m5-vanos problems

[jmn]

Am I right in thinking that the Vanos unit was improved at some time during the cars' production run? Does anyone have details of when any change was made? Was it from a certain engine or chassis number?

[Ashok]

E39 or E60?

[Neil.D]

If its E39 then they fitted an oil pressure acculator somewhen around the turn of the millenium. All it does is keep the oil in the VANOS ready for when the engine is next started. Otherwise it can be starved of oil for a few seconds creating the 'diesel' type noise.

The E60 I beleive has no VANOS issues - just lots of other ones...hey ASHOK!

[stringbag]

Yes, they changed the design around '00, but as mentioned above, it is not really anything to worry about. The advice I was given is that it may make a noise but it will not do any harm. I bought an '02 M5 anyway, but read a lot about vanos issues doing my research. BMW changed a few under warranty, but it was purely because they didn't want a customer who spent £60k to be annoyed with a noisy engine - they might not come back. There was not a performance or maintenance issue.
BTW they also change the design of the piston rings around the same time to stop chronic oil usage.
If you are interested in an M5, try this forum - its knowledge base is incredible.
www.m5board.com

[ASBO]

stringbag said:

If you are interested in an M5, try this forum - its knowledge base is incredible.
www.m5board.com

I second that

[Ashok]

Neil.D said:

... just lots of other ones...hey ASHOK!

Thanks for reminding me!

[Jim Green]

Any M5 with a build date of 03/00 onwards had the revised piston rings fitted......Vanos accumulator was retro fitted to many pre-facelift cars under warranty and you can quickly find out if yours was retro fitted by contacting your local BMW dealer for the cars service history. I did this and found out that mine had been fitted with the vanos accumulator at 6 months old under warranty.