X5 E70 40D fault after deep water.

[pdhart]

Hi All,

I'm hoping someone can help. My wife took the X5 for the day, as we'd had a lot of rain, and there is a bit of a flood near our village. It was about 12" deep I think, according to where she said the water went. She was driving very slowly. Everything was fine until around the middle of the flood and then loads of lights came on. ABS, Dynamic Stability Control, and Electronic Handbrake warnings. Car still drove home.

Scanner shows below, some go after reset but come back after driving;

VTG (Transfer Case)
520D Transfer Box(VTG): Line Disconnection, terminal 30b
CF80 Signal from engine management: setpoint-torque request
5213 Transfer box(VTG): Servor motor: fault, load circuit
5215 Transfer box(VTG): Internal Control unit fault(software reset)
5216 Unexpected deactivation PWM
5222 Transfer box(VTG): Control Unit Complete Deactivation
522A Transfer box(VTG): Internal Control unit fault(software reset)

ABS/DCS (Dynamic Stability Control)
D36A No message recieved (VTG, 0xBC), reciever DSC, transmitter VTG
D36B No message recieved (VTG, 0x376), reciever DSC, transmitter VTG
5F3A Transfer Case: Malfunction

ECM/DME/DDE (Digital Motor/Diesel Electronics)
4C3C Message(SOLL_MOM_ANF, 0xBB)
49A6 LIN bus Communication Fault

Electro-mechanical Parking Brake
EMF DSC interface: Signal Invalid

My guess is water got into somewhere it shouldn't, as car was fine prior to wading. I've had the bottom covers off the car and checked the connector on the servo motor on the transfer case. I looked dry and clean but gave it a spray with some electrical cleaner/lubricant (proper stuff, not WD40) just in case. I've also had the boot completely out and checked for water there, as I've read it can get into the electronics around that. Again, all looks fine and not wet, although it has stood for a couple of days before I could get time to look at it. 4x4 is definately not working at all - front wheels disengaged all the time. Parking brake does work when stationary, but not when moving. It's SUPPOSED to be good for half a metre, and I've definately had it in deep water before, with no issues.

Any ideas on what to check next or what might be the problem? I'm hoping it's just water somewhere, as it was all fine prior to gettting wet. Don't really like the idea if it going back to BMW dealer if I can help it.

thanks Paul.

[Greydog]

Morning Paul

Most of your fault codes are linked to the Transfer case so will probably reset and return if the Transfer fault isn't fixed. My guess (and it is a guess) would be the servo motor didn't like being dunked and is dead. Or the transfer case gears have stripped

A complete servo motor is around £80, or a set of nylon gears around £20 as you already have the covers off I would pull the Servo Motor and test it and check the gears

Dave

[pdhart]

Thanks Dave, Any advice on how to test if the motor is good or bad? Are there any other electronics in or on the transfer case, or is it just the servo motor that generates the comms error?

I did try and take it off yesterday evening but it appears you need to take off the supporting bracket. I got all of those bolts out (and the one that goes through the transfer case), but it still didn't want to budge. There appears to be a rubber mount that goes between the support and the transfer case, which doesn't come off easily.

Thanks again.

[Greydog]

I assume your talking about the gearbox support bracket I have changed mine as the original was really rusty mine took less than an hour to remove and replace. Once all the bolts where out from memory 5 then the long one I put a small jack under the transfer case to take the weight and raise/lower it to help get the long bolt back in when putting it back.

Check to make sure you have all the fasteners out there are a couple of Videos on You tube

Dave

 

[pdhart]

Some good news (I think). I've found this full of water, so hopefully that's the problem. I've got the ATC 450 transfer case, so it doesn't have the worm gear problem. I've managed to find the exact unit secondhand on ebay, from a breaker, so hopefully that will fix it. This unit should be waterproof, but clearly time has not been kind to it, and the seals aren't as good as they should be. The puddles around it are what came out when I opened it.

[Greydog]

That will do it 🤣 seals are supposed to keep water out not in 🤣 Good find Paul

Hope your up and running noq

Dave

[pdhart]

So the new module appeared to have fixed all of the faults, but I’m not out of the woods quite yet. It looks like it needs coding to the car before it will actually engage the 4 wheel drive. Hopefully got someone who can do that for me on Monday. 

