Originally Posted by JeffNNJ' post='962120' date='Aug 1 2009, 04:33 PM

Just another reason why I will not own a car 15 seconds out of warranty. Awesome move. You saved yourself a very nice vacation.

Originally Posted by blackfalcon' post='961639' date='Jul 31 2009, 09:09 PM

Just a quick note. I had another post about 6 weeks agao complaining that the SMG on my car was leaving me stuck in N at startup sometimes. I took the car into the dealership and and BMW NA claimed I needed a new $8000 transmission. It was very interesting, because the tech at the dealership implied that BMW DIS system does not let the technician see all the data from the car. They send all the data to BMW NA who makes the final decision as to what the issue is, and they don't always share the reason behind this with the local technician. I completetly disagreed with BMW NA and requested they have there regional rep come look at the car. He did and again stated it needed a new transmission.

I picked up the car to go get a second opinion from someone with a GT1. The car did act up at all after I picked it up for another 1000 miles or so. Wednesday the car completely starting shutting down, and eventually bricked itself in my driveway and would not shift into any gears.

I pushed the car into my garage and put it up a lifts, and got out my volt meter and started checking what voltage etc. was being sent to the pump, etc. from the main smg controll unit. I ended up figuring out that it was just a bad SMG Hydrolic pump motor. It wasn't completely shot, it would hang up sometimes when it was asked to start, and would start with light tap from my finger.

The motor was ridiculously easy to remove. There are only two/four bolts holdilng it to the hydrolic pump (only remove the torx bolts not the hex) and three mounting it to the transmission. BMW doesn't sell this little tiny motory by itself here in the states. You can only buy the whole damn hydrolic assembly to the tune of $3800. The is a completely absurd thing for BMW NA to do.

I took the motor into a shop that rebuilds them and he put it on some sort of tester and reved it up for a while and then handed it back to me and claimed it was fixed. (something about the grease in the bearings needed to be heated up and spun into place?) I took it back home and put it back in car and everything has been running fine since. FYI, you don't have to take the car in to blead tranmission, or have a DIS/GT1 at home.

The moral of this story is this... Don't believe BMW NA when they are trying to part you from your $$$. Take it for a second opinion first.

Secondly, if anyone nows were I can buy a DENSO hdryolic pump, I'd sleep better at night, instead of worrying that this one will crap out on my again.

Originally Posted by AlexFW' post='965008' date='Aug 4 2009, 10:10 AM

Called Denso and was told they work and produce just for manufacterers, no way for us to buy directly from them.

They are 600 km far from me, otherwise I could go there and talk.

Originally Posted by blackfalcon' post='965784' date='Aug 5 2009, 04:31 AM

Thanks for the effort Alex. I'm going to the dealership to check and see what I think is correct from the schematics, which is that the E46 pump is the same.

Originally Posted by blackfalcon

Just a quick fyi. I've put 20,000 miles on the car since I performed this repair and its still running great.