if your steering wheel quit going up and down during start up, shutting down and manual adjustment chances are the shaft is broken especially if you can hear the motor whirring and no movement is visible.

New shaft is $20 online and the e39 shaft is compatible (same part) Plenty of e39 in the junkyard compared to e53.

Removal is easy since you just have to remove the 2 trim pieces for the kick panel, once those are out the shaft is visible and can be pulled out and replaced.

this is the shaft that controls the up/down movement


and this is how the broken shaft looks like compared to the working one.





https://www.facebook.com/Bmw-e53-2508322126058762/