I posted a few days ago how it was my turn for the classic "low oil pressure" due the check valve in the bottom of the oil filter cannister not closing all the way and letting the oil drain down overnite. Guess mine was the extreme case since it would bleed down in less than an hour. Sticker shock at BMA, their best price for a new "dealer-only" cannister is $379 -- time to take mine off & do some investigation. They come out of a 7 without removing the alternator with the use of a swivel. Mine is the newer "improved" style cannister, they're not supposed to fail. What happened is excess oil pressure caused the entire stamped sheetmetal seat to pop out of the cannister. It was tilted up about 1/8" on the left side, held in place by only 4 "stakes". I was able to tap the seat back down where it belongs by slipping a 17mm thinwall socket into the recess. You can see I got a little happy with adding more stakes:



For reference, Bruno discusses this on his site:

http://www.bmwe34.net/e34main/trouble/OilCanister.htm

His is for the older style cannister. The newer one is BMW part number 11 42 1 720 691. If anyone has an old style, I'll be happy to see if I can repair the check valve for free and mail it back to you.

So far, so good with the oil pressure light going out only a few seconds after starting after sitting for an hour. The true test will be if it holds overnight. I confess I was the cause of the failure, I took the car to the track a week ago & exceeded redline more often than not -- shame on me, must have popped the seat out of the cannister during a wild downshift going into one of the turns. I turned in respectable times for a 7 with minor mods, my best laptime was 1:59 on the full 1.74 mile outer road course. For comparison, on CCA'er with a '95 Euro M5 wagon did a 1:57 & an e28 M5 did 2:01. Most of the Porsches blew us all away with 1:40's or better. A stock Miata did 1:52. A Subaru WRX embarassed us all with a 1:37. The best times were a Porsche Carrera Turbo with a 1:32 and a full race prep'd 914 with a 1:31. I have no business on the track with a 7 but it's one of those things "a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do":



http://www.nmia.com/~dgnrg/sandia4.jpg

http://www.nmia.com/~dgnrg/sandia5.jpg