Thanks for the suggestions guys. Luckily here in Hong Kong the mileage is fairly low on all cars. On my 2002 it is just coming up on only 20,000miles so hopefully will not have a reapeat of the problem you had Burkleymh for a long time yet.

In the end I decided to call in the professionals. Brought it to the BMW service station. They made me feel a little better as this car has a subwoofer fitted right in front of the rear light cluster on the inside which makes it diffiult to work on. They must have spent 30mins trying to get everything out before they could remove the rear cluster and retireve the bulb. When all was said and done the total charge was HK$20, about US$ 3 for the bulb. The rest of the work they said was on the house !! What a result !!

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2002 X5 4.4i. Black with beige leather interior. Sports Pack.