Free guide · 2005–2010 · S85 5.0 V10 · 507 PS
BMW M5 E60: what to check before you buy
What this car is, and the six questions that decide whether the one you are looking at is a good buy.
In this guide · 6 chapters
Who built it, and what they built
BMW launched it with what it called the first V10 engine to power a production saloon.
The E60 M5 arrived in 2005 with the S85B50: 4,999 cc, ten cylinders, naturally aspirated, 507 PS at 7,750 rpm, and a limit of 8,250. In a car with four doors, a boot and back seats a family can sit in.
The V10 was not a marketing decision dressed up as engineering. BMW was in Formula One at the time, and the engine that came out of that period has the shape of that thinking: a very short stroke, very high revs, and individual throttle bodies rather than one big one. It also has consequences, and this guide is mostly about those.
The gearbox, and one thing to establish before you travel
In Europe the E60 M5 came only with the seven-speed SMG III. The manual was built for North America. So a manual car in Europe is an import, and that is neither good nor bad — it is simply a fact to establish from the paperwork rather than from an advert.
The SMG is an automated manual: a real clutch, worked by a hydraulic pump. It has its own service item, the fluid, and one specialist guide ties skipping it to wear of the gearbox's own pump and actuator. The faults chapter explains why.
How the figures in this guide work
No euro totals. A labour rate differs by country and by workshop. So each job carries a step on a scale of five — an hour or two, half a day, a day, two or three days, a week or more in the workshop — plus one line on where the work sits: in the part, or in getting to it.
On this car the published figures for the same job differ so widely by market and by year that any single number would have misled you.
The six questions that decide whether this car is a good buy
1 · Is there an invoice for the rod bearings, with the mileage on it?
This is the question. The bearings are an interval, not a failure, and there is usually little or no warning beforehand.
2 · Do you know that "no noise" proves nothing?
It does not. That is the whole point of an interval: the car is fine until it is not.
3 · When was the SMG fluid last changed?
One specialist guide gives it a fixed interval, says it is frequently skipped, and ties skipping it to wear of the SMG's own pump and actuator. The interval to hold the invoice against is in the buying guide.
4 · What oil, and how often?
BMW specifies a particular oil for this engine, and specialists give a short interval between changes. A folder of long-interval services is a different car from a folder of short ones — which oil and which interval you want to see on the invoices is in the buying guide.
5 · Can you see the FULL fault memory, passive entries included?
Both the SMG and the engine management. A fault that has been wiped comes back only once the problem happens again, so ask for the passive entries and for when the memory was last cleared.
6 · Manual or SMG — and if it is a manual, where did it come from?
Europe only got the SMG, so in Europe a manual is an import, and the paperwork should say so.
What the honest answer to all six looks like
A car with a bearing invoice, a folder of short-interval oil services, an SMG fluid change on schedule and a printed fault memory is a car you can buy on the answers. A car whose owner says "it has never given me any trouble" has told you nothing at all — on this engine, that sentence is compatible with every outcome.
Which years, which specification
Built from September 2004 to December 2009. That is the saloon, by the BMW M Registry's production figures, and it is the car in this guide; the same engine went into the E61 Touring, built into 2010, and the E63/E64 M6.
The gearbox is the specification that matters. SMG III as standard in Europe, seven speeds. The six-speed manual exists but was a North American car, so in Europe it is an import — check the documents, not the advert.
What to establish about the oil history, because it is a specification of a sort. BMW specifies a particular oil for this engine, and specialists give a short interval between changes. So the relevant question is not "has it been serviced" but "on which schedule". Two cars of the same year and mileage can sit on opposite sides of that.
On modifications: be careful with anything that changes how the engine breathes or how the oil behaves. This is an engine with a documented bearing interval and a documented oil specification. A car with an aftermarket intake and no invoices is not a bargain, it is an unknown.
What it is worth
No price list — it moves by country and by month. What is worth having is the method, and on this car the method is unusually simple to state.
The purchase price is the smallest number in the story. That is not a warning; it is arithmetic. A rod bearing service, a VANOS pump and a pair of throttle actuators are each a serious workshop job, and any of the three can be waiting. So the only comparison that means anything is asking price plus what is outstanding.
There are three kinds of these for sale.
The documented car. Bearing invoice with a mileage, oil services at the short interval, SMG fluid done, printed fault memory. Top of the market and usually the cheapest car on the page once you have done the sums.
