I've just bought a 1996 E39 323i with a genuine 62,000 on the clock. It has a main dealer history except for the last service, where it says 6.5 litres synthetic oil 10-40. Yesterday the oil light came on and I see it's just below the minimum mark on the dipstick, it's done 7,000 since the service. I can't get an answer on the phone number I have for the company that did the service, so what oil should I top it up with? It's 11 months since the service so maybe a full change may be in order, but I read somewhere that 15,000 was more than likely. I thought 10-40 was semi-synthetic, I expected fully synth to be more like 5-30, although I suppose 12 years ago 10-40 was cutting edge.
Any recommendations for topping it up? Magnatec has been mentioned by someone at work.
Edited by Pugugly on 24/04/2008 at 15:57
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Change it !
From Castrol's website the recommended oil would be
EDGE SPORT 0W-40 (a,q,r) 6.5
Alternative recommendation MAGNATEC 10W-40 A3/B3
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I checked the Castrol site, it says in the addendum that you can't use Edge on the E39.
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There's more than one Castrol Edge. Their 0W -30 meets BMW longlife 01, and the 5W 30 and 0W 40 both meet BMW longlife 04. Any would be ideal for this car. I wouldn't bother with the semi-synthetic.
JS
Edited by John S on 24/04/2008 at 19:46
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I put a litre of Shell Helix 5-30 fully synthetic (not the new diesel version) in tonight, twas all I could get in a hurry. I couldn't use the car today because of the oil light and I got caught in the Noah-like deluge around Manchester at 11:30 this morning on the bike, even the bottom of inside my rucksack was wet. It took 1.5 seconds from lightening flash to hearing the thunder, which made it all but overhead, not the nicest biking experience I've ever had. So I was determined to have the car option for tomorrow.
I think for peace of mind I'll get an oil and filter change asap.
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I had a 92 E34 520 (with an M50 engine) that snapped its cam-chain at 35K miles with a full BMW service history and using BMW wonder-oil.
Now , I'm an engineer and a Physics graduate and after 30 years of learning, data collection and reflection I have come to the following conclusions...
Ignore the service indicator.
Ignore the pink fluffy dice that oil company suits talk about BWM spec this and VW spec that.
Change the oil every 6000 miles (time is immaterial and new cheap-oil is a lot better than 6000 mile wonder-oil).
Use the cheapest oil that meets the SL or CF spec (contains zinc dialkyl-phosphate, that's the important chemical !)
If you're REALLY rich ... use fully synthetic, but its not worth the money.
Lidl sell good oil for £8 a gallon.
Edited by Dynamic Dave on 16/06/2008 at 01:23
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I'd tend to agree with that, the only purpose of long-life anything on a car is to make the initial servicing cheap for fleet managers, and let the poor soul who buys it off them to take the long-term consequences.
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I'm not sure that frequent changes of low-spec oil does any good. In fact, if it gets affected by heat, and degrades, it may create sludge. As many thousands found, especially in North America, on MB, Toyotas and VW petrol engines, where the "oil is oil" theory foundered. This was a trial by thousands of users, not just one failure. RI,RO.
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Where was low-spec oil mentioned? The cheapest that meets the required standard is what's being suggested.
In my case I've got the nikasil engine so I'm not fussed about sticking rigidly to manufacturer's recommendations, the supposedly great engineers didn't know much about fuel so why should I put my faith in their opinions about oil?
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Polonium stated: "use the cheapest oil that meets the API SL or CF spec", which are rather old specs, and satisfied by cheap oil. As BMW use ACEA, plus their own on top, and American oil standards are irrelevant, I stand by what I said. Cheap oil was stated to be adequate, in the context of the posters gripe that manufacturers oil standards were apparently nonsense. You can't have it both ways.
Edited by nortones2 on 16/06/2008 at 18:04
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