JBW - in case this might help. You might contact Wolfgang at Peter Schmidt Transmissions in Burlingame, CA (near San Francisco). The phone is 650 348-3990. (FYI, I have no financial interests with this business.) They are an authorized ZF shop and the one who rebuilt mine. Wolfgang is very knowledgeable and helpful, and possibly can direct you to a ZF shop in your area, or, handle a transmission exchange via shipping with your indy shop? He's also quite familiar with this problem. Note that these same transmissions are also used in Jags (XK8s), Audi's, other BMWs, and Mercedes', and perhaps others. I should note that when mine went out the problem was so great that the replacement part was on "global backorder" for months. I was able to locate one in Detroit by exercising some auto industry contacts I have. I don't know if this situation has improved. Also, I've received reports from MANY owners with this problem. There seems to be no relation to mileage of the vehilce. Some only had a couple thousand miles on them and were replaced under warranty. The failure mileage runs from 2,000 to 150,000, and everything in-between. The ZF transmission is ONLY used in the X5 V8's. The transmission used on the 3.0 6 cylinders was supplied by GM (Hydromatic). Do we have any class-action attorney's out there interested in looking into this???

MK