Clean leaves out of the front?

[dms-01]

Someone please enlighten me on the best way to clean leaves out of the bottom opening by the oil cooler and radiator?

[DocL]

If they are small, I use a leaf blower and they come right out.

[ellipsis212]

If you ever remove the bumper for a project you can drop the oil cooler bit and actually get everything out. The leaves are only what's visibly stuck...I took out a large dustpan of rocks, leaves, and debris and then cleaned off the fins with air. There was way more junk than I had anticipated!

[Jbonly21]

Originally Posted by dms-01

Someone please enlighten me on the best way to clean leaves out of the bottom opening by the oil cooler and radiator?

Removing the bumper is the easiest way to go, took me about 3 hours.

[BzsBimmer]

You don’t need to remove the entire bumper... you will need to jack up the front end and loosen the bolts to the cooler from under car.

Wear glasses!!! There’s a lot of crap down there I bet.

[fiveohwblow]

My car was originally purchased by a certain celebrity living in Malibu. I imagine his long and expensive driveway was a billion tiny pebbles because that’s what I found in mine along with leaves.

Regardless, going under is the move. I had to pull mine out to do my CBC and it takes all of 15 minutes this way. There a few bolts to undo but overall you can let it hang down and blow air through or whatever you need to do.

[kindafrosty]

I use this claw to grab the big leaves.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00275F5I8

To remove the small bits, I use a shop vacuum with a long polycarbonate tube attached. Works quite well but not as effective as going under and removing the tray.

[Suds]

I created a small suction hose that I attach to a shop vac to suck them out.

[ano0oj]

Originally Posted by kindafrosty

I use this claw to grab the big leaves.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00275F5I8

To remove the small bits, I use a shop vacuum with a long polycarbonate tube attached. Works quite well but not as effective as going under and removing the tray.

I use this tool as well for big debris. My local carwash has compressed air lines which I just point in there and all the little stuff comes right out

[DerekLimeRock]

Consider investing in fine mesh grill covers from zunsport. They will filter out larger debris such as track rubber.

https://www.zunsport.com/us/bmw-us/b...ront-grill-set

[Morgen Black]

I asked the same question a few years ago and someone mentioned this kit on Amazon.com

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

It works great for reaching inside the front vents to get rid of all the small leaves, bees, bugs and other things that you want removed and it only takes a matter of mintues.

MB

[icegrill]

Originally Posted by BzsBimmer

You don’t need to remove the entire bumper... you will need to jack up the front end and loosen the bolts to the cooler from under car.

Wear glasses!!! There’s a lot of crap down there I bet.

This it's super easy! 3 bolts for the oil cooler after removing the pan guard.

[dms-01]

Originally Posted by icegrill

This it's super easy! 3 bolts for the oil cooler after removing the pan guard.

It is easy just a lot of bolts. I did it for the first time after 3 years and 30k and there was a ton of debris. Probably 5 cigarettes butts too which is odd but mostly leaves and shit.

What I did find interesting is I paid $1700 to replace that oil cooler on a previous F80 and it to get it off is cake so wondering ho much of that $1700 was parts and how much was labor.

[BzsBimmer]

The OE and aftermarket oil coolers are about $500-600 so.... add the cost of an oil change, the rest would be labor unless more parts were replaced like hoses and such but, yeah you probably got shafted but at least now you know how easy it is.

[dms-01]

Originally Posted by BzsBimmer

The OE and aftermarket oil coolers are about $500-600 so.... add the cost of an oil change, the rest would be labor unless more parts were replaced like hoses and such but, yeah you probably got shafted but at least now you know how easy it is.

I was wrong, it was actually the radiator that I had replaced which obviously requires more work. Not sure why I thought it was the oil cooler.

[BzsBimmer]

I still can’t imagine the R&R for a radiator costing that much but then again, I just replaced mine in my E46 and it was fairly simple lol.