Technical POLL - 840 owners please....

    Ok guys and gals.

    I need some help from anyone who runs an 840, ANY MODEL OR YEAR with the Steptronic box.

    I am attaching 2 pics of the gear linkage inside the console of 2 different cars which are different, in as much as in the first, you can clearly see a shiftlock solenoid on the top left, whereas in the second, it is missing.

    Before I go at length about my poll, can anyone with an 840 please just lift the leather gaiter surrounding the gear lever, (a great opportunity to clean it out ) and then let me know the month and year of your car build and confirm which you have. It is NOT necessary to remove the surround like I have in the pics, you can see it (or not!) through the gaiter recess.

    Please do NOT go by any parts listing such as RealOEM, I need a VISUALLY confirmed check.

    Please answer YES if you have the solenoid type followed by your build date or NO with the build date if you do not have the solenoid type.

    WITH SOLENOID SHIFT LOCK......



    WITHOUT SHIFT LOCK.......



    Thanks,

    8Tech.

    Shiftlock "ought" to be present in any M62 (or so I thought - see below).
    I do remember a fairly early M73 (12/94) - also Steptronic - which was diagnosed with a Shiftlock problem, only to find out that someone seemingly replaced the EGS with a late version which was looking for a solenoid that wasn´t there.


    I was pretty sure that all Steptronic cars from 1/1995 came with this feature ex factory - introduced alongside EWSII but ETK tells otherwise: from 9/96


    All my M62´s have shiftlock - that is 10/96, 11/97, 5/99.


    Cheers
    Reinhard

    Zitat von Fatandre;105860

    What does this shiftlock do?


    It locks the shifter until you press the brake, to reduce the possibility of whizzing off as you stick it in drive!

    Ok guys, thanks to those who responded, clearly not many 840's in the US!


    So here was the issue.......


    Mid 1996 840Ci with an M62.


    Car is in "Trans Failsafe". Close examination shows that unless you depress the brake pedal, the warning does not come on until you do so. The car can also shift from "P" or "N" to drive or reverse without depressing the brake.


    Plugging in to the diagnostics on the Solus, the BMW Main Dealer system, the Snap-On scanner, the Launch AND another system ALL show the shiftlock solenoid failure.


    Problem....the car does NOT have a shiftlock solenoid and for all intent and purposes, never has.!!!


    I then measured the resistance of a solenoid and found 22.5 Ohms. In an attempt to trick the ECU, the owner tried crossing the solenoid wire with this but to no avail.


    So, we have an EGS transmission module looking for a signal from a solenoid that is not installed. However, the cars manufactured a couple of months later DID have a solenoid. I then tried to source a new solenoid from BMW but it is not available separately from the shifter so £230.00 later, a new shifter arrives.........without a solenoid, as that chassis number shouldn't have one.


    Bored yet? :naughty:


    So, in desparation, I order the solenoid from a later car. £60 later, it arrives but with no fittings and no way of fitting it to the shifter, new OR old.


    So I just plugged it in to see what would happen......no change.


    So now things are getting pretty desperate. To test the operation of the solenoid, I traced the wiring of another car and there is a 12v permanent supply to the solenoid from the EGS transmission module. Checking this car, there was no supply to the solenoid.


    I then checked continuity from the solenoid, only to find that BMW have installed 2 identical wiring plugs in the transmission tunnel console so all this time, we were plugging in to the one lying next to the solenoid, NOT the one bound up in the loom and hidden.:banghead:


    So now checking continuity between the CORRECT multiplug and the EGS module on pins 2 and 53 shows no continuity.....probably because BMW never added the bloody wires in the loom!!!


    I then installed cables from pins 53 (which does have a connection to the transmission valve chest) and pin 2 to the loom in the console. I then installed the later solenoid and voila!! problem solved.


    It would appear a previous low battery or jump start has re-programmed/confused the EGS module into thinking the car should have a solenoid, which it now has, although the loom wiring was not even there.


    A long job but I got there in the end.


    Phew!


    8Tech.

    Such tenacity! Another example of why you are the UK expert on the E31 - a well deserved accolade:top:

    Nr Welshpool, Powys, Wales[INDENT]E31 840 Ci Sport - 1999
    VW Passat Alltrack - 2013
    Mercedes SLK 320 - 2002
    Toyota Rav4 - 1997[/INDENT]

    As the owner, I bow at the 8Tech altar, carrying headache pills and gifts. Thank you Gerry, I don't believe there is anyone to match your skill and determination to keep our 8's on the road.

