2013 all4 countryman S -
At random over the past 10k miles running mostly well, it seemed only when I was going up hill at highway speeds with 20-30% throttle (low rpm high gear), I'd get a check-engine light with a p054b code.

Resarching the code, I found that it could likely be that the exhaust side Vanos solenoid may be clogged or not functioning properly. The valve has a filter/mesh screen on the inlets that can become clogged and not allowing enough oil flow to properly control the exhaust-side of the variable valve timing. It's doing it more often lately and sometimes even disables the turbo; seems to slip into a limp mode state. I have to pull over, restart the motor and finish my drive and sometimes the code would clear on its own.

Lately, the code is active on a cold startup before even hitting the road. I popped the hood today and figured I'll take a look at that valve to see if it could use some cleaning or just get a replacement ordered. I looked at some manuals and they claimed that both the exhaust side and intake side vanos valves are held in place with a 10mm bolt, but no. I didn't find that bold, I instead found what looked like a t30 torx head bolt and found a snug fitting torx head to use.

I found that this bolt was very tight. I was probably putting a good 30-40lbs on that tiny bolt. I decided to put pb blaster on it all day, start the motor and get the bolt nice and hot and try again. It turned, ... Or so I thought, it seems I've stripped it. Not entirely destroyed but the t30 bit now skips when trying to turn it. It's a tough location to put a lot of doward (bolt facing) pressure onto the tool to get a better bite.

Does anyone have some magical mechanical tips to grab onto this bolt and extract it?

On the brighter side of this story, my code is now gone upon startup and took it for a drive, running beautifully. I don't know if maybe the electrical connection to the valve that I cleaned up may have made a difference but I'd still love to be able to remove that solenoid and clean/replace it.

Thanks in advance for any tips or advice on what kind of screw/bolt extractor/grabber I could use. I tried some snapon extractors that grab onto the outside of the bolt but too bulky, not enough room between the solenoid and the fastener.

 

had the same bolt on the intake side strip out! what a pain in the ***. I think i ended up beating 12-point socket onto the outside of it to get it out.

 

Although not exactly meant for them, there are broken bolt removers that might work for this since one could fit the internal stripped out Torx head. Look for the twisted spline style removers, you hammer the right size bit into that bolt, and fit a 6 or 12 point socket on the hex drive end of the extractor bit to hopefully get that bolt out.

 

Not sure if he got it, but just did this repair over the weekend. I used a punch, to tap the top edge of the bad bolt from the side. then I tapped the T30 socket into the bolt. Removing the oil dipstick tube, and the heat shield over the header gave me more room to work. Once out, put in a new hex head bolt.