[omniphil]

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Picked up a 2020 X3M recently. Removing the oil cap showed a ton of white crud. Certainly never seen this on any other vehicle I've had. Looks like something is mixing with the oil?

[redbullfan]

That happens when you do short trips

[omniphil]

Originally Posted by redbullfan

That happens when you do short trips

Probably previous owners then, I do long trips.
I'll wipe it all down and see if it comes back...

[danniexi]

moisture (e.g. water or coolant). short drives can cause this. bigger issues like failing head gasket can cause it as well.

go for a long drive and get those oil temps up. if issue reappears then you’ll have bigger problems to tackle.

[joebie3]

That's a bit more sludge than short trip type sludge. Clean it up, and monitor that. My Spidey senses are tingling so hard on that tbh.

[Marmugmotleocay]

I do very short trips to work everyday and I just checked mine and it looks almost the same. When I wiped it off it didn't feel anything like oil. I have an oil change scheduled for next month. I will talk to the service manager about it.

[adamzhuzhul]

I changed my oil last week. I have the same issue as yours. The engine oil I drained looks normal, and the oil filter as well. The oil and the filter I used are BMW TPT 0w30 LL-01 FE and BMW OEM filter. This service is around 8k miles away from the previous service (a little bit too long; I plan to do 5k instead for the future).

For personal driving tasks, I started a short drive (3 miles, 10 minutes) to work every day 6 months ago. And it’s my first time seeing the issue. Currently, I warm the car for 5 minutes before I drive out every day to prevent this issue.

I plan to do an engine flush and an oil change next week to see if it’s still happening and inspecting the oil. I also plan to switch the current OEM oil to Motul X-max 0w-40 to see if it becomes better since I saw a lot of forums state that the BMW OEM oil is not that good and a little too thin for s58. (They do it for fuel economy).

My personal thoughts about this issue (not sure if it’s true): I read coupe of posts states the issue happens more in cold weather situations (winter or cold city). Also even after a long highway drive (70 miles) where the oil is at its operating temperature (~100°C), when I opened the hood, the airbox is cold (ambient temp ~ 15°C). I noticed that the filter neck is standing out from the engine for a certain distance and surrounded by the cold airbox. Is it possible that the vapor from the engine condensed in the neck area due to the surrounding cold temperature?

Stay posted! Let me know if anyone have better understanding about this.

Thanks!

[Jnat]

All comments above are relevant imo. Not getting any engine up to operating temps can do this and short trips are likely to blame. Larger problems could also exist but normally there would be other symptoms like smoke (white would be coolant) from the tailpipe. Let us know and good luck but sounds like short trip itis.

[Bee Pee]

Short trip-itis - idling the car for 5mins to warm it isn’t going to help.

Best advice is to drive off asap after engine starting then hold lower gears ie in sport mode or manual mode to help expedite warm up cycle. Letting auto box do its thing allows it to changing up into higher gears (torquey motors) too soon if wanting to warm engine efficiently on short drives.

[YolkyPalky]

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1JYn...w?usp=drivesdk

Page 319 of Owners Manual

“Drive Away Without Delay” - it’s not recommended to idle car to attempt to bring up temperature.

[Marmugmotleocay]

When I start my car I wait till the RPM's drop before I drive off. Is the manual telling me to just start and drive off immediately?

[Jnat]

In general on a cold start (most vehicles) and this is what i've always done, wait for the cold start idle to come down and go. Obviously let the vehicle warm up while driving before any type of spirited attempts are taken!

[omniphil]

Same here. I never idle cars. its not good for the car. (Or the environment)
And Idling only warms up the engine, all the diffs and trans need warming up too and the best/fastest way is by driving it easy.
Turn the key and wait 5 seconds for the oil to get moving around and drive away.
Keep driving very easily until the oil is over 180 degrees F. (Which takes about 10 minutes on this vehicle with its large oil capacity)

Honestly this is what scares the crap out of me when buying a used car, because you know the previous owner didn't do this..
Drive it to the top of their street and then floor it merging onto the next road... This problem is worse on a vehicle like this with its very long warm up cycle.
(Unless one of you nice folks had the X3 before me and took care of it )

[mikestpierre]

I am also in NH and picked up a 24 X4M in October. My oil cap looked like that whenever I pulled it off. Bulk of my trips this winter were short, but even after a few 1500-2000 mile road trips it still had some white film on it.

Every time I've brought it in for an oil change I mentioned it but they said everything looks good, just the cold weather.

You aren't kidding about the warmup cycle... I can be on the road for 20-30 minutes and the temps are still approaching normal. At first I thought something was wrong, but soon realized all the auxiliary cooling it has for warmer temps.

[omniphil]

Originally Posted by mikestpierre

I am also in NH and picked up a 24 X4M in October. My oil cap looked like that whenever I pulled it off. Bulk of my trips this winter were short, but even after a few 1500-2000 mile road trips it still had some white film on it.

Every time I've brought it in for an oil change I mentioned it but they said everything looks good, just the cold weather.

You aren't kidding about the warmup cycle... I can be on the road for 20-30 minutes and the temps are still approaching normal. At first I thought something was wrong, but soon realized all the auxiliary cooling it has for warmer temps.

That and the 7+ quarts of oil... Looking at the tiny oil gauge it would appear that the top edge of the blue cold area is 185F. That's generally hot enough to start getting on it. Waiting until it stabilizes is somewhere in the 210F range and will certainly take a while.

So as long as you are not in the blue cold zone its plenty warm. Oil at 180F is where I wait until on all my other cars and it seems BMW agrees as that's where the blue zone ends as well.

[BlauHouse]

Originally Posted by Marmugmotleocay

When I start my car I wait till the RPM's drop before I drive off. Is the manual telling me to just start and drive off immediately?

No, let the RPMs drop then drive away is what it means. I've driven off immediately and sometimes I get a little bucking and lag in the throttle response. If I let the RPMs drop, I don't get this at all.

[prostcfc]

I do very short trips each day (roundtrip under a mile) and I haven't seen this in my G20. I do park in a heated garage, so maybe that helps?

I just disabled the cold start mode since it's so loud with my aftermarket DP and exhaust. I'm going to monitor it and see if I'll start seeing these deposits.

[Lil'Stanky]

You have this Problem only in F97/F98 beceause of the long fiiller neck. Other S58 like G80 do not have the long filler neck.

[omniphil]

So it seems like this isn't really too much a problem.

So the question is should we be checking under the cap periodically and just cleaning that gunk out? Seems like it's actually moisture and I'd guess we don't want that in our oil.

[Mnfamilyguy2020]

Had this on my last few BMW's.

I do Long trips, absolutely ridiculous temperature cycles of minnesota.... Here is my oil cap from my X4MC

https://x3.xbimmers.com/forums/attac...1&d=1711633792

Not present on my range rover V8 or my wife's Velar R-Dynamic (Higher hp 6 CYL)

[stefan]

That's weird as hell. I'd suspect a head gasket leak but that feels unlikely. You have coolant in your oil somehow, maybe the heat exchanger.

[Marmugmotleocay]

My BMW Service Advisor said this is a known issue with short trips in cold weather and it's nothing to be worried about. Im going in for the yearly oil change this Saturday. I will be switching to twice a year going forward.
I bought my car new 3 years ago this month and she only has 11,800 miles. I need to drive her more when I retire in January.