Anyone have any idea what this transmission whine is?
 

Hello all,

So I have a 2012 X5 xDrive35d that I custom ordered and purchased brand new four years ago. Warranty's gone and it is almost at 46k on the odo.

As luck would have it, two months after warranty, I start hearing this whining as I'm accelerating and I believe it is coming from the transmission. The sound increases and decreases as the RPMs go up and shifts. No noticeable decrease in vehicle performance and no lights on the dash.

The whine sounds like an electric golf cart or sometimes like a crying cat. It's most noticeable between gears 1-3. It happens when the vehicle is both cold and hot. The sound also happens if I lay off the gas approaching a red light and let it coast.

Does anyone have any idea what the heck this sound is? I'm hoping it's something simple (low ATF fluid?) that perhaps a transmission fluid change may fix. I've looked around on the underside of the car and my garage floor and have not found any indications of leaks.

Below is my video of the noise. I manually shifted so that the RPMs can go higher and it can be heard easier but it does it normally on D as well.

UPDATE: It was a bad idler pulley. See my post on Pg 3.

How far out of warranty??? BMW has some leeway.

Do you have a good relationship with your SA?

Let us know when the warrant ended...

Warranty ended April 30th, 2016. I have no relationship with any SAs as I have only been in the shop for scheduled maintenance, recalls, and two CELs in the past 4 years. I also go to one of three different dealers depending on their convenience to my location.

Does the whine increase/decrease with RPM? Sounds Transfer Case to me, but I'm just shooting from the hip.


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It does increase with RPM and decreases again as it shifts to a lower RPM on the next gear

This is old, I thought I had something newer:


Here:https://batxcr1.bmwcenternet.com/lib...ce_program.htm


Too bad you didnt develop a relationship with one SA/one dealer. As Ive often said, screw the salesmen- its the SA that can make or break your ownership experience.


Id bring it in front of a dealer. I guess pick any. Understand the criteria they are supposed to use in the policy, see if you can hit those buttons.



We can try and diagnose, blah blah- but if there is any chance you could get it covered it might be worth a few $ to let them snoop around....

Does it happen when you put it in Park and rev the engine?

If not, I would suggest a tranny fluid and Transfer Case fluid change, and see if disappears.

If yes, I'd say the pulleys.

Good Luck!

Do you have adaptive drive?

I just drove around to warm up the car, stopped at a parking lot, and revved the engine on P. Yes, it still makes the noise.

I took a visual inspection of the pulleys that I could see from opening the hood. I have very little auto mechanic experience so I don't quite know what I'm looking at. I took a few pictures, all seem to be fine. The third picture is of a belt that looks like it might be off center but that might just be parallax. First pic is of it zoomed it. (sorry, don't know how to arrange uploaded photos here)

Only work I've had done that's pulley-related would be some sort of recall on a pullley bolt a long while back.

Negative. I wanted the option but passed on it because I knew I would keep this car a while and I had already read all the horror stories about the air bags developing leaks. Maybe after this vehicle dies and I decide to lease.

I say April isnt too far out. Try all 3 of them if you gont get it covered under goodwill warranty. If its something dealer could make money on they may just work it into the expired warranty. Cant hurt to try.. all 3

Called two dealers just now. First dealer tried to play the logic game with me. "So your warranty expired, and you're wondering whether it's covered under warranty?" Second dealer was much nicer and they said they will see if it can be covered but I'd have to come in to get it diagnosed first, costing up to $160 and seeing if that will be covered by BMW. Set up an appointment... it's three weeks out. Ouch. Just hope it's something stupid like maybe needing more fluid somewhere. I'd gladly pay that. If it needs a new transmission and they won't cover it... jumping ship for a Japanese car.

When you had the recall work done, do you recall the SA you dealt with?

Go back there, find him by name and have a chat/ "Hey, you were very helpful with the recall, I am having and issue- the car is just out of warranty- and I am wondering if, in your opinion, this is something I should have you look at." See if he/she will give you any positive indication.

Just an idea.

Setting up an appointment, telling the telephone clerk the issue- them already having the vin pulled up as out of warranty(and the days' cars all listed on the service managers hit list) is not when you FIRST want to see if they will be nice.

Verify that it's not the steering pump. In park, crank the wheel to one side and hold it firmly against full lock, see if the sound gets louder. That sounds like the noise mine made, but a steering fluid flush cured 90% of the noise.

If you haven't already, try turning the AC off and see if that makes any difference. I've change many noisy AC compressors through the years.

I had an annoying whine that developed in my 35d and it was a bad alternator bearing.

