Best price on a new instrument cluster from dealer

[sunny5280]

Originally Posted by rph74

I've heard a lot of good about these guys:

VDORepair.com | Automotive Instrument Cluster Repair

I need to get this done on my 540i soon too.

I went with a repair for my MID for two reasons:

1. I didn't have to do the work. Having someone else do it puts the responsibility on them to fix / replace anything that may be damaged during the repair.
2. It came with a lifetime guarantee. I have more faith the repair will have less problems than the replacement of the cluster (which I've read end up failing too).

I don't think I used VDO for the repair but the company (person I believe) who did the repair on mine did an excellent job.

[rph74]

You are correct in stating that dealer replacements can fail. I had my cluster replaced on my e39 back in 2004, and it started failing again 3 years later. A repair couldn't be any worse!

[HPIA4v2]

Originally Posted by rph74

You are correct in stating that dealer replacements can fail. I had my cluster replaced on my e39 back in 2004, and it started failing again 3 years later. A repair couldn't be any worse!

I have a feeling, humidity maybe a major factor in this problem, though can't imagine BMW not using gold plated PCB traces where the ribbin cable connect to (gold won't oxidize like copper). Hope I don;t have to replace mine again after the first goodwill by BMW.

[vegasX5]

Originally Posted by HPIA4v2

I have a feeling, humidity maybe a major factor in this problem, though can't imagine BMW not using gold plated PCB traces where the ribbin cable connect to (gold won't oxidize like copper). Hope I don;t have to replace mine again after the first goodwill by BMW.

In regards to humidity being the culprit, I can tell you it was certainly not a factor in my case. My X5 has been in Las Vegas with basically no humidity since the day it was purchased and has never ever seen snow and probably seen rain fewer than 10 times in it's whole life. It could be a factor in some locations, but I can guarantee that it has not had an impact in my case (pixels started going out around 40k miles and 4 years old btw).