I can try and send pics later, but we have magnets at the shop that are like coat hangers, they are great for this kind of stuff. Good luck OP
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I bought this one from earlier in the thread and it fits great underneath the cam ledges, I can snake it from the intake side to the exhaust side with no issues. I haven't found this screw yet, I'm thinking I might have blown it out of my engine bay with air as I have boroscoped all of the channels and areas where it could have fallen and can't find it. The magnet itself isn't that strong, it can pick up the screw but if you move it too quickly it will fall off. I'm going to go at it for hours this weekend, maybe attach more magnets to help grab it. I'm going to remove the front bumper to jack the car up and check my driveway for this motherfucker, I'll keep the thread updated.
I'm gonna buy a new narrower attachment for my blow gun, I was hitting it with 80psi out of the standard blow gun from pep boys from multiple angles and I didn't see any movement at all. Since I am blowing it from all angles I have to check each channel in the head now to see if i threw it somewhere else.
Is the oil drain in the middle of those passages? I have fished through all 6 and have not found it yet, and I have boroscoped near all of the springs and retainers and it is not there.
Small magnet with a hole in the center and safety wire might get you a little further in before pulling parts. Amazon has a billion of them starting at like $9 shipped. May be worth a shot. Just make damned sure you tie off the wire securely (or you'll be finding tools and magnets).
I do a lot of work with magnets. KJ Magnetics is the place to go for magnet solutions. N52 is the grade you want.
Filippo
Filippo
I used to sell advertising of various sorts and people always wanted to beat their head against a wall for countless hours to make a few pennies in the name of avoiding an advertising budget.
At some point, you have to ask yourself how much money you could make mowing lawns with all the time you spent, and then just pay someone to fix it properly. I never take my own advice here but its something to chew on lol
At some point, you have to ask yourself how much money you could make mowing lawns with all the time you spent, and then just pay someone to fix it properly. I never take my own advice here but its something to chew on lol
I've spent around 5 hours fishing around every nook and cranny under that cam ledge with a small profile boroscope and (weakish) magnet snake. It is NOT there. At this point I think I either blew it out with air, or it's in the oil pan. Before I tow it over to my local family BMW tuner shop, I'm going to drain the oil and fish around the oil pan with the boroscope and magnet through that drain hole.
ALSO: Unfortunately I have tapped 5/6 pcv ports, and my 6th cylinder valve is open and I am obviously not comfortable closing it with this rogue screw hiding somewhere in my engine.
Just buy some rods and pistons and build the engine, take care of all your problems at once 
What does the valve being open affect you tapping and plugging the port? If you are worried about shavings you can catch them.
Just buy some rods and pistons and build the engine, take care of all your problems at once
I'm very careful about the shavings, I use painters tape to physically cover the port and douse the nozzle off a brakleen can with grease then poke it around that hole to grab most of them, then pressurized air w regular brakleen, finish it out with a vacuum etc. Regardless of all this, there will still be shavings at the bottom of my valves every single time, not sure how I could do it cleaner
We used liberal amounts of white lithium grease on folded heavy duty paper towels. Worked quite well.
Filippo
Filippo
I believe there are two other cases of this happening and both just said "screw it" and gave it a rip. One guy never found it and assumed it's just stuck in
You could try draining the oil, then dump 2 gallons of cheap shit into the head as fast as you can and see if the rush of oil will push the screw down a gally. Think beer chug with pierced can.
You could try draining the oil, then dump 2 gallons of cheap shit into the head as fast as you can and see if the rush of oil will push the screw down a gally. Think beer chug with pierced can.
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If it was a stock head I would have sent it to the moon and back by now. The previous owner spent a TON of money building the hell out of this head when the gasket blew (on a stock bottom end o.o) and I don't want to put that money to waste.
You say not to crank the engine by the crank nut, how else would i crank it? I will definitely pull my plugs and scope down my cylinders after I crank it a few times as you suggest, never thought about that.
Alternatively, just to completely eliminate the chance of it sitting under a camshaft ledge, I was going to order the $250 camshaft lock tool, pull the ledges, check and reassemble then return the tool to amazon, but this is after I will drain the oil and check the pan itself for this fucker.
I deleted the section regarding the cranking over/valve thing, By design its impossible to happen. Probably why posting at 2AM isnt smart.
I'd still turn the engine over by hand just for the shits. A lot of people pop the cap off the alternator and use the T-50 torx on there. I think even if you were pour tons of oil in there that it wont be enough to carry out the set screw.
Whatever became of this nightmare? I was doing my head ports earlier and was thinking about this each time I was pushing the plug down to the hole.
No idea, haven't ran the engine since. I work on this car DIY with little previous experience, just spent the last 4 months dropping the oil pan (did not find the screw), snapping oil pan bolts at half torque, replacing my entire radiator/hoses because my CSF radiator blew some welds (first search result on google will reveal it, don't buy higher-capacity radiators since the computer doesn't know the difference so there is very little benefit anyways), and fitting on the worst relocation inlets set on the market (precision raceworks, quality is fine, fitment is TERRIBLE with aluminum outlets). Most of the time, obviously, waiting for parts to arrive. Now I only have to replace an auxiliary radiator line which took me a long time to find because the previous owner decided to spend $2000 on the BMW performance cooling package. Luckily I turned the car off in august with about an eighth tank of fuel I can gently run out to get new fuel, but after these 4-5 months of working on this car I probably won't even recognize driving it.
Ah, I know the pain of not driving. Keep us updated on what ends up happening, hopefully it becomes a non issue.
Same. I think I’ve had mine sitting on stands with no desire to put it back together for at least a year and a half, maybe two. Smh
lol ..... aaaargh ..... lol ...... rrrrrrr .... yeah now I know why so many low miles. Wait on parts. Wait on weather. Wait on motivation. What on time. ...... tick ... tock .... tick ... tock.
Filippo
Filippo
