Oil consumption rate

[DaveZ3]

Hello - how much oil consumption do the 3.0 and 3.2 cars tend to have? I think my car is going through too much oil. I've used about 3 litres of oil over a 3,000 mile period. There are no leaks so it must be burning it off. Is this excessive? What could be the problem? The engine sounds great and the car drives well - basically it's been a great car since I got it and I love driving it but I'm concerned about how much oil I've gone through over the last couple of months.

Any comments would be gratefully received.

Cheers,
Dave

 

[Big Daddy]

My 98 M uses no oil between changes. I would say that 3 liters is too much! Is the car smoking under acceleration? Is it leaking anywhere? How many miles are on the car?

 

[DaveZ3]

The car tends to give off condensation when first started in the morning but nothing too noticable (its about 0 degrees cent in the morning here at the moment). This soon goes but there isn't any visible smoke. The car has no oil leaks but somehow I seem to be burning oil up. There is no oil on the garage floor or in the engine bay....its strange. The car now has 50,000 miles on the clock. However, the car is still under warranty, so I will take it to BMW to check out. Could it be the piston rings?

 

[Big Daddy]

I too have 50k and no smoke. I would have a leak down test done to see if there is a potential for a problem.

 

[Kirby]

On other threads here owners have reported somewhat high oil consumption on the 2.5 and 3.0. When questioned, BMW usually claims that 1000 - 1500 miles per quart/liter is not a problem or indicative of a failure.

 

[DaveZ3]

Spoke to a BMW dealership today who told me a similar line - 1 litre per 1000 miles is 'normal'. I can't see how it can be normal when it only seems to affect a handful of cars....most people are telling how great their cars are with no oil consumption at all

 

[bimmerZ5]

i think that's a bit odd. i have a 3.0 M54 engine w/ 25K miles (about 40K km) on it now and i've never burned that much oil. in fact, i've never had to add oil in between oil changes which I perform around 7500 miles (12000km) or once a year. perhaps an oil sample sent for an oil analysis might reveal more?

 

[IslandDawgZ4]

To my surprise, my '05 3.0 oil light came on at 7k miles (just the yellow warning at shutdown). I checked it and only the tip of the stick showed oil! I quickly purchased 2 qts. of Mobile 1, one to use and the 2nd for future use...but, it took BOTH qts. to get a full reading on the stick [???1]. It's not that bad especially compared to the RX-8 (I know, they use oil) I had which took a qt. every 800-1k miles. And it doesn't exceed BMW's "normal usuage" number. But I also had an '02 Miata that I drove the crap out of (had to if you wanted to go), 6k rpm in the 1st 3 gears, routinely and I never had to add oil between 5k changes.
So, given my experience thus far, it would seem that 3 ltrs. (3.1700646 qts) in 3k miles is really excessive despite BMW's 1500 miles/qt. It ain't a rotary!!!!