THE M3 IS GETTING THE ANRI BUILD TREATMENT - Blown headgasket to build thread

[fattycharged]

Curious what that means as well, OEM plus on the power

[ChapterM3]

Guys, I’ve been waiting to post my full process and review over these 7 months until I was able to drive it for at least 1,000 miles. I just hit that mark this week and needless to say I am completely blown away by how the car feels.

This post is to summarize my experience so far: from my search for a shop to do the work to deciding to go with Anri/my review of working with him, to getting the car back with a rebuilt engine on February 23.

The search for a shop to do the work –
If you haven’t seen the entire process, go back to the beginning of this post to read the full story of how my nightmare unfolded in front of me. Essentially, a set of misfire codes led to the discovery of head gasket failure.

As soon as I realized that the car needed a head gasket, the search began for a shop, and quite honestly, the anxiety in this process was incredible. My dream car is down with a massive problem that cannot get fixed until the motor is cracked open: I didn’t want to just give the car to anyone. I debated about the DIY route, but ultimately realized this was way over my head in terms of my mechanical ability, what to do and more importantly, what could go wrong. I did not want to further blow my engine, or fix it, only for it to blow again a few thousand miles later. I needed to have peace of mind when it came to getting the car back on the road.

I called 7 shops in total - all of which are either known on this forum, have been mentioned, or have been recommended. After reading some of the horror stories on this forum I was very cautious about selecting my choice of shop.

All of them did not meet my expectations. I could not trust just some service advisor without actually talking to the person doing the work, and then in the end shelling out a ton of money with no real idea of what work was done, or worse, receiving mediocre service that would end up costing me even more in the long run. I’m grouping them as they all had the same points, plus or minus a few, and I felt that (at least in the Los Angeles area) all had the same demeanor to me, as if I was simply customer #234677, get the car in, credit card out.

Warranty –
Every shop I spoke with gave a warranty on their rebuilt engine between 3 weeks and 9 months. Each one of them said that they’ve never had a problem with their builds and that I shouldn’t worry about ever having to use the warranty.

Customer Service - on the phone with service advisors –
6 out 7 of the shops I was never able to speak with the owner or primary mechanic, but someone in their service department. Each had friendly customer service, but when it came to the hard details, they had to go ask their boss or primary mechanic to then relay the message. There was never a direct conversation with the person doing the work on the car, as that was their business’s structure.
The one shop that I did speak with the owner, admitted to me on the phone that he was high on coke, and that I should call back tomorrow to get my name on a 2-3 month long list of head gasket jobs as he was so inundated with work. He quoted me “$8k easy” and that if I “didn’t have the pockets for more you should just sell the car”
Explanations of what would happen were slim. The most memorable reply to my question of “What would be done to the car to replace the head gasket?” summarizes my conversations with them all as this is essentially every reply I got: “Yeah so the process for the head gasket is pretty simple: we take the head off in the car, have the head sent to the machine shop, they resurface everything and maybe we slim the block a bit to match it, then we replace the head gasket, and put it back on. $7-8k. If the car burns oil afterwards this is normal, typical of these engines, I mean they’re over 25 years old. What do you expect? If you need cylinders or rings down the road we can do that too. Probably $15-18k to do the engine. Up to you, if it were my car I’d just do the engine, up to you though. Let me know in the next day and I’ll put you on the waitlist”

Customer service - in person with owners/head mechanics –
For the few shops that I visited to get quotes, I was told that they could do the work and do an amazing job, they’ve done tons of these. As soon as I started to ask about costs, details of their work, warranties, etc., the conversation changed from friendly to cold and wanting to get me out of the shop. In one instance, as soon as I asked more in-depth questions of what would be done to my car, the seemingly friendly owner that I was speaking with suddenly opened his laptop, his eyes and attention now at his screen, while still telling me what would be done, how much it was going to cost and then suddenly he unplugged his his laptop and walked away, asking a service advisor to continue the conversation.
Most places I visited were very established shops that did very well for themselves. With that said, I could care less about the brand or what type of success the business had and more about what expertise would be working on my motor and understanding the technicalities behind building it. Above all else: I did not want to get into a nightmare scenario that I’ve read about on here where some have spent 5 figures on an engine job to only continue to have problems for months or years afterwards.
I walked into each shop with anticipation thinking that yes, I found the shop! I wanted so badly to have this decision done and get the car fixed. Every single time I left, I thought to myself there was no way in hell I would leave my car with those guys and sleep well at night, continuously thinking about “What if” scenarios.

