Wow night and day difference.

Not a good weekend
 

So had the radio out to replace the ribbon cable
That sort of went well enough
No amount of cold beers helped fix all the lines, so some still missing some lines.
Ah well.

Did remove all the buttons as they did stick a lot
So they all work.

So that was alright

So Sunday mornig I decided to calibrate the fuel and temp gauge
If you look at previous photos, the gauges are off position

So I decide to just pull the dials off, and place them in the correct place,
As I was taking out the dash after a test, the cover over the Park, and gear display falls out
And slides into the steering arm covers
So i drop the steering down with the selector, and it squashes the plastic cover that had got trapped between the arm and the bracket.
So broke the clear display cover into little bits.

And while pulling off the temp dial, the whole pin pulled off and the little spring came with.
Sooooo.....

Now the temp gauge doesnt work
And the plastic screen is also damaged, so no display over the Park and gear display section.
And the fuel gauge is still a littke out of scale, but not touching that..

But the buttons on the radio work well now.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhh, that sounds like me with my 540i gauges... Fixed the pixels (three times) before I got it to work... I had to use two gauges to get mine to work... I think I have the parts left over from the repair and can send you the screen and temp gauge, if I still have that gauge...

What's even more funny (funnier?) is that I have to do this very thing to my 4.6is cluster, which is extremely expensive, even on the used market, if I mess it up...

You ever get that rear light thing fixed from parts you found locally? I still have that silver trim...

Cheers!!!

I got the screen to work second time round.
But messed the temp gauge.

Would appreciate the gauge.


I will happily send a courrier to pick the gauge and silver boot thingy.

Oh, my fault... I meant the cover over the gear selection thing... I probably have that still... I'll have to verify if I have a good temp gauge...

How do I get the.... I'll just PM you...

Cheers!!

Insteument without gear indicator cover
 

Here is a photo of the gauges at present.

Temp doesnt work
Fuel out of scale
And gear display plastic gone as it was squashed on Sunday.

Oh well.

Good day!!

You mind if I steal your thread to show how I did my pixel repair? Maybe I should ask for forgiveness, instead of permission...

Here is a before shot... You can see the missing pixels...

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j4...pssqttokzc.jpg

And afterwards... I put a new ribbon in the cluster I got from a guy overseas... Having to do it again, I would just end up buying local as I didn't see anything special with his...

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j4...psjm6dyxbu.jpg

My issue was the same as yours... I pulled these perfect coil springs thru the needle hole, destroying them...

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j4...psjsebw6gi.jpg

So, I carefully pulled the needle off the pin and set them aside...

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j4...psd0wn9tdd.jpg

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j4...psoxm060qp.jpg

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j4...psvjknjfmp.jpg

I got my second cluster and squeezed the base of the plastic needle to break the bond it had on the pin. The needle came off the pin with very little effort... I marked them (new and old) and facing up...

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j4...psiavmwtz9.jpg

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j4...psvrkpkllv.jpg

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j4...psundos99p.jpg

This left the pin in the motor...

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j4...ps7kugjicj.jpg

WORK BENCH!!

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j4...psnbv7krbp.jpg

I pulled the motor with pin and installed it on my good cluster. I put everything back together except for the cover... I made note of where the needles were pointing and lined up the needles close to those spots with power on the cluster... Slight push to keep them from falling off... NOW, I don't know what happened to the fuel gauge, but it seemed to "stick" at some locations after I was done... It is the only one that did this... It still works and the light still comes on, but it isn't 110% perfect like I would have hoped!

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j4...psjgevy8ha.jpg

Cycled power to see what they would do... I ran the test a couple times to see where the needles stopped... You can go beyond the electrical stops and hit the motors mechanical stop to spin the needle more the direction you want to go...

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j4...pstclzvewn.jpg

If you have a slow motion camera on your phone, you can get pretty accurate with where the needle should be... It is better to go clockwise when fine tuning as it is difficult to get the needle to "JUMP" over the stop pin...

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j4...psb9r7o3vk.jpg

Instant fuel was the difficult one... Once happy, I unplugged and finished assembly... Pixels are still good in the cluster, but the one I did for the MIDI failed soon after the repair... Again, nothing special about the overseas version... Get them local... They all come from China anyway...

I know you can drill holes in the dash to access the screws to fix the pixels, but I just didn't like that idea all that much...

Hope this helps someone!!

Cheers!!

Excellent write up

Also did the radio, will see how long that lasts.

Hey. Bought a used '05 X5 4.4i. Bought Carly for BMW II and also had fun with diagnostics and codes. Had to replace both front air struts w/ new sensors (4 wheel self level suspension) now I need to get it recalibrated Likewise, I found some great info in these forums that allows me to cut that "BMW certified" mechanic out. Mostly. Lol.

Oh. And payed $6100 cash for my X. He was asking almost $10Gs

FYI. I worked 2 years at the Spartanburg SC plant. ALL Xs come out of this plant. Due to the number of quality control checkpoints each unit goes through convinced me to one day own one. Dream answered.

Yes, my X has her issues but the drive, alone, gives you a feel of success.

Enjoy even though you might get nickel and dimed to death. Lol

So.....
It has been a few months
Was going to sell it as there are to many projects
The battery went dead and I was busy building a workshop.
So bought a new battery and installed it.
After driving it again, I decided I don't want to sell it
Goes so well, needs some work, but so far nothing major