    Jaap



    1996 840Ci
    1990 964 RS
    1985 Turbo Esprit

    Great solution for a problem which really should not exist. :roll:


    Do you know whether the EGS was swapped with a later one prior to you taking over?
    Revtor will likely know whether the check for a solenoid can be removed/inserted by coding alone.


    In case the Transmission Fail Safe message reappears pls also check the innards of the trans selector switch attached to the gearbox.


    I have had a troublesome time with one in a E39 (5HP24 gearbox). The old ones have a venting tube which over time paves the way to corrosion of the switch contacts with resistance creeping up between normally disconnected pins.
    We were able to track this down using DIS and observed shaky response of the gear selected. In the end the gearbox ECU was no longer certain what gear was selected mechanically and hence threw a TFS message. Picture below from old Roadfly thread


    Although riveted shut those switches can be opened (gearbox may have to be lowered a few cms in order to get the switch off the axle) and refurbished by removing the green stuff.


    Once we had this sorted the TFS message was gone.


    Cheers
    Reinhard

    Zitat von reinhard;106004

    Revtor will likely know whether the check for a solenoid can be removed/inserted by coding alone.

    To be honest I don't know. It makes sense this can be toggled through coding, but the main question is how because the transmission is not supported by coding tool NCS Expert (or SSS/Progman for that matter). There is a control unit description file for the M62/M73 Steptronic transmission, "AGS922.PRG" in "EDIABAS\ECU\", that can be opened with ToolSet 32 but none of the jobs allow recoding. One of the jobs, "codier_cs_pruefen" (verify coding checksum) suggests it verifies the checksum of the coding memory, but even if that can confirm the coding memory got corrupted I do not know of a way to fix the coding.

    Zitat von reinhard;106004

    Great solution for a problem which really should not exist. :roll:


    Do you know whether the EGS was swapped with a later one prior to you taking over?


    definitely not, it started after discharged batteries. It would appear that using my fix, you could retrofit the later shiftlocked selector and gain the safety of the shiftlock.

    Zitat von Wildatheart;105994

    As the owner, I bow at the 8Tech altar, carrying headache pills and gifts. Thank you Gerry, I don't believe there is anyone to match your skill and determination to keep our 8's on the road.


    I second that!


    As a brand new owner of an 840, in fact my first BMW, I took my car to Gerry at Phoenix Motor Sport to have a few problems sorted. It was a toss-up between my local and well respected garage (who probably have never worked on an 840 before) or a E31 specialist.
    It was one of the best decisions I have made. Although I thought I was quite through when inspecting the car prior to purchase and thought I had spotted all the problems Gerry discovered that the wipers would randomly stop. Initially it was thought the linkages were partially seizing causing the relay to trip (expensive). Gerry’s experience of the cars made him look a bit deeper and discovered a bad connector (cheap) and now the wipers are fine.


    So a great big thank you to Gerry from me as well!:top:


    Phil

    I've been chasing the same problem on my own car (mid '96 840CI) and the previous owner did so for a year as well.


    Timm and others have been kindly persevering with me on the bimmerforums while narrowing down the possibilities. Another member had similar problems but did having wiring there, suggesting there was perhaps one fitted at some stage?


    The fault on my own car appeared after the two batteries went flat, which is similar to what 740 and 540 owners in the States have experienced. It's almost as if the EGS units in the early UK M62 cars were reflashed to ignore this non existent solenoid, and they have reverted to a previous program after the batteries ran flat. At least this confirms that this is an issue not unique to my car (no lock and definitely no wiring for one).


    Reading this part, "I then measured the resistance of a solenoid and found 22.5 Ohms. In an attempt to trick the ECU, the owner tried crossing the solenoid wire with this but to no avail." I presume this was prior to installing the cables to the solenoid plug? If so, to save fitting a part that was never there (and costs £60+), could the pins be bridged on the EGS itself or just wire a bulb in to draw some current?

    I doubt that EEPROMs would re-flash themselves, but with the age of the electronics, now, it is possible that certain capacitors have started to fail causing the fault to appear once the voltage is reset (flat battery). Very odd, nevertheless.

    Zitat von arnie;119506

    I doubt that EEPROMs would re-flash themselves, but with the age of the electronics, now, it is possible that certain capacitors have started to fail causing the fault to appear once the voltage is reset (flat battery). Very odd, nevertheless.


    Very odd indeed, still haven't gotten to the bottom of it either sadly.

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