Goin' in for service, yeah yeah!! (archive)

The little monkey in the X5 is sick, so I'm taking it in. Read on:
If you read regularly, you will know that my radio (and Digi's) is not working properly. I have an appointment today to have a new head unit installed, because a new amp did not fix the problem. In the two days previous to today, it seems that everything electrical in the X5 has malfunctioned, almost. In order, here's what I saw, starting on Tuesday:
*The selflevel susp inact. appeared in the display. Stopped, restarted, it went away.
*Turn signals would not work. Pushed stalk into position, but no lights in dash, no clicking. (I later found out that the exterior signals were working fine, but nothing inside the car was signalling the activation of the signal. Got it?) They began to work as a drove, but irregularly, like a delayed reaction. I would turn the signal on, but no interior light or clicker, then a few seconds later, it would start flashing and clicking. By the end of the day, they were mostly working normal.
*When locking/unlocking, the parking lights no longer flashed.
----Wednesday------
*selflevel suspension light back on, this time would not go away all the way to work. Normally, an error code lights up, then goes away, leaving those little arrow things in the dash display. This did not go away, it just stayed there. I did cycle through the OBC functions (MPG, etc) and I left it on MPG, so I didn't have to look at the stupid error. Just before I reached my destination, I cycled back through the OBC, but there were no error messages at all.
*Turn signals still not working in the car. This time they never really got back to normal operation.
*PDC would not turn on when selecting reverse, had to turn it on by hand.(in the morning) PDC would not turn on at all that night, with button or selecting reverse. Shut car off, then on and it worked fine.
-----Thursday---------
*selflevel suspension light on the whole way to work. This time it would not even let me cycle through the on board computer displays. The warning just stayed in the display.
*Turn signals (interior) never worked. Just stayed off the whole commute (getting worse easch day) They do still work on the exterior lights. So I am still sginalling, I just can't tell.

I have had the turn signal problem two times before, but both times were very brief. I asked the service guy about it, and he said it was probably just another "BMW electrical quirk". "Our cars sometimes have a few weird electrical glitches that appear for a few seconds, then disappear." I had heard this before, so I didn't figure it to be a big deal.

All of this has lead me to the following conclusion: BMW does not wire their vehicles in the traditional manner. Most other cars use actual connections from the cockpit controls to the mechanism being controlled; an example being the turn signals. They are wired from the stalk, to a flasher, to a power source, to the lights. BMW, to be different, came up with a different, smarter way to control the vehicle's functions. They hook every single control and diagnostic into one central brain, and then that brain controls the vehicle. That brain belongs to a silver leaf monkey. I believe my monkey is very sick and I hope my dealer can fix him. Below is a picture of him. Please wish him well.
Thanks,
theJrod (sig omitted out of respect for the monkey)

Follow Ups:

Self Leveling update... Rob 13:05 6/29/2001 (0)
Monkey's tail is too long..there is the problem. MiCkeY 13:14 6/28/2001 (0)
Had turn signal issue once...and MB-X5 13:09 6/28/2001 (12)
- Thanks, I'll tell my monkey, , i mean dealer theJrod 14:41 6/28/2001 (11)
  - Do you think they will replace my monkey, because theJrod 14:45 6/28/2001 (10)
    - aka Mr. Happy LOL DCX5er 14:50 6/28/2001 (9)
      - He threw his feces at a neon when i drove by theJrod 14:57 6/28/2001 (8)
        
        Oh NO, what a disgusting melange of images DCX5er 15:03 6/28/2001 (7)
        
        Need p/n for feces - anyone?? alpina22 15:38 6/28/2001 (6)
        
        # p00p theJrod 16:07 6/28/2001 (1)
        
        But cannot be ordered with sheepskin covers! DCX5er 16:10 6/28/2001 (0)
        
        I just hope Loophole doesn't take this one on! DCX5er 15:42 6/28/2001 (3)
        
        Now you have made "dumbya" real mad.... MiCkeY 15:47 6/28/2001 (2)
        
        I seem to remember some infamous pictures . . . DCX5er 15:53 6/28/2001 (1)
        
        I remember, Yuppie spanking the monkey Daniel 18:18 6/28/2001 (0)

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