Mark: Hi, it's Mark Bossert. I'm here with Bernie Pawlik, Pawlik Automotive in Vancouver, BC Canada, Vancouver's best auto service experience, and we're talking cars. How you doing Bernie?
Bernie: Doing very well.
Mark: Well, this morning our guest is a 2017 BMW M240i, they love their long names. BMW. What was going on with this vehicle?
Bernie: We can add X Drive onto the end of that too, just to make the name even longer. This vehicle came in with a coolant leak. Also needed rear brakes, but we'll talk about that another time. But yeah, it came in with a coolant leak. So we did our diagnosis, which consists of a pressure test to start. Found some leakage from the water pump and areas in behind the water pump. These are often buried, so things need to be removed to find out where the actual leaks are coming from. But at the very least, we knew it needed a water pump.
Mark: So this being a smaller BMW, is this still a, like what motor is running in this?
Bernie: It's got a six cylinder twin turbo.
Mark: In line.
Bernie: In line, yep. I say a traditional BMW. So there's our beautiful little convertible sports car. Very nice little machine.
There's the view of the engine crammed into that little engine compartment.
This view here actually shows, part of the process. We remove the intake manifold to access the rest of the cooling system because to get the water pump out, there are bolts and items underneath the intake manifold, so we start with that. But there's a whole bunch of cooling system components underneath the intake manifold. And with those arrows. I'll point out a few.
So the red arrow just points to the radiator hose. It goes from the radiator to the engine. There's a plastic piece that yellow and red hose attached to. There's a temperature sensor in there and the red arrow I put there, because that's basically a very common clip that they use on not just BMWs a lot of cars, but it's basically a snap together clip.
So that's a plastic fitting, snaps onto the housing. There's a rubber o ring in there. Those things can leak the moment you touch 'em or move them. They deteriorate over time. So we replaced that. The yellow arrow, I'm just pointing to the clamp on that. That's a pinch clamp on a traditional rubber hose.
And those don't need to be replaced 'cause they tend to last. They're very reliable. Why they don't use them more? The reason they don't use 'em more often is because it's way easier to assemble stuff with snap together clamps. The blue arrow points to an item called the Coolant Thermal Management Unit. It's a very fancy name for a thermostat. And that piece we also replaced in the process because we had to remove components from that. And the moment you touch anything on these, usually end up with a coolant leak. So we didn't want to have the customer come back with a coolant leak coming from somewhere else.
Now there's the front view of the engine. This is where the water pump is located. That red arrow actually points to the water pump. And unlike a lot of BMW engines, which use an electric water pump, which has the thermal management unit beside the water pump. Well, the thermostat. This one uses a mechanical water pump driven by the fan which is a little different than BMW's used for quite a while.
In order to remove the pump,
Mark: You gotta move this and this?
Bernie: Yeah, that's right. So, the item on the right where you're moving your mouse pointer, that's the air conditioning compressor. We don't have to discharge the air conditioning, but it just needs to be unbolted from that housing. And the alternator also needs to be removed. Again, they're not a huge, you know, they're a couple bolts, but they're all things that you need to do to remove these pieces. So all of those have to come off. And then once the water pump is bolt unbolted from the block, it comes off that thermal management unit. There's a coupler that connects 'em. That piece broke just 'cause it's all brittle plastic. And that's only sold with a thermal management unit.
And sounds like a country and western song. It's like, you know. This broke and that broke. Sorry?
Mark: My dog died.
Bernie: Your dog died. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So this is a view at the thermal management unit. You can see the coolant hose that was there on the right. The radiator hose is off, and there's a few pieces in there. We replaced all of those items except that hose that had the yellow arrow to it because again, I mentioned those clamps are very durable.
Mark: And it's rubber, not plastic.
Bernie: That's rubber. Yeah, exactly. So yeah, anything with plastic is really just kind of asking for trouble.
So this is that thermal management unit. Again, a fancy name for thermostat and very expensive.
So we're looking at sort of the inside where the coolant flows in from the water pump. And this unit will divert coolant into the engine or heating system or wherever it decides to go, depending on where the most effective cooling and most effective energy usage.
Mark: So this allows the engine to warm up properly when you first start it, when it's cold. It prevents it from overheating when you're driving hard or whatever and et cetera.
Bernie: Exactly. Yeah. And that's kind of key. If you get into a really old car, like say 30 years old, and you hop in, you turn it on, especially on a cold day, it'll take a while for the heat to get in the cabin. A car like this, you have some warmth trickling in on a super cold day, even in a minute. So, yeah, it makes a big difference.
Mark: And on here we have?
Bernie: This is the water pump with the housing. And so that piece that we're looking at, sort of in the bottom left, it has a big black seal around it.
If we look closer at that seal, you can see it's already deteriorated and kind of disintegrating. And so this was leaking a bit. Just kinda happens over time. So this is metal, it's not plastic like we complain about how it tends to wear out. But, again, the seals tend to go so.
Mark: So did you just replace the seal on this or did you have to put in a whole new water pump?
Bernie: No, the water pump comes complete with the housing. You can actually buy a water pump without the housing, but BMW doesn't sell it that way. There's after market pieces. You can see the water pump does unbolt from the housing, and it was leaking, but not as severe as the amount of leakage was coming out. So we knew we had two leaks on this vehicle.
Mark: So there was a leak in here where I'm moving, roughly in there or up in here on the other end. And then as well here?
Bernie: Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
Mark: So then you replace everything?
Bernie: Yeah, replace everything.
Mark: What's this?
Bernie: This is a plastic coupler that goes between that metal water pump housing and that thermal management unit. And of course, in the process of taking it apart, we're very gentle and careful as we could be. But the piece in the plastic on the top, there's a little nipple that sort of sticks up. That piece snapped off. It just kind of happens when you trying to gently move things out sometimes. Again, plastic, old and brittle and, that piece unfortunately is not sold separately. You have to buy that whole thermal management unit. I'm not gonna say how much it was, it was a lot of money. It comes complete with that.
Mark: So once you repaired all that stuff and put everything back together again, how was the vehicle running?
Bernie: Perfect. Runs awesome. No leaks and everything is done complete, so there won't be any oh, you know, six months or a year that's like, oh, it's leaking from there. We gotta pull the intake manifold back off to fix something. It's done, complete, and it should be good for another eight years or hopefully longer. It's a good car, it should last for a long time. It should have lots of life left in it.
Mark: If you're having issues with coolant leaks, the people to see in Vancouver are Pawlik Automotive. You can reach them online at pawlikautomotive.com or you can call them to book your appointment. You can call them and talk to someone too at (604) 327-7112. You have to book ahead. They're always busy. Pawlik Automotive in Vancouver, BC Canada. Thanks so much for watching and listening. Thanks Bernie.
Bernie: Thank you Mark, thanks for watching.
