amount of trimming of the dust shield to make them fit, otherwise fitted straight on. (Actually looking at my records I’d completely rebuilt/refurbed, all new discs pads and shoes on the rear brakes in Aug 2020 too).
In 2021, it seems I literally didn’t need to do anything apart from an oil+filters service. I have a note that I had the check engine light come up for “2aa2” camshaft sensor – I cleaned it and it disappeared and didn’t come up again, and also 29F4 and 29F5 for low cat efficiency – but I didn’t believe them as they happened at EXACTLY the same mileage/time/trigger… and again didn’t return after clearing.
May/June ’22 I didn’t a chunk of maintenance, new front suspension arms (all Lemforder)
Finally changed that headlight levelling arm that failed pretty early on in my ownership and I had just cable tied to get me by..and that had worked I kept the part until a sensible time to install it!
Seems they were the original front arms I was changing – they didn’t even look too bad for 230k miles.
Other little things happened then, like new number plate lights, the old ones had corroded and were intermittently working I worked out, sometimes the lightbulb out warning would flash up on the dash…. I swapped them for LED ones from a 2007 model as I had a spare bootlid – obviously they’re different connectors, so I pieced together some loom adaptors (yes the insulating tape was a bit jank but I couldn’t find my heatshrink at the time!).
Now the number plate lights worked reliably, but the car was telling me that the lights weren’t working (ironic as they were actually working as opposed to before where the corroded connection wasn’t working but the car thought it was!), so I coded that light check out…
Oh yeah – and fitted brand new dealer plates from the original dealer who sold the car afaik…little nerdy touches and that!
Another couple of things that happened in ’22, all the pad wear sensors had a chronic melt down, and the car was freaking out that I had no brakes! No idea what triggered that or why it happened… it was parked on a bit of a slope on a wet field in wales for a week…no idea if that had anything to do with it.
So I got the pad wear sensor and shorted out together and reset everything. I take my wheels off often enough to manually check the pads….
In July 2022, I had a door locking actuator fail (the drivers door did this back in July 2017 – but less spectacularly, I could use the mechanical key, just the remote central locking wouldn’t lock or unlock it). This time it was the rear o/s…and it was stuck in the locked position. So that was fun removing the interior enough to get the door card off from inside, to then try and somehow, and I have no idea how unlock the thing so I could open the door! This part is one of the most common to BMW’s you can buy, it spans many many models, and got an updated revision at some point – so the replacement came from a relatively new 5 series.
At some point I’d get my hands on some Style 216 wheels (from the 320 si, BBS wheel things). I got the refurbed and wrapped in new rubber. I even ceramic coated them, and got those self levelling centre caps.
Here’s a photo of them fitted (and filthy, coz you know, November in Yorkshire)
.
So at the end of 2022, the car intermittently started to take a while to crank, and then would run a bit rough, and then be fine. I had the 2AA2 inlet camshaft fault code – and from experience of once forgetting to plug the inlet camshaft sensor wiring back in, the car cranks a while and does start in like a safer mode as it calculates from the exhaust camshaft sensor and the main crank sensor what it thinks the inlet camshaft sensor should do… I changed the sensor…still did it intermittently. I had vanos solenoid codes…swapped the solenoid and they didn’t follow – but then bought two new vanos solenoids anyway and fitted them… (I’d changed only one way back when I bought the car as it was an issue then…and figured they have been talked about as a semi-service item). Yeah, that didn’t fix it. After much buggering about, I traced the individual cables back to the ecu box, they were all good, I was then backprobing the connector/sensor and manually turning the car over by hand to verify the sensor for no good reason (I’m always buying oe sensor and stuff..bonus points if you have the BMW logo ground off!), and figured out it was a dodgy connection plug onto the sensor! So I bought a new plug, de-pinned the old one, crimped new connectors on, and voila, fault fixed!
No interesting photos for this one, but here’s one for the story.
That’ll do for now, I’ll fill you in with 2023, 2024 so far, and my current issue!
