BMW Timing Chain Lawsuit: The N20/N26 Engine Settlement

The Defect

The lawsuit concerned BMW vehicles with N20 and N26 turbocharged four-cylinder engines, roughly model years 2012-2015. Plaintiffs alleged the timing-chain assembly — and the related oil-pump drive chain — could wear and fail prematurely, letting the chain skip on its sprockets. When that happens, the pistons and valves can collide, causing the engine to stall or fail entirely — a catastrophic, expensive failure.

A timing-chain failure is the kind of defect that can turn a running car into a written-off engine with little warning.

The Settlement

BMW reached a class-action settlement, granted final approval in early 2021, that provided an extended-warranty program covering repair or replacement of the timing-chain module, the oil-pump drive-chain module and the engine if damaged by a chain failure — generally up to 8 years or 100,000 miles — plus a reimbursement program for owners who had already paid for such repairs. BMW did not admit wrongdoing.

Extended-warranty-plus-reimbursement is the standard shape of auto-defect settlements, where the practical remedy is covering the repair and refunding those who paid out of pocket.

What Owners Should Know

Owners of affected N20/N26 BMWs should keep any repair orders referencing the timing chain, oil-pump chain or resulting engine damage, along with receipts, since reimbursement claims are built on those records. Even outside a settlement window, documenting a known-defect repair strengthens any warranty argument.