**Z4** How-tos (post links here)

Originally Posted by fbriggs

OK..here is how you really change the water pump on a Z4....(E85, m54 motor, mine is a 2.5) I have done this procedure, and all you will need are one water pump with o-ring, two m6x25mm bolts, a gallon of anti-freeze, simple hand tools, a few blocks of wood, a rolling floor jack, and jack stands. It is a good time to replace the belts, so get both of them. Yes, you do have to move the engine..a little.
1. Jack up the car on one side, place a smaller jackstand under the car where the front stabalizer is bolted to the frame. You just need to get the car up enough to remove the front plastic splashpan. Now remove the splashpan, grip it firmly, and toss it at the nearest BMW engineer to show your gratitude for designing a car that has a sheet metal support with webing placed directly infront of the water pump, thereby making it necessary to move the engine in order to remove the water pump, even though there is enough room infront of the sheet metal support to be able to desing it with a slight 1" dip towards the front of the car thereby providing enough clearance to simply remove the water pump unimpeded. Now, jack up the car a little higher, and remove your small jackstand and place a big jackstand (now that you have the clearance) under the car. place the jack on the other side, and jack it up enough to place another large jackstand under the car at the point where the anti-sway bar (stabilizer) bolts to the frame. Now place a rolling floorjack under the engine and place a block of wood between the jack and the oilpan at the front of the engine. Make sure this block of wood is long enough to support the load across the entire width of the oilpan, in order to srpead the weight of the engine across as much of the oilpan as possible, for obvious reasons. You just need to jack it up to meet the oilpan, don't go any higher yet. The reason you do this now is because the underside of the engine will soon become wet with anti-freeze, making everything slippery.
2. Now remove the belt for the A/C compressor (torx bit needed for tensioner)
3. Remove the top plastic (fanshroud?) cover and loosen but don't remove the bolts on the water pump pulley. Remove the serpentine belt. 16mm socket for the tensioner.
4. Now remove the 10mm bolts on the water pump pulley. Tap the pulley gently to get it off. It is made of plastic, so be careful. Remove the 10mm nuts on the water pump. Now install your m6x25mm bolts into the threaded holes on the water pump. Tighten them, and this will remove the water pump from the engine block. The coolant will spill out, but it won't be a lot. Now remove the upper radiator hose only where it connects to the engine by prying the metal clip. Push it up out of the way against the oil filter housing. You can remove the hose before removing the pump, but I did not because it would otherwise make everything wet that I still have to work on.
5. Now remove the nut at the left engine mount. I think it is a 16mm, might have been 15mm.
6. Jack up the engine slowly, but only go up to the point where the engine mounting bolt is just at the lip of the engine mount, where it almost clears the engine mount, but no further. (I would not want to have to line that thing up upon installation. Besides, it is not necessary to go that far.) You should now be able to pull out the water pump going in the direction of the passenger side.
Ta Da! You've now saved your self a lot of money. Now install the new water pump by lubricating the new o-ring with a little ant-freeze on your hand, and install the water pump. Put the car back together. Pour in some anti-freeze. With the car and the heater running, bleed the air out of the cooling system. (With the bleeder screw located next to the resevior cap.) But keep the old water pump. You will need this during your next trip to Germany, when you get the opportunity to throw it at the head of a BMW z4 engineer. This will make them think! It would be different if these water pumps did not fail prematurely.
Hope this helps!

Hi, I have a 2003 Z4 3.0i E85 Chassis with a M54 Engine. I posted back in May the failure of my Cooling System. I was gradually loosing Antifreeze over a few months and then one day the cooling system failed.

I am a true DIY but have significant experience and tools with cars other than a BMW. The forum, especially the above quote from fbriggs, gave me the confidence that the repair was DIW feasible. However the gap between feasibility and reality can be enormous at times. I would like to share my DIY experience and the "crutches" I used to make my fix a success.

