My car died :(

Malt_Vinegar

Malt_Vinegar

Malt_Vinegar

Don
Joined
20 Oct 2002
Posts
17,049
Location
In a house
The beemer died today, its the first time its ever let me down properly.

I started it up, and drove it towards work (I actually get the train to work now, but needed to drive to another office to do some work later that day)

The car warmed up within about 2 minutes of me leaving the house? However, no heat from the heater?! Whilst i was driving along the temp was creeping up slowly.

I pulled into a petrol station, and saw the temp rise, so drove off again and it stabilised at 3/4s of the temp guage, still away from the red. However, as i go nearer and nearer the motorway, traffic got slowly worse, and the temp was nearly in the red. So i pulled over and stopped at the train station in theale, and decided to get the train in. (never actually went into the red!)

I had a quick look at under the bonnet before running for the train, it looks like there is a leak from the explansion tank attached to the rad, so im thinking im going to top it up, then drive it home when the traffic is gone.

When i get it home wrap it up in the garage and pull out the rad/expansion tank to try and find the dodgy seal. I think its the base of the expansion tank, just below level sensor. Fingers crossed i can bodge up a decent seal and order another expansion tank if required to make sure it wont go wrong again. The last thing i want to do to this poor old beast is cook the engine after 190k cause i didnt fix it properly!
 
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I thought maybe gasket too at first, but there is no loss in power and no huge clouds of steam.

The cooling system is working, but seems to just be dumping its fluids, directly below the rad/expansion tank. Once its at a very low level it just cant work very well, and wont keep the car cool.

If the gasket does turn out to be cooked, wellll, time to learn to change a head gasket!
 
Lashout_UK said:
Sounds like classic head gasket failures to be honest - the heater failure, quick heat up. Only if you persist do you suffer from lack of power and serious problems.

I suspect if you'd kept going you'd have noticed smoke from the rear and then it'd have all been over. The loss of fluid from the expansion tank might be from where it's blown out due to being heavily pressurised (although I'm not sure).

But you never know :) - you might just be losing fluids! Best case scenario I hope :D
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Ahh well, if its that bad, i shall have to hasten my search for a new car then :p

Dont think its worth doing a HG on this old thing, sadly :(
 
Barry Smalley said:
Thats me told then. :D :D
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lol.. Defo not the fan :P

I have had no chance to check any of this yet, i will when i get the car back from the car park later tonight. I literally dumped it and ran to the train after breifly checking there was no fire risk!!

However, im debating wether its worth risking driving it again till its fixed...

Cant tow it either, its an Auto :(

Heres a pic of it for peeps who dont know the car...

BMnow1.jpg


BMnow2.jpg
 
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I looked at the oil cap, looked normal, could not really see what the dip stick was looking like in the dark car park. Felt pretty much normal, not really in the habit of rubbing engine oil between my fingers :p

Im going to attempt to top it up and drive back to My house tonight (posting from my parents house after dropping in to fix the PC)

If it just drops the coolant, and gets a bit hot, i will work on the possible leak. If i get bigger problems and water in exhaust im gunna get the old tools out and see if i can removed the head :P
 
I replaced the water pump only 1.5k ish ago :)

Its not got any of the symptons i had from back then. I dont think its that, also because of the way the pump is on the M50 engine it usually pretty obvious when it is :)
 
R124/LA420 said:
Sounds pretty much like the water pump that failed on my dads 1990 e34 530i


That iirc, did pretty much the same thing.

Don't drive it, you run the risk of seriously warping the head.

Less than £80 from a specialist to fix it, the pump, not a warped head that is.

If the heads warped, the cars effectively scrap, unless you have a very cheap local garage....
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The water pump has been done very recently and its not showing any of the same problems i had when it did go??

Apart from the waterloss, and it only ran slightly hot then, nothing like the way it heated on the way out this morning..

Bah, im so confused :(
 
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My dad is a big client of the garage. The guy knows im his son, and i really doubt he would try and do me over. Not for a simple job like a water pump, i was actually going to do it myself, but my dad gave him the go-ahead before i could say no :p Looking back, it would seem it prolly nearer 3k ago it was done, not that that makes much diffo when the first one did over 180k :p

Plus, the actual wobbling, and horrible noise that came with it dying are now gone, and all is (was working fine again) I would be really suprised, especially seeing as it was MOTed by the same guy one Friday (I know the MOT is not a proof of a car in great condition) I asked about it and he said it felt great when he had driven it (7.2 miles according to the milometer)
 
Well, yer, i topped up with water. (bout 1.5 litres)

Drove home, nothing felt funny at all. Over the 10 miles it was never more than 1 degree over the middle mark on the guage.

Parked up, left it idling for 5 mins, still in the middle.

Turned it off - No warnings. left it for 45 mins, went back "BING BING - Coolant Low"

Moved it into the garage, and its a brand new garage, so im going to monitor floor markings :p
 
Lashout_UK said:
Well, get a good look in in the morning, sounds like you could be lucky :D
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No can do, gotta burn off to work early again.

However on the weekend, expect a photo disection (sp? - help me out here) or where i think the fault may be :P
 
I managed to get a good look at my engine today, it seems its not just a coolant leak, there is a bit of an oil splattering around the block. There did seems to be some water in the oil.

So, i shall be cancelling my car insurance, SORNing the vehicle, refunding the roadtax.

Then i will need to purchase a head gasket kit. And find a manual for the M50 engine. I have never actually done anything other than a rocker gasket engine-wise before.

Then its time to get down to it. Learn my way around the Magical M50 :p

I will try to document and photograph the removal re-build for the people of OCUK. I will start a separate thread when i start the strip. (tommorrow i should expect :))
 
Liverpool-Lad said:
SORN, cancelling roadtax? How long are you planning on taking? ;)
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Long time :p

Im going to be doing it over months, as i expect i will be doing other things aswell :) I will be doing about an hour a night when i get the chance, and its also a way i can save on outgoings for a few months to pay back some more of my debt :)

Its also an apportunity to do things to the car that i cant do when its on the road and i want to be using it :D
 
Simon said:
Compression test will help tell you if the engine is pressurising the cooling system.

To me it sounds like there was a leak which caused the overheating. You sure that oil you found wasn't there before. The higher engine temp may of caused oil to get past a seal too
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I have no way of doing a compression test, although i did google that if i do have a dodgy HG, then if i look at the expansion tank with the cap off, hold the engine at revs, the expansion tank might surge, which would be the exhaust gases exiting into the coolant?

Should i start with a total coolant system flush/re-build, then clean the engine up and see what happens?

When i say i saw water in the oil, i took the oil cap off (after it had been sat for a few days) and there was a bit of clear fluid settled on the metal part of the cap.
 
geiger said:
I couldnt spot a Haynes manual for your car, only later and earlier models. Cleaning the engine sounds a good idea, I'd do all the small things before considering anything more complex or costly. Compression test should be simple afaik
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Haynes for my M50 engined version does not exist (afaik)

There is a "Bentley" Manual that covers it apparently.
 
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