KyleB

Man oh man do I hope I do not have to use this information...but just in case I do, where is the best place to source a new/reman transmission for an '04 530i? dealer lists it at around 5800.00. not interested in used if i have to replace it.

TIA!

AchtungE60

What is the problem?

smurf520i

Mine also, 04 520i with 22,500 miles on the clock, gave up the ghost last week. Some problem with gears 4 and 5. Got the usual 'fail-safe' error.
I was quoted £5,700 by the Holland Park dealer in London. The dealer then reduced it to £5,200 as a goodwill gesture, and I was told that the gearbox itself costs £3,900+.
Dealers won't open it up, only replace it.
So I took the car to a gearbox specialist instead. It's still going to cost me upwards of £2,200 to fix.
Let me know what error you got, if you have the full diagnosis.

KyleB

last week the lady was driving to work and she got a 'fail safe' mode warning on idrive. she said the car upshifted a little funny , and then the warning came on. she didn't make it sound like a violent upshift, and the car continued the next 10 or so miles to work just fine, even with the warning on idrive. she parked it, turned it off, turned it back on, and the warning was gone. car sat for about 4 hours, then she came home without incident. car has 97K on it, and when i bought it one of the oil services at BMW of sarasota at 89K miles contained a "automatic transmission checked" repair line on it. this was when the PO had the car. i was always curious what exactly that was, and now im thinking they had the same thing happen. im taking it in to a trusted indy when i get a chance, and i think i might have them change out the pan/filter and fluid since it's almost at 100K. of course, after experiencing this im wondering if doing that will exacerbate the problem.

the car got a new battery from the PO at BMW sarasota in early 2008. im going to have them load test the battery and see if (hopefully) that's the culprit. car has been driving fine since early last week when this happened.

im not new to BMW, and one thing ive learned over the years is that modern BMWs loooove to throw codes. im hoping this is a whole bunch of nothing, but you never know.

KyleB

ZF automatic transmissions are junk IMO. i wish BMW would have stuck with GM transmissions. better yet, i wish i could convince my lady to drive a manual. one can dream...

AchtungE60

I have 4 bimmers and all autos and never had an issue. My 04 E60 has the same ZF 6 speed and no problems. Actually it shifts like butter. You'd be surprised to find out who makes the ZF tranny.
Anyway this could be due to many errors including a MAFS issue. BMW's are not the easiest to diagnose but it's not rocket science either. I had an E46 with GM tranny go into limp mode and it turned out to be a fuse and the MAFS. Of course they guy wanted to rebuild the tranny and so forth. I didn't feel like shelling out the money so I diagnosed it and fixed it for $80. Sold it to a friend and it's still running fine 60K miles later.
Drain oil, fill it back up with Pentosin ATF+1 and drive it for a week or two. Then drain, change the pan/filter and the mechatronics sleeve, and fill it back up with Pentosin ATF+1, Folow the DIY here and you'll be fine. Best $350 or so you'll ever spend. Then you can re-think the "ZF junk" idea. At 175L-200K if you still have the car, just drain and fill no need to do pan filter gain.

KyleB

yep, will do. i was going to do the sleeve as part of this. maybe ill take out the MAF sensor and clean it, im going to guess it's never been done. i also don't trust the DISA valve at this mileage, but i'm not sure if that would cause what she experienced.

my view of ZF is probably a bit tainted from my E30 days. anyone who had a 4HP22 and revved it in neutral was asking for a blown transmission. no bueno mang, no bueno. I also lost count of how many E36s I had come in with blown ZF gearboxes, although I'm sure some of them were due to operator error.

thanks for the input, ill let you know how it goes!