To be perfectly honest I never noticed much difference from the normal stick to the sport one, but i've not really tested it properly. When the sport button is pressed the steering definately tightens up, but as for the quicker gear changes the jury is still out. I dont tend to boot my car around the place anymore, the cost of pertrol here in the UK is too expensive for that, but purely for experimental purposes I will over the next few days with the normal shifter and then the sport one I've switched the shifter back to the normal one at the moment cause the car is going into the dealer for a little warranty work on it and I feared they would notice the mod and query the warranty.
The actual mod for me is more for cosmetic looks rather than performance, the remote control style shifter just does not look right in my opinion.

 

Slight update:
I've been running with the standard auto shifter for over a week now and the throttle response does not feel as quick as the SAT shifter setup, jury is still out on the speed of the gear changes being quicker. I'll have the SAT shifter back in the car at the weekend hopefully so will post if I feel much difference.

 

Well, I might as well wade into this mod as well... and ask for some help from the technical guru's out there!

I'm currently working with my local dealer (they've been excellent help so far, and willing to help find a solution) to retrofit a heated M-Sport steering wheel with paddles and the SAT into my 2008 550i M-sport (this wheel/option was available as of the 2009 models). So far, the biggest challenge appears to be that no one has attempted this in retrofit in Canada yet - at least no one that BMW Canada is aware of.

Before ordering all of the parts, the dealership wants to make sure that appropriate coding can be done to recognize the paddles and heated wheel, but are indicating no option to code these appears when they plug my car into the diagnostic/programming software. From another post here on the site, it appears that what needs to happen before anything can be coded is these "options" need to be added to the vehicle (vehicle order code?) so the diagnostic software would attempt to recognize and program the appropriate modules...

Does anyone have any more info on how an option code can be attached to a vehilce's data (specifically an option that is not offerred as a normal retrofit)?

Thanks!

____________________________

2008 550i M-sport
2006 X3 2.5i

 

Did you have any luck with this? I have purchased a 2008 paddle steering wheel but I havent heard of anyone successfully retro fitting this wheel. This is the only reason for fitting the SAT for me so if the paddles do not work then no point in fitting the shifter. Any help would be much appreciated.

Thank you

Ian

 

Yes, a couple of us have successfully completed the full retrofit with the paddles. All the info is in this thread... SAT Retrofit. The information on the full retrofit is on the last few pages, but the entire thread is worth a read. You will need to have a dealer/indie willing to modify the VO codes of the car in order for the programming to work correctly, but other than that it's not too difficult.

Good luck!

 

Thank you.