So my E28 (87 535i) hasn’t been my daily driver for a while, and I don’t drive it every day—especially now with it being winter in Utah. I have it parked with a battery tender to keep everything healthy, and it always starts. It’s a little rough at first but cleans up after a minute or so.The weird part is that while driving around town, it started idling rough again, then died and would just crank with no start. Luckily, I was able to coast into a gas station and put some fuel in (I was hoping to get ethanol-free gas since I think it stores better and doesn’t break down as fast). A buddy came to help, and it started again, but it was backfiring and eventually died again. We left it parked, grabbed lunch, and when we came back about an hour later, it fired up instantly and ran great.This also happened last winter after I was out of state for a few months. I got fresh gas, took it on the freeway, and it ran great.
So my question is—has anyone had issues like this with storage? I think my mistake might have been leaving it parked low on fuel, leading to condensation mixing with the gas and making it run like crap.I replaced the fuel pump and filter about three years ago, and the plugs, cap, and rotor maybe two or three years ago. Just wondering if there’s something I should check or if bad fuel could really make it run this bad, die, and then not start for like 30 minutes?
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E28 535i starting issues after not driving for awhile
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- Posts: 3
- Joined: Dec 27, 2024 12:41 PM
- Location: New Orleans
Re: E28 535i starting issues after not driving for awhile
If you haven't already, consider resoldering the 3 "troublemaker" joints inside the DME/ECU.
I have an '88 535i that would randomly cut off, only to restart minutes, hours, or even days later as if nothing was wrong. I replaced the plugs, cap, rotor, crank position sensors, both fuel pumps, as well as the relays only to be met with the same issue. I was losing my mind!
Finally, I pulled apart the DME to find that the three solder joints were cracked. I resoldered and have not had issues since. There has to be a thread on this that I cannot find--maybe someone else can post it?
I have an '88 535i that would randomly cut off, only to restart minutes, hours, or even days later as if nothing was wrong. I replaced the plugs, cap, rotor, crank position sensors, both fuel pumps, as well as the relays only to be met with the same issue. I was losing my mind!
Finally, I pulled apart the DME to find that the three solder joints were cracked. I resoldered and have not had issues since. There has to be a thread on this that I cannot find--maybe someone else can post it?
Re: E28 535i starting issues after not driving for awhile
I haven’t t checked that yet, but funny enough, that did happen to me a few years back. That’s s when I threw all those parts at it, like you mentioned. Luckily, my friend had his old DME/ECU that he no longer needed since he’s s now running a standalone setup for his turbo e28. I also believe his old DME was refurbished at some point, so I’d d think it should still be good. I wont rule it out, but I’m leaning toward my car running a bit rich, combined with old gas, possibly fouling the plugs and causing poor or no running.Today, I got it running and stayed close to home. I was able to get up to 50 mph, but under hard acceleration, it broke up pretty badly. On the way back, it died once and struggled to restart, but I managed to get it going again and back home, where it seemed to idle fine for about 20 minutes. I just don’t fully trust it yet since it’s still inconsistent.