Originally Posted By AJSki2fly
I have not removed the wings personally, but it's not a difficult procedure having watch a mechanic do so.

With respect to the issue you have, I had a problem with my S1 being hestitant under hard acceleration, the cause of this being to the inlet head manifold bolts. They are a stud with an inverted mushroom shape sleeve with a hard rubber between the inlet manifold and the sleeve, the stud when clamped down is a fixed length and the rubber forces the head onto the gasket between engine block and inlet manifold. What happens is that the rubber compresses and creeps with time. This causes pressure to decrease to the inlet manifold and can then result in air leaks to the inlet manifold and mixture issues. This problem becomes worse when engine gets warm. So your starting issue could be due to this. I found that if I forced the hesitation under hard acceleration then a fault code would occur indicating mixture issues.

The problem described is discussed at length in the V8 website link I posted. I have known of two other cars with this issue. I would ask the BMW specialist to replace the head bolt sleeves along with new rubbers as a precaution whilst they have it. Each one is £2.71 and there are 10, and it only takes about 1 hour to do once the bonnet is off.


Thanks for the tip Adrian.

The N62 seems to be a robust engine, but there's also a lot that can cause the symptoms I'm experiencing. Unfortunately without diagnostic gear I just don't have enough data take the engine apart.

I will get the Aero to a BMW specialist Tuesday after our holiday here in the States.