Under the car cover, waiting for me to make a decision -

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How I decided to go with Anri –

After all of this research and visiting shops, the car had been sitting under its car cover for about 2 months and I was comfortable knowing that it would continue to sit until I found the right shop or person to do the job right the first time. I had never heard of Anri before, but his name kept popping up in various threads on the forum and he had been chiming in on this thread with very in-depth posts from time to time. I then found his thread on a “Blown-S54” that caught my eye on how this engine was saved and his attention to detail. I didn’t know if he was a mechanic or not but I decided to message him anyway to get his insight on my situation. This led to phone calls, and even a visit to his shop.

It turns out that he’s an engine builder - Not just any engine builder who will work on the engine, but also the mechanic, and the machinist. This was a welcomed surprise, as he’s not outsourcing major components to some machine shop, but doing it himself so he will literally know the engine’s he builds inside and out.

I also had no idea what a true fanatic he is about customizing BMW engines. When I visited his shop in Paso Robles, he told me he had developed a double vanos system for S38/S14 engine, I didn’t even know you could do that - I also saw pretty much every M engine that’s worth talking about being custom built in his shop: S38/S14, S65, a couple S54’s, an S62, etc. it was like heaven of BMW engines and experiments for new custom parts for these engines he was working on all over the place.

I realized at that moment I had found a mad scientist for M engines.

Also a fun fact I realized is that he’s big in the world of essentially every classic M car out there from the E24M6 E34M5, E30M3 S38/S14E46M3 E39M5 to the E92M3.

We talked about pricing, how the build would go, what he would do, and how communication would go. He told me every single angle of what could be wrong with the engine based on my diagnosis and the symptoms that I was hearing - and matched that with what that might mean in terms of work, and pricing.

He warned me that on a high-mileage engine when the head is removed and put back together there is a risk that the engine might start burning oil. This is because the bore shape will be changed at TDC. In addition to this, the existing piston rings will not take to the new shape unless they are replaced, and the bore is honed. This information no other shop cared to explain to me so that I understood what could occur and the risk I would be taking if I didn’t do the cylinders/rings at the same time. Ultimately the risk I would be taking if I only replaced the head gasket, is that once it’s time to put the engine back together I would most likely start burning oil. This is the kind of expertise I evaluated compared to the other shops who just wanted to R&R the head gasket and move on.

Communication moving forward was simple: all messages and calls would be directly with him. No service person, automated service, or someone taking the calls. It would be him all the time. Pricing-wise we discussed prices in each direction I might want to go in to get the motor running again. He would provide photos of everything, and make sure I understood everything before proceeding or not, depending on what I chose to do.

The experience I had with Anri from the initial conversations and visit was completely different than any of the other shops I spoke with. On top of all of that, he offered a warranty with the build: 2 years and unlimited miles, which was exactly what I was looking for. Yes, 2 years and unlimited miles is incredible, no doubt, but beyond that I immediately felt a sense of relief that finally, I have found a guy that stands behind his work. I mean BMW gives you 2 years or 40k. Now I found a guy who told me to go drive it across the country and hit the track, if his engine gave up, he’d honor it.

After talking with him a few more times after this, and continuing to read his threads on this forum, I decided to trust him and go with his service for my engine.

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Review of working with Anri –
TLDR – I have found my own personal race engineer for my car and he will be the only one working on it from now on.

Full explanation –
I would highly recommend Anri to anyone looking for any and all work done on their M car. From communication to expectations to delivery, this guy nailed it all. From that moment I decided to trust him with my car, it was the best decision that I ever made. The engine is the smoothest I’ve ever heard it, and after 1000 miles on it, it is an animal. I don’t know what trade secrets he put in the motor but I have never felt my car feel like this. The thing is FAST. All of the noises of rattling from the vanos that turned out to be loose screws, gone. All the other little quirks here and there, gone. I’ve never felt the amount of torque I do in the lower power band, and needless to say, I made the right decision to go with Anri.

This guy cares, immensely, about his builds. So much so that yes it does take time as you can see from my timeline (Nov 23-Feb 24), but he is focused on each project with his absolute FULL attention. I felt completely taken care of every step of the way. His communication was clear: He calls me when he has an update and doesn’t when he doesn’t. When he would call, we would be on the phone for sometimes an hour or more, and at no point did I feel like he was trying to rush me off the phone or balk if I had more questions. He actually welcomed more questions so that I fully understood what was going on. I heard from him about once or twice a week with detailed updates about what was going on, with pictures and detailed ideas/thoughts/opinions on what I should do.

I never felt like a number in line to pay for a service, if that makes sense. From shopping around LA for a shop, I felt like every option I had was that I would get taken advantage of, and or screwed in the long run because ultimately I never knew who was going to touch my car.
He also told me some really hard truths about work done on my car previously that were hard to swallow. I ultimately came to realize that a lot of places just don’t fully KNOW what goes into making performance upgrades and how the S54 reacts to them. Anri does, and he will fully explain it to you inside and out so you understand it as well. I even learned a lot by speaking with him (and also of course reading as much as I could about what he was talking about online) and again reminded how thankful I was that I decided to go with him - I never would have gotten this level of attention or care, let alone a solid engine at the end of the day.

