[mitch57]

Does anyone else but me think this is a poor design for cooling? Why would you put that radiator so close to the ground where just about any road debris could get flipped up into the radiator and possibly knock it out of commission. Plus, on my X40i there's no honeycombing plastic grill to keep crap from getting to the radiator. I can literally stick my whole fist through the lower slot.

[cvp33]

You should see where my other car’s radiator is....

[jmciver]

Haha, that is still better than some other radiator placement designs on other BMW models... The oil cooler on the F8x M3/M4 is actually facing the ground on the bottom of the car, just forward of the engine (I suspect the Vette has a similar design...). More than one F8x owner has had the unfortunate issue of accidentally running over something in the road that led to oil cooler damage just due to the location of the oil cooler....

That said, for the X7, I will speculate it has to do with engine bay real estate design to get proper air flow to ALL of the different radiators in the X7 - and there are a lot of them. In fairness to the F8x M3/M4 design, there are a crap ton of radiators/coolers in the car, primarily due to the air/water intercooler system that is used for the intake (the same system that the X7 engines use). The location of the oil cooler on the bottom of the car is actually the most efficient location and the overall cooling system of the F8x M3/M4 performs extremely well. It is just unfortunate that the oil cooler is in a somewhat vulnerable position...

But it is interesting you don't have the honeycomb grill (or something similar) to provide protection from the "big" stuff that could get you when driving on typical streets/highways. I know the M-Sport package bumper does have the honeycomb grill in that area. Must be a Luxury Line thing, but it does not make too much sense from a basic protection perspective...

[mitch57]

Originally Posted by jmciver

Haha, that is still better than some other radiator placement designs on other BMW models... The oil cooler on the F8x M3/M4 is actually facing the ground on the bottom of the car, just forward of the engine (I suspect the Vette has a similar design...). More than one F8x owner has had the unfortunate issue of accidentally running over something in the road that led to oil cooler damage just due to the location of the oil cooler....

That said, for the X7, I will speculate it has to do with engine bay real estate design to get proper air flow to ALL of the different radiators in the X7 - and there are a lot of them. In fairness to the F8x M3/M4 design, there are a crap ton of radiators/coolers in the car, primarily due to the air/water intercooler system that is used for the intake (the same system that the X7 engines use). The location of the oil cooler on the bottom of the car is actually the most efficient location and the overall cooling system of the F8x M3/M4 performs extremely well. It is just unfortunate that the oil cooler is in a somewhat vulnerable position...

But it is interesting you don't have the honeycomb grill (or something similar) to provide protection from the "big" stuff that could get you when driving on typical streets/highways. I know the M-Sport package bumper does have the honeycomb grill in that area. Must be a Luxury Line thing, but it does not make too much sense from a basic protection perspective...

I wonder if it's possible and how much it would cost to retrofit the M-Sport grill covers on the 40i? Might be worth looking into just for piece of mind.

[jmciver]

Originally Posted by mitch57

I wonder if it's possible and how much it would cost to retrofit the M-Sport grill covers on the 40i? Might be worth looking into just for piece of mind.

They look close in size, but I would be very surprised if those parts were interchangeable as the M-sport bumper and and Luxury Line bumpers are different designs.....