OP checking in for a rare visit…at some point in the last few years I kinda massively reduced my forum usage and er life stuff. But this thread is a part of me so I like to check in. I still have my E91, my annual mileage has massively reduced, but I am now on a handful of miles short of 245k
.
To join back in with some content, I’ll post a few updates of things that have happened…can’t remember the last update I gave, I’ll jump back to mid 2020 so at least there’s some interesting stuff…)
September 2020, I fitted some Brembo 4 pots from a F32 435i with 340mm discs, they just about sneak behind the 17 inch wheels. I had to do the most minor amount of trimming of the dust shield to make them fit, otherwise fitted straight on. (Actually looking at my records I’d completely rebuilt/refurbed, all new discs pads and shoes on the rear brakes in Aug 2020 too).
In 2021, it seems I literally didn’t need to do anything apart from an oil+filters service. I have a note that I had the check engine light come up for “2aa2” camshaft sensor – I cleaned it and it disappeared and didn’t come up again, and also 29F4 and 29F5 for low cat efficiency – but I didn’t believe them as they happened at EXACTLY the same mileage/time/trigger… and again didn’t return after clearing.
May/June ’22 I didn’t a chunk of maintenance, new front suspension arms (all Lemforder)
Finally changed that headlight levelling arm that failed pretty early on in my ownership and I had just cable tied to get me by..and that had worked I kept the part until a sensible time to install it!
Seems they were the original front arms I was changing – they didn’t even look too bad for 230k miles.
Other little things happened then, like new number plate lights, the old ones had corroded and were intermittently working I worked out, sometimes the lightbulb out warning would flash up on the dash…. I swapped them for LED ones from a 2007 model as I had a spare bootlid – obviously they’re different connectors, so I pieced together some loom adaptors (yes the insulating tape was a bit jank but I couldn’t find my heatshrink at the time!).
Now the number plate lights worked reliably, but the car was telling me that the lights weren’t working (ironic as they were actually working as opposed to before where the corroded connection wasn’t working but the car thought it was!), so I coded that light check out…
Oh yeah – and fitted brand new dealer plates from the original dealer who sold the car afaik…little nerdy touches and that!
Another couple of things that happened in ’22, all the pad wear sensors had a chronic melt down, and the car was freaking out that I had no brakes! No idea what triggered that or why it happened… it was parked on a bit of a slope on a wet field in wales for a week…no idea if that had anything to do with it.
So I got the pad wear sensor and shorted out together and reset everything. I take my wheels off often enough to manually check the pads….
In July 2022, I had a door locking actuator fail (the drivers door did this back in July 2017 – but less spectacularly, I could use the mechanical key, just the remote central locking wouldn’t lock or unlock it). This time it was the rear o/s…and it was stuck in the locked position. So that was fun removing the interior enough to get the door card off from inside, to then try and somehow, and I have no idea how unlock the thing so I could open the door! This part is one of the most common to BMW’s you can buy, it spans many many models, and got an updated revision at some point – so the replacement came from a relatively new 5 series.
At some point I’d get my hands on some Style 216 wheels (from the 320 si, BBS wheel things). I got the refurbed and wrapped in new rubber. I even ceramic coated them, and got those self levelling centre caps.
Here’s a photo of them fitted (and filthy, coz you know, November in Yorkshire)
.
So at the end of 2022, the car intermittently started to take a while to crank, and then would run a bit rough, and then be fine. I had the 2AA2 inlet camshaft fault code – and from experience of once forgetting to plug the inlet camshaft sensor wiring back in, the car cranks a while and does start in like a safer mode as it calculates from the exhaust camshaft sensor and the main crank sensor what it thinks the inlet camshaft sensor should do… I changed the sensor…still did it intermittently. I had vanos solenoid codes…swapped the solenoid and they didn’t follow – but then bought two new vanos solenoids anyway and fitted them… (I’d changed only one way back when I bought the car as it was an issue then…and figured they have been talked about as a semi-service item). Yeah, that didn’t fix it. After much buggering about, I traced the individual cables back to the ecu box, they were all good, I was then backprobing the connector/sensor and manually turning the car over by hand to verify the sensor for no good reason (I’m always buying oe sensor and stuff..bonus points if you have the BMW logo ground off!), and figured out it was a dodgy connection plug onto the sensor! So I bought a new plug, de-pinned the old one, crimped new connectors on, and voila, fault fixed!
