Engine Fail Safe Prog+ABS light+DSC light+sluggish
 

This just happened and my immediate response was to run to this forum.

Was just driving along when warnings happened.

Details:
2003 x5 3 liter
I do not know the age of the battery.
It has been raining quite a bit around here (Tampa...Tropical Storm Isaac)

I looked up the warning message in the book: Paraphrase: Electrical engine fault, see dealership.

Thoughts? It seems to still be driveable but very sluggish acceleration. HELP! Thanks in advance.

Check for air leak. I had all those lights and sluggishness when the rubber boot on the airbox came off.

On the way out the door to see...but still in office clothes...so may need to save the dirty work for later.

Not to mention I have clients coming in for RNC. Non ideal timing!

This happens to me alot as well. I shut it off, remove key, put in key turn 1 click, remove key, wait 30 seconds, start up no lights. I havent had it hooked up to find out what the issue is but it does get annoying.

My buddy had similar complaint. Found his alternator to be the fault. It was spiking to over 60a randomly and tripping all sorts of faults.

+1 on the battery and or alternator! My alternator took a crap and drained my battery low enough to trigger all the alarms.

whoa that is pretty high, considering the 90a/120a alternator installed!

Update.
Since my problem had originally occurred. The faults were intermittent. I was too busy to really deal with it and it really wasn't affecting the driving really.

The issues I wrote about in my first post occurred about two more times but again never for very long and was really more of a nuisance and disappear when I turn the car back on.

Everything was quiet for a week or so but then started getting intermittent DSC (yellow circle) and ABS fault lights on the dash.. No more "engine fail safe mode" issues as I orinally had. These new fault environments would come and go.

I know I needed to get the codes read to see what was going on. In the meantime I put in some seafoam fuel cleaner as a "why not".

Then finally had the codes read by a BMW shop.

5a brief power interruption
(76) 118 DME/DDE does not fulfill torque request
(68) 104 steering angle sensor, internal

The shop was either being lazy with me or they weren't sure exactly what the problem was, saying they needed to research the codes more. However, When I left, they suggested to replace the battery in case the battery was not providing proper amps, triggering all the faults due to the sensitive nature of the system. And the steering sensor.

Upon inspection of the battery myself later ( I don't know how old the battery was ). I deduced by stamped on codes of the duralast gold battery was made in 2005. So going on 5+years. Plausible cause to everything.

Going to see about replacing it. But I could see the alternator being cause as well.

What about monititoring voltage while car is on. You should be between 13-14v. It above spikes, you will have issues. If constantly below, you have issues. Click link in my sig.

this just started happening to me....about a week.......gotta do the research...either alternator or something...

I had the same thing happen to my 05 x5 4.4 I replaced the battery but I was in the process of getting an alternator due to a high pitch whinning noise which I suspect the bearings in the alternator. Anyway both were replaced no issues until the next day. I had a trans failsafe program error. Reset that fault and out of the blue I am getting ABS /BREAKS 4×4 TRACTION Control lights coming on the dash. Can't figure this out yet. This is driving me crazy. The car can sit over night and when it starts no warning lights and boom about 30 minutes later warning lights pop back on. Any suggestions?

This sounds like transfer case actuator gear failure. Search that. Pay attention to when you shut the car off without having that error. I bet you will hear grinding noise.

if there are no air leaks, majority of the time, the engine wiring harness is faulty.

Update

Battery was found to be only 2 years old. Did a full battery test. All came out normal.

Since then...other than the warning lights being on. Nothing really happening. Sooo decided I would try out a another shop to see what they had to say about. Again was causing me no trouble and wasn't a priority for me.

Till this past Monday.

Service Engine Light is now on solid. Rough idle. Add a little gas to keep RPM's at 1000 it purrs just fine. Let it fall back to idle and rough again.

