I think they key here is that I am having the sucking from the oil tube when I remove the cap. Can you all clarify that this is a sign to replace my AOS?

Regardless of whether or not my car smokes on startup (Which it only did on 2 occasions since I have had the car for 2 years) I should still get my AOS replaced.

Thanks for the heads up.

This may not be quite the same thing but we had a BMW 528 and it developed a fault with the AOS. We'd had it about a year or so when the engine developed a whistle coming from the head area. We were told it was a faulty valve in the AOS and were quoted about NZ$600-800 to fix it. I asked if it was something that needed to be done urgently as we needed the car for a 1000km trip that weekend. I was told that it wasn't really anything vital and that apart from maybe getting a little louder it wouldn't do anything much more than that.

We had the car for about 4 years (60,000 km's)after that and never bothered to get that fault fixed. The BMW agents didn't even bother to bring it up either really.

Hi ftor
 

If you didn't fixed it yet, I will be happy to give you a hand with the job.
I'm located in Fort Lauderdale, and have all the required tools. so just send me a PM if you want.