Under valve cover - 09 BMW 328i

[Kantaro]

2009 BMW 328i with 140k km. Service records indicate that the oil was changed annually at 12-15k km intervals at the dealership with BMW 5w30 from 2009 to 2015. From 2016 to 2020, I continued changing the oil annually with Motomaster F1 5w40 (LL-01) at 8-10k km intervals with mostly highway driving, with 1L top ups 6-7k km into each interval. Since 2020, I switched to Pennzoil Euro 0w30 and now only drive <1k km of city driving per year.

The valve cover gasket was replaced under CPO warranty in 2016 but started leaking again this year. I put it off but it became a problem when oil dripped onto the exhaust manifold and stank up the cabin. I dreaded this repair and while it wasn't very difficult in the end, it was still a very tedious 5 hours.

The oil pan gasket was also replaced in 2016 so now I'm worried that it's also leaking...

Oiler for the Valvetronic gear:

 

[demarpaint]

Looks good to me.

 

[dnewton3]

I've seen far, far worse. Nothing to be concerned about there by any means.

 

[Bjornviken]

looks good

 

[wwillson]

We keep seeing a bit of varnish on the spring hold down bolts on many of these BMW motors. The bolt head must either run cooler than the head or have little oil flow or both. I believe the varnish we see there is a tell tale sign of varnish in other places, like the ring packs. Can you pull a piston for us to see?

 

[Urshurak776]

Looks fine!

 

[SC Maintenance]

Looks good to me.

Excuse my ignorance, but why are the left banks springs mounted horizontally with extending ends? I presume those are valves springs still, correct?

 

[vpr5703]

Looks good to me.

Excuse my ignorance, but why are the left banks springs mounted horizontally with extending ends? I presume those are valves springs still, correct?

That's part of BMWs Valvetronic system. It's variable valve timing and lift on steroids. One of its main uses is completely negating the need for a throttle body in most situations. It's pretty neat.

 

[Marcozi]

Is the valve cover original? BMW plastic valve covers are notorious for warping and cracking.

 

[wemay]

Looks just fine to me. Keep on motoring.

 

[JavierH19]

Looks great to me.

 

[BMWTurboDzl]

8 yrs on a replacement gasket isn't bad.

The teeth on the eccentric shaft look good. How many km on the engine?

 

[Kantaro]

Is the valve cover original? BMW plastic valve covers are notorious for warping and cracking.

I'm not sure how complete my records are but the dealership replaced the valve cover in 2013 at 57k km, presumably because the factory one was warped or cracked. This should be the same cover since then. What's weird is that the valve cover gasket was replaced in 2016 at 99k km. Seems highly unlikely that the dealer would reuse the original gasket, which means the gasket only survived 3 years and 30k km? Then again, the BMW gasket I just replaced only had 40k km but 8 years. It was still very flexible/pliable but still leaked on the exhaust side.

For whatever it's worth, the valve cover gasket material is still ACM rubber. The other common leaking gaskets (oil filter housing and cooler) were originally HNBR but was recently updated to FKM in the past few years.