2011 BMW X6 ENGINE EXCHANGE

Part 1:  The wet beginning

It all started with a frog.  Well, not really, but sort of.  I bet y'all remember about a month ago when the Texas Hill Country was hit hard with thunderstorms and flooding.  We had a few cars come in with water intrusion this and smell and mold that.  One day, just after the worst of the rain fell, Dennis from Harper's Towing brought us a wet 2011 BMW X6.  It was the same day said amphibian visited us.  This X6 had been driven through an average low water crossing but something had gone wrong.  The engine would crank over roughly but something was obviously not right inside.  We'd later discover that water had made it all the way from that low water crossing all throughout the intake manifolds, turbo-chargers, exhaust manifolds, and, most importantly, into the combustion chambers.  

There's not supposed to be water inside that turbo!  Hydro-locking an engine destroys its insides because, unlike an air/fuel mixture, water is not compressible.  As the engine runs and spins, when water is introduced to the cylinders, the pistons attempt to compress the water bending and breaking connecting rods, crankshafts, and any other weak link in the chain.  Rafa diagnosed no to low compression in many cylinders as well as shortened (bent) connecting rods.  And so began the extraction...

Quick explanation before we're done for today:  Unlike the days of yore, when engines were smaller and less complex, we remove engines as part of an assembly from below.  The engine, transmission, and front suspension come out as a unit from the bottom!  Special care must be taken to not allow the vehicle to fall off the lift when removing 1,000 lbs.+ from its front half.  In fact, BMW specifies that sand bags be loaded into the front floorboard.  Seriously.  No one likes a car flying off of a lift so we complied.  No, I'm not meditating on that table, just testing out our new 2,500 lb. capacity hydraulic lift table (and mentally preparing for my biggest job this year).  There's Rafa at the bottom with our baby freshly birthed!