[8303otte]

Hi all,
This is probably the worst car I have ever owned, but I am stuck with it so...

I have had rough idle since I bought the car and I had fault codes for the nox sensor - today I took a gamble on cleaning the Vanos solenoids which has cured my cold idle problem and runs like a dream and weirdly the nox sensor fault has gone problem now is I have a fault code for inlet vanos reference.

Ive bought replacements but any ideas if this will fix the fault? what does reference even mean?

[E92William]

Hey they can be problematic but great once sorted out! What exact codes are you getting? First thing I would do is swap the solenoids around then see what codes it throws. If the code is still present after that you want to take off your oil filter cap and make sure you have the basket for the filter in there aswell as the o ring on the end. If it's still the inlet vanos then you want to check the vanos check valves on the side of the head and clean them, make sure they move around freely as they're supposed to keep oil in the system after being turned off and they prevent drain back into the oil pan. After that you're messing with cam bearing ledge seals and physical vanos actuators but these don't go bad often at all.

[8303otte]

so I made a silly mistake, I plugged the connectors in the wrong way around (I had just come off a night shift) Seems to tun a lot better after a clean - might still have a kook at the check valves though, she has got 84k on her now.
Tha

[hassmaschine]

valves should be fine at 84k, they will last a long time with just cleaning them (or even leaving them alone). It's actually kind of amazing how much better the modern Vanos is than it was on the E36 and E46, which had all sorts of issues and often needed completely rebuilt or replaced.

[4foothill]

On a similar note, if one vanos has a lower resistance than the other when tested with a multimeter, does that imply the vanos isn't performing as well as it could? and is that something that a dodgy solder joint would likely cause?

Basically I'm looking for more things to fix with my new micro soldering pen...

[8303otte]

Originally Posted by hassmaschine

valves should be fine at 84k, they will last a long time with just cleaning them (or even leaving them alone). It's actually kind of amazing how much better the modern Vanos is than it was on the E36 and E46, which had all sorts of issues and often needed completely rebuilt or replaced.

i honestly cannot believe how much better the car runs!!