[Greydog]

Great job Paul

If they have INPA/ISTA or one of the other BMW capable systems now available you should be OK

Dave

[pdhart]

OK, posting for others to know the pain. So the guy with the appropriate coding tablet couldn't code it. It needs to be a repair in the software, not just coding, according to that. For that I need to find a 3 or 4 digit number near the part number on the transfer case/gearbox. Then that can be used to tell the car it's been changed and I guess tell the electronics about the transfer case/gearbox. Anyone know anything about doing this, or where I can find this magical number?  Is it on the gearbox or the transfer case? Transfer case is ATC 450.

If I can't find it, it's going to the dealer for an airbag recall on Monday, and they will 'investigate' the issue for £222. No clue on how much it will cost to code it until that investigation is done.

Note to self - stay away from water.

Paul.

[Greydog]

Morning Paul

Not sure what system he was using 

But your Gearbox should be GA8HP707 AWD Your Transfer case had 2 around that time ATC 450 and ATC 451 ? Are you sure of the part number I ask as Realoem says 2012 April onwards should be ATC 451 

Dave

[pdhart]

Thanks Dave, it's got ATC 450 stamped on the transfer case.

He tried two tools, Autologic Drive Pro and an older Autologic unit. Both said there was no option to just code the unit and it needed to be done as a repair, and then asked for the 3 or 4 digit code as above - that screen shot was from the older autologic.

Paul.

[Greydog]

Autologic is one of the better clones 

I will see if I can check ISTA to see what comes up as it has workshop instructions but can't do it until Thursday sorry

I don't suppose it would be as simple as 450 the transfer designation? Or did he try that?

[pdhart]

Thanks Dave. I've just got myself a copy of ISTA. Have to admit I'm a bit scared of trying it given the various warning found online about bricking your car. I've only installed the diagnostic part, Rhiengold I think it is, not ISTA P, for now. Getting underneath it again on Wednesday night to see if I can find any numbers on the case.

Paul.

[Greydog]

Fingers crossed matey

Dave

[pdhart]

So a further update. I found the number on the transfer case - it was next to the ATC 450 name on the case, but you wouldn't have known that by looking at the picture above. It's not until I started to clean it up that I could see anything. I cannot make out any numbers from this due to the corrosion of the case. It's madness that BMW do it in this way, if this number is so important to allow you to change the servo actuator. Anyway, I spoke to the local BMW dealer and they are not sure if they can do it or not. They will charge me £222 to investigate the issue, and then let me know the cost to do the work to fix it - i.e. pair the module to the transfer case. If they need this number, and there is no other way to do it, then I'm guessing that the only other option is a new transfer case as well. I'm pretty annoyed that I have a perfectly good transfer case and I've bought the replacement control module, only to find that there is no way to make them work together. There really is no need to make it this hard. I did also try and clean up the old module to see if I could talk to that and maybe get the code, but it's completely dead, and the original faults all come back if I put this module back on.

So if you have similar problems, make sure you can read these numbers before you start buying bits to fix the problem. More once I have it from the main dealer.

Paul.

[Greydog]

Sadly BMW will want to change the complete transfer case which is what they will try to convince you to do £££££ 

I wonder if you can get a rubbing  ? May be easier to read the numbers 

Dave

[pdhart]

OK, so I thought I'd give a final update on this - IT'S FIXED. With nothing to lose I decided to try and sand down the transfer case and see if I can get to the  numbers under the corrosion. My thinking was I've nothing to lose, as if I couldn't get the number I was most likely looking at £1000's for a new one. So with some light sanding with wet and dry I started to see numbers. There weren't very clear looking straight on, but with the light shining from below, the number was clearly visible. 184 was the number I needed. With that I took it back to my local, very helpful, BMW tech and he was able to pair the new actuator to the transfer case, clear all the faults and recalibrate. Now it's silky smooth and seems better than it was before the flood (it did have a bit of low speed shudder on hard turns before). I did also change the transfer case oil.

I hope this helps anyone else with similar issues and a ATC450 TC.

Paul.

[Greydog]

Morning Paul

Absolutely brilliant news 

If you had some snatching at low speed on lock or in reverse on lock it can be caused by miss matched tyres so check tyres and wear.

Dave

[pdhart]

It got better once the TC was calibrated. However as the current tyres are not BMW star rated I’m changing them to Pirelli P zero’s this week. There was a couple of stored TC over temp errors so changing them just to be safe.