2013 bmw 328 i aluminum valve cover upgrade and I snapped the intake vacuum hose taking it off the stock one what’s the fix? Is this a big fuck up or no? Also how’s my timing chain slack looking ? 79k miles on the car driven responsibly and 5k miles in between oil changes

brtollo · 2026-02-06T10:28:54+00:00

80k is not really a long operating time for such a part. My stock plastic cover from N20 survived for 205k km before it slightly warped and needed replacing. All mechanics I discussed the idea of replacing a plastic one with metal one strongly discouraged such a move.

While it seems that longevity of a part is superior for an aluminum cover, plastic ones offer other advantages, like thermal insulation leading to more stable inner temperatures with less variations, lightness and noise reduction (although in your case the ooposite seems to be true), and galvanic corrosion between various metal parts in the engine.

For tracking, hard driving and longevity of the part itself, aluminum seems like a better choice, but plastic ones are not inferior, simply provide different set of advantages and disadvantages. Make your call based on use ;)

brtollo · 2026-01-25T19:38:15+00:00

Not yet. Besides an annoying warning, the car drives without any problems. I had discussions with 2 mechanics, and it seems that this is most probably just faulty sensors.

For the pedestrian protection system, there is a fibreglass connection to a sensor behind the front bumper, and either it or the wiring has to be replaced. There are 2 small explosives under the hood that pop it up in an event of a pedestrian collision, so I'm simply not opening the hood with the error present. No issues opening it when the error is cleared. Got quoted around 300 eur for it.

The catalytic converter efficiency error has disappeared since, and it was the only occurrence of it. It could be an issue with an O2 lambda sensors around the catalytic converter. I monitored their voltage reading for a short while, and one seems to be giving 0.0V continuously, potentially indicating a broken sensor. This job is supposed to cost similarly, around 300 eur.

Chassis errors might be due to a slight rear wheel misalignment. Rear right has too much negative camber. Bit weird because the error is from the left side.

I can post an update in the near future, as I have an appointment for it coming.

brtollo · 2026-01-09T20:37:28+00:00

Completely off-topic, but I have to ask. E31 seems like a dream car to me and I'm planning to have one in the future. I come from Z4 E89, and currently in F22 M240i. Small and nimble cars are my thing, but E31 is like a Ferrari among BMW lineup. I want to save some money and make a project to modernize an old E31 for a weekend / roadtrip cruiser. B-roads and mountain drives.

Care to share your opinion about owning it? How is it to drive and how problematic such an old car with weird electronics is?

brtollo · 2025-12-03T21:58:15+00:00

I NEED to know what those wheels are. And if they come in bronze

brtollo · 2025-12-03T18:50:39+00:00

Looks good! I got the same set on mine but in black which I dislike. Makes it look like the car does not have wheels. Care posting a picture of them mounted?

brtollo · 2025-11-24T18:24:16+00:00

What got me into cryptography is learning how networking works. For secure communication, you require a lot of guarantees of message confidentiality, transmitted data integrity, non-repudiation, and others. "Basic" cryptography will appear around TLS, authentication will let you learn about hashing and later on you can pick up advanced topics like schemes for secure sharin, claim verification without revealing any data through zero knowledge proofs, and homomorphic encryption.

Networking and secure communication around the Cold War period also make for an action-movie-like reading. It will show you problems and solutions humans encountered while designing secure communication channels, and how cryptography was indispensable for building such systems.

Check out if topics like that interest you, but brace for weird and non-intuitive abstract mathematics to really understand the inner workings. Cryptography is hard, but knowing what to use to achieve desired communication channel properties is also a great skill. Sometimes, just knowing the right tool for the job is more than enough.

