The bmw logo is meant to light up to. I think you got a fault in both of them.

 

I had the same problem. I completely broke the unit to bits when I removed it though , and had to spend many hours with a soldering iron to repair the membrane strips carrying the wires, and with epoxy resin to glue the broken plastic back together.

The reason the lights went out seemed to be a combination of the resistors on the led surface mount circuit board burnt up,and water damoge that had caused rusting (it lookslike green stuff over the soldered joints.). I had to bypass the blown leds to make the others work, and also had to buy a a few extra ones to replace the ones i destroyed with my soldering iron.

The re-mounted unit on my car is no longer perfectly flush, and there is also wind noise on the door,as the unit forms part of the door seal.

I realised after I had completely fu*ked my unit up that i could have had these replaced under my extended warranty.

I have attached somepics. The red and black wires you see are to replace the membrane connector i broke when pulling the unit out.
Was deffo not worth the bother when i did it - ended up spending many days fixing it.

 

Whoa. I guess not as easy as just changing the bulbs. One of my lights is out too on the driver's side. I better take it to the dealer for that one.

 

I had an '04 and one of the doorsill lights was inconsistent so I had it replaced under warranty and wow, it was so much brighter. I think they fade over time.

 

They changed suppliers sometime in CY06 or 07. Relatively high failure rate on MY04 and 05. As you now know too hard to fix and is usually a broken ribbon cable as root cause to boot. If not under warranty I'd call parts department and get the best price plus a CCA discount or try one of the vendors in dealers/purchasing forum for a good price (Newport BMW??). Easy enough to change once you have part in hand. Be sure and get the correct side - they are left and right sided. 5147........ part number. Were ~$150 retail cost last I checked.

 

Hey Cobra - where did you find out about the failure reate for the illuminated door sills? Do you have any BMW documentation that states this? I might be able to get my driver side sill replaced as this is only half working, but my ealer is saying it must have been excessive wear and tear and won't replace under warranty.

Thanks.

 

Excessive wear on a light? That cant be right........ I would call shenanigans.

 

My SA is the source of this info. He was changing them in MY garage and showed me the back of the old and new parts. Said the ribbon cable/connector was weak link. Minimal signs of moisture but could be another source of failure I suppose. I am pretty sure the old mfr was AC Delco, but can't be sure. I had a partial failure on one side and full failure on other. No SIB on this. Wear and tear is BS. They are LEDs! I don't step on the door sills do you, heck no. I would not get huffy with them but a carefully worded short letter to dealer service manager could go a long way. I usually start out with the title "Why I cannot give 5s". Usually I get a VERY favorable response.