E30 Zone

just want to know if anyone has had any probs with their engines or any break downs i recently got a 316i with the m40 at 140k evryone and i mean everyone!! keeps takin the piss at how its gona break down all the time it is very annoying

you lot reckon its reliable ?

Its only as reliable as you make it. Show the car sum love and you will be on road for a long time . 140k is nothing really for a bmw thats been looked after!!!

There only jealous mate

Mine has never broke down

As a general statement, it's not going to break down, but I can't extend that statement definitely to your particular E30!
The two most likely things to happen, given half decent maintenence and servicing, are that the electric fuel pump will start acting up and quit on you, (but a good thump will get it going again temporarily), and the crank position sensor will start giving problems, causing the engine to cut when hot.
I've driven E30s almost exclusively for around sixteen years now, and not once has any of them failed to complete a journey.

might breakdown when IDIOTS like this get hold of them

In 6k miles I've had a battery die and a bit of trim got stuck when I was changing gear ... and sometime the windscreen is a bit smudgy

No, they never break down

I'm going to regret saying this but in the 14 years I have been driving and some of my cars were absolute heaps I have never had a car that did not finish the journey it started. Some of them have limped home an d 20 mph.

People who go on about old high milage cars being unreliable wind me up. My daily drive is a 160k Saab that I bought four years ago as a stop gap in between decent cars and I've not bothered to change it. My brother in law bought a brand new 206 at the same time as I bought the Saab and his car has just been a catalog of disasters and massive repair bills then again he takes no care of it what so ever and has only serviced it once in four years. Where as my Saab needed a battery last winter and thats all its ever need it also has just gone strait through another MOT.

My point is if its well made to start with and you keep on top of any maintenance it will be fine.

in the 7 years of having e30s ive never [should i say it] had one break down ever, ive come out one morning and had a flat battery before but thats it. i would put money on your friends french or what ever breaking down 1st

never had one properly break down to the point of being stranded. (had about 7 or more e30's)

I've had a fuel pump cause me to bunny hop and crawl home (the last 50 miles of a 200 mile journey) but most problems i've had have been niggly ones.

had an exhaust pipe snap, but just meant a noisy ride home

Cypriotgeeza wrote:

might breakdown when IDIOTS like this get hold of them

I`m gonna give this a go tomorrow. Looks easy enough, right?

What could go wrong?

lol yeh i know they must be jealous! the majority of my freinds have them crap fiat puntos and polos man they look so ugly !! and i would never go french even if someone paid me i have to say i have seriously developed a hatred for them shitty hatchbacks

im only 18 pretty much everyone even my gf told me not to get this car,
but when i got it eventually i dont it just looks so nice compared to nearly all the cars on my road my one just looks 10 times better !

My i.S split a hose which meant I had to get towed home

And my clutch master cylinder has gone now, just about managed to kangaroo it home night before last! luckily it was less than a mile to go when it actually went...

JWaller360 wrote:My i.S split a hose which meant I had to get towed home

That comes under lack of maintenence, and it's perfectly possible to drive a car with inoperative clutch hydraulics. I've bought a few like this, and driven them a minimum of 100 miles home.

My 163K 316i has never broke down once. I've been everywhere with it. I've driven it 200 miles round trip to santapod and thrahed it down the drag strip with no problems.

Maintain it well and it will go on forever.

i've only ever had a fuel pump live feed prob in 25 mth of e30 ness

bmw9818 wrote:just want to know if anyone has had any probs with their engines or any break downs i recently got a 316i with the m40 at 140k evryone and i mean everyone!! keeps takin the pee pee at how its gona break down all the time it is very annoying

you lot reckon its reliable ?

does it sound like a tractor?

noisy top ends and m40's go hand in glove,
but keep on going,i tried to kill one once and it wouldn't die!

In the seven years ive ran an e30 the only time ive been left at the side of the road is when this happened





Thats a valve dropping at 5K

Apart from that ive never been stranded and i use an E30 as a daily.

even when they have issues they still plod on to get you home.

lee killed one,engine

my old 316i camshaft came loose and bent a fair few valves! had to get it trailored home from nottingham to essex! bad times.

I get the same stick at work about mine, but people seem to forget that the two of us doing the most miles have the oldest cars (my L-reg E30 and an L-reg Escort)!! As we've both found, take care of it properly and you'll be fine. The only problems I've had can be traced back to me every time.
That said, you do get the odd lemon but that should have been spotted and sorted before the car was 5 years old.

Alex wrote:Mine has never broke down

Same here, it has been with us since it left the factory and the closest it ever came to a 'breakdown' was when the steering rack gave up, but even then it was just about drivable. It has never refused to start and engine-wise it has been as-sound-as from day one back in 1988. give these cars just a bit of TLC and they'll return reliability in bucket-loads.

If you know nothing about cars, get a reputable BMW specialist to give the engine/suspension/gearbox a good look over, and he'll tell you (and prioritise) what it needs to get it running sweetly. Once this work is done, and you keep on top of your annual servicing your car should run and run.

