» Site Navigation | | » Recent Threads | | 1999 M3 Swap 09-07-2023 10:10 PM 05-02-2024 08:18 PM 6 Replies, 405,344 Views | | | | | 02-27-2016, 11:14 PM | #1 | Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: San Francisco, CA Posts: 425 | Spark Plugs exploding! Help! (S52) Hey guys, So I went to Laguna Seca and everything went awesome. After a full day at the track the car was amazing, and felt perfect. At the very end of the next to last session though, I get a horrible misfire and have to pull in. Shut the car off as soon as I could, ran the code - cylinder 6. I park, take the covers off and see a fried coil (I mean, fried - warped and smoking, with the core embedded in the body of the coil). I disassemble the whole mess, and find a spark plug (OEM, BOSCH FGR8KQE) just lying there with a hole through the center of the hex which is still firmly in the head, the silicone from the boot melted and essentially just the core left there which looks like it was found after a plane crash. I clean it all up, extract what was left of the plug out of the head. Miraculously find someone around with an M3 - buy a coil and a plug off them, run the engine briefly to force any crap lying in the spark plug hole out. Then replace the spark plug and the car seems to be running ok, doesnt immediately stall out like when you run it without the spark plug. I limped it to NAPA without the boot with the injector unplugged. Got a new boot, threw it all together and it seems to be running just fine, no noticeable roughness or anything, so it appears as if I literally dodged a bullet made out of the core of the damn FGR8KQE. Big question is - I gota get the damn ticking time bombs out of the car and I need new plugs. Does anyone know of a 100% recommended replacement that will perform as well as the BOSCH's without the danger of the porcelain getting obliterated in the car (I heard of a number of cases of failure with BOSCH, so I am looking for a replacement). Thanks guys! -Artem | | | 02-27-2016, 11:55 PM | #2 | Senior Member Join Date: Nov 2013 Location: Bresse Track France Posts: 535 | hi artem,i have NGK iridium on my trackdays ti (M52B28),working great until 7200 rpm and you can choose a lower heater grade than the OEM one for better performance and less temp for the head of the engine | | | 02-28-2016, 01:11 AM | #3 | Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: San Francisco, CA Posts: 425 | Thanks sam! Good to know! Are those the bkr6equip's? I might throw bkr6ekub's in that I had in my z4 temporarily while the other boschs started leaking... I should have taken precautions as soon as that happened! | | | 02-28-2016, 10:19 AM | #4 | Senior Member Join Date: Nov 2013 Location: Bresse Track France Posts: 535 | the NGK iridium model for my engine are BKR6EIX the lower grade is BKR7EIX | | | 04-06-2016, 04:02 AM | #5 | Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: San Francisco, CA Posts: 425 | Update: Ran a compression test, got numbers around 180PSI across the board (whew). Pulled all the BOSCH plugs out, put in NGK BKR6EQUP, runs beautifully. My advice is if you have BOSCH plugs - get those NGKs in there. | | | 04-06-2016, 04:23 AM | #6 | Senior Member Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: norcal - 94590 Posts: 3,186 | I'll second the NGK's, Artem. Been running those since the swap 7 years (!!!) ago. Glad you got it all sorted out and running like it's supposed to.. How'd you like Laguna Seca? I've been 3 times since November, it just keeps getting better for me. __________________ James 95 active w/leather interior and sport interior conversion, Vaders, full M-Tech exterior conversion. Now m50 swapped* Eibach sway bars, D2 Coilovers, Depo's w/AE's, blacked-out sides and grills, LeatherZ console and door armrests, 1 series starter button mod, and custom finished Style 5's <--- in this color! Named "Roddy": *M50 6 cyl. swap with fan delete, S50 cams and chip, AFE stage 2 intake, M3 clutch and 11.5 lb Fidanza flywheel, 3.15LSD, battery relocated to rear and complete custom exhaust. Sweet! 97 318ti sport, Alaska Blue, Contours, coilovers, Dove Vaders and custom black/grey interior named "Max" 95 318ti Active in Cosmos, S50 swap in progress... named "Pit" SUPPORT 318ti.org! CLICK THE LINK ABOVE! Hosting a forum like this is not free. 318ti.org is one of the best BMW forums on the web because it is member supported, not vendor supported. The cost to become a Supporter is a nominal $10.00... A YEAR! DO IT! NOW! | | | 04-07-2016, 01:56 AM | #7 | Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2012 Location: SF Bay Area Posts: 315 | I'll agree on NGK's over Bosch. Had too many issues with Bosch in various BMW's including the loss of the ground electrode (prongs) into multiple cylinders on an M62TU. Never have had nor seen that issue occur with NGK's __________________ 01 740iS Cosmos Black 97 318ti Boston Green 99 318ti Titanium Silver 13 X5 3.5XDrive Cosmos Black 97 318ti Alpine White (gone but not forgotten) 88 325iC Schwartz Black (sold) 97 740iL Schwartz Black (sold) 84 633csi Schwartz Black (sold) 96 318ti Alaska Blue (sold) 08 X5 4.8i Titanium Silver (sold) | | | 04-07-2016, 03:29 AM | #8 | Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: San Francisco, CA Posts: 425 | Thanks guys! Wish I had known before throwing those in there.. oh well, it just cost me 20 mins at the track in the end. Laguna Seca was pretty awesome! I got a time of 1:58:23 on my last lap before failure, and I was only doing better, almost 1:57 when that damn plug blew up! | | | 04-20-2016, 05:52 PM | #9 | Member Join Date: May 2015 Location: Carnation Posts: 44 | "BOSCH" Yup. Once a quality brand... once. I'll 3rd NGK. t | | | | Currently Active Users Viewing This Thread: 1 (0 members and 1 guests) | | Posting Rules | You may not post new threads You may not post replies You may not post attachments You may not edit your posts HTML code is Off | | | |