2.0
hardly worth mentioning- Crashes / Fires:
- 0 / 0
- Injuries / Deaths:
- 0 / 0
- Average Mileage:
- 77,628 miles
About These NHTSA Complaints:
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« Read the previous 20 complaints
When I drive my car back to home, sudden noise from the front of the engine and found out the power steering pump and belts were off and sheared off some bolts around the holding. After the repair at the time on 5/1/2012, engine starts discovering oil leak around the front cylinder head housing. Keeping the oil level up to the require level for the past year. As of today 11/21/2013, I discovered the reason why the cylinder head housing is leaking oil is 2 sheared off bolts on top of the head housing. I drive normally and aluminum screws are not acceptable for a high performance car and it broke off that easy with normal driving condition.
- San Ramon, CA, USA
BMW over-torqued the four cylinder head bolts on all N52 engines during manufacture, including my car. The bolt heads are popping off on all the cars, resulting in potential catastrophic engine damage at speed and minimally thousands of dollars in repair costs. The issue is a well known defect in how BMW built these engines (affecting many, many 5 series cars) but is taking absolutely no responsibility for this. This is not a maintenance issue or anything owner-related -- it's purely a mistake by BMW that they refuse to take responsibility for and to cover repair costs. They corrected the specs the following year and don't torque the bolts as much, but are leaving previous owners out to dry for some $3000-5000 in repair costs. Please do something to make BMW take responsibility and to retro-actively reimburse people for this mistake of theirs. Thanks.
- Pleasanton, CA, USA
While changing my oil, notice that oil has been slowly leaking around the valve cover. Looked on online forums and found that there are many people with the same issue. I inspected the area where they have stated common broken valve cover bolts and sure enough the bolts were broken. They literally just sitting in the valve cover with no purpose. They came right off when I pulled them up by hand.
- St Marys, GA, USA
My 530I BMW has at least one broken cylinder head bolt. This is a very common problem with the BMW N52 engines. I was quoted $4500 for the repair. As I mentioned this is a very common problem, a known problem by BMW, but BMW isn't willing to offer me any assistance. I feel a need to report this expensive and common problem, and BMW's unwillingness to resolve this problem. I have spent hours with bmwusa and my local BMW stevens creek dealership and so far all I have done is wasted many hours of my time. BMW needs to assume responsibility for something that is obviously a detect in their design.
- San Jose, CA, USA
All 3 aluminum head bolts were broken causing an oil leak which could result in a fire. Bolts were found in oil pan which could have damaged engine and caused failure. There are no warning lights or messages that indicate a problem. The only way to know there is a problem is an oil leak beneath the car. This was fixed out of warranty at a cost of $2131.78. The same problem occurred again 2.5 years later on March 27, 2013 at 105,135 miles and a cost of $2236.47. BMW doesn't think this is a major problem and says it is "typical" of a "high performance" engine. To me, this is not a normal maintenance item, not to mention the potential for fire and possible injury. There appears to be only one other complaint with your office for this specific problem for this specific car, but I think you will find similar problems for all BMW's with 3.0 liter and other engines with aluminum head bolts, including the 325, 330, 528, 730, etc.
- Redondo Beach, CA, USA
We have owned this vehicle since 2007 and have not had too many issues with it. However, recently it developed an oil leak which BMW has refused to fix. What has happened is that four aluminum bolts that hold the top of the engine block on to the engine have broken for no apparent reason. According to the repair shop I took it to, BMW knows this is a defect. They should have never used aluminum bolts as fasteners for this engine. I have had to spend $2900 to have these bolts replaced by an authorized BMW repair shop. This has stopped the leak. The dealer wanted $4300 to do the same repair. This is not right. My mechanic said that this oil leak could have caused an engine fire if I had let it go. Any help you can be on this matter would be great.
- Laguna Niguel, CA, USA
My son was driving the car to work and it only got about 8 blocks from our house when the car stalled and lost complete power. He coasted to the side of the road and from the looks when I arrived the serpentine tension belt had broken we turned the key over and the engine was in a free spin. We had it towed to a local service shop and they replaced the belt but stated the engine had no compression towed car to a second shop and got the same opinion the engine had no compression. There was no warning lights or messages on the dash. The car just stopped operating in the middle of the road and gave no warning.
- San Antonio, TX, USA
The contact owns a 2006 BMW 530xi wagon. The contact stated that a private mechanic advised that four bolts were detached from the engine. The manufacturer was contacted but the vehicle was not repaired. The failure and current mileages were 101,000.
- Fishurs, IN, USA
- Gresham, OR, USA