As advanced and solid as the E46 feels it has a major weakness in the rear suspension: the subframe rips away from the chassis. The subframe is bolted to the chassis at four points under the trunk floor. The attachment points where it gets bolted are spot welded to the sheet metal of the floor.If youre thinking of buying a E46 M3, you should be aware of the all too common subframe cracking issue that affected all E46s. Motor Trend explains.BMW E46 Subframe Reinforcement Kit – $139.90Hey, I recently noticed in now my brother's 328ci that there's a pretty large crack in the mounting point for the rear subframe when under the car.– Designed specifically to follow the contours of the OSR subframe Differential carrier location face/area.E46-sub-003 – QTY.1. – For use at the OSF Differential carrier location face/area. This is the other major problem area on the sub-frame and where cracking is again most common.
![]() ![]() Less money for customers.Moreover, at what point does the manufacturer get to limit its exposure for the longevity of its products? Cars have a warranty. I would be willing to bet a substantial sum of money that if a good BMW customer that has an existing relationship with the selling dealer has a car with this problem - in other words, this is not the first time or second time they've made an appearance at the dealer - the reps will have it taken care of under "goodwill." Now, rather than pay to take care of customer cars in cases where the customer can make the case that the car should be repaired on BMW's nickel, BMW will pay a big pile of money to the lawyers. Now, because there are too many lawyers, anytime shit happens, there are three thousand attorneys with too much free billable time on their hands and a system that encourages them to go fish. Diff mounts breakaway on e28s, especially early models my e23 had trans mounts rip out of the chassis rail - point is that shit happens. Just a WAG.Personally, I think this issue is rare and is something that enthusiasts get more worried about than is warranted. Moreover, from the perspective of the consumer, all that matters is that they will pay.That being said, I wonder if this problem is worse on the e46 than on the e36 because, by and large, the e46 chassis cars had more power. The 325's floor was torn really badly, and the Turner Motorsport repair pieces worked really well.Last week one of our customers with a pristine, super low mileage, gently driven bright yellow 323Ci came in with that letter, all worried that her car would fall apart. In addition to the cracked floors, the M3 ripped 3 of the mounting ears off the subframe too, the 325i just the right forward one. As an attorney, from the perspective of having clients that I can actually defend and sleep at night, in terms of the company's overall conduct and ethics, BMW is a client I would gladly take any day of the week.Tucker wrote:I've had to repair a couple E46's for this problem, one a track-rat M3 that lives it's whole life on RA1's, and the other a slammed 325iA with huge chrome wheels that gets hammered around by a college kid. But I wouldn't pay any of this too much attention in terms of my regard for the company. How long is BMW expected to fix cars that are out of warranty? Not to sound unsympathetic - it's not a clear answer, I understand - but I don't think its fair either to simply expect BMW to continue to pay for car repairs post warranty.Again, I am not saying BMW is perfect - far from it in fact. E46 Subframe How To Whine OnBMW also has a specific procedure to repair this problem 'on the books' since 2002 - see TIS for more information.BMW knows of the weakness. BMW has also changed the floor stamping in ~2000 or 2001 on E46s to address this issue - the later E46s are known to be a bit stronger.3. BMW AG (not NA.AG) has had a warranty program in place for E46 rear subframe/floor failures since the early 2000s, when this weakness was first brought to pass.2. Cars that have been tracked or which have had suspension modifications, including having aftermarket wheels installed are exempted.However if you've done none of the above, and your car develops cracks and needs repair, you'll be covered.1. I was a little surprised to see this lawsuit, but I suppose a greater percentage of hard-driving E46 owners know how to whine on the internet than did E36 owners.Neither of these cars are eligible to be covered under the terms of this lawsuit. Shark navigator nv60 manual free downloadE36 M3 has reinforcement plates which help - E46 has no reinforcements from the factory.Let me put it this way.Turner had already developed a reinforcement kit for the E46 a few years into production after its racing found this weakness. E36 design of the floor and subframe attachments is slightly different (stronger)2. They're also not going to admit liability for this issue.What this class action lawsuit has enabled us to do is that A) if you've had to pay out of pocket for this, and your car is out of warranty you can get repaid B) if you are out of warranty, you have 1-year from finalizing of the claim (I think it's sometime in August) to get the car inspected and repaired if necessary C) if your car is still under warranty, you have effectively +1 year of coverage for this particular repair.As for the E36, my experience has been that it's not as big an issue as it is for the E46. They weren't going to start goodwilling all of this on out of warranty work just like that unless they were forced to. BMW NA's position as with any sales-side subsidiary is that they need to protect their bottom line as well as BMW Group. You're doing something way outside the design envelope.In any case, I think this is a good result, and now E46 owners will have some recourse within reason should this issue affect them. Obviously if you rip out the E36 M3 stuff you're doing something either really stupid or you're putting down huge amounts of power or running aluminum blocks for springs.but you get the idea.
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