Gang,
I need some help diagnosing why my 91 318i 4 door suddenly died while my GF was driving it Sat night in Oakland. The 318i has only 129K on it, it ran great up until Sat night. When I bought the car in Aug last year (one owner car, only 115K on it), the PO gave up on the car due to an intermittent stalling problem that several So Cal shops (including the dealer) couldn't seem to fix. After I bought the car, I swapped out the ECU from my parts car and it was night and day difference, car ran great. The PO spent a fortune on the car trying to figure out stalling problem, (new fuel pump, fuel pump relays, filters, etc...). I have had no problems at all with this car in the last 15 months. The battery is only 14 months old, could the ECU go out again???
Help, I'm 11 time zones away since I'm deployed to the sandbox and I can't help her out. My GF had AAA tow the car to her place. I'm about ready to say just have AAA tow it to a local shop. Before I do, I'd like some input from the peanut gallery on what they think may be wrong with the car.
I had someone check out the car yesterday and they gave me some feedback on what they thought might be wrong, see below. Any other ideas???
Thanks in advance
Gordon
No, the problem isn't different - I just got to read this message later after I had gone to Vivian's place earlier and had a listen. Now that you told me about what had happened before, it appears to be the same problem. It sounds like there's a bad starter (?) since it will spin up but the pinion isn't making any contact to the flywheel to crank the motor; you can hear the pistons moving (barely audible exhaust sound), but it just spins up and that's it. Maybe due to not enough juice (or amps?). It definitely is not the motor (valves, pistons, etc). I suppose testing the ECU for resistance on all of the outputs woudl be a good idea. I offered to meet with the mechanics with/without Vivian this week since she only has Monday off and I have Tuesday, Wed, Thurs. These are the places that I have used and can say that I got great service (for 1 of them anyway, the rest has been "word on the street")... yelp.com is also a great resource:
Germany's Best
Specializing in Porsche, BMW & Mercedes
5291 College Avenue
Oakland, CA 94618
(510) 658-8948
H & B BMW SPECIALISTS
2300 Fourth St
Berkeley, CA 94701
http://www.hbspecialists.com/
German Auto Sport
1453 4th Street
(between Jones St & Page St)
Berkeley, CA 94710
(510) 525-6000
Bavarian Professionals
(510) 524-6000
1218 7th St
Berkeley, CA 94710
http://www.bavpros.com
I need some help diagnosing why my 91 318i 4 door suddenly died while my GF was driving it Sat night in Oakland. The 318i has only 129K on it, it ran great up until Sat night. When I bought the car in Aug last year (one owner car, only 115K on it), the PO gave up on the car due to an intermittent stalling problem that several So Cal shops (including the dealer) couldn't seem to fix. After I bought the car, I swapped out the ECU from my parts car and it was night and day difference, car ran great. The PO spent a fortune on the car trying to figure out stalling problem, (new fuel pump, fuel pump relays, filters, etc...). I have had no problems at all with this car in the last 15 months. The battery is only 14 months old, could the ECU go out again???
Help, I'm 11 time zones away since I'm deployed to the sandbox and I can't help her out. My GF had AAA tow the car to her place. I'm about ready to say just have AAA tow it to a local shop. Before I do, I'd like some input from the peanut gallery on what they think may be wrong with the car.
I had someone check out the car yesterday and they gave me some feedback on what they thought might be wrong, see below. Any other ideas???
Thanks in advance
Gordon
No, the problem isn't different - I just got to read this message later after I had gone to Vivian's place earlier and had a listen. Now that you told me about what had happened before, it appears to be the same problem. It sounds like there's a bad starter (?) since it will spin up but the pinion isn't making any contact to the flywheel to crank the motor; you can hear the pistons moving (barely audible exhaust sound), but it just spins up and that's it. Maybe due to not enough juice (or amps?). It definitely is not the motor (valves, pistons, etc). I suppose testing the ECU for resistance on all of the outputs woudl be a good idea. I offered to meet with the mechanics with/without Vivian this week since she only has Monday off and I have Tuesday, Wed, Thurs. These are the places that I have used and can say that I got great service (for 1 of them anyway, the rest has been "word on the street")... yelp.com is also a great resource:
Germany's Best
Specializing in Porsche, BMW & Mercedes
5291 College Avenue
Oakland, CA 94618
(510) 658-8948
H & B BMW SPECIALISTS
2300 Fourth St
Berkeley, CA 94701
http://www.hbspecialists.com/
German Auto Sport
1453 4th Street
(between Jones St & Page St)
Berkeley, CA 94710
(510) 525-6000
Bavarian Professionals
(510) 524-6000
1218 7th St
Berkeley, CA 94710
http://www.bavpros.com
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