99 BMW M3-Questions

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I wish it was mine, but........... A buddy just bought one of these with 50K miles. Nice sled. It has been dealer serviced and the dipstick was low, so he figured he would have the oil changed out. I told him a little about this board and that 10w60 is recommended fill in the new ones, but it turns out not his. Anyway, dealer did an "oil service" not an oil change for, get this $260 WHOPPIN BUCKS. I also gets a microfilter, oil filter and DINO-thats right DINO oil. they put 5w30 in. I advised an auto-rx clean and go syn. My first thoughts were M1 0w40 or delvac 5w40 in summer and M1 5w30 or castrol german 0w30 in winter as it will not be driven too much in Chicago winter. I also gave him a blacksrone oil analysis kit. Will post once back. The dealer would not reset the service light as it had not hit 9500 miles yet, though they also recommended a change as the DINO had been in 8200 miles-OUCH. We'll see what the results are. Any what do you all think about what to use in this bad boy? Thanks
 
Nice car! Breaks my heart to hear the previous owner left some cheap oil in there for that long. I'm afraid to wonder how they otherwise maintained the poor thing.....
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Get that dino out now. Fill with Pennzoil or Castrol and run the AutoRx (supposed to run dino with this treatment). Then switch to the Delvac or M1.

And don't let the dealer do an oil dis-service again....ouch!
 
AL
the dealers put in BMW 5w30 dino as fill for this. in doing some other web research other BMW guys do use 40 wt. i just cannot believe DINO in this car, but what really interests me is that the 2001-2003 now use 10W60. How the **** could this stuff pump in a Chicago winter??????
Anyway the engine is 3.0 or 3.2 inline 6 with raised compression and dohc cam. It is their high perf screamer, high revvin and high horseppower. as such i was thinking a 40 wt in warmer weather. BTW the manual states to "call your dealer". Go figure.
 
quote:

Originally posted by smeltjr:
I wish it was mine, but........... A buddy just bought one of these with 50K miles. Nice sled. It has been dealer serviced and the dipstick was low, so he figured he would have the oil changed out. I told him a little about this board and that 10w60 is recommended fill in the new ones, but it turns out not his....... The dealer would not reset the service light as it had not hit 9500 miles yet, though they also recommended a change as the DINO had been in 8200 miles-OUCH. We'll see what the results are. Any what do you all think about what to use in this bad boy? Thanks

Bud, I was at the BMW dealer last month, went there with my friend to get his M3 serviced. BMW M3's have to use a special kind of oil, diff from normal BMW's such as 530, 740, etc. They use a BMW special oil.....10w-60. It is made by Castrol.

M3's are kind of touchy. They have a reputation for blowing up. Even with "special BMW motor oil," they will still blow up. Good luck!!!!
 
i have done some research on the engine recalls and it applies only to 2001-2003 engines. there are other posts on the board on the engine blow ups and 10w60 oil. this is NOT that engine. the 10w60 is a german syn and as i understand it can only be purchased at dealers. The dealer put 5w30 dino and the dealers cost of the oil was $15-not much. in fact pretty cheap for a dealer. i highly doubt that the oil that they put in these engines from the dealer is anything special. now the 10w60 is another story.
 
Flimflam: What car won't blow up when dino oil is left in for over 8000mi???
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Seriously, I second AL's reccomendation for Delvac 5w-40. If that is not easily found, M1 0w-40 for the hot half of the year and M1 10w-30 for the cold half of the year.
 
10W-60 TWS Motorsport from Castrol is recommended only for S54(E46 M3) and some S62(E39 M5) engines and it does not apply in this case. The oil in this S52 engine was initially either dino 15W-40 or synthetic 5W-40 but BMW changed the specs later on.
You can get a lot of useful info here: US M3 E36 FAQ .

The engine in US E36 M3s was detuned compared to Euro version, it makes 240HP vs 321HP in Euro trim and has only single Vanos. It was closer to M50 engine found in regular 3 series and this is probably the reason for dino oil, we have to remember it was in 1999.

I heard great things about Red Line 10W-40 in this engine and this would be my recommendation. During Chicago winter he can use 5W-30 but I would probably stick with 40wt.

As far as M3 engines blowing up it had nothing to do with oil and was limited to a short run starting in September '01 and caused by a faulty bearings, probably manufacturing problem.
 
I'd run 15W-50 M1 in the summer and 5W-30 BMW Synthetic in the winter. The BMW Synthetic is the factory fill in all US BMWs except for the previously mentioned M engines. The price is quite reasonable-especially with a BMW CCA discount. I even run the stuff in my 1993 Pathfinder. Are you sure that the dealer didn't perform an Inspection I? A regular BMW "Oil Service" is only an oil change, period. An Inspection I service takes some time to perform properly, but far too many dealers just give the car a cursory once-over. In any event, a gearhead owner can save $$$ by spending a couple of hours doing the job in the driveway-the service is described in detail in the Warranty/Service booklet. FWIW, my local BMW independent tech charged me $154 for an Inspection I on my 318ti track rat, and that included replacing the front pads with Axxis Metalmasters.
 
quote:

Flimflam: What car won't blow up when dino oil is left in for over 8000mi???

I know this wasn't directed at me and this is completely off topic, but I feel the need to add this little anecdote:

I work at Auto Zone selling car parts. Well, I had a guy come in looking for a valve cover gasket for an 84 F150 with an inline 6. Well, he asked me to get him an oil filter too, which I did. He then proceeded to tell me about how he hasn't changed the oil in two years because the drain plug was stripped and he was afraid he wouldn't be able to get it back in. I asked him how many miles were on it. His answer? 340,000!!!! So I guess not every car will blow up if dino is left in for 8,000 miles
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Rest assured, your friend can safely use the Castrol 10-60 as I use it in my 1994 BMW 850CSi that doesn't call for this oil specifically. It is some good s**t. Tell him to use this, redline away...and leave it in for the full spec'd interval...~8-10k mi...
 
I can't believe a reputable BMW service department would put "dino" 5w30 in any car they serviced. As far as I know, BMW dealers use their private label 5w30 synthetic in everything except older models and the newer M models that require Castrol 10w60 synthetic. (The private label 5w30 is nothing but rebottled Castrol TXT, BTW.)
 
quote:

Originally posted by G-Man II:
I can't believe a reputable BMW service department would put "dino" 5w30 in any car they serviced. As far as I know, BMW dealers use their private label 5w30 synthetic in everything except older models and the newer M models that require Castrol 10w60 synthetic. (The private label 5w30 is nothing but rebottled Castrol TXT, BTW.)

Actually there are 2 oils that each BMW dealership should carry: mineral 15W-40 PN 07 51 0 017 868 with list price of $2.35 and synthetic 5W-30 PN 07 51 0 017 866 for $3.80 list. Dino 15W-40 was probably the oil the car came with so maybe that's what the dealer has put in it as they do in some of the older models as well. If they indeed put some other dino 5W-30 I would never let them touch my car again.
 
The e46 M3 uses only 10W60.

Now the engine blowing up was a fault in the first 18,000 engines produced. Then there was a tranny recall on the SMG II.

Other than that, it is a sweet car.
 
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