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all right today i'm changing two uh two oxygen sensors on my bmw 1996 328i
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uh they're they're the upstream ones on these cars on the 96s uh 1996s up on the bmw e36s
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they're going to have four oxygen sensors on these cars. They're going to have two on the downstream past the catalytic converter
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then they're going to have two on the upstream right around the exhaust manifold area
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Today I'm replacing the upstream ones. They're a little expensive. They're about $100 a pop
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But if your car's BMW recommends, you change them about 100,000 miles
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If you got it on 100 miles chances are pretty soon you going to have a check engine light flashing for oxygen sensors If they the upstream ones I recommend you change them as soon as possible because they can actually damage your catalytic converter over time And it might seem a little
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expensive since you're changing those O2 sensors and they're about 200 bucks for two of them
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But trust me, if you've ever seen how expensive a cat is on one of these cars, a new one
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it's freaking insane. It's two, three grand. I've seen they're very, very expensive
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So plus, changing the O2 sensors, it'll actually increase your fuel consumption, your fuel mileage will get a lot better
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Or, you know, you can see a couple miles to the gallon difference when you change your O2 sensors on these cars
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So I'm about to begin. First thing you do is you go ahead and remove the plastic covering on your valve covers
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I got a strut bar in this car, so I got to take it off. and then you jack the front of the car up
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All right, so here's my two old O2 sensors. They pretty fouled up I done both the downstream and the upstream before The upstream are much easier to do definitely It a little bit hard to get in there but what I did is
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first for one of them, the lower one, I was able to actually use a 22mm monkey wrench
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and get on there. Just with little turns, I was able to get it off and get the new one on
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And with the second one, it was impossible with the monkey wrench
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So I went to AutoZone, and I went and bought a – they actually have – actually, I didn't even buy it
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I just rented it. It's specifically called an O2 sensor socket tool that they have
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And I used that, and it worked like a dream. And then I was able to put the new ones in and install them
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The only thing I would advise on this is just do them one at a time so you don't get the wires mixed up
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Because it does matter which bay they go into according to their position on the exhaust
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So just make sure you do them one at a time and wire them up one at a time and that it for that all right so here are the o2 sensors on the BMW the first one is right here and
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these are both pretty easy to reach they're not too bad so there it is right
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there and then the second one it's a little bit higher it is right up here so
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you got two up to two o2 sensors on the upstream and I was able to actually get
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this one that I'm looking at now which is the top highest one I was able to get
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that with a monkey wrench with just little turns the other one I had to get the O2 sensor tool, but it's still pretty easy to reach
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Then you just follow it up to the motor and remove them and replace them
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Just do it one at a time so you don't get mixed up which banks they go to