Hello all - I'm new at the forums - just took delivery of my '06 M5 on April 7th after waiting for it to be built to my specs in Germany, and have had a nightmare of an experience thus far. The following problems are still undiagnosed, as my local BMW service dept. had my car for 10 working days and was unable to find the problem. I'm at my wits end and am crushed that I can't enjoy this car - any insight or advice is appreciated beyond words....
Upon ignition the following errors start to show up in my idrive display :
Increased Emissions! (this is always first)
DSC Malfunction!
Start-Off Assistance Inactive!
DBC Malfunction!
Engine Malfunction/Reduced Power! (this of course comes with the engine effectively cutting itself in half, so the car's power is completely gone).
What's odd is, the other Idrive status screen shows that all is well, so some part of the computer is very confused - it's unlikely that all of these things are actually wrong with the car, so everyone involved sees this as a communication or software or connection error. However, I took the car to BMW at which time they immediately diagnosed the problem as a bad DSC sensor, which was causing the whole system to go haywire. They replaced the DSC sensor - that didnt solve it. They then replaced the entire control module that's part of the DSC/SMG system - that didn't solve it. They checked all of the wiring - everything ohmed out fine and checked out OK. They re-programmed the software 3 or 4 times - didn't solve it.
After 10 days of being promised my car back, I decided to go in and get the car back from BMW for the weekend last Friday just so we could all clear our heads and regroup. I mentioned that I had the K40 integrated radar detector and the Blinder laser diffusers installed (hard wired not bluetooth) right before the error messages began (in fact it was the day before they started popping up.) The service foreman and I called the company who installed the radar/laser system to find that they wired for power via the brake relay - which is the way they had done it on several M5's with no issue. BMW highly doubted this was the problem, but agreed there was an outside chance due to them just not knowing enough about the car yet - they unhooked the system from power and let me try the car out over the weekend. Well, I had no errors for a week - drove 100's of miles stopping and starting the car 6-8 times a day - no errors, no issues, nothing. So, deductive reasoning would lead one to believe that the laser/radar system was improperly installed and was the root of the issues.
So, I went back to the company who installed my radar/laser, explained the problem, at which time they thought that the only potential problem might be a backflow through the wiring causing the computer to go haywire. So, they attached a diode to prevent the backflow and sent me on my way. Two hours later, bam! Every error message popped back up and almost caused me to just drive the thing off the bridge with me securely fastened in. I've since de-powered the laser/radar system to no avail - it's completely unwired for power and Im still getting these errors and subsequent power-downs every time I start the car.
Has anyone else run into this type of situation? BMW Service has gone as far to call BMW Corporate to admit defeat and ask for help, but have received no course of action - so we're stuck here. (well they claim they called I cant vouch for sure.) I've waited my my entire professional life to buy an M5, only to be cursed with a car that now drives like a $100,000 Corolla. Someone - Anyone - please help!
DK
UPDATE: BMW is fully aware of everything thats been done to the car, and believe it or not decided that re-wiring the K-40's/Blinder's power source from the brake relay to the 12-volt ignition switch (or something along those lines) was the way to go. They have a motor sports dept. at this particular dealership, whose tech claimed to have successfully installed this very system in 2 other '06 M5's without any incident. BMW re-wired it, reset all of the faults from the system, and drove the car for a few miles, stopped/started a few times - all with no faults whatsoever. I go pick up the car, and not 5 miles down the road the christmas tree of misery lit up all at once. Now I'm right back at square one.
One thing I didnt mention earlier, was that when these faults first began to show, they were few and far between - and would reset themselves when I turned off the car. While I was waiting for the DSC sensor to come in from backorder, the car ran at 100% with no faults whatsoever for about 2 weeks straight. One day they just decided to come back - and always in the same exact order as the time before. Does any of this make any sense at all? It's starting to sound like it's the car and not the K40/Blinders - although the car ran fine for a week when the system was de-powered and the car's software was reset. I'm at a total loss - as is my service dept. I'm seriously considering calling BMW Corporate and getting them involved - does anyone have any experience getting things done that way? Im thinking that if they cant figure it out and obviously cant blame it on the k40/blinders due to their failure with it, that I shoudlnt be expected to wait until they can diagnose and remedy the issue - that could take months at this rate.
I'm way past "lost it" at this point - I'm open for any and all suggestions.
Thanks - DK