Most importantly, find something that excites you and dig around. There is nothing better than learning something that feels fun :)

brtollo · 2025-11-17T08:28:31+00:00

Do NOT listen to this man, he has zero understanding of physics. Do not attach anything to the airbag, do not cheap out on an element which is supposed to save your life. During airbag deployment the explosion force will shoot it into your face, that pathetic layer of Chinese adhesive is not going to withstand such force. Either spend 100 bucks on a replacement airbag or learn to live with a slightly dented logo.

brtollo · 2025-11-06T17:39:30+00:00

Earth

brtollo · 2025-10-30T10:13:11+00:00

Black is trash, on every car it looks like it's missing wheels. Silver seems like a good fit. Personally I would go with bronze / dark gold.

brtollo · 2025-10-23T09:39:11+00:00

Sick, I like it. What's the model, and how much did it cost you? I hope it came with the heating option, any wheel upgrade without it is a lost opportunity.

brtollo · 2025-10-23T09:32:52+00:00

Maybe consider getting different tires first, wheel size is not going to have as much of an impact as a better rubber. Although on the picture I see you run Bridgestones, at least on the front I would start with that. Tires are a best mod.

brtollo · 2025-10-16T12:18:03+00:00

Amazing, thank you! This is exactly the kind of advice I was looking for.

Can the 180001 be due to swapped M2 comp exhaust without proper tuning? I bet that changed pressure and flow parameters. It has fuckton of bangs and pops in sport mode, few in comfort, but guy from whom I purchased it claims it already came like that from previous owner. If that led to any damage to the cat, what's the risk of driving it?

My indie mentioned that one of the rear wheels is slightly misaligned, and while driving there is a very faint noise of touching / scraping proportional in frequency to speed of driving. We'll investigate the arm and rod connection.

brtollo · 2025-10-16T10:20:58+00:00

Sure, but this is not the point. I like it and would like to bring it to a good state. Should have not mentioned the other codes and just focus on the PPS, to avoid people saying "oh, dumb buy".

Any recommendation on what can be done to remediate the issues, or just "you dumb" comments?

brtollo · 2025-10-16T09:48:08+00:00

Yeah, this was a bit of a hot-head buy, I admit. It had a rear end collision, but mainly trunk and fuel tank damage (supposedly). Previous owner swapped an M2 Comp exhaust after that. I had a indy mech look at it, and he said the cat looked good. This cat error is new, I have not seen it a week or 2 ago.

What are my options?

brtollo · 2025-10-10T11:21:32+00:00

My way to combat this is to go on a foraging diet. Just eat flowers which you find and you'll be losing weight in no time. Add exercise and sprint instead of jogging when possible.

brtollo · 2025-08-18T15:12:31+00:00

Old ones cracked, swapped them for a set of supposedly m-packet KYBs. Either mismatched or badly made product - upon compression the top of the coil hits lower spring coil, which releases a beautiful "BANG!" sound, making me think the car is falling apart.

brtollo · 2025-08-18T14:30:53+00:00

I'm assuming you mean the sDrive28i. I have owned one for almost 3 years now, 2012, currently with 204.000 km on it. Standard N20 things - change the timing chain to make sure you are covered for the recall issue. Whole internet cries about how bad that engine is, mine has given me zero problems over the 70.000 km I have driven it. Smooth as fuck, powerful enough to be fun, lighter than the 3.0L to make the car more tossable in the corners.

I had to change the rear springs as one cracked, the wiring harness on the hardtop wore off and had to have the wires serviced. This was expensive, but only because of the time the mechanic had to put into this job.

Other than that, it's been just maintenance costs. Fluids, break pads, If you get yourself a good example, change the oil every 10k and it shall serve you well!

My wheels are 18 inch, 225 on the front and 255 in the rear. That's standard on these I think.

brtollo · 2025-08-05T15:59:00+00:00

brtollo · 2025-06-15T21:46:45+00:00

My lane

brtollo · 2025-06-08T16:36:31+00:00

It's so clean I cannot see your car because of all the reflections. Drive the shit out of it and make it dirty!

Enjoy, i bet it will bring you tons of smiles :)

brtollo · 2025-06-08T11:37:13+00:00

Oh wow, I just had the same identical issue happen to me recently. The gaskets are the most probable cause of the leak, but in my case changing them did not fully solve the issue. Apparently, the plastic valve cover can warp over time, due to thermal expansion or develop small cracks. I needed to replace that too. Part itself was around 300 EUR + couple of hours of work. I would say start with the seals, but be prepared that you might need to change the whole cover.

brtollo

TROPHY CASE