The tidy car with a thin folder. Drives beautifully — they all do. Buy it on the assumption that the bearings, the SMG fluid and possibly the actuators are all in front of you.
The cheap one. On an E60 M5 the reason is nearly always one of four things: bearings, VANOS, actuators, SMG. All four are knowable before you buy, and none of them is knowable from the driver's seat.
Compare entry prices, not asking prices. And do not let low mileage reassure you: the bearing interval is measured in tens of thousands of kilometres, but oil that has sat, and SMG fluid that has never been changed, are functions of years.
What it is actually like to own one
Ten cylinders, 8,250 rpm, and the noise that goes with them. That is what people keep them for, and no running-cost table will change that.
What it asks in return is discipline of a specific kind. The sources are consistent that the car rewards knowledgeable ownership rather than enthusiastic ownership. Brakes are a regular consumable.
The habit that matters most, and it is cheap: short oil intervals with the right oil, and the SMG fluid on schedule. Those two are among the cheapest items in this entire guide. The sources tie the wrong oil to faster bearing wear, and one specialist guide ties a skipped SMG fluid change to wear of the SMG pump and actuator.
What surprises people is not the bills. It is that the car gives so little warning. On most cars in this series something rattles, smells or leaks before it costs you money. Here two of the expensive items — the bearings and the throttle actuators — are documented as arriving with little or no warning. That is why this guide is organised around paperwork and read-outs rather than around noises.
The buying guide — €24
Everything above is what the car is. This is what you check.
Six faults that belong to this engine, taken apart one by one, with how much work each repair is and how to tell which of them you are looking at. Nine things that are simply twenty years old, every one with how much work it is, what tells you about it at a viewing, and whether it has to be done now, within a year or two, or not at all. Why the bodyshell chapter is short, and what to look at underneath anyway. The rod bearings, and why they are an interval rather than a failure. The viewing in six steps, including the two moments that come only once. The sentences you say to the seller, and how to build an offer out of what you found.
And a card you print and take with you — twenty-three lines, in the order you do them. That comes as a separate file, because nobody wants to print a whole guide to take a few pages to a car park.
This is what one of the nine looks like
3 · Oil consumption
Half a day to establish which cause it is · diagnosis Above one quart per 1,000 miles on some engines. Valve stem seals, piston rings or the PCV system. Ask for a figure rather than an impression.
Within a year or two, unless it is climbing.
And this is how the card reads
- 1 · The paperwork · do this before the engine is started
- 2 · The cold start
- 3 · The engine bay, engine off
- 4 · The read-out · at a specialist — this is the centre of the viewing
- 5 · The test drive
- 6 · On the lift
What €24 buys, put next to what it saves
Rod bearings are two or three days, and they are best done on a schedule because they seldom give a warning. The VANOS high-pressure pump is two or three days as well, because it sits inside the sump, and both throttle actuators are a day. The guide is €24. It will not stop any of that from being needed — but it does tell you which of them you are looking at before you agree a price, and that is the whole of the difference between paying for a car and paying for someone else's postponed maintenance.
Why there are no prices in it
Because a price we cannot verify is worse than no price, and because a price would be wrong for most of the people reading this anyway. Workshop rates across Europe differ widely, and so do parts prices. A quote from a specialist in one country tells you nothing in another.
What does not change is how much work a job is — that follows from what has to come off the car. So every point in the guide says whether it is an hour or two, half a day, a day, two or three days, or a week or more in the workshop, with a labour figure where a source gives one. And it says whether the money sits in the part or in getting to it, which is what lets you tell a fair quote from a bad one.
If you want a figure, ask any workshop one question — what is your hourly rate? — and every effort level in the guide becomes your own number, in your own currency. One question, and the answer is actually true for you.
How this guide was put together
Because you should know before you pay for it.
- Every fault and symptom comes from a source the guide names, the manufacturer's own documents first. The effort levels are our assessment, unless a source gives the hours.
- Where specialists place bearing trouble at a different mileage from the replacement guideline, you get both figures and why they do not contradict each other.
- The effort of every job is counted item by item and checked against the list before every edition.
- It says as plainly what you can leave alone as what you have to do. None of the nine age points start from leave it.
Leave your email address at the checkout and both files arrive straight away: one guide and one card, as two pdfs. No subscription, no account.
The full guide · €24
17-page guide, A4 and phone · 3-page inspection card · instant PDF · VAT included
Have every car inspected before you buy by someone who knows this engine. This is general information about the model and not advice about a specific car.