N54 start issue, N54 problems keep em coming!

[air_1jordan 7]

Hi all,

Bit of a story before I dive into the issue at present.

6 months of working on my E82 135i project! Everything has been reassembled and it's ready to go! Had everything you can think of wrong with it. Water pump failure, gaskets leaking ect. Many thanks to Brent at BMWorld for supplying about 80% of the parts I needed. Did every single preventative maintenance thing on the car. New brake pads, gaskets, coolant flange, water pump, thermo, vacuum lines ect ect. Now she's been parked up in my garage now for almost a month without being started, she's been sitting on a trickle charger on her new battery.

Went to start it in the weekend to take it for a WOF and found that now it just cranks and cranks about 3 or 4 times before giving up... Ran codes on it and it popped up with the codes in the image attached. Went to go change the relay but my car doesn't have a relay in the DME box, only the fan relay. After a search, everyone suggests that the fuse is now build into the fuse box (in the Gove box) and that either the JBE or fuse box is faulty or the DME is toast!

Now I've done the following to try isolate the issue, I've swapped the Fuse box and JBE to a used one from a wrecked car. No avail and same codes. So fuse and JBE are not the issue... I've pulled DME out to inspect for water damage, corrosion and burnt wiring. Couldn't find any damage. Engine wiring is fine and nothing I can see is damaged, checked all ground points ect 

So I've basically isolated it down to the DME being the issue which is a shame because it's a MSD81 DME

Are these known to just fail? Is there anything else I can check and test? If not, is there anywhere is New Zealand I can send my DME too for repair? Can I use a used DME if I can find one?

Cheers J

 

 

 

 

[HypedKidz 24]

Does it have a battery cable recall on it?

[air_1jordan 7]

44 minutes ago, F10er said:

Have you physically checked the power supply at all the relevant DME pins? The DME relay supplies power to 4 fuses, which then power the DME. Do all 4 of these pins have a good power supply at the DME? DME's are not a common failure, so i wouldn't panic just yet. I've attached a wiring diagram, but i don't know the year of your car so it may not be correct. What is the build date or chassis number of your car? 

https://www.newtis.info/tisv2/a/en/e82-135i-cou/wiring-functional-info/power-train/engine-electronics-mevd/voltage-supply/control-unit-power-supply/CkOkr85a

Thank you! I’ll take a look at those fuses tomorrow. My car build date is June 2009

If I get a multimeter, would Pin 9, 11 and 12 on the DME be a good way to test power? 
 

J

Edited July 14, 2020 by air_1jordan
S

[air_1jordan 7]

1 hour ago, HypedKidz said:

Does it have a battery cable recall on it?

Battery recall done  I did think of that, but when I replaced the fuse box you could see the replacement cable.

[air_1jordan 7]

24 minutes ago, F10er said:

Also what are you using to read the fault codes? Do you have JB4 or anything similar on the car? 

Using Carly for BMW the latest update. Can post the full codes.

[air_1jordan 7]

Carly.zip

[air_1jordan 7]

13 hours ago, F10er said:

I've heard mixed reviews with Carly. Sometimes it doesn't pick up all the fault codes and gives the wrong descriptions of faults. I would recommend downloading ISTA D for an issue like this. Its free to download from bimmergeeks.net You just need a k+dcan cable which you may have already if you're using carly.

Yeah I have as well, Carly is my “quick and easy” check scan tool and coder. 
I have a K+DCan cable and INPA setup, so will download ISTA D and see how it goes, never used it before, is it quite easy to navigate? Or should I do a bit of research on how to use it first? 
 

cheers

[air_1jordan 7]

@F10er

Evening, yes sorry for the delayed update. I was playing around and installing INSTA this afternoon. 
I managed to pull the fault codes off of INSTA D seems like I get the same/similar codes as Carly reported? 
Ignore the headunit error. My CIC isn’t plugged in at the moment.

Edited July 22, 2020 by air_1jordan

[air_1jordan 7]

22 hours ago, F10er said:

Did you run the test modules for those faults? (Calculate test plan button bottom right of screen?)

Ended up getting an error (sorry forgot to take screenshot) “Module is unresponsive. Application will revert back”

 

BUT! Fortunately I have a friend who kindly offered his DME, CAS and Key for me to test! After swapping my DME and CAS, car fired right up! I know this is taking a cheeky shortcut, but the opportunity came up. So it’s either the CAS or DME? Everything else in the car is the same.

is there a chance it could be the CAS? Or is the fact the original key, unlocks ect... that it could be my original DME? obviously need to give back these items to my mate. Could the original DME be repaired locally in NZ or is it worth finding a used DME, CAS and key? 
 

cheers for your help! I’ll definitely be using INSTA D from now! 

