E46 rust - inevitable in all cars?
Discussion
As above, I'm thinking of getting my first E46 (late manual M3). I'm looking at circa 60K mile cars from reputable dealers and this would be a second car for me; garaged, 3-4k pa. If it has no (obvious visual) rust ATM, is this inevitable at some point? I'd hate to buy a car and then have to sink a couple of grand in to rust repairs on a weekend toy in a couple of years time.
I've read lots of info, but obviously for many these cars are used daily, and many are now high milers - so, can it be avoided or is it inevitable?
Must admit, I've only recently read about these rust issues (have been brushing up on sub frames etc) and am shocked!
I've read lots of info, but obviously for many these cars are used daily, and many are now high milers - so, can it be avoided or is it inevitable?
Must admit, I've only recently read about these rust issues (have been brushing up on sub frames etc) and am shocked!
Edited by giger on Thursday 7th June 11:37
Not all E46s will turn to rust. I’ve had three now. The previous one had 250k when it died in a tragic accident.
That needed some remedial rust work. My latest has minimal rust, but I can see where it would start from. These areas are mud trapped under rear arches, mud trapped under side skirts, loose/missing floor grommets, damaged under seal. Damaged underseal around rear jacking points.
Front wings will rust on E46s, cheap enough for new ones. My advice if you buy an E46, check the areas I have listed, remove side skirts, wax the sills-not Waxoil, Bilthamber.
Might be worth reading my silver 330d thread for an idea of where E46s rust.
That needed some remedial rust work. My latest has minimal rust, but I can see where it would start from. These areas are mud trapped under rear arches, mud trapped under side skirts, loose/missing floor grommets, damaged under seal. Damaged underseal around rear jacking points.
Front wings will rust on E46s, cheap enough for new ones. My advice if you buy an E46, check the areas I have listed, remove side skirts, wax the sills-not Waxoil, Bilthamber.
Might be worth reading my silver 330d thread for an idea of where E46s rust.
Many thanks - much appreciated. I know my comment might seem like a sweeping statement, but from hearing of the issues in the past 24 hours, I'm amazed by how many different forum posts I have unearthed in that time! It's even more concerning as I am thinking of putting my money in to a CS and I would hate to see it rust away.
I'll check your thread out.
I'll check your thread out.
I went to see a 90k mile CS for £18,000 that’d had all 4 corners re-done under bmw warranty for corrosion.
Having had bmw ‘fix’ corrosion before and it reappearing a few years later I was sceptical of buying it thinking it was mint.
Personally I’d budget rust/corrosion into your budget as they will go somewhere eventually, unless they’ve been garaged and only dry weather summer driven, imo.
With head gasket, sub frame carrier, vanos, and first pass rusting becoming a thing on this age car, I thought the M3 were mostly over-priced and over-rated.
I still think should I have bought it and just got it how I wanted it, but being (potentially) £25,000 down by 5 yes down the line on the kinda car it is, at the age it is, was too much for me.
I’d have rather bought one at £25,000 back when they were nearly new.
Having had bmw ‘fix’ corrosion before and it reappearing a few years later I was sceptical of buying it thinking it was mint.
Personally I’d budget rust/corrosion into your budget as they will go somewhere eventually, unless they’ve been garaged and only dry weather summer driven, imo.
With head gasket, sub frame carrier, vanos, and first pass rusting becoming a thing on this age car, I thought the M3 were mostly over-priced and over-rated.
I still think should I have bought it and just got it how I wanted it, but being (potentially) £25,000 down by 5 yes down the line on the kinda car it is, at the age it is, was too much for me.
I’d have rather bought one at £25,000 back when they were nearly new.
Yup! I've seen a 30,000 mile '06 'vert with rust just beginning to start on the wings and that's a garaged car. IMHO the wings will rust. The rest can be prevented.
