Auto transmission problem - e46 3 series

[ParanoidAndroid]

Hi guys,

Had a nightmare getting my other halves BMW 325i touring out of the non-gritted roads around here at the weekend. Kept getting stuck and had to be pushed out by kind neighbours.

Unfortunately we seem to have knackered the auto gearbox. Basically when we start the car now and put into drive the car just revs (no movement) for a few seconds before a clunk can be heard then a warning light (cog with ! in it) appears on the dashboard next to the gear indicator. We then seem to have drive okay but only in 3rd/4th gear. No 1st, 2nd or reverse.

Looking in the owners manual it states the car has gone into an emergency program and to take it to the nearest BMW dealer. A mate plugged his fault code reader in but it's not showing any transmission errors, only an error about anti stall, which he cleared.

Any thoughts? Is the gearbox gone? I'm going to call and transmission specialist in the morning and see what they say but just wondered if anyone had seen or heard of this before? Reluctant to go the BMW dealer route if I don't have to.

Car is a 2001 325i Sport Touring.

Cheers,
Graham

Edited by ParanoidAndroid on Monday 11th January 20:21

[4nonymous]

Tried disconnecting battery?

It has indeed gone into the Emergency run programme so you're transmisson is not actuallyd dead/dying.

It realised something was malfunctioning and activated the programme, most likely due to the crazy revs, wheel spinning etc.

[ParanoidAndroid]

Thanks, did wonder about doing this as someone mentioned to me disconnecting the battery and then touching both cables together which apparently can do some sort of software reset but was also warned about ECU spikes so decided against it.

Will give it a go tomorrow morning.

Cheers,
Graham

[TheEnd]

touching the cables discharges any components still connected, but the codes will be recorded on a chip inside.

There is no point clearing the fault, as it self tests on starting, clunks when it find the still existing problem, writes another error code, and goes into limp mode.

[ParanoidAndroid]

what happens is you can start the car, everything will look okay. Put in drive and push accelerator to pull away but all I get is the engine reving. Push accelerator a bit more (about 2.5k rpm) I then get the clunk and the transmission error however I then can move forward but locked in 3rd/4th.

Thanks for comments so far.

[TheEnd]

At a guess, i'd say a valve seal has gone, the electical resistances are all in order, so the light doesn't come on immediately, but when it asks the valve to shift fluid and do something, it flags a code when it's request isn't carried out.

Many years ago i had a similar problem, but that occurred intermittently when driving from a bad connection on an internal speed sensor.
It would do the same limp mode as soon as the wire moved. Switching off and restarting would sort everything out until the sensor lost it's signal.

The diag procedure in the box will start off by checking the resistance and continuity of all the electrical bits, and then keep an eye out for expected signals (if this were ABS sensors, a broken wire would put your light on immediately, but a misplaced sensor or broken ring would only appear when you start to drive off)

As you light doesn't come on straight away, your electrical gubbins are all still connected, and giving decent signals at idle, but when trying to move, since it doesn't move, it looks like a mechanical problem inside.
Maybe it is the speed sensor, it's a pretty common problem point, but i would expect everything to work fine for a second before the ECU realised it's blind and shuts the system down.

Ideally, i'd look around in the yellow pages etc for an autobox specialist. Unless it's low oil/fluid (unlikely to be a dipstick for you to check, but look for oil leaks) then you'll be staring down the barrel of a £300-ish repair, and probably a £20 component inside that needs the box to be stripped down to get too.

[Swarley]

Did you ever solve the problem?

[CPB31]

Bit of a copy of the above really...

Did you have any luck with this? My mate has a Jag XJ8 which has exactly the same problem, he has replaced a few of the sensors, but still isn't finally solved it.

[Mojooo]

Just to bump this - I had this earleir - cog warning came on - main problem was car seemed to be slower and when I starting moving from a stop the car juddered - think as it changed gears.

2 hours later I drove the car just fine.

I may get it booked in at my local garage but I guess maybe they won't find anything until the fault shows up again.

[Alexa41]

Hi guys
I jet washed my engine with G101 multi degreaser and since that i have the dreaded orange cog and a vibration noise coming on . I turn the car off and back on again and it resets itself but comes on again.

Ive read a lot of people saying its either a bad battery or a maf sensor or saying it needs an ecu reset

Can someone please please please please please please please please tell me if there is an easy fix to this ?

Thanks.
Alex.

[Monkeyman2019]

Hi all I’m new to here so any help will do I have a 51plate 330d auto all was well till I came to traffic lights and put it in N when I put it back in D nothing happened so put back in N and then D again it’s set off fine but 100 yards down the road is stopped going and just revved I was told to disconnect the battery when I do it drives ok for 100 yards then just revs again can anybody help please

[helix402]

Autobox or torque converter are probably broken. Scrap it or convert it to a manual.

[ParanoidAndroid]

Sorry, only just seen this old thread resurrected. I was the OP and unfortunately needed to have a gearbox rebuild to fix this issue