twobeemers

Hi guys (and gals). Had a little problem with the 550i the other morning. I was shifting through the gears like I always do when the left side one - the one I almost always use to do my upshifting - "gave" a little and stopped working. It felt the same way a clicker ball point pen feels when you click it down and just by the feel you KNOW it ain't coming back. The right one is no longer working either. The paddle isn't physically broken or anything, just buggered.

I have looked around a lot for an answer and found some M5 and M3 folks who have broken shifters, but no non-M E60's. I can't even find the part number of the shifter. Anyone else run into this issue and have a solution? If there is a way, I'd even be willing to convert to the M5 style shifters (left upshift, right downshift) if it could be done.

Thanks in advance.

Wolrab

Steering wheel rebuild cost me about $1300 the first time. That was $300 for each paddle, plus 7 hours labor, although I think I was partly paying the shop for learning how to do it. That was at about 100k. A paddle just failed again at less than 160k. I had elected to live with it for a while, and then the indy shop offered to comp the labor, so I did it again. The paddle switch is just a bad design, and (needless to say) over-engineered. But then it wouldn't be a BMW if it wasn't over-engineered.

twobeemers

The only place I've found that said they could actually help is Motive Mods out of Hanford, California. I can get a single paddle for $220 or I can convert to the entire M5 setup for $570 and some change. I honestly like the idea of converting to the M5 setup as it would match what Audi and others do so going from car to car would be less of an issue. But it IS $570.

I expected to be able to find the paddles themselves for reasonable money but no luck so far. I haven't tapped into recylers yet, but it might be an option. Motive Mods also offered to take a look at the hosed up paddle to see if it's salvageable which I'm strongly considering.

Thanks for the input on what you did.

AchtungE60

LOL