Safe RPM driving conditions

[Gr8ful]

Hey all,

I just got a five-speed 2000 323i sedan and am fairly new to driving manual transmissions. I want this car to last a long time including the engine.

What is a good/safe RPM to shift at or what RPM should I be shifting at for normal driving conditions?

And if I feel like getting a little quick what RPM rate is safe to go to? I normally shift at around 3,000 - 3,500 RPM. Is this a good RPM to be shifting at? I realize red-lining it probably isn't good, but is reaching RPMs up to 5,000 rpm safe for the engine if this RPM is frequently reached? Will driving the car at a constant RPM of say 3,500 - 4,000 RPM be bad? (my friend rode with me and said I was 'babying' the car..I guess the engine revving is a little intimidating or I'm scared I might 'hurt' the engine hehe but I wanna find out the facts).

Any information will be much appreciated!! Thanks in advance!

 

[Kirby]

Running the engine at higher RPMS isn't necessarily bad, especially in the 3000 - 4500 RPM range on a BMW engine. Pushing it to redline occasionally isn't a problem either. Actually, it's WORSE on an engine to lug it (drive at low RPM). If the engine feels unresponsive when you gas it, or it feels like it is 'chugging' along, you're lugging it, and you should downshift.

What will make a much bigger difference in longevity is how you maintain the engine. Change the oil as per the schedule, stay with the maintenance plan.

 

[Wadula]

reving the engine really is no problem. find a good mix of babying and pushing her and you will be just fine. as kirby said it doesn't even hurt to squeeze the last horse out of her once in a while. as i said just find a nice mix.
and the maintenance of course is the key you need for high milage.

 

[bahnstormer]

just make sure u change your oil every 3-4k miles

 

[Gr8ful]

Thank you so much guys!! I just put an AEM Cold-air intake on her and she's rockin' now.. glad to know I can safely bring her up to 4,500 - 5,000 RPM without a worry

I was told that the oil only needs to be changed every 15K miles, just to be extra weary is it a good idea to change it more frequently maybe the usual 3k - 4k miles? Thanks again!!

 

[mikev]

Thank you so much guys!! I just put an AEM Cold-air intake on her and she's rockin' now.. glad to know I can safely bring her up to 4,500 - 5,000 RPM without a worry

I was told that the oil only needs to be changed every 15K miles, just to be extra weary is it a good idea to change it more frequently maybe the usual 3k - 4k miles? Thanks again!!

check it every week and when it gets fairly dirty its time to change!

 

[brahtw8]

Thank you so much guys!! I just put an AEM Cold-air intake on her and she's rockin' now.. glad to know I can safely bring her up to 4,500 - 5,000 RPM without a worry

Your car has a rev limiter, which kicks in at around 7000 rpm or so.

You should not be afraid to take your car up into the 6k range, or even to the rev limiter. Indeed, if you are not going to drive the car above 5k RPM, you should sell it and buy something less sporty, preferably with an automatic transmission. The whole point of the car is to enjoy the smooth as butter inline six that loves to rev. I have near 148k on my '94 325i and I still hit the rev limiter now and again.

Over the very long term, repeated driving at high RPM may cause a small amount of additional engine wear, but we are talking hundreds of thousands of miles.

An over-rev, where you rev the engine beyond the redline, is when engine damage happens. Even then, you probably have at least 500 RPM above redline before you have to worry about bending valves and whatnot. Anticipating your question, you cannot go beyond redline when accelerating in gear, but you can when you downshift, so don't miss a shift. (By miss a shift, I mean shift into 2nd gear when you are looking for 4th gear and traveling at a speed beyond the maximum speed in 2nd at redline. Say, shifting from 5th to 2nd at 85 MPH. Very bad. Known as the Money Shift.)

 

[Wadula]

ahhh the old oil story. your car has a nice little screen with 5 green fields that light up at start. when they are gone and the yellow one shows up only, then you have to change the oil. all others is too overcautios and money wasting in my books. bmw doen's install that gauge for fun.

 

[MrElussive]

As long as you warm up your engine properly and change the oil on time, you can drive it however you want. The car won't let you abuse the engine. There is nothing wrong with taking the car to redline, but what you have to realize is that when you get to redline, that is when you have to shift.
Personally, I take my car to redline almost every day, I'd say, and it is running fine.

 

[Dave8812]

They woulden't put a redline on the car if you coulden't take the engine to that speed. As long as the engine is in decent shape, and you don't do it all of the time, you should be okay taking it up there pretty high every once in a while.

 

[frolf]

yeah, bmw's are built to run. if your car has good clean oil, is properly warmed up, good gas, and you drive with a little common sense, you'll be more than fine. you'll be happy, and so will your car. dont think of it like "i took my car to redline once on tuesday, next time i can do it then is friday" no no no no no. today i blasted through the gears twice, and because i followed the above (warm engine, good oil) it was perfectly fine for my engine.

 

[AutoXfreak]

If you tend to run the engine at low RPMs there is a bad thing called carbon that will build up on the pistons. I know this because the lady that owned the car before me said that she NEVER took the RPMs above 3500. The consequense was a compression that was 20 to 30 PSI more than stock. So after about 10 cans of techron fuel injector cleaner and running her hard for a bit the compression fianaly came back down to normal. So rev away my good friend and enjoy the power!!!

 

[jonnyz16]

I always say I'm just blowing out the carbon honey ..

 

[Section_8]

Awesome, I just got my first BMW the week of Thanksgiving, wasn't quite sure of where it was 'safe' to take it to, although it sounds like I haven't really been pushing it as much as I thought (I switch gears around 4000-4500 normally, and get it up to right below the red when giving it the iron foot). (BMW Newbie turning into a BMW Nut pretty quickly..)

I've got a few things (mods) I want to do (performance springs to drop it some, a front stressbar and swaybar kit front and back) but I haven't thought about under the hood much, other then maybe a K&N Air Filter, and a Tri-Flo Exhust upgrade. What sort of things can I do to get the HP's up a little, that won't add extra wear to the engine? I've heard about the power programmer boxes (chips) you can get, which let you switch between and monitor different performance settings. Whats the deal with them, any long lasting problems with using them?

Thanks!
[driving2]