[naitoon]

Hi there!

Today while debugging a rather subtle rattling sound coming from the engine bay that could be heard with windows open or closed, and when accelerating especially at low rpms, I explored the engine bay and found a couple of plastics that weren’t properly secured to the bay. See the attached pics.

Even if this is not the cause of the rattle (still to be proven), I’d like to see how this looks in your cars. Could any of you real mvps here send me a picture of the same area in your car, to compare it?

BTW, I’m disappointed to see this when I’ve always serviced my car at BMW (Seattle, Mountain View, San Francisco).

Thank you for your help!! 🙏🏻 🏎️💨

[jayee88]

Man I HATE the fasteners in those two trim pieces, they're always a PITA to pry off and I usually have to hammer them back in with a wrench or something because the fit is so tight.

To be honest, I don't think much would be impacted by leaving them off, but the missing fasteners are the standard plastic push pin fasteners that are all around the engine bay. I don't have my car with me right now to snap pics but I've removed them a couple of times using quite a bit of poking and prodding with metal tools and my panels are definitely scratched, but not as much as that first pic.

Edit - here's a Kies video showing the removal of that fastener at around 0:50

[MooMooM2]

Dealer special right there, they just don't care. But yeah there are suppose to be clips there, a few missing is no big deal but they should be replacing them as they break them.

Regardless you can get those for dirt cheap

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

[SilverScotty]

[QUOTE=jayee88;31079852]Man I HATE the fasteners in those two trim pieces, they're always a PITA to pry off and I usually have to hammer them back in with a wrench or something because the fit is so tight.

To be honest, I don't think much would be impacted by leaving them off, but the missing fasteners are the standard plastic push pin fasteners that are all around the engine bay. I don't have my car with me right now to snap pics but I've removed them a couple of times using quite a bit of poking and prodding with metal tools and my panels are definitely scratched, but not as much as that first pic.






Jayee88 is right. The last time I swapped filters I had to remove these and not only were they super tight, but when I got one of them out it dropped down into the crevice towards the windshield and it took me 30+ min to fish it out with flashlights and grabbers. I wouldn't worry about it unless you are trying to show off your engine bay. At least the fasteners that BMW chose are a PITA and something thinner would probably work better. Figure out something thinner and just buy a bag for $5 online because these will go missing again in the future.

Chances are you may be able to find them in the open space behind where they are. The dealer didn't lose them because they are still in the car, they just didn't take the time to fish them out.

[naitoon]

Thank you all, especially for the video and Amazon link. I’ll check if it’s still in the car. 🙏🏻

[Backroads Bimmer]

Making fasteners disappear is the about the only thing my local bmw dealership is good at. They replaced my charge air cooler under warranty after insisting that it was my radiator leaking. They lost about half of the plastic fasteners under the hood over the course of the two weeks it took them to replace the charge air cooler. I guess the upside is I ended up with a new radiator, oil coler, and charge air cooler. I replaced most of the fasteners with amazon fasteners for much less than what the oem fasteners cost.

[Brokenbones]

Yup. Bunch missing plastic fasteners from dealer.
Bolts in wrong place. Stripped bolts. Poorly reinstalled trim. Untightened charge pipe connector blown off driving home from regular maintenance … you name it
Why I try to do my own work if possible