No interesting photos for this one, but here’s one for the story.
That’ll do for now, I’ll fill you in with 2023, 2024 so far, and my current issue!
Help please!
Preferably anyone else with an N52, but similar engines may help.
When you unlock or lock your car, or open a door but no key in slot - does your waterpump run? Easiest way to check is top open coolant reservoir and see if the coolant is squirting round. I'm trying to work out what the car should do as standard...
(I've been having battery drain issues, not quite got to the bottom of it, but it's the waterpump that's doing the battery draining bit, but it's not the waterpumps fault!...)
Preferably anyone else with an N52, but similar engines may help.
When you unlock or lock your car, or open a door but no key in slot - does your waterpump run? Easiest way to check is top open coolant reservoir and see if the coolant is squirting round. I'm trying to work out what the car should do as standard...
(I've been having battery drain issues, not quite got to the bottom of it, but it's the waterpump that's doing the battery draining bit, but it's not the waterpumps fault!...)
Hey Zippy,
Nice to see you’re back. Well done on the mileage too. My 330i is on 216k now, and is sitting out currently as it needs a rear wheel bearing. Corrosion is getting to it now, but mine is an August 2005 build, so 19 years old soon. You’ve definitely been keeping up with it though, nice job. I’d fit bigger brakes to mine but they’ve done over 80,000 miles now and aren’t worn out, so I have no excuse to.
On the waterpump I’m 99% sure mine doesn’t. When I unlock the car or wake it from sleep (like pulling the boot handle when locked), the fuel pump primes but that’s about it. I know that when I check the coolant level there’s no flow through the bleed pipe which I would expect when the pump is running. I don’t know if there’s anything else on the BSD bus causing funny things to happen and then make the pump run. I say that as the alternator, oil level/condition sensor and IBS sensor (if fitted) are all on the BSD bus, too.
Nice to see you’re back. Well done on the mileage too. My 330i is on 216k now, and is sitting out currently as it needs a rear wheel bearing. Corrosion is getting to it now, but mine is an August 2005 build, so 19 years old soon. You’ve definitely been keeping up with it though, nice job. I’d fit bigger brakes to mine but they’ve done over 80,000 miles now and aren’t worn out, so I have no excuse to.
On the waterpump I’m 99% sure mine doesn’t. When I unlock the car or wake it from sleep (like pulling the boot handle when locked), the fuel pump primes but that’s about it. I know that when I check the coolant level there’s no flow through the bleed pipe which I would expect when the pump is running. I don’t know if there’s anything else on the BSD bus causing funny things to happen and then make the pump run. I say that as the alternator, oil level/condition sensor and IBS sensor (if fitted) are all on the BSD bus, too.
JakeT said:
Hey Zippy,
Nice to see you’re back. Well done on the mileage too. My 330i is on 216k now, and is sitting out currently as it needs a rear wheel bearing. Corrosion is getting to it now, but mine is an August 2005 build, so 19 years old soon. You’ve definitely been keeping up with it though, nice job. I’d fit bigger brakes to mine but they’ve done over 80,000 miles now and aren’t worn out, so I have no excuse to.
Hey Jake!Nice to see you’re back. Well done on the mileage too. My 330i is on 216k now, and is sitting out currently as it needs a rear wheel bearing. Corrosion is getting to it now, but mine is an August 2005 build, so 19 years old soon. You’ve definitely been keeping up with it though, nice job. I’d fit bigger brakes to mine but they’ve done over 80,000 miles now and aren’t worn out, so I have no excuse to.
