[pits200]

Car has 110k miles on it and decided it was time to start replacing some mounts. Started with the transfer case mount(harder than first appeared), did the driver side motor mount(pretty simple), and now want to do the passenger motor mount.

Has anyone tackled this on an xi with the additional components?

Thanks

[pits200]

Anyone

[matteblue3er]

Passenger engine mount is a pretty common failure on all E9x for some reason. I've seen many cars come into our shop with bad passenger mounts....driver's side is always ok.

I did mine when I had my subframe down to do front axles, oil pan gasket, and trans pan/fluid.

But you can probably jack the motor up some, loosen the subframe and let it hang. Personally, I wouldn't try this without a proper engine support on top.

[pits200]

Thanks. So unlike the drivers side this is not possible to do without dropping the suffrage a few inches? Really trying to avoid adding the complexity of an engine brace and sub frame deop.

[Julian2485]

How does one know if motor mount needs to be replaced ?

[pits200]

Engine movement, rough idle, sloppy shifts. Open the hood, put the car in drive with foot on brake and reviews engine a little, observe movement, it should be minimal.

[matteblue3er]

Originally Posted by Julian2485

How does one know if motor mount needs to be replaced ?

My car would vibrate and make rattling noises at resting idle when my passenger mount was bad.

By resting idle, I mean idle after the car has warmed up. Not cold start idle that is slightly raised

The mount was completely shot. In fact, I could rip the mount from the engine once the subframe was down.

Besides the rattling at idle, there were no other obvious symptoms. No rough shifts or weird noises.

What I did notice after replacement was better throttle response. I guess the motor was moving as I applied throttle and this movement resulted in a sloppy throttle feedback.

[PhaseP]

Originally Posted by pits200

Thanks. So unlike the drivers side this is not possible to do without dropping the suffrage a few inches? Really trying to avoid adding the complexity of an engine brace and sub frame deop.

I did both the driver and passenger side engine mounts by supporting and lifting the engine from below on the oil pan, but doing it one at a time. The passenger side is actually easier than the driver side, there is more room to move there.

Placed a block of wood on a jack under the oil pan, loosened and removed the engine mount upper nut from top of the engine with a 24" extension. You have to leave the driver side engine mount bolted on fully so that it becomes the pivot point when engine is being lifted, and also provides stability to the engine. If both mounts are loosened, engine will be unstable and dangerous just being lifted from below. If needed the driver side engine mount nut maybe loosened a bit, but if loosened too much it won't let the passenger side come up enough. Just geometry, the driver side being the pivot point and loosening it will raise that pivot point up.

So lifted the engine a bit with the jack slowly as much as possible. Unbolt the two lower bolts on the subframe to the engine mount. Rotate the engine mount so that its upper stud frees of the mount bracket and bring it down. Put the new one in the same way. Needs some rotating wiggling but gets in.

Driver side had required me to remove that gas and break line protection bracket and move the gas line a bit around to get the engine mount out.
Passenger side just comes out.
The driver side also had required to dismount the air filter box, the power steering reservoir and set to side so its hoses don't get pinched when engine is being lifted up. I also had to remove the driver side strut brace, because this was smashing the pressure differential sensor on the back of the intake manifold when engine was being raised.

Not sure just lifting the engine for passenger side would need these, but I would watch an eye on those while doing the engine lifting.

There is a DIY at rmeuropean I think (or fcpeuro) for XI engine mount replacement. It is good but they skipped on the moving of the power steering reservoir and others I mentioned, also they skip on the need to disconnect the gas line from its tie down, after removing the protection bracket under the engine fro driver side engine mount. Maybe they were able to do without these, but I couldn't
Hope this helps.

[pits200]

Definitely will help. Is this for an xi n54?

For the driver side I noticed all those hassles you were talking about so I removed my intake and charge pipe and just removed the whole mounting bracket for rhe mount. Only had to get under the car to loosen the two bolts. Made the job 100% easier and didn't need to jack up the car at all.

Thanks for the help again I'll report back.

[PhaseP]

Mine is an N52. I did all the removing and placing the engine mounts from under the car. Didn't remove the mounting brackets on the engine. I found out the engine mounts come out only at a certain angle to free the stud from the mounting holes. If I remember correctly on passenger side I had to rotate the mount 180 degrees. On driver 90 degrees clockwise while lying under the car.
Good luck!

[pits200]

Just tackled this job today. Took about 3 hours bit probably could do it next time around in an hour.

1.) Remove top 16 mm bolt on both driver and passenger side mounts. Drivers side is under chargepipe, need about 15 inches of extension. Passenger side is much tougher if you have an n54 due to the pipes coming from the turbo, makes it hard to see the top bolt. I used about 20 inches of extension with a universal on the end. You won't be able to feel if you're getting in the top nut so what I did was remove the tire and moved the extension up top with my left hand then reached down into the wheel well just above the axle and guided the socket on. This is a lot of fun but once you break the nut it comes off by hand.

2.) Remove both mounting bolts to mount.

3.) Remove metal plate under car and Jack up engine in a safe manner.

4.) Now you will have some space but the mount won't come out due to the downpipes. I then loosened the 3 subframe bolts almost all the way and pryed the subframe down to get room. After working on it for about 10 minutes I was able to get the mount out. The new one went back in much easier.

That's about it, the mount wasn't ripped but seemed totally disconnected and was very loose. Car idles much better and feels much smoother on acceleration.