[Scuttles]

Due to high oil temps, these get cooked, brittle, and crack insanely fast. In order to prevent ever having to do it again, has anyone used any gasket sealer, RTV, shellac, aviation sealant, etc. on the oring-style gaskets to help keep them sealed up when the rubber eventually fails?

Not looking to start a debate, its a poor design that is quoted over $2000 to fix. Im going to do it myself, and to prevent having to do it in another xx,xxx miles, would like to understand if anyone has done this, what they used, and with what success. Thank you!

[TheShadow]

the dealership quoted you $2000? or a independent shop?
Parts for VCG: $200 or so and labor is 4hrs. so should be around $600 or so.

I got mine replaced under warranty thankfully.

[John in VA]

Local dealer quoted me $1800 to replace the valve cover gasket, including an associated hose. Turns out the cover was warped at 45K miles.

[Rebound]

Originally Posted by John in VA

Local dealer quoted me $1800 to replace the valve cover gasket, including an associated hose. Turns out the cover was warped at 45K miles.

Good lord that's expensive!

Forgive me if that's the average of what dealers charge, but that's an awful lot of money for a valve cover gasket replacement.

My first car was a VW Bus and the gaskets cost about $2.50 and you replaced them at every oil change.

[EDWYER]

[Wgosma]

Originally Posted by Rebound

Good lord that's expensive!

Forgive me if that's the average of what dealers charge, but that's an awful lot of money for a valve cover gasket replacement.

My first car was a VW Bus and the gaskets cost about $2.50 and you replaced them at every oil change.

My guess is the part cost of the cover itself is a good hunk of that $1800 price he was quoted.

[John in VA]

Originally Posted by Wgosma

My guess is the part cost of the cover itself is a good hunk of that $1800 price he was quoted.

Correct. Needless to say, they won't be doing the job!

[upsidedownfunnel]

I wouldn't use RTV. The initial seal is fine and I feel like the degradation of the seal would occur whether or not you used RTV.

Also, over $2000? Is that with a new valve cover? If your car is out of warranty, there is zero reason to go to the dealership for this work. You're just throwing away your money.

I'd just do it myself without RTV. Are you even going to own the car long enough to have to do it again in about 75k miles?

[Rebound]

Originally Posted by Wgosma

My guess is the part cost of the cover itself is a good hunk of that $1800 price he was quoted.

Good point! I checked ECS, and an entire new valve cover is $470 USD, apparently including the valve cover gasket (it says, "including gaskets").

I think labor cost of replacing entire valve cover vs only the gasket would be the same; maybe there are a few odd and ends you need to transfer from old valve cover to new.

So, I still don't see this exceeding $1,000, even at a garage that serves espresso.

[upsidedownfunnel]

Originally Posted by Rebound

Good point! I checked ECS, and an entire new valve cover is $470 USD, apparently including the valve cover gasket (it says, "including gaskets").

I think labor cost of replacing entire valve cover vs only the gasket would be the same; maybe there are a few odd and ends you need to transfer from old valve cover to new.

So, I still don't see this exceeding $1,000, even at a garage that serves espresso.

Some garages charge up to $800 for just the VCG without the cover. You'd be hard pressed to find a place that will do a valve cover replacement for less than $1000, unless they maybe use a generic one, which I don't think is worth it.

[Fredo]

My mechanic replaced my N55 V/C last month. This is the list of parts. It was $1,000 OTD. He recommended to replace the hose and seal at the same time, no extra labor. He has 14 years of experience at the BMW dealer and opened his own shop 6 months ago.

11127570292 N55 V/C 1.0 @ 539.14 =$ 539.14
11367609963 Valvetronic Screw 2.0 @ 0.99 =$ 1.98
11127599753 Vent Hose 1.0 @ 61.26 =$ 61.26
11377502022 Valvetronic Seal 1.0 @ 9.89 =$ 9.89

[Scuttles]

Who cares what the shop costs, because as stated in the OP I am not going to have them do the work. For everyones sanity, that was for VCG and Oil filter housing seal.

Im interested in finding out if anyone has had success using non-hardening sealant such as Aviation sealant on either the VCG or OFHG to help keep rubber sealed to surfaces once it gets brittle and cracks.

Thank you for the suggestion on the seal, ill replace that, but not the hose unless I break it. If I do, Ill cut off and replace with heater hose. Have had to do it a TON on my Cayenne.

[The0pportunist]

My rocker cover gasket & oil filter housing gasket got replaced at 52K under warranty too.

They did throw in a cheeky £100 charge to change a 'brittle' coolant line which must have fell apart when doing the above work. Grrrr