IMHO I'd get one assuming:
-Rear arches are fine
-Jacking points are fine
-If you have new wings, happy days and take it as a bonus. Otherwise, waxoyl them if they haven't started; most IME have; they rust from the edge of the inner lip and them out. So by the time you see the rust it's too late. If the arch lip is in any way feeling rough it will need wings in the future.
OEM wings for an M3 are now £330 each. Not a great price but not too bad compared to other cars.
For me two things need to be done on an M3, even on super low mileage cars:
-RACP; to be fair this can be caught in time if you go to the right specialists; BMW don't check for the cracks correctly if you look into their procedure. Redish do detail how to inspect the RACP on their online videos. One of their videos has a 60,000 mile car with a scrap RACP fitted, so don't think lower mileage = less problems. They are now 15 years old at least and some have been abused more than others.
-Big end shells. For me this is a killer. If the engine is tapping it's too late. The choices are to reground the crank but then find someone to retreat the crank if you want any chance of the engine living for long, buy a new crank for crazy money from BMW or another engine, again, silly money (£3k seems to be about the going rate for an S54). Again, there is no indication here; a bloke I know who sells cars in MK for a classic car dealer had one go on him come sale time. There are cars for sale on 70k with scrap engines yet mine had the bearings done at 138k with only one just about beginning to show copper, and there are some on 200k still on the original shells.
Buy one; they are great cars in working order. I've moaned to everyone about mine being moneypit, even if you take my RACP reinforcement and big-end shells out of the equation, but they really do deliver a lot in fine fettle.
Here's my experience over 2 years and 16k in one; I did 15k of those before Xmas.
https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...
And my costs. The big-ticket items a few people wouldn't have done are:
-Paintjob. £1k
-RACP; I did mine as I planned to do a couple of track days now and again; £700; the bushings did need doing badly!
-Big Ends; Again, I wanted to use the engine once warmed up without worrying about things; one friend sold his because it was tapping. £900.
https://www.pistonheads.com/members/showcar.asp?ca...
Yorkshire Trip (1 of 40) by Charlieboy, on Flickr
IMHO I'd get one assuming:
-Rear arches are fine
-Jacking points are fine
-If you have new wings, happy days and take it as a bonus. Otherwise, waxoyl them if they haven't started; most IME have; they rust from the edge of the inner lip and them out. So by the time you see the rust it's too late. If the arch lip is in any way feeling rough it will need wings in the future.
OEM wings for an M3 are now £330 each. Not a great price but not too bad compared to other cars.
For me two things need to be done on an M3, even on super low mileage cars:
-RACP; to be fair this can be caught in time if you go to the right specialists; BMW don't check for the cracks correctly if you look into their procedure. Redish do detail how to inspect the RACP on their online videos. One of their videos has a 60,000 mile car with a scrap RACP fitted, so don't think lower mileage = less problems. They are now 15 years old at least and some have been abused more than others.
-Big end shells. For me this is a killer. If the engine is tapping it's too late. The choices are to reground the crank but then find someone to retreat the crank if you want any chance of the engine living for long, buy a new crank for crazy money from BMW or another engine, again, silly money (£3k seems to be about the going rate for an S54). Again, there is no indication here; a bloke I know who sells cars in MK for a classic car dealer had one go on him come sale time. There are cars for sale on 70k with scrap engines yet mine had the bearings done at 138k with only one just about beginning to show copper, and there are some on 200k still on the original shells.
Buy one; they are great cars in working order. I've moaned to everyone about mine being moneypit, even if you take my RACP reinforcement and big-end shells out of the equation, but they really do deliver a lot in fine fettle.
Here's my experience over 2 years and 16k in one; I did 15k of those before Xmas.
https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...
And my costs. The big-ticket items a few people wouldn't have done are:
-Paintjob. £1k
-RACP; I did mine as I planned to do a couple of track days now and again; £700; the bushings did need doing badly!
-Big Ends; Again, I wanted to use the engine once warmed up without worrying about things; one friend sold his because it was tapping. £900.
https://www.pistonheads.com/members/showcar.asp?ca...