I was surfing this forum last night and found this thread

http://www.xoutpost.com/bmw-sav-foru...og-solved.html

It might well be it, sounds good, or at least I want to believe it lol. Easy enough to find out. Stay tuned. If not...then back to the drawing board.

extremely doubtful. if the battery ever dies and engine stalls on M54 engines and the engine computer sometimes cannot remember the stored adaptation of the throttle body. When this happens this fault will be stored when restarting the car immediately. To clear this fault without the bmw scan tool, ensure the battery is good, and then turn the ignition on for 30 seconds. Within this 30 seconds the engine computer will perform a sweep test on the throttle body to check for blockages and then when returning to rest will record the adaptation angle. Clear the fault memory and you should be able to start the car normally.

Update,

While I was digging in to get at the throttle valve, I attempted to take off the air adjusting unit. I discovered the flap inside the intake manifold was broken. Replaced the part ($187 from dealer) Service Engine Soon light and the rough idle was solved!

Took it to a new mechanic that seemed to have a better scanner and we determined that the Steering Angle sensor was not responding, no output data while we turned the wheel. I looked up other posts and found that it can be reset or recalibrated if power is lost. This should account for the DSC and ABS lights remaining. HOWEVER, I keep seeing the power interruption code show up and wonder if the steering angle sensor is fine but the power interruption is the true root cause of the issues.... ie electrical...perhaps the wiring harness mentioned earlier it this post thread....

Just replace the angle sensor or do more digging into the wiring/power interruption?? (sensor is $200) Thoughts..

2003x5guy
I was getting all kinds of codes. Voltage codes speed sensors and steering angle and more. Once the alternator was replaced all issues went away. The biggest worry was the trans fail safe program issue. I have been reading a lot of post and google some of the codes to see what kind of issues everyone is coming up with. So far everything is running fine. Let me know what you find out.
Thanks
Don

I would first try to replace the ignition switch....$50-60 part and an hour of your time might solve your issue.....had this problem with my e46 and it did fixed the problem after replacing the ignition switch.

Check alternator. Usually caused by unstable voltage output, your alternator or the voltage regulator is on the way dying!

In my case, all lights in the cluster were light up, the brake light flashed, trans prog safe mode on, ABS, battery light, almost everything. The vehcle sluggished, reluctant to go when you press the gas paddle. Used DIS to check the fault code, it indicated overvoltage output from alternator and sometime no voltage output. I replaced the alternator and cleared all the fault code, costed me US$600 including labor cost. Now everything backs to normal.

Any update on this isssue? I´m having similar problems with my V8. Thanks in advance.

J.Seven

Replaced the Steering angle sensor, reprogrammed computer and all lights off and running good. Steering angle sensor is a DYI... Just need a screw driver, a small hammer and wrench.

Thanks. Where is located this sensor?

For my model, it is located in the steering column under the "knee area" dash trim

In my case all the warnings lights were due to a faulty ABS module failure. Dealer was asking 1500eur for it, I could trace the original manufacter in Spain "Bosh" and manage to get it for 350eur.

I am kind of sh!tting myself that I am having a gbx issue coming on... I stood under the chassis last night in the lube shop as I had heard this 'clacking' noise when I shut the car off, like gears missing, happening since the weekend, and here's what the underside looked like; I got someone to shut the car off and the sound is definitely coming from the top of this unit.

Yup, either flip that gear, or buy a new one and swap it in there. Speedogears.com.

Well, put me down as a fully paid-up member of the 'stripped-gears club'- I didn't have the reverse Torx tool to pull the actuator off on Fri so I had to wait till my parts guys were open this morning - lucky I did as not only did they replace the plastic gear as if they had done the same thing many times before, but from the back office the boss happened to pull a very nicely machined BRASS gear which we swapped in. He gets them made up himself.
The really telling difference after this fix was the shifting using the tiptronic 'manual' - recently there was a long delay between pulling the gear shift and the actuator 'bumping' the car into the next gear, maybe one second where the revs carried on climbing before the change kicked in. This delay has completely gone, and the progression with Auto is once again very smooth. Plus all those annoying warning lights have gone off for good. Apparently the oil in the previous picture is from a busted oil seal under the exhaust side, so I need to see to that next.
Here's the nicely rutted plastic gear, the opposite side of the plastic gear (intact), and the new brass one we put in.