Blown motors, Rod Bearing failure S65 Registry.

Are you listing people who are not on the forums? Like Instagram and etc?

TheRussski wrote

Are you listing people who are not on the forums? Like Instagram and etc?

Positive . Some from ///MFlight and FB are on the list.

///M Power-Belgium wrote

Positive . Some from ///MFlight and FB are on the list.

kuwtbe90s bearing failure at 42k miles on Instagram

TheRussski wrote

kuwtbe90s bearing failure at 42k miles on Instagram

I looked him up but can't figure out where he explains what happened to his car.
.

aus wrote

I looked him up but can't figure out where he explains what happened to his car.
.

Look up his post from November 21 with a picture of the front of the car. In comments he said look at my story to what happened, I looked and he said that they found metal shavings in the filter and now has a rod tick

2006325i for the list => https://www.m3post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1565239

bmwlover0725 for the list => https://www.m3post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1565421

Tomas_e92m3 for the list => https://www.m3post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1568031

///M Power-Belgium wrote

Tomas_e92m3 for the list => https://www.m3post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1568031

Goes to show you that just because you passed 100k miles on original bearings...doesn’t mean you’re safe for the rest of cars life

byroncheung wrote

I have put in about 70 records into my spreadsheet so far, this is the histogram of failure mileage... Obviously part of it is driven by the fact that there are probably more cars at mileage round 45-60k mile... I need to adjust for that fact somehow if i want the plot to represent failure rate / probability... But it does feel like if a car managed to survive past 60k mile, the chance of a failure after 60k is lower than before 60k...

Did you keep up with your spreadsheet?
There does seem to be a definite trend that the engine fail rate decreases after 60k miles....consistent with poor tolerance management during parts manufacture rather than a deficiency in the actual clearance specification.
Else why are there still ~60,000 cars still driving around fine rather than littering every corner with a broken engine....now that they are heading towards 11 years old and mostly with high mileages.

I would not assume the 60,000 M3 are mostly higher mileage. Based on what members here write, it seems like the majority of owners don’t accumulate a lot of miles. I agree though that probably 90% of these cars are still driving fine on their original bearings at 5-10 years old. On the other hand, bearings from most 20-25 year old E36M3 will look only lightly worn while most bearings removed from E9xM3 look heavily worn.

As ever the UK market remains obstinately reluctant to see anything like the same levels of engine problems that the USA market has (as a function of number of cars in circulation.)
You guys seem to have 2 or 3 lunched engines a month reported on M3post (although it seems less than that more recently - especially if you count only rod bearing failures)...we are unlikely to see that in a year reported on our big M3 forum....and also it seems less lately in the UK.
You'd have thought that as cars age and mileages increase that the numbers would be on an ever increasing curve upwards.

Sneaky Pete wrote

As ever the UK market remains obstinately reluctant to see anything like the same levels of engine problems that the USA market has (as a function of number of cars in circulation.)
You guys seem to have 2 or 3 lunched engines a month reported on M3post...we are unlikely to see that in a year reported on our big M3 forum.

Well if you intentionally limit your scope of input to this forum, oddly you limit your data. https://www.facebook.com/MrVanos/

Steven Lewis, AKA Mr. Vanos in Darlington sees them frequently.

Sneaky Pete wrote

byroncheung wrote

I have put in about 70 records into my spreadsheet so far, this is the histogram of failure mileage... Obviously part of it is driven by the fact that there are probably more cars at mileage round 45-60k mile... I need to adjust for that fact somehow if i want the plot to represent failure rate / probability... But it does feel like if a car managed to survive past 60k mile, the chance of a failure after 60k is lower than before 60k...

Did you keep up with your spreadsheet?
There does seem to be a definite trend that the engine fail rate decreases after 60k miles....consistent with poor tolerance management during parts manufacture rather than a deficiency in the actual clearance specification.
Else why are there still ~60,000 cars still driving around fine rather than littering every corner with a broken engine....now that they are heading towards 11 years old and mostly with high mileages.

The histogram is not showing any kind of predictive statistics. The histogram is only showing population frequency and reflects the fact that more cars in the wild are around 50,000 miles and fewer are above and below that. See the quote below.

pbonsalb wrote

I would not assume the 60,000 M3 are mostly higher mileage. Based on what members here write, it seems like the majority of owners don't accumulate a put if miles. I agree though that probably 90% of these cars are still driving fine on their original bearings at 5-10 years old. On the other hand, bearings from most 20-25 year old E36M3 will look only lightly worn while most bearings removed from E9xM3 look heavily worn.

jcolley wrote

Well if you intentionally limit your scope of input to this forum, oddly you limit your data.

Well it seems reasonable to compare a USA forum directly to a UK forum.
If I was doing a poll on the number of people who smoke I wouldn't include a tobacconist because if he included his smoking customers he would distort the result.

jcolley wrote

https://www.facebook.com/MrVanos/

Steven Lewis, AKA Mr. Vanos in Darlington sees them frequently.

He certainly sees a lot of M5s but very few S65 failures. Which fits in with the general lack of S65 failures in the UK.

Sneaky Pete wrote

He certainly sees a lot of M5s but very few S65 failures. Which fits in with the general lack of S65 failures in the UK.

What does that mean Pete, S85 design did end up too tight? (using same shells and crank dimensions but still). Just curious about your view of the differences and reasons here.

Cheers
Nik

Sneaky Pete wrote

Well it seems reasonable to compare a USA forum directly to a UK forum.
If I was doing a poll on the number of people who smoke I wouldn't include a tobacconist because if he included his smoking customers he would distort the result.



He certainly sees a lot of M5s but very few S65 failures. Which fits in with the general lack of S65 failures in the UK.

So what’s the difference between the S85 rod bearing failures and the S65 rod bearing failures? Same bearings. Same clearances. Essentially same engine minus 2 cylinders.

pbonsalb wrote

So what’s the difference between the S85 rod bearing failures and the S65 rod bearing failures? Same bearings. Same clearances. Essentially same engine minus 2 cylinders.

Spot on .

Sneaky Pete wrote

...He certainly sees a lot of M5s but very few S65 failures. Which fits in with the general lack of S65 failures in the UK.

jcolley wrote

Colley, you know whether 5 in for new shells, or 5 in for blown engines?

Cheers

Helmsman wrote

Colley, you know whether 5 in for new shells, or 5 in for blown engines?

Cheers

I don't, sorry.

I do know he and I had a discussion about fuel injector failures and some correlation to recently changed fuel filters. We both on our own came up with a purge routine we do after a filter change now to flush 2-3 gal down the lines and prevent debris carry-through.

pbonsalb wrote

So what’s the difference between the S85 rod bearing failures and the S65 rod bearing failures? Same bearings. Same clearances. Essentially same engine minus 2 cylinders.

Good point well made.
I would imagine you would have to look at what BMW changed when they developed the S65 from the S85.
That being the Vanos with associated changes to the lubrication system and the ion sensing anti knock system...being the principle changes.
However I've never tracked the S85 engine failure rate (apart from the first batch of failures which in every case the owner had applied an ECU tune) so I can't make any comparisons with S65 failures.
I have though followed S65 failures in the UK and the USA...and there is a clear and significant difference in failure rate as a function of cars sold.

That needs to be accounted for...pretending its not happening just clouds the issue.

What also complicates things is that it appears that cars that had RB replacements with oem spec bearings that were later pulled apart for inspection had bearing in good condition.