Yorkshire Trip (1 of 40) by Charlieboy, on FlickrEdited by SebringMan on Saturday 9th June 21:29
I've got a very tidy x-reg 330ci with 155k on, but I have had both sides resprayed.
Front wings change easy and certainly the standard ones are cheap, prepainted or otherwise. My rear arches where treated and have held for a year, watch this space. Tiny bit on the pass side around the front of the college covers. Dent in the boot lid and rear quarter due to a ridge tile. Paid something like £650 for the lot for a reasonable but not concourse job.
Daniel
Front wings change easy and certainly the standard ones are cheap, prepainted or otherwise. My rear arches where treated and have held for a year, watch this space. Tiny bit on the pass side around the front of the college covers. Dent in the boot lid and rear quarter due to a ridge tile. Paid something like £650 for the lot for a reasonable but not concourse job.
Daniel
My E85 Z4 had no rust on arches and within 2yrs it’s all just appeared, despite cleaning arches and not doing many winter miles.
The issue is arch liners rubbing through paint and eventually exposed metal will rust.
Any M3 you see, as said, WILL fail and need full remedial work, unless it’s a garage queen and has never been wet road/salty road use.
My annoyance is BMW should do a general inspection of this kinda stuff as part of services, especially insp2, as it’s also part of their duty for paint warranties, at least to check and advise.
My mk5 Golf has corrosion starting in similar places, arch liners rubbing and salty mud getting into rubbing areas and doing its magic.
Early owners don’t care, middle owners care but do nothing, late owners suffer the consequences.
Cars rust. Budget for it!
The issue is arch liners rubbing through paint and eventually exposed metal will rust.
Any M3 you see, as said, WILL fail and need full remedial work, unless it’s a garage queen and has never been wet road/salty road use.
My annoyance is BMW should do a general inspection of this kinda stuff as part of services, especially insp2, as it’s also part of their duty for paint warranties, at least to check and advise.
My mk5 Golf has corrosion starting in similar places, arch liners rubbing and salty mud getting into rubbing areas and doing its magic.
Early owners don’t care, middle owners care but do nothing, late owners suffer the consequences.
Cars rust. Budget for it!
My m3 has its drivers side wing replaced under BMWS 12 year warranty. The other side was (and still is) fine.
There’s a very small section on the rear drivers side arch that’s been there a little while. It does around 3k a year and is kept away most of the time - they will rust. As long as you remember that when working out what you want to spend it’ll be ok.
There’s a very small section on the rear drivers side arch that’s been there a little while. It does around 3k a year and is kept away most of the time - they will rust. As long as you remember that when working out what you want to spend it’ll be ok.
guys sorry im new on here just brought e46 coupe m sport for £400 drives fine had to get new window screen last week but one major job is rust can anyone point me in right direction ? 3 of my arches arent too bad but drivers side rear is crazy to the point of cutting out and putting over fenders on it and get them colour coded atleast they plastic and wont rust again
thanks for reading
mike
thanks for reading
mike
bakerm said:
guys sorry im new on here just brought e46 coupe m sport for £400 drives fine had to get new window screen last week but one major job is rust can anyone point me in right direction ? 3 of my arches arent too bad but drivers side rear is crazy to the point of cutting out and putting over fenders on it and get them colour coded atleast they plastic and wont rust again
thanks for reading
mike
Like I said before (although I actually sold the car) budget £400 per arch. £200 per sill end. thanks for reading
mike
On my E39S 530i Sport I had from memory one rear arch, two sill ends and a couple of smaller patches done. Worked out to be around £1000 all in. That's cut out and weld new metal.
bakerm said:
guys sorry im new on here just brought e46 coupe m sport for £400 drives fine had to get new window screen last week but one major job is rust can anyone point me in right direction ? 3 of my arches arent too bad but drivers side rear is crazy to the point of cutting out and putting over fenders on it and get them colour coded atleast they plastic and wont rust again
thanks for reading
mike
boughtthanks for reading
mike
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