On a personal note, I love to see a guy like this get to do what he loves. I can hear it in his voice when he’s telling me about the work either on my car or others' cars and how much he loves these things. He makes me feel and know that I am his customer, not some number, and that he knows how much I love my car because he loves it as well. He is not a brand that has a logo and has a big IG following, or a Youtube channel (although if he did, it would be killer), but he is the guy who just does the work. And that is something that I appreciate over anything else.

Anri is now essentially what I like to call my M3’s personal race engineer from now on. To know that this one specific person has built my engine, knows it inside and out, and I can call him at any time to ask him questions about it - The peace of mind that gives me is simply incredible. For those of you who would say, “yes, but I would rather be that person myself”, that’s great if you have the ability of doing that and have the resources to do so - I am one to know my limits of what I’m capable of, what I can learn and execute, and that simply I accepted that I don’t have the time/money/desire to learn and break things like I did in my buddies garage in high school. Sure I can do oil changes, valve cover gaskets, etc. but to do something like this? Not for me.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this journey with me from blown head gasket to now the conclusion of a beautifully running S54. I’ll continue to post more photos and videos as I make them, and perhaps I might just turn this into a build thread.

If you have any questions feel free to comment or message me directly.

Jonathan

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Now enjoy some photos - more to come!
Day I picked it up - Wish there was more to show of the work done in the motor, but it looks the same from the outside




First day I had it in the canyons after the first oil change at 500 miles -




A perfect summary of how I now feel in the car - this was at the end of that first full day back with it and I was about to head home when a guy took this photo and gave it to me, he perfectly captured the joy I felt after the journey the car and I had just been on – Needless to say, THANK YOU ANRI!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[RC Fresh]

Good to know there's a reputable shop/guy locally to us! Strong work. Anri just got a follow from me

[PSUEng]

Great to hear OP! I've read the thread and curious about how a leaking fan clutch comes into play here; I found mine was leaking and I've recently replaced it. I'm interested in understanding how it all ties together with overheating--fan clutch water pump type, driving cycles, etc.

[Cubieman]

Awesome man, great to hear all of this worked out and you now have yourself a new mechanic you feel good about.

If I ever need a full on engine rebuild I'll likely crate it up and off to him it goes.

[dreamdrivedrift]

Glad to hear you had a good experience - the amount he has shared and contributed to his forum is outstanding and he will be the one I go to if I need engine work. Curious out of the shops you looked at, was Carbahn in Norcal one of them?

[Slideways]

Glad to hear you had a good experience - the amount he has shared and contributed to his forum is outstanding and he will be the one I go to if I need engine work. Curious out of the shops you looked at, was Carbahn in Norcal one of them?

Carbahn will still do S54 work, but they specialize mainly in newer German cars. They used to list the 3.3L S54 build on their website and based on the 2002 M roadster that sold recently, the work is expensive (images of the receipts were included in the auction). For someone who is looking for a standard refresh, it is not a great option and probably not worth their time.

[ChapterM3]

Glad to hear you had a good experience - the amount he has shared and contributed to his forum is outstanding and he will be the one I go to if I need engine work. Curious out of the shops you looked at, was Carbahn in Norcal one of them?

No, Carbahn was not one of them - didn't span my search out that far!

[eXpensiveGears]

Beautiful write-up and review. I think I found my engine builder when I'm ready to redo mine as well!

[ChapterM3]

Beautiful write-up and review. I think I found my engine builder when I'm ready to redo mine as well!

Glad it was helpful! If you have any questions on the whole process feel free to send me a DM

[ChapterM3]

Went out in the canyons last week, such a blast. This thing rips!

[0-60motorsports]

Went out in the canyons last week, such a blast. This thing rips!

Awesome! Looks great.

[elrichmeister]

Went out in the canyons last week, such a blast. This thing rips!

Is that ACH? If so I haven't been up there in a year, did they open the main path to Newcombs? Last time i went both paths were closed.

[ChapterM3]

Awesome! Looks great.

Thank you!!

Is that ACH? If so I haven't been up there in a year, did they open the main path to Newcombs? Last time i went both paths were closed.

This is off Angeles Forrest Highway, so that left turn on ACH at the fire station. I haven't been up to Newcombs since the land slide (why it was closed), but I think it might be open now as I saw some photos of a meet there that could have been last week but I can't confirm that. When I continued on this road to Upper Big Tahjunga, that was still closed to local traffic only so I assume that section is still closed.