Re: New $4

[quk@isham-research.demon.co.uk (Phil Payne)]

In message <006001be4f71$49cfb380$6e54f2d1@oemcomputer> "Andrew Seward" writes:

> The E36 model 1995 M3 was a 3.0 liter.  This was bumped up to 3.2 liter
> displacement in either late 1996 or early 1997.
>
> I believe most of the complaints about "high sulfur gasoline" problems came
> from owners of the early (1989 - on) 5-series cars, not from the 3-series
> cars.

>From Dejanews:

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See Page 71 of edition 18th March [1988] Autocar.

This article is very interesting (thanks Paul for the info).

For those who are interested (but haven't seen it):

Last December (97) news broke in the media about BMW engines
experiencing exaggerated cylinder wear because of the high sulphur
content of some fuels, here in the UK.

The numbers quoted (in the UK market) were 600 aluminium alloy blocks
with Nicasil coated bores used in the 2.0, 2.5, and 2.8-litre engines
out of a total of 40-50,000.

UK fuel typically contains 250 ppm of sulphur compared to a European
standard of 500 ppm (it used to be 1000 ppm).  Some areas in Britain
seem more affected than others (Manchester and Liverpool are cited as
examples), and the cars had usually covered less than 30,000 miles.

BMW introduced a diagnostic process called the 'cylinder leakage test'
and is quoted as saying BMW will replace faulty units with the new
design as used in the new 3-series and all other alloy-block engines
from this month's production onwards. The swap can be done in 3 days,
parts supply allowing.

It seems only the UK is affected - all you others can feel smug :-)
However, it seems the problem is not really fully understood, yet.

[The remainder of the (full-page) article gives a fair bit of very
interesting detail and some background including other manafacturers'
practice: Jaguar, Porsche, Mercedes and others all use similar
techniques - for some engines - yet haven't experienced the problems
(yet?)]
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--
 Phil Payne
 Phone: 0385 302803   Fax: 01536 723021
 (The contents of this post will _NOT_ appear in the UK Newsletter.)