XSeries-forum

Did the very last 3.0d's have 230bhp rather than 218bhp ? (tuning company I contacted clearly believes so)

As far as I'm aware, there was no change to the power output.

Any increase above 218bhp happened with the E70 switchover. E53s remained at 218 I'm sorry to say. The extra 12 would not have made a huge difference and in all honesty probably would not have been worth it.

BMW are marketing experts and will use any increase in power or the introduction of a new engine in conjunction with the release of a new model or face lift. Certainly over the last decade I have never seen an un-marketed increase.

Don

Wasn't the pre-face lift lower on power though? My dad had a pre-facelift 3.0d with mine being the 3.0d facelift. Besides the 6 speed gear box that mine has, his felt noticably slower.

E53 only ever had 2 outputs.

Prefacelift 184HP & Facelift 218HP.

If you want confirmation check Parkers for specs. I have read nearly every guide/review on the E53's & am confident in my answer.

I would be concerned to let anyone work on my car if they gave me this info.

The engines in the facelift has a different displacement so classified as a 3l as apposed to 2.9l in pre facelift. The size is prefacelift 2926cc 183bhp and facelift is 2993cc 218bhp. They are also different insurance groups. prefacelift is a 16A and facelift is a 17. The same engines were used in the 330d which I previously owned and swapped for the X5. They did have 3 BHP ratings 184/204 and 218. I did have to ask the insurance company on why such a change in premium and they said about the displacement size.