Originally Posted by zonefive (Post 1196073)

1. There's nothing "BMW specific" in the GM 5L40 which would prevent a quality transmission rebuild shop from rebuilding the transmission. These are GM transmissions, and quality parts are available from many sources.

2. I'm not sure why you lost faith in the original shop. Are they an ATRA or ATSG member shop?

I lost faith because they told me initially before taking the transmission out that there was nothing wrong with the torque converter. Then when they got the thing out and inspected it, they told me the torque converter has grenaded itself and ruined the transmission. This is the shop: MIRAMAR TRANSMISSION - Miramar Transmission & Auto Repair

Used transmissions are a crapshoot. There is really no way to know what you're getting.

So you paid a shop to remove, dismantle and inspect, but lost faith in them. I assume you paid them for their work?

Yes, I paid everyone for their work. I'm not sure why it matters who paid for what, but I don't mind answering

Then you bought a reman from a place online, and paid someone to install. That didn't work. Did you pay for the second R&R?

Street Smart paid for the installation of the second reman transmission

Then you bought a used unit, wasn't good, Paid again for R&R. Then there was another R&R for second used transmission - not sure who paid for that.

In all of this, you never replaced the converter? Or you replaced it with the remain, but returned the remain and used a used converter with the used transmission? Didn't the reman come with a remain converter?

The reman transmissions both came with a remanufactured converter. I never thought, nor was I advised, to combine a reman converter with the used transmissions. Probably would have been a good idea.

Now you're going to R&R again to do a converter or a BMW reman?

Correct

Do you have the original transmission?

No, the original transmission was shipped back to Street Smart as part of the core exchange.

Are all the mounts good? Has anyone checked the mounts/transfer case/diffs? Are there any codes in DME/EGS/4WD/ABS modules? Any dash warnings?

There are no codes at all. The transmission mount was changed with the transmission. The transfer case was changed 45,000 miles ago. Can the diff cause these symptoms?

You need to go to a qualified shop that can diagnose what the problem is, not just buy more parts.

Problem is finding a qualified shop. One I went to had stellar reviews and either lied to me about the torque converter being good or didn't know what they were talking about

Originally Posted by Caryalon (Post 1196106)

There's another possibility - they didn't believe that the converter caused the problem, because the symptoms did not point to converter, but realized, upon disassembly, that the converter had blown up, distributing metal throughout the transmission, and causing the issue by affecting the valve body or other internal part(s).

I own a transmission shop. I don't have X-Ray vision. Neither, to my knowledge, does anyone else. Expecting a shop to absolutely know, for sure, ahead of time, what will be found is not reasonable. An educated guess, based on experience, is reasonable, but must be backed up by inspection/diagnosis. Transmissions are complex. (And getting more complex all the time.)

I don't know Miramar Transmissions (I'm in NYC), but they have terrific reviews on Yelp. They are an ATRA member. Based on those things, I would tend to believe they know what they are doing.

If I were you, I'd go to ATRA.com, Shop Finder, and find a shop who can give you a second opinion.

Originally Posted by zonefive (Post 1196186)

Thanks for the input. I'm glad you agree with me that the shop should not have told me that the torque converter was definitely not the problem until they were able to inspect the transmission internally.

Originally Posted by upallnight (Post 1196080)

Since your old trans grenaded and left a lot of shrapnel in the trans, you will need to flush out the trans cooler in the radiator or replace the radiator. Could be the leftover shrapnel in the trans cooler is causing the problem.

Originally Posted by srmmmm (Post 1196290)

2002 X5 3.0 386,900 miles (Original fluid in GM 5L40E)

Originally Posted by andrewwynn (Post 1196297)

Close to a pretty epic milestone. (and already over 600,000 km).