When I described my failure on this forum, there were a number of failure scenarios presented based on a number of different cooling components. My serpentine belt had shredded. The first thing I did was remove the remainder of the serpentine belt and remove the intact accessory belt. When checking for failed components, I initially looked for frozen or wobbly pully wheels. Water pump was wobbling all over the place. I looked for leakage around the thermostat and any cracks in the antifreeze reservoir. (With the water pump replaced , I am still looking to verify no leakage at those points)

First, the on line discussions are great if you know the ins and outs of your car. What is lacking is figures to give oneself the confidence that what you are doing is the right thing in the right place. To quell this fear, I relied on the online BMW maintenance manual provided by Mitchell.com . It only costs $11.00 a month to get access to a well described, well illustrated manual so one can feel confident that the forum descriptions are well visualized and confirrmed. You ccan rent the manuals for a day (really cheap), a month or longer. For a cost of a socket, it is well worth the peace of mind.

Second, we all can use a better description of jack support points. I relied on multiple web sources to convince me of the support points on the vehicle to my jacking and jack standing. I didnt have a fancy jack and only felt comfortable working with the 4 visually obvious jack points on the sides of the car. You really dont want to make a mistake at this point in the game and the lack of visuals can give one pause. Also, make sure you always have a buddy system given you are a DIY and some secondary jack stand support points for insurance. Disasters happen and you dont want to be the unlucky one with a low clearance car. One thing I learned by searching on the WEB is if you want to place jack supports for the front, using the rear jack points on the Z4 will lift the whole side and allow you to place a jack stand under the front jack support point.

All in all, the first time BMW DIY'er took the time to not rush, verify each step with some kind of visualization and if something doesnt seem right, ask questions or do more research............DONT FORCE THE ISSUE!!!!!!!!! And as fbriggs said, "save the old water pump to throw at the Z4 Engineer for requiring you to lift the engine 30 cm" and be proud you saved yourself a boatload of money for a $60 replacement part and a few belts. I'll be looking over the next few weeks for any sign of leakage but I certainly feel confident on many DIY repairs going forward now that I feel confident knowing the placement of components of the engine and the chassis. Next fix should be a breeze. Thanks for all who contributed to my questions.

Pete

http://wds.spaghetticoder.org/

I am searching for a good repairmen in NE-Central Florida for a Z4, do we have any BMW owners near me that I may speak with? Thanks

Both the same.

MS S70, Z4-M:



MS S54, E46 - M3:

64 million:



200 CPS:



200 CPS Correction:



OTHER STUFF.

Oil Sump:



Valve adjust:

US/CDN front passenger seat (with OC3 mat) only.

11 42 7 833 769 $15.24r

http://www.bimmerfest.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=240959

Transport mode:



A/C Transport lock-out:



A light

Just wanted to say Thank You to Ron Stygar for the information posted here on triple turn signal activation and some other features. The dealer first called back saying it could not be done on the Z4. When I downloaded and forwarded the files posted on this forum, all of a sudden they figured it out.

Thanks again for all the helpful information and DIY stuff.

My 2.5i has only 38,000 miles and want it to last a long time. I live in Laredo, TX, 154 miles from the closest BMW dealer in San Antonio. How can I find a reputable service center here? If I change my own oil when it's due, what do I use? Filter? I will see 90-100 days each year above 100 degrees. Any suggestions for keeping the paint and top from getting trashed by the sun?

Setting Tool:

is it just me or can anyone else see the pics in "Adjusting toe-in and camber on front axle" & "Checking thickness of brake pad" ?

Originally Posted by kennef

is it just me or can anyone else see the pics in "Adjusting toe-in and camber on front axle" & "Checking thickness of brake pad" ?

It should be working now.

Originally Posted by Ron Stygar

It should be working now.

Thx mate.

Nut doesn't show in the torque area.

I've been using the BMW plastilube 5.5 ml foil brake lube packets for years.
81 22 9 407 103 $2.24 retail.
They are a pain to use.



Finally found a source (actually two) for the 75 ml tubes BMW use to sell.
Ordered them yesterday from AW and they showed up today.

AW Imported Parts Inc.
120 Kremer Avenue
Eatontown, NJ 07724
732-542-5600
Ask for Brian
$5.99 each plus $6.00 shipping and $1.93 tax for four.
$31.89 total = $7.97 each

Bimmerworld.com
$7.45 each plus $9.97 shipping which is the same for one or four.
$39.77 total = $9.94 each

Technical Data


mm to inches:
http://www.convertunits.com/from/mm/to/inches


Wheel bearing:


Front brake:


Wheel: