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Sounds right, long time since I saw one in the flesh, and at night :-)

Get the BMW electrical manuals for the donor car and the recipient car. Compare wiring diagrams side by side. That's the only way to stop fishing about in the dark

Check the light bulb Check the contacts are clean and shiny and tight What transmission do you have? EGS A4S 310R, (with A M switch = Auto, Manual) or EGS A5S 310Z (with E*S switch = Economy, Ice, Sport) The illumination of the A/M or E*S switch is caused by bulbs inside the switch and fed from a separate power source to the transmission control, but I think this is not your problem. I think you mean the transmission position indicator light is not working. The transmission position indicator light is fed from the light switch via the dimmer At the transmission position indicator light: Green/red wire is power for illumination Ground will be a brown wire. The green/red wire comes from the illumination dimmer switch, which also feeds all other interior illumination If all other illumination works (ashtrays, hazard light, ASC switch, instrument cluster illumination), and just the transmission position indicator doesn't, then check the wire feeding the lamp, check the lamp connections, check the earth wire, etc. Should be easy to find.

Assuming E30 325i 1989: Fuse 23 (7.5A) feeds the illumination and the right hand taillights. If taillights are OK but instrument cluster not working then fuse must be fine. Pin 1 on the Light Switch feeds all interior illumination Wire is Grey/Red. This same colour wire goes to every illuminated switch If you have lost illumination to ALL switches / Ashtray / Radio / Instrument Cluster then check the Light Switch carefully. measure for power on Pin 1. Will be there in Park and Headlights On. Replace switch if faulty. NOTE: the window switch illumination comes from the Window Switch power feed. So if the Windows work but the switch illumination doesn't, then suspect blown window switch bulbs. Or bad / corroded connections etc inside the switch

Assuming you have a 1999 323i, check the following: The only common factor is the light switch. Remove the light switch, have it hanging out and still connected and measure the pins / wires as follows: Position 0 = Off 1 = Park lights 2 = Park lights and Headlights Right Hand Taillight F37 (Engine Bay, 10A) feeds power on Red/Blue wire to pin 11 of the light switch The switch switches power to the taillight. The wire to the taillight is on the switch pin 2, and is Grey/Yellow. If no Check Control fitted, the wire goes direct to the taillight. If Check Control, it goes via the Check Control module and becomes Grey/Blue/Yellow for one bulb and Grey/Blue/Yellow for the other bulb. (maybe BMW made a mistake with wire colours here?) Left Hand Taillight F33 (Engine Bay, 10A) feeds power on Red/White wire to pin 5 of the light switch The switch switches power to the taillight. The wire to the taillight is on the switch pin 6, and is Grey/Violet. If no Check Control fitted, the wire goes direct to the taillight. If Check Control, it goes via the Check Control module and becomes Grey/Violet/Yellow for one bulb and Grey/Green/Yellow for the other bulb. Instrument Lights F37 (Engine Bay, 10A) feeds power on Red/Blue wire to pin 11 of the light switch The switch switches power to the light dimmer. The wire to the light dimmer is on the switch pin 1, and is Grey/Black. This goes to pin 3 of the Light Dimmer The power leaves the light dimmer on pin 2 and becomes Green/Red The Green/Red wire then goes to all dash illumination including the instrument cluster, where it becomes pin 2 on the cluster connector. CONCLUSION If you have the right hand taillight fail at the same times as all dash illumination, then suspect F37 and/or the light switch. Check the fuse carefully, the connectors are firmly seated and clean and tight, and the light switch If the light switch has failled or has bad connections, replace it with a new one

Rear door leaks are quite common in E39s. You need to replace the rubber gunky gluey stuff that seals the moisture stopper (plastic sheet) against the door frame. If not 100% sealed then water gets through the gaps and into the car. The sealer is Butyl rubber, use only the original BMW stuff, sticks like glue, really good. I did my rear doors when one started leaking. No problems ever since. I used the genuine BMW butyl rubber, costs peanuts 8about $10 to $20 for enough for both rear doors) And it's wise to check and repair all 4 doors at the same time: if the butyl has failed on one door, it may soon fail on the other doors, given that the butyl rubber is the same age on all four doors... And make sure you park the car in the sun all day long with all doors open to fully dry out the car! lift the carpets if you can... As for the wood - if the clips don't hold, and you've tried new clips, then you'll have to resort to glue or replacing whichever part has been deformed - but if the deformed part is the door panel, then glue might be the best bet.

Dead laser or stuck mechanism Consider replacing ye olde fashioned CD changer with a CP600BMW SD card reader, plug and play, extremely easy to fit and very high quality Around 1'000 songs and with full song title display Google CP600BMW ...

Yes.

Use the 12V feeds for safety. The E46 is very similar, but the Light Control Module is directly behind the light switch (pull light switch out to observe)

The CP600BMW is recognised as a CD changer and uses the same CD changer protocol. So it is limited to 6 x CDs, whereby each CD can hold hundreds of songs Each CD is a directory and the CP600BMW can recurse sub directories as well The text display happens in the same way as the Intravee - it overwrites the display generated by the nav

You may have blown all 4 if you were using excessive bass.... you should always listen to the stereo and recognise when the speakers are bottoming out, and then turn the volume down. Otherwise, you physically destroy the cones.

Yep, on the rear parcel tray.