When I did my rear wheel bearings, I built up a separate set with new drive flange, dust shields and bushings, and then swapped the whole thing over. Make sure you pay attention to which way round you put the bearing in, as that's where the wheel speed signal is, if you put it in backwards you won't get a wheel speed signal...
I'm pretty diligent on corrosion prevention on mine, especially places like wheel arches etc. My front O/S wing has got a bit of visible acne on it now, but I'm not as bothered on a panel you can easily remove, and it currently looks smart enough when cleaned tbh.
JakeT said:
On the waterpump I’m 99% sure mine doesn’t. When I unlock the car or wake it from sleep (like pulling the boot handle when locked), the fuel pump primes but that’s about it. I know that when I check the coolant level there’s no flow through the bleed pipe which I would expect when the pump is running. I don’t know if there’s anything else on the BSD bus causing funny things to happen and then make the pump run. I say that as the alternator, oil level/condition sensor and IBS sensor (if fitted) are all on the BSD bus, too.
Cool, cheers. I figured as much, I can't think of any reason logically as to why it should want it to under those circumstances.Court_S said:
Yes, best wheels!Court_S said:
I’ve no issue with the brakes but the F series ones look loads better if nothing else. Shame they’re so expensive now because they’re such a popular upgrade.
Yeah, at the time it cost me about as much to do this as new discs and pads of decent quality, and as I needed new discs and pads, well no brainer!Court_S said:
Re the water pump, I’m sure it’s just the fuel pump priming when it’s unlocked.
Yeah, well versed with that! That's fine, it's meant to happen.the TLDR version of my battery drain issues, after finally pinpointing it to the waterpump, and it's clearly running when it shouldn't be. It will timeout after 30 mins or so, but if you open a door, or unlock it or whatever, it starts all over again.
My diagnosis process is that basically the water pump has power+ground all the time. And then gets a PWM signal from the ecu to control it/the speed.
So the DME calculates what seed signal to give water pump and sends it over.
So I have the following options as to why the water pump is running
1. Bad pump (I’ve replaced this, and it’s behaving the same, so rules this out... I mean I didn't just jump straight to this, if I pulled the fuse for the water pump, obviously it stops, but when you put it back in, it doesn't start again so figured the DME wasn't telling it to go..)
2. Bad DME
3. Bad sensor input to the ECU telling it the engine is hot when it's not – (I’ve verified the temperature sensors are operating, and they seem to be doing so correctly.)
4. Dodgy wiring I guess – but again I’m getting readings and sending commands to water pump/from temperature sensors via ISTA so I don’t think it’s this.
So er, currently looking at a bad DME.
Interestingly, the water pump stops operating if I put the key in the slot and turn the ignition on (no engine start) – and I wouldn’t expect the pump to be running until it needs to be!
Gonna go contact ECU testing. Allegedly the MSV70 DME is an easy one to clone, but I can't see it listed on ECU Testing site as to one they're happy to work on.
Court_S said:
The DME’s are dead easy to clone in these (as I found out last year when ours flooded). If the car starts / runs it’s even easy apparently.
Where did you get yours cloned? I see lots of ebay adverts and random garages that claim to do these things, but it's a bit of a lottery. I'm not all that interested in learning (yet!)... ECU testing I've used before and they're the real deal, so happy to send stuff to them and pay the premium for peace of mind. I'm not particularly up to speed with specialists and other people doing work for me...well because I've not needed to yet.Edited by zippyonline on Monday 29th July 15:27
zippyonline said:
Hey Jake!
When I did my rear wheel bearings, I built up a separate set with new drive flange, dust shields and bushings, and then swapped the whole thing over. Make sure you pay attention to which way round you put the bearing in, as that's where the wheel speed signal is, if you put it in backwards you won't get a wheel speed signal...
