Everybody welcome back, Mark with Exotic
Carr Play Place, standing in front of my
illustrious e60 m5 today. Today we're
going to talk about the 5 Series BMW's
and the most unreliable, that top 5 most
unreliable 5 Series BMW is on the market
today as a used car purchase. Before we
get to that though make sure you check
out the description below there's a link
to my Shopify channel, I'm selling many
great shirts you'll love it. Check it out.
But let's get rolling, so into the top 5
most unreliable 5 Series BMWs.
Today starts with number one, it's the
e60, the 2007 to 2010 E60 535i and
why is that such a problem? While it
shares a lot of the great attributes
that the 335 has as in, it's basically
one of the favorites for the tuners, but
that all comes with some challenges. We
know these cars come with a straight 6 3
liter engine twin turbo charged with
producing 300 horsepower and about 300
foot-pounds of torque,
but because it was BMWs new kick at
turbo charging, yeah they had done that
back many years ago, but they were
getting back into the turbo charging
game, the e60 generation in general had a
lot of complex electrical concerns and
issues to deal with, but on top of that,
it also had high pressure fuel pump,
which coincidentally lost BMW lost a
class-action suit and BMW ultimately
anteed up to honor 10 years and up to
two hundred thousand kilometers of
warranty to get that resolved for many,
many customers out there today. It also
had issues like leaky valve cover
gaskets, leaky oil filter gaskets, fuel
injector issue, to interpose the problems
themselves with the turbos, and the
Radley wastegate issues that were an
annoyance for a lot of owners as well, so
it had a host of mechanical problems and
these problems in a lot of cases you
would even,
I'm under warranty but sometimes they
actually recurred, so it was a problem
time and time again just as the 335 was
with the same n54 twin turbocharged
engine. So the second most problematic 5
Series BMW goes of course to the car
behind me the e60 m5, featuring the v10
the S85 v10 that produces 507 brake
horsepower at about 383 foot-pounds of
torque.
While this thing was an absolute
masterpiece, f1 derived engine, f1
sounding engine, that's why a lot of
enthusiasts still love it today, was able
to attain over 200 miles per hour, but
that all came at a cost again because
the e60 generations had a new level of
electrical complexities, those were
problems for these cars, but on top of
that it had a lot of mechanical problems
as well, and some of the mechanical
problems start with things like the idle
throttle actuators, we had double vanos
issues, where they start making noise,
rattling of course, vanos pumps we're a
problem, the high-pressure pumps could be
a problem, and the lines could be a
problem, those are all issues and very
expensive issues. Some of which could
actually write off the entire value of
the car. Of course there was also gearbox
issues, we had problems specifically with
the SMG 3, we had problems with a
differential, but the king the granddaddy
of problems came with you know 60, 7,0 80
thousand miles on the odometer for these
cars, rod bearings, a filthy problem. A
problem that was consistent through
almost every single e60 m5 I know. There
were some owners out there that didn't
see as much of an issue, but there were
consistently high volumes of cars that
sustained rod bearing either
failures or premature wear, and this of
course is the primary reason why this
car makes number 2 for the most
problematic largest number issue 5
Series BMW's. And so the third most
problematic 5 Series BMW again goes to
another E60 and E61 model,
of course the touring model, goes to any
of the cars that had the
N47, the four-cylinder turbo diesel
engine that was one of the entry level
based diesel engines that were available
on the market in those eras. The n47
engine had a a catastrophic issue
related to it, it actually had two failure
modes, two significant fatal flaws with
this car, and one of which of course was
the timing chain failures, timing chain
failures, of course synchronizes the
valves, and the Pistons make the car run
properly when that synchronization goes
out of whack,
like they often do when the timing chain
breaks. This is called an interference
engine, you have collision between valves
and pistons, resulting in immediate
stoppage of the engine, and often broken
parts scattered throughout the engine,
catastrophic problem N47 turbo diesel
engine that was available in the 520 D
of the e60 generation, that was a real
big problem. Another fatal flaw with that
car, was the fact that it actually had
the timing chain arrangement was on the
firewall, so you couldn't even change the
chain for relatively small cost as a
preventative measure, it was a
significant cost even to pull the motor
out to replace that timing chain for
those who actually felt compelled to get
ahead on the maintenance on that
particular car. So it was a very costly
thing to preventative check on, and it
was even more costly when he started
hearing that rattling noise and the car
instantly stopped, shut down, went dark on
you. That usually meant you had a
catastrophic engine failure which was
very, very common in that n47 engine.
Another little issue that you had a
design flaw on the n47 engine, was the
fact that it had poorly lubricated
wastegate springs and hardware, so often
what happened is the wastegate would
stick, usually stick open, which is
probably safer that way it stuck open so
it's essentially, it would flush most of
your boost out while you were driving,
resulting in a loss of power as well as
poor fuel economy, this was recognized
early on, and a lot of these cars were
rectified of this issue, although it was
a problem.
So the fourth most problematic 5 Series
BMW of all time goes to the e39 m5. Enthusiasts
loved that car, it had a 400 horsepower
v8 engine, strapped to a six-speed manual
gearbox, it was one of the last of the
old-school generation BMWs that was more
mechanical than it was electrical,
and that's why a lot of
people love that car dearly, and that's
why those cars and the values are going
up today, but unfortunately it is an M
car. A lot of them are driven hard and as
a result here is a list of issues you
can find within e39 m5 rod bearings. I
know the e60 m5 gets all the rhetoric
around it, but the e39 also had a lot of
the cars I've come across had rod
bearing replaced because they also have
problems. There was also suspension
bushing issues, sticky brakes, I noticed a
lot of these cars on the used car market,
now I'm finding with rust on the round,
the rockers, the gas cap door in that
area, you'd also find sometimes rust
around the rear quarters. They had rust.
Don't forget they also had a dual Vanos
system which could also act up and cause
you expensive repairs as well. These cars
were also susceptible to carbon buildup,
as well that would also result in you
know kind of plugging of the intake
system, the valve system, and as well of
course O2 sensors were also not
uncommon to burnout. So you would have a
host of engine lights, it was also the
kind of car not unlike the e60 m5 where
every time you turn the key, you sort of
flinched and hoped you didn't see that
magical engine light. Other than that, it
was a spectacularly great car to drive,
and still is today, and that's why it
fetches a still a significant dollar. The
car has not reached beater status, so just
understand because it was an expensive
car in its day, it still has expensive
repairs associated with it. It is an M
car. So the fifth most problematic five
series car goes to the e30 530i and
that car was produced in 1992 to 1996, and
that happens to be the car that had 215
horsepower v8 strapped to either an
automatic transmission or a manual
5-speed gearbox. I've got to warn you
first,
not a great power plan to begin with,
when strapped to the auto, it's a very
sluggish feeling gearbox, and the car
wasn't really that sporty feeling, plus
it's kind of heavy, so you always want to
buy this car with a manual for starters.
Well where this car became a problem was
other than the usual barrage of
electrical failures, windows coming off
the rails, or you had host of other just
generic issues, you also had valve cover
gasket problems, water pump problems,
leaking, but most importantly the liners
of the engine were consisting of nikka
cell and the high sulfur content that
was in the fuels of those eras, take a
real toll on that internal parts of the
engine, thus reducing the power over time
in the car internally, essentially
started to corrode and wear away, and you
reduce compression, you lost power over
the years, that wasn't a great car to
have because the internal, the guts the
nickasel, if you can find the car later
on with the Elsill lining, that was a
much better option, but generally because
the early deterioration of the internal
lining of the engine coupled with the
weak automatic gearbox, and host of
electrical problems as well some leaks
on the front end of the motor. This was
easily in my books one of the worst cars
available in the 5-series market today,
on the used market of course. So
everybody I really hope you enjoyed the
video. Make sure you give me a like, don't
forget to share the video with your
friends, and most importantly of course,
subscribe to the channel. Hey check out a
lot of the other great videos if you're
shopping for a used BMW, if you've seen
my other videos, I've already got videos
out on the the most reliable, the most
unreliable 3-series cars, we're gonna
touch on that for the five series, and
probably look at the 7 Series as well. So
make sure you give me a thumbs up,
subscribe and I hope to see you guys
real soon. See you then.
Bye bye.