I recently fitted an Performance air filter on to my e36 318is and it has caused the engine to idle erractically! I have checked all of the hoses for splits and I have cleaned up the Bosch air flow sensor and plug connections but it is still playing up? I have even fitted the factory standard air box and filter back on to the car with no luck? I was wondering if the ecu has gone into fault mode, the engine idle switch is faulty or has the Bosch air sensor broke down? Any advice would be great, thanks

Unlikely but if you have damaged the ICV whilst fiddling with the aspiration system, that may be causing your issue. Yank it, clean it a lil and yam it back in.

I cant think of any way you could manipulate the ECUs function by changing the intake unless you have knocked a sensor out of place. How I look at it, You can run the engine fine even if you was to completely delete the filter (Avoid this for obvious reasons) so you should be okay

Bare with the forums for some more great suggestions

HTH Daz

Try disconnecting the battery for a few hours (resets ECU in most cases), this will hopefully make the car "re-learn" your driving style. Probably won't cure the fault but it will be better !!...

Is it just a performance panel filter or Induction kit?

You have a air leak somewhere,its not a ecu issue

Having listening to the car try to run it sounds like its an air leak around the intake manifold! Sounds like a wooshing noise :-( hopefully just a split hose or a dodgey gasget!

It's an induction kit as well, not a replacement filter

Thank you for all of the advice with my problem, managed to sort it out now! Ended up taking the air intake manifold off of the car, cleaning it all up and re gasket all of the connections! Actually runs better than before! Thanks tho :-)

Well done Dan ;)

Well done Dan, often people dont bother fixing it themselves, hats off to you for doing this rather than going down the pub

Hi mate.. i had the same problem on my old 316 compact.. It turned oout to be a split in the hose but because its rigged unless you take it off its hard to find.

As for the air filter, i would suggest getting yourself a pannal filter. It does the same job but doesnt mess with the air system. in my opinion i feel they work better. Not sure what everyone else thinks

Nice one for the comments! Yeah I would rather attempt to fix it than just hand it over to mechanic and get charged a fortune!

Since the car has web running with the cone filter I haven't seemed to have any problems with the air flow sensors playing up. Once I have the decat pipe fitted tho I am going to get her remapped so that she is fueling correctly! Don't want to run her to lean or rich and risk damaging any of the internals!

Filters work well, if enough cold air gets to them,

i got a cone filter n looked at fitting it today but the air box has 2 pipes running to it what do u do with these ??????? put it on for a min n reved it n it sounds well horny lol

Two hoses from the air box? Is the car an e36 4 cyl or 6 cyl? Where do the two pipes go?

I know for the M42 1800 4 cyl there is a Bosch air flow sensor connected to the air box then from there, a single pipe which T's onto the intake manifold and another smaller pipe heads to another Bosch sensor underneath of the manifold?

Not to clued up on the 6 cyl M50 engine tho to be honest but I'm sure some of the lads on the forum will probably know what both pipes do!

Hope this helps a little bit tho

yep its the 6 cyl not looked where the pipes go yet

If one pipe is larger then it will defo head towards the inlet manifold, the other one will probably head towards a sensor! Make sure you don't losen any of the pipes at the sensor because you could have the same issues I had with crazy idling :-)

ok but if i put a cone filter on what do i do with the pipes when i take them off the old air box ?????? do i just leave them tied up somewhere or put mini filters on the ends of the pipe

I found an adapter plate for my air filter so that it could take a cone filter! I you have a little search on eBay y

You might find a similar thing! If not have a look on Schmeidmann's website! They have got loads of genuine BMW parts and after markets parts. You should find something on there but expect to pay quite a bit for it tho!

One pipe will be an engine breather, to re-circulate some expelled fumes for emission purposes ;)