[HalfJobHarry 106]

On 7/23/2020 at 8:01 PM, air_1jordan said:

Ended up getting an error (sorry forgot to take screenshot) “Module is unresponsive. Application will revert back”

 

BUT! Fortunately I have a friend who kindly offered his DME, CAS and Key for me to test! After swapping my DME and CAS, car fired right up! I know this is taking a cheeky shortcut, but the opportunity came up. So it’s either the CAS or DME? Everything else in the car is the same.

is there a chance it could be the CAS? Or is the fact the original key, unlocks ect... that it could be my original DME? obviously need to give back these items to my mate. Could the original DME be repaired locally in NZ or is it worth finding a used DME, CAS and key? 
 

cheers for your help! I’ll definitely be using INSTA D from now! 

Late to the party on this one sorry...but the symptom of cranking but no fire reminds me of when the CAS and DME are not synced. I have some memory of the 2fa4 incorrect data code being some symptom of this. In fact as I sit here wracking my brain..I'm almost cetain that 2fa4 IS a data mismatch betwenn the CAS and DME. This doesn't point to a physical failure in my (somewhat limited) experience with this. I remember around 10 years back when I swapped the DME in my E46 there was a whole heap of coding and programming to do on the DME/CAS to get this going. Also sometimes the 'rolling code' between the CAS and DME can get out of sync as there is a time based element at work (at least on the E46) might be different on the later models. There is a function in INPA to sync them again that is probably also somewhere in ISTA-D....

EDIT: The process is call CAS/DME Align .... 

Edited August 13, 2020 by HalfJobHarry
extra info.

[HypedKidz 24]

1 hour ago, HalfJobHarry said:

Late to the party on this one sorry...but the symptom of cranking but no fire reminds me of when the CAS and DME are not synced. I have some memory of the 2fa4 incorrect data code being some symptom of this. In fact as I sit here wracking my brain..I'm almost cetain that 2fa4 IS a data mismatch betwenn the CAS and DME. This doesn't point to a physical failure in my (somewhat limited) experience with this. I remember around 10 years back when I swapped the DME in my E46 there was a whole heap of coding and programming to do on the DME/CAS to get this going. Also sometimes the 'rolling code' between the CAS and DME can get out of sync as there is a time based element at work (at least on the E46) might be different on the later models. There is a function in INPA to sync them again that is probably also somewhere in ISTA-D....

EDIT: The process is call CAS/DME Align .... 

E46 security system is a whole lot different to E82....

[air_1jordan 7]

Yeah basically any model BMW after 2002 (I believe) have a more complex security system.

The CAS and DME are married together in the sense that, INPA or any software tool cannot flash or program a different DME to another car (CAS) without the need of special lock smith electronic tools. 
 

I had to send my DME, CAS and Key remote to a car ECU repair specialist who married a donor MSD81 DME to my existing CAS.

My old DME was water damaged and blew.?
 

[HalfJobHarry 106]

17 minutes ago, HypedKidz said:

E46 security system is a whole lot different to E82....

This is true but there are similarities...I know CAS and EWS are substantially different...but the crank with no fire ...along with that code....seems like too strong a symptom to ignore. 

Given that the engine runs with donor CAS and DME...it seems to strongly point to an issue between the two. If both the CAS and the DME can be interrogated then are likely to not have 'died'. That coupled with the fact the car wasn't run for quite some time....

I'm saying it's an area worthy of further investigation, rather than at this point going out out sourcing (and having programmed and coded) new CAS and DMEs. 

[HalfJobHarry 106]

1 minute ago, air_1jordan said:

Yeah basically any model BMW after 2002 (I believe) have a more complex security system.

The CAS and DME are married together in the sense that, INPA or any software tool cannot flash or program a different DME to another car (CAS) without the need of special lock smith electronic tools. 
 

I had to send my DME, CAS and Key remote to a car ECU repair specialist who married a donor MSD81 DME to my existing CAS.

My old DME was water damaged and blew.?
 

This is true in so far as it's a coding and programming operation. It's not 'special locksmith tools'. You just need the software and interface to program the module and code it properly. It's probably easier on CAS vehicles than it was with EWS from what I can see. EWS was a pain in that many of the operations could only be done by pulling the module and reprogramming it directly with a kind of 'clamp' that sat over the CPU. At least on CAS vehicles everything can be done via the ODB.