I'm pretty diligent on corrosion prevention on mine, especially places like wheel arches etc. My front O/S wing has got a bit of visible acne on it now, but I'm not as bothered on a panel you can easily remove, and it currently looks smart enough when cleaned tbh.
Funnily enough I’ve done similar as the driveshaft is seized in the drive flange on mine. That, combined with a house move means I’ve dropped it with my father in law for one of his lads to do. I’ve purchased a used whole assembly to be swapped in, and supplied them with a bearing should they need wish to use it.When I did my rear wheel bearings, I built up a separate set with new drive flange, dust shields and bushings, and then swapped the whole thing over. Make sure you pay attention to which way round you put the bearing in, as that's where the wheel speed signal is, if you put it in backwards you won't get a wheel speed signal...
I'm pretty diligent on corrosion prevention on mine, especially places like wheel arches etc. My front O/S wing has got a bit of visible acne on it now, but I'm not as bothered on a panel you can easily remove, and it currently looks smart enough when cleaned tbh.
That’s fair enough, and I would be too but mine has been getting a little bad for a while. Floors et al are starting to be sad. BMW fitted a new bonnet, offside rear door, painted the tailgate and painted a rear wing under corrosion warranty on mine, so I can’t complain so much. It’s certainly a lot better than the E46 328ci I had at a similar age. I’ve treated the rear subframe to try and buy it some time, too.
Reading your other posts I’d also be looking at the DME. As Sam says, thy can be cloned easily enough, usually for when they get flooded.
Hey Zippy! Great to hear from you again after such a long time. And glad to see you're still trucking with the E91 
I think I've resolved in my mind that I won't ever get rid of this unless/until it goes very seriously wrong. I'll most likely just store it if I get something else and occasionally swap back over.
I think I've resolved in my mind that I won't ever get rid of this unless/until it goes very seriously wrong. I'll most likely just store it if I get something else and occasionally swap back over.
zippyonline said:
Hey All,
In July 2022, I had a door locking actuator fail (the drivers door did this back in July 2017 – but less spectacularly, I could use the mechanical key, just the remote central locking wouldn’t lock or unlock it). This time it was the rear o/s…and it was stuck in the locked position. So that was fun removing the interior enough to get the door card off from inside, to then try and somehow, and I have no idea how unlock the thing so I could open the door! This part is one of the most common to BMW’s you can buy, it spans many many models, and got an updated revision at some point – so the replacement came from a relatively new 5 series.
That’ll do for now, I’ll fill you in with 2023, 2024 so far, and my current issue!
It looks like you have been pretty busy! In July 2022, I had a door locking actuator fail (the drivers door did this back in July 2017 – but less spectacularly, I could use the mechanical key, just the remote central locking wouldn’t lock or unlock it). This time it was the rear o/s…and it was stuck in the locked position. So that was fun removing the interior enough to get the door card off from inside, to then try and somehow, and I have no idea how unlock the thing so I could open the door! This part is one of the most common to BMW’s you can buy, it spans many many models, and got an updated revision at some point – so the replacement came from a relatively new 5 series.
That’ll do for now, I’ll fill you in with 2023, 2024 so far, and my current issue!
Your door lock issues sound familiar. I had the passenger side rear door lock fail on my 55 plate E90 last year which blew the fuse. All the remote would do was set or unset the alarm and I ended up with the driver's door locked but all the others, the boot and filler flap unlocked. I couldn't try the physical key because my driver's door lock hasn't had a barrel in it since I got the car!
Thankfully my ex-Sytner BMW Indy managed to diagnose the problem.
zippyonline said:
Where did you get yours cloned? I see lots of ebay adverts and random garages that claim to do these things, but it's a bit of a lottery. I'm not all that interested in learning (yet!)... ECU testing I've used before and they're the real deal, so happy to send stuff to them and pay the premium for peace of mind. I'm not particularly up to speed with specialists and other people doing work for me...well because I've not needed to yet.
I had mine done at BW Chiptune.Edited by zippyonline on Monday 29th July 15:27
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