Symptom: engine whine, increased with engine speed, whether in Neutral or Drive. Also, any other failed bearings in the belt pulleys can make the same noise. Just get your assessed and go from there.

I replaced it with a new alternator, although I probably could have found a reputable shop to rebuild it but decided to just go with new.

Next step, you can let somebody rev the engine while you put your ears close to the pulleys and see if it gets louder. If you can pinpoint the pulley that'll be the best.


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Tried that, sounds the same. My father had an E39 with a screwed up steering pump and that hilarious sound it made still is in my head... doesn't sound like that. The sound I'm hearing sort of sounds like what happens when you leave the transmission at a lower gear and accelerate slowly but never shift up... like a gear is spinning too fast

Makes no difference. I also did just that in the YouTube video in the original post (you can see me turning it off so my phone can try to capture the noise better)

Just called one dealer to see if I can get the transmission fluid changed and to get a quote on that.. was told it's lifetime and they simply don't do it unless it's leaking. I asked how much it would be to check if it's leaking and top it off and he said it was over $200... lol.

As you've mentioned the noise is engine speed dependent, and occurs in Park and Drive, it's directly connected the engine and not the transmission. I wouldn't touch the transmission or transfer case as the noise is still made when it's disengaged when you shift it to Park.

You need to find a good independent shop to get an assessment of what pulley bearings are out. A good shop will have a good stethoscope to use see which is causing your noise. I've listened to your video and it sounded just like my bad alternator bearing. However, any pulley bearing can make that noise.

Thank you for your reply. It looks like this might be the answer. I parked the vehicle, pressed on the gas with the door open while standing outside. Then I did it again with the hood open and it is definitely louder. I'll have a friend verify it this weekend when I have someone to help me but now it defintely seems to be coming from the engine bay. The hard part now, if it is a pulley, is finding out which one is making the noise. Hopefully, it's the pulley with the bolt replaced from the recall so I won't have trouble having it repaired free.

Try it with the a/c blower off. I had one that everytime I accelerated it made the blower motor whine. This happened shortly after I got mine. That was roughly 85k miles ago. Its starting to do it again...

I have a similar whine with the AC on when accelerating. Just popped up this summer. I rolled my eyes when I made the direct connection to having the AC on. Im thinking its the AC Compressor.

I'm thinking its the alternator. Have any decent mechanic listen to the engine. On the plus side your issue is consistent and easily reproducible. If it were me I'd walk into the dealer I bought the thing at and tell them to send a master tech out to the parking lot and take 3 seconds to listen to the engine and no I'm not paying a $160 diagnostic fee. You should also get the details on the recall work done on the pulley -- the dealer that did the work will have it. I'd be suspicious that they screwed something up during the recall work.. good luck

I think you're right. So I tried listening with the hood open to see if it's one of the pulleys and the sound seems to be coming from the driver side (where the alternator is). I drove the car today and hear sometimes a faint noise as if plastic is slapping something repeatedly (but it's not) so I'm leaning very heavily towards the alternator. I'll see if BMW will cover this under goodwill warranty in two weeks :(

UPDATE: I went to the dealership to get it diagnosed for $160. They gave me a loaner for a week so I will count it as a rental cost

The result was a failing idler pulley. They wanted $1,000. I said no... I'd rather use the money on some new tires and a vacation. I bought a new pulley from their parts dept. for $55 and installed it myself. Took me 6 hours because this was my first time working on this car so I wanted to be careful, there was a lack of DIY on the Internet (not many people have the diesel apparently), and I am an idiot in general. Thank goodness the fan in front is electric and is technically only held on by two tabs (as opposed to my father's old E39 which is connected to the engine).

Now the whine's gone! Wheeee!

Curious WWONG did the noise change with AC on / off. I have a similar noise that changes in volume with AC off but don't entirely go away. Wondering if it might be the same.

No it did not. The idler pulley has nothing to do with the AC. Its function is... well, just spinning around with the belt. Sounds like you might have a problem with your AC fan.

Thanks for the response. After reading some more of the previous posts I think I'll wait another month and just cut the AC belt to see what happens.

Hi WWONG, I am about to undertake the same repair on my 2011 35d for the same whine, plus my X5 has 81,000 miles on the original belts & idler pulleys and is time for some preventative maintenance. Did you approach your pulley swap from the bottom or did you manage to reach it from the top? Doesn't seem to be much room up top and would like to know if it's possible from below. I've worked on cars for years now, including 6 different BMWs but don't want to get started only to find out I can't reach everything. Thanks in advance.