bymer

Hey guys well I have gotten myself into a pickle here. About two days ago, my cd changer started to cycle through the Cd's every time I open the car door (initial entry.) The Fan would also not blow past its' halfway point.

After research it ended up being because of a low battery charge. Last night my car gave me a Low Battery Charge Warning. My main issue/problem that scares me is that the little white dashes on the tachometer that indicate the engine temperature have stopped moving. They do work as I tested them through the Cluster Test in OBC. Hidden OBC menu shows when the car is cold the Rev limit is 6350 but the dashes (only 3 of them showing car is fully warm) are at like ~7000.

Every time i start the car, even if the engine is cold I have 3 white dashes/ticks indicating the engine is fully warmed up, even when it is not. What could be the issue?

Things i have tried:
1) recode the Kombi/Mask/Cas ecu's to their original default settings
2) Bought a charger and started charging the battery.
3) Pulled and reinstalled the Instrument Cluster Fuse

None of these things seemed to help, as the lines still are always at 3 dashes. Before it used to be like 8-9 of them during a cold start and they would gradually decrease.

PS: One thing to note, After I had bought the charger, and after a few hours of charging, I get into the car to try and read some errors with INPA and a "Low Baterry Charge Warning" comes up? so the battery was not charged? Im beginning to worry that this might be an alternator issue or IBS or possibly a bad battery? I replaced the battery a few months ago.

I am so worried, please help me guys, any input at ALL would be appreciated.

Car is currently charging with the car charger, I do not know what to do

(Car is a 2005 525i (M54)
No Navi (M-ask 2)

mikegreen

How old is the battery?

What is the voltage at the battery?

What does the hidden obd menu tell you the voltage is?

I would unplug the battery and let it charge... let the car think about this for a while :-) PEnding the battery is newish and good still.

bymer

Battery is a few months old (registered through Inpa)

Voltage through OBC while car is off = 11.8-12.4 Car ON: 13.8-14.1

I have been charging the battery for about 4 hours and then I went into the car opened the door for 3 minutes and the "Low battery warning" came on. Seems like the battery did not charge?

Cd changer keeps cycling when I enter the car.
and my main concern in the "White dashes around the tacho which indiciate an approximate engine temp. They are stuck at the 3 dash mark (showing car is fully warm even during a cold start). I do not know what to do. I also receieved an "SoS Call failure error" What the heck is going on.

DanL

It may be a bad IBS cable, a problem that plagued early E60's. If it's bad it could keep your car from going to sleep, meaning your battery will be constantly draining. If you're using a trickle charger to charge the battery it may only be keeping up with the drain. You could try disconnecting it to see if your problems go away. I believe it's fine to drive with the cable disconnected. Did you replace the battery with an identically spec'd replacement? If not, you need to do more than simply register the battery, you'll need to code your car with the new specs. Speaking of which, you mentioned that you recoded several modules back to their default settings which implies that you may have coded them earlier to enable certain hidden features. Any chance you screwed something up in the process?

bymer

I replaced the battery with this one.

Buy AutoCraft Gold Battery, Group Size 95R, 950 CCA 95R/H9 at Advance Auto Parts

I got a replacement battery at Advanced Auto Parts today and when I put it in, the Cd Changer stopped cycling, and the rev counter dashes were back to normal. I guess it was a bad battery cell. Now my only concern is that hopefully nothing is wrong with the car and that the car does not discharge it. I will keep you updated. Thank you!

Anything I should look out for with this new battery or any signs of something drawing too much energy?

I registered the battery with DIS as well.

twh

Make sure you have the vent tube hooked up to the battery or the H gas will build up in the trunk.

bymer

Yep tube is hooked up.

bymer

Hey guys so after the car has had the new battery in it for the day, I check the voltage and it dropped from 12.5 to 11.8 overnight. Something is eating the battery alive. Looks like the car is going to sleep based by the orange LED being OFF by the shifter, but something else is keeping it alive/eating the battery. The CD changer started cycling again. Where should I start looking, what should I do ? Please help.

mikegreen

Put an amp meter on the battery, how much is it draining with everything off?

Start pulling fuses until the load drops.

Alternatively, pull the fuses for the radio, hvac, lights, and other non-essential to driving stuff and take a voltage reading over the same time period - eventually, by process of elimination, you can figure out what is causing the sleepy-electricity-load...

bymer

That is what I am going to do next. Does the car have to be in sleep mode when I do the Amp test or just ignition off and all accessories off? What should be a good load? .50 milli amps?