Easy. Firstly, note that the high beam switch switches a 5V line to ground. The 5V line goes to the Light Control Module (LCM). So if fitting a relaz here, zou-ll need a blocking diode to prevent backfeeding 12V into the LCM data inputs. The LCM then switches on the power to the high beams> White with green stripe wire is left high-beam White with blue stripe wire is right high beam Wires run from LCM in driver's footwell to the bulbs. This is the only way to tap into the high beam light circuit. You cannot use the instrument cluster as the high beam is an LED controlled by data transmission over the databus

Start with the basics by checking speaker continuity. You can do this easily by unplugging the speaker connector from the amplifier in the boot and measuring the speakers. I'm assuming you have the DSP amp, because only cars with the DSP amp had the subwoofer system fitted. But anyway, its the same procedure for all speakers in the car. And you don't even need the wiring diagram as the speakers are all wired as a paired cable, and it is easy to identify the cable pairs. The subwoofers naturally have the thicker wires... And remember with the DSP system you have 14 speakers, so quite a few to check. All 4 subs are wired directly and individually back to the DSP amplifier. So if all 4 subs failed at the same time, really there's only the amplifier as culprit - unless you blew all 4 subs at the same time!! (if you did this, stop winding up the bass so loud!!) The sub wiring on the DSP amp on connector A (X18871, 15pin black) is Sub 1: pins 1 & 9 Sub 2: pins 2 & 10 Sub 3: pins 14 & 7 Sub 4: pins 13 & 6 In each case the first pin number is positive. And the amplifier is located behind the CD changer in the boot, big metal silver box with heatsinks (fins) on it, and 3 x connectors. Turn key off before unplugging. Tip: check for water damage! Quite common... look for water marks on the case, check all connector pins are shiny and clean, not green and gunked up.

That's only on ex-Japan E39s Singapore E39s - and the rest of the world - have the nav in the proper place: on the left hand side above the CD changer

Extremely easy if you use SD card instead of USB stick. The CP600BMW is a replacement for the Cd changer. Can be used on any car with the ibus-controlled CD changer (E46, E39, E38 from approx 1998, X3, X5 (non idrive), Z4, even the later E34s. Unplug the CD changer, plug in the CP600BMW and you have a SD card reader that can handle over 1,000 songs, supports text display of artist and title on almost any model BMW radio, uses full radio controls, and is of really good quality. Will be on the market any day now. Much better than those cheap shitty chinese USB stick readers...

Battery off - wait 15min - battery on = RESET

But remember: handsfree allows two free hands to control the vehicle - ever tried changing gears, indicating, and driving around a roundabout all at the same time, one handed? Ever since I started using a proper handsfree kit in my car about a year ago, I really understand the difference between holding the phone to your ear, and a proper handsfree kit 8sound over radio, controlled by radio volume control, etc)

Japan went from IR to RF in around 2002/ish By the way, IR works heaps better at night ... due to less IR interference from the sun

It's in the boot, but it's mounted on the back of the rear seat, right hand side. It's behind the bulge in the boot lining. Remove boot lining to observe. Replace the tuner module (radio module), on boot left hand side rear-seat back bulge with a Euro model radio module. Not a US module! Radio modules can be had from Grant (hotwire) or found easily on ebay Germany. Or hunt at a wreckers, but they often only have Japanese tuners, not Euro tuners. But any tuner out of a pre 2001 car ex NZ, Europe, Singapore of South Africa will work.

The ex-Japan cars have an Alpine Japanese nav system in them The Alpine nav drive (in the boot) has to be removed and replaced with a VDO nav drive for the system to work in NZ. Whole of the world - except Japan - uses the VDO system Only the ex-Japan cars need this conversion to make the nav work. After replacement of the nav drive, the nav system is identical to the NZ-new cars (except that no NZ-new E39s were sold with nav, but that's another story) anyway, can be done, I've done loads, if you're into DIY and are handy with working on cars and soldering wires you can do it yourself, otherwise see Grant (hotwire) and he'll give you an offer to do the lot at his work.

The BMW system is the bees knees, and the best, and can be had cheap on ebay. Plug and play with your existing telephone connections, existing microphone, existing sound system, etc. Everything else is a hack and doesn't work nowhere near as well. Best option: Intravee (www.intravention.co.uk) - full display, full control, absolutely supreme Simplest option: swap radio module for later version with AUX-IN, use the AUX-IN (no control, no display) You can use that setup with any car in the world. Because it uses speaker-level inputs, so connect it to the speaker of your choice. Use my NavCoder software, it'll enable TV for you by changing the configuration (coding) of the TV tuner. www.siegenthaler.co.nz But the BMW system is the best, and nothing beats the built-in nav system. Even for in town driving. Saying that "it doesn't go" implies you have an ex-Japan imported BMW. You can readily update the nav system with either a Mk3 nav (cheap) or a Mk4 (more expensive) to make it 100% NZ compatible. Ebay is a good source for parts.

You probably would be. It's all about distracting the drivers concentration on the road.

If you have the standard BMW Business RDS tape deck, then there are no special limiters. The E46 does not even use an external amplifier (unless you have the Harmon Kardon premium sound package) The Business RDS amplifier simply amplifies until the physical voltage limitations of the 12V supply come into play. Then clipping occurs. Just like any other standard car radio on the market. To verify your problem: 1. Use a well-known CD, that you are familiar with on your home stereo 2. Play the CD, and set the stereo, in turn, for Rear Left, Rear Right, Front Left then Front Right 3. Once you have the stereo set for eg Rear Left, listen to the music carefully. Check tweeter and woofer (if fitted - speaker packages vary) Repeat for all other speakers. It is highly unlikley that all speakers are blown at the same time, unless the previous owner played a lot of loud music with a lot of bass at high volumes for long times. This can readily wreck the speakers.

DO IT the voice control of the nav is cool.... "Beam me up Scotty"