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Do NOt Buy A BMW Diesel Engine Car Without Understanding this Risk

39K views 575 replies 75 participants last post by  Michael Schott 
#1 ·
You can do everything right as an owner and inadvertently catch a bad tank of fuel and incur a $10K engine fix. THIS IS NOT A WARRANTABLE ITEM. And once you go out of pocket $10K to get your car back on the road, the risk remains and will be yours to bear if it happens again. The risk remains as long as you own the car.

I wish I hadn't been so ignorant when I bought mine. Think long and hard about the purchase and understand the risk you take on. BMW NA will never accept responsibility for this. You will not know when you get bad diesel until its too late and, contrary to other opinions and posts, it's NOT limited to off-brand stations. The fuel that allegedly ruined my engine was from Shell.

I hope this factual commentary educates anyone who is on the fence as to whether to buy a BMW diesel car. It's also important to consider resale value as this engine ruination risk is a known flaw in these engines.

If the moderator doesn't remove this post then it can be considered a good public service announcement from a victim of the above mentioned issue.
 
#545 ·
Just made an account to post this...

A friend of mine had similar issues with VW over fuel contamination (he filled up with bio-diesel B20). Ultimately VW relented and replaced his HPFP. Bio-diesel can dissolve styrofoam in concentrations over 5%. OP may have never put unleaded gas in, just topped up with B20.
 
#558 · (Edited)
surprisingly the Styrofoam cup and sniff test is apparently a widely accepted field test for diesel contaminated by gasoline, to be backed up by a lab test. was surprised to find that vw uses it, and its also used in diesel competition to disqualify competitors using spiked fuel.
you learn something new every day.

why the lab test has not been performed is unclear. perhaps it has by the dealer or bmwna. you can be sure that they are getting their ducks in a row if they have dug in their heels and there is a hint of legal action.

The clamming up and stonewalling that has happened suggests to me that they either got the sense the OP was going to bring legal action or he actually suggested it. in any business, the moment there is a threat or suggestion of legal action, the SOP would be to discontinue friendly communications and prepare to address a legal action-- basically wait to be served and for the discovery request before saying or divulging any more information.

i'm almost certain the call to not cover the repair was done at the field service engineer level. diagnostics at the dealership level are pretty basic. plug into computer and it will tell you to do A. if after doing A, issue persists, do B. etc etc etc. at some point during the diagnostic tree, the dealer was told to pull a sample of the fuel.

based on what the OP has posted, the dealer has a sample of the fuel and is willing to provide a portion of that for independent testing to the OP. i have no doubt in my mind BMWNA has probably instructed the dealer to secure that sample if it is not already in their hands. its not a criminal case, so they will not need a chain of custody. just an affidavit from the dealership staff stating that on such and such a date they removed sample Y of fuel from vehicle X

the standard for proof in a case like this is NOT beyond a reasonable doubt. it would be a preponderance of the evidence (is it more likely that _______ is true). bmw would make the case that the failure was caused by gasoline in the fuel, see engineering reports blah blah blah blah, the affidavit of the tech stating the odor of gasoline and the preliminary cup test, and an explanation of why both are acceptable field tests for establishing the presence of, followed up by lab tests on the sample. the opposing side would have to lay a case to show that the more likely reason for the failure would be a defect in the engine or some other issue that would be covered under the warranty.

I dare say that if geico is looking to recoup the payout they made, they will be looking at the fueling stations NOT BMW.

But, based on the OP's account, his dealer royally screwed up this entire interaction. by the time bmwna was involved, it was past the point of no return. the whole issue would have turned out much better if they had at the onset, tested the fuel and verified gasoline, and suggested pursuing the fuel source. we will never know how the interaction with the op and the dealer went down, this could be the dealership being completely unreasonable, or it could have been a reaction of the dealer to the op demanding they fix it under warranty. we'll probably never know the other side of the story. but it seems apparent that they decided at some point to dig their heels in and hand over an extreme repair estimate along with warranty void threats.

my $0.02
 
#560 ·
surprisingly the Styrofoam cup and sniff test is apparently a widely accepted field test for diesel contaminated by gasoline, to be backed up by a lab test. was surprised to find that vw uses it, and its also used in diesel competition to disqualify competitors using spiked fuel.
you learn something new every day.
This is exactly what I've been saying.
 
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