ticking noise from cold engine....again?

[siscobmw]

Hi
I am guessing...anyone has still got ticking noise when engine is cold?
I have it with 2000 kms on the odo.
anyone called the dealer?
is it normal with low mileage cars?
anyone other than me?
Francesco


PS: my scenario is this:turn on engine, starts at 1200 rpm, then goes slowly to 6-700 rpm and the ticking noise(it's not big ticking) appears.If I press pedal no ticking noise at whatever engione speed....I move the car for 50 meters and I wait for the gate to open, the ticking is not barely audible, 200 meters again til the traffic light near my house and the ticking noise is gone....Yours?

[zEdP]

Yes siscobmw, no change with my 30i and >12000km on the clock.

I'm glad the ticking is not getting any louder because the weather is colder. I have had bmw's that only produced mechanical noises when cold started on cold winter mornings.

EdP

[teagueAMX]

It's normal. BMW's VANOS valve lifter technology is somewhat noisy. There are some posts on here or on the e90 forum.

[siscobmw]

ahahahah.....
cross fingers and pray you don't hear any strange noise from your 2010 3.0i.....
Francesco

[teagueAMX]

Here you go. And don't be fooled by some of the complaints in the thread. Take it for what it's worth and that is it is somewhat noisy, especially when cold.

http://www.e90post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=13504

Here a 'tube vid of Tiff Needell, a former race driver from 5th gear doing a cross country test of an M5. When you get to about 4:07 he jokes about how noisy it is when you start it cold. Following that he proceeded to drive it a good number of freeway miles and then took it to a test tack and beat the stuffing out of it high rev'g to the limit the entire test. The engine took it without complaint.

Believe me, if you have a real problem it will be much noisier then some mild ticking sounds, and, your engine will run bad too but you're covered by warranty.

[siscobmw]

thank you...My worries come from the fact that my previous 3.0Si z4 never had this sound.....I knew that some cars had something replaced under warranty cause some noises from the engine.....my friend just had every part of top end replaced under warranty cause a strange noise on his 30i z4 , and now it still has problems with noise(despite his noise is much more like a diesel noise !!!)...so I started to think about it a lot, maybe too much ...thanks a lot for your help, teagueamx....very kind!
Francesco

[teagueAMX]

Originally Posted by siscobmw

thank you...My worries come from the fact that my previous 3.0Si z4 never had this sound.....I knew that some cars had something replaced under warranty cause some noises from the engine.....my friend just had every part of top end replaced under warranty cause a strange noise on his 30i z4 , and now it still has problems with noise(despite his noise is much more like a diesel noise !!!)...so I started to think about it a lot, maybe too much ...thanks a lot for your help, teagueamx....very kind!
Francesco

Us Italiano need to stick together and help each other out, right!

Another complaint with engines that use direct injection is a sound like a diesel engine, which again is normal and other makes of cars using direct injection have similar sounds. The direct injectors themselves make the noise, but I can't remember if that applies to the 30i engine or not.

Glad I could help. Enjoy your Z.

[siscobmw]

here we have n52 with "normal" indirect injection, maybe the n53 has the direct injection....
Francesco...

[juhap]

Originally Posted by siscobmw

thank you...My worries come from the fact that my previous 3.0Si z4 never had this sound

I have a 2.5si and it has this sound. Not absolutely sure it's always been there, but at least this winter it has sounded like a diesel when the engine is cold enough. Then again this is the coldest winter here in a long time.

[siscobmw]

my did this first time last july.....so I don't think it's weather related stuff.....

[siscobmw]

this is my friend 's car, the engine is not fully warm, he did only 6kms....and thisi is the sound...

Here in Italy a lot of velvetronic engines do this sound but only after a short warmup....my engine is quiet just after 1 km....
two guys have trouble after changing the whole distribution, without resolving anything....one had his engine replaced under warranty....And rumours are that the engine is replaced and delivered to munich because there are several engine with this problem...and they want to study this.....the 30i seems to be the most affected engine, 2-3 cases of 23i....
I will let you know.....but bmw has no idea of the problem, or it looks like that...
Francesco

[teagueAMX]

Francesco,

I couldn't tell from the tube vid what model was featured, but it sounded a little bit like dieseling sound the direct injectors make, but that was really loud.

[lusebra]

Originally Posted by siscobmw

Hi
.......PS: my scenario is this:turn on engine, starts at 1200 rpm, then goes slowly to 6-700 rpm and the ticking noise(it's not big ticking) appears.If I press pedal no ticking noise at whatever engione speed....I move the car for 50 meters and I wait for the gate to open, the ticking is not barely audible, 200 meters again til the traffic light near my house and the ticking noise is gone....Yours?

Me too... same behavior of Francesco.....Z4 E89 3.0. This afternoon, after a week stop, I started the car in my garage and.....surprise.....I heard the "ticking noise". To be honest I heard this noise in other occasions, but I did not care. Ambient temperature 13 °C. It lasted about 2-3 mins and disappeared at all. I drove for 15 km at 1500-3000 rpm, I stopped the car without turning the engine off and.... no ticking noise. Anyway on Monday 8th March I will be going to my dealer for other reasons and I'll tell about this noise. I have a registration of the engine emitting this noise. I'll try to post if I'll be able to do.
Lusebra

[siscobmw]

hi!
it seems that italian cars have more problems than "foreign"cars...
I was told that also a german engine was replaced not to fix problem, but to get the noisy one and study the problem...
mmh.....
Lusebra, where are you from?Are you wrotong also on italian forums?
Francesco

[lusebra]

I'm from Tuscany. I subscribed an italian forum "BMWPASSION".....

[siscobmw]

me too.....I am siscoe3....
Francesco

PS: also there you find a 3d about this....
Francesco

[lusebra]

Hi,
I've been posting two movies of ticking sound of my Z4 E89 3.0i (September 2009). The first one is after starting the engine after a week stop, the second one is after about 3 mins after starting engine. As you can hear in the first one there is an almost regular metallic sound (tick), while in the second one it disappears.

1 - http://gallery.me.com/lusebra#100072
2 - http://gallery.me.com/lusebra#100083

Is it normal? or I have to concern about the engine? Thanks
Lusebra

[siscobmw]

some owner is worrying here....
today a dealer told me that it is normal, and it's not hva related , but it's vanos related....a little of ticking and rattling is normal when cold.....mmh....
I am not convinced at all....
SiSco

[teagueAMX]

Originally Posted by lusebra

Hi,
I've been posting two movies of ticking sound of my Z4 E89 3.0i (September 2009). The first one is after starting the engine after a week stop, the second one is after about 3 mins after starting engine. As you can hear in the first one there is an almost regular metallic sound (tick), while in the second one it disappears.

1 - http://gallery.me.com/lusebra#100072
2 - http://gallery.me.com/lusebra#100083

Is it normal? or I have to concern about the engine? Thanks
Lusebra

Note my comment from before, below.

Originally Posted by teagueAMX

It's normal. BMW's VANOS valve lifter technology is somewhat noisy. There are some posts on here or on the e90 forum.

Actually the 2nd video sounded pretty good - not sure if I missed something, but that was definitely normal sounding. As previously stated, the double VANOS valve train is really quite complicated is and is a little noisy even after it's warmed up.

[siscobmw]

when my engine is warmed up is really quiet, I hear only the belt rotating on its pulley..a dealer told me that engine wiithout warm lambda probes has not regular sound and nor ragular mixtruee balance, so vanos have to work a lot from cold to compensate this and to have smooth behaviour....

[siscobmw]

not the best video ever made, but you can hear the ticking noise starting when the engine change rpm.....

[SHADOW4]

Originally Posted by siscobmw

not the best video ever made, but you can hear the ticking noise starting when the engine change rpm.....

That is not "ticking" That is pure metal to metal banging! If my car (delivery end of april) sounds like that I would toe it back to the shop.
I can not belive that sound! Scary!