[CarJunkie]

Originally Posted by mattm

Just to do a slight thread hijack:

Over the weekend my 1M Coupe generated two check engine light messages. When I shut the car off and restart it, the CEL went away. I did a code read and it appears to be similar to the problem I had almost two years ago with the intake charge pipe failure.

From the service writer:
Morning Matt, the turbo waste gates are stuck open, the turbo's need to be replaced, luckily it's covered under the emissions warranty!!!!! Car will be here for about a week I would guess, on a side note did you see all the maintenance it was calling for?

Quotes on the maint (I can do the air filter and cabin filter, got a coupon for an oil change from them too):
Don't have intake off, looking at $900 in labor plus intake gasket(s) air filter $75, micro filter $145, oil $95, plugs $500, diff fluid $105, man.trans.fluid change $245, I can do 15% off everything but the oil change.

Should they find carbon build up is the $900 (less 15%=$765) a good price?
$500 for plugs seems high, too. Is it DIY easy or worth paying someone else if it's a pain in the butt? Damn, Amazon has the plugs for $9.08.

The most difficult part of changing the plugs is that you have to remove the cabin filter and cowl before you can remove the engine cover. I found a decent instructional vid on youtube for the first time, which helped. Now that I have done it a few times, it is easy. I have to do it to get to my catch can for inspection. Also make sure you have the correct spark plug socket. ECS has them. If you DIY, you could change the plugs AND COILS for less than $500.

My indy shop inspected the intake valves at about 40k miles and the carbon build-up was minor, so no walnut blast was needed. Walnut blast would have been about $600. (My dealer had quoted over $1k!) They did a cleaning job that involved injecting a BG valve cleaner product into the intake while the car was running which was less than $200.