The bodywork will fail before your M40 ever will.

My old 325 broke down once...when the injector wiring multipin plug corroded...A couple of hours remaking the connections and it was as good as new!

My M3 broke down once on the road when the alternator earth strap snapped and the battery ran flat...
It did breakdown another time on a trackday when I ran a bearing, though

In general, so long as you do some basic preventative maintenance and use decent oils, etc, the mechanicals should last over 250K miles...

All the E30s I've had have been more reliable than other BMWs (E28, E34, E36), in general, as they have less to go wrong, on the whole...

yeh im a p/t mechanic so il defo keep it in good shape, one thing i think the idle valve has a slight prob not sure when the car is in neutral idleing when i push the accel it sort of judders and the engine feels like its going to stall not sure i need to look into soon anyone know what this could be?

bmw9818 wrote:yeh im a p/t mechanic so il defo keep it in good shape, one thing i think the idle valve has a slight prob not sure when the car is in neutral idleing when i push the accel it sort of judders and the engine feels like its going to stall not sure i need to look into soon anyone know what this could be?

Post up in tech help, sounds like an air leak but a dodgy idle can be a number of things, is it serviced?

leeparkes wrote:

bmw9818 wrote:yeh im a p/t mechanic so il defo keep it in good shape, one thing i think the idle valve has a slight prob not sure when the car is in neutral idleing when i push the accel it sort of judders and the engine feels like its going to stall not sure i need to look into soon anyone know what this could be?

Post up in tech help, sounds like an air leak but a dodgy idle can be a number of things, is it serviced?

yep i gave it the full works, it was overheating cause of the water pump replaced this temp is stable but i dont know im thinking the idle valve most likely cause in in neutral it tends to fluctuate up and down weirdly

that's the icv or any of the air pipes perished,have you disconnected the icv pug yet?

When I took the m3 to the nurburgring in september it had been absolutely faultless with over a 1000 miles and 8 laps of the 'ring up until the point I commented on it! At the junction to my estate the clutch pedal went to the floor. Clutch slave cylinder went. I managed to get it in to first and limp it to my drive though so all good! Funny thing wasnit was fine two days later but I got it replaced anyway.

Brianmoooore wrote:

JWaller360 wrote:My i.S split a hose which meant I had to get towed home

That comes under lack of maintenence, and it's perfectly possible to drive a car with inoperative clutch hydraulics. I've bought a few like this, and driven them a minimum of 100 miles home.

Very true,my clutch slave gave up on Salisbury Plains once,no trouble getting home.
It was my first 325 I was suprised at how you could get it moving from a standing start on the key in third gear

You don't need a clutch to change gear! The main problem comes from having to come to a halt in traffic.

Brianmoooore wrote:

JWaller360 wrote:My i.S split a hose which meant I had to get towed home

That comes under lack of maintenence, and it's perfectly possible to drive a car with inoperative clutch hydraulics. I've bought a few like this, and driven them a minimum of 100 miles home.

Sorry, meant to say it was a coolant hose! Right under the inlet manifold, couldn't be arsed taking the manifold off to bandage it up, so got a lift!

The clutch seems completely co-incidental, though I had to get it going on the starter once or twice...

I have had loads of breakdowns, however only 3 were due to the engine explding on it'self.

The first was a headgasket failuer which caused lots of smoke heat and detonation. My own fault since I saw the temps rise and did not do anything due to the fact it was past 12 at night and the road I was on was not a savoury one, so it was the car or my life.

The 2nd time was due to the mech I used not fitting the key back into the crankpulley properly , this in turn caused a hit between valves and piston, not nice, broke all 12 rockers and bent the shafts. Turbo cars and revs, not a good story.

The 3rd one was giving my mate the car, and him not realising that an overheating BMW does not need cold water into the expansion bottle, this caused Cracked head.

Had loads of other niggles , clutch slave cyl , pressure plate, boost pipes coming off, Air Flow meter blowing (yes Literaly bottom plate came off) up , fuel pump relay , broken Viscous fan, hell I could go on and on, but remember this is on an old car with 300 000 + km 's on the clock and turbo charged.

however I must say since my last incident 3 years ago I have not had a single fault, with just the normal sevice being carried out.

bmw9818 wrote:yeh im a p/t mechanic so il defo keep it in good shape, one thing i think the idle valve has a slight prob not sure when the car is in neutral idleing when i push the accel it sort of judders and the engine feels like its going to stall not sure i need to look into soon anyone know what this could be?

That is quite likely to be the ICV "sticking", as you say. Apparently you can attempt to clean it - mine was like that when I got it, but with regular use it's actually stopped doing it - think it had been parked up for a while.

Not fatal anyway AFAIK, it just causes slight off-idle issues in neutral.

So, in summary, all Down to incompetence/care and completely avoidable then?

mine blew the headgasket after a hose split.

saying that though, my car gets a harder life than most as its a sprint/hill climb and rally car so not the end of the world