Need help!! Car broke down during road trip
 

I was on a road trip to Canada and the red battery sign came on. Car drove fine but then afterwards I started getting lot more signs, I got the awd sign dsc abs then trans malfunction then the screen turned off and car did not accelerate at all. I turned it off and then the car doesn’t turn on at all anymore. I’m going to get it tower but what should I do ?! Have no idea what it could be. Battery ? Alternator ? https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/202...15e1f513ba.jpg
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Alternator quit providing enough energy to sustain vehicles electrical loads.
You continued to drive depleting the battery's charge.
Error msg's are likely due to falling system voltage.

Could be a few things. In my order of likelihood:

1. Drive belt snapped (could be the belt, but usually because of a pulley/tensioner problem) causing no alternator charging to the battery, eventually battery ran low on voltage causing modules to report errors. Eventually battery got too weak to start car.

2. Alternator crapped out (either electrically or mechanically) causing above symptoms after battery couldn't support the car anymore electrically by outputting enough voltage/amperage.

3. Battery completely died causing above electrical problems.

Good luck. Hopefully it is just a snapped drive belt... but seldom am I that lucky so I wouldn't count on it.

Thanks for everyone’s quick reply! Is there a way I could check if it is the alternator or battery ? I will check if the drive belt snapped once it gets off the tow truck.

If the drive belt snapped you would have lost power steering also and most likely wouldn't have been able to drive further. In order to check charging you need to jump start the X5, hook up a voltmeter to the connection points in the engine bay (one under the red plastic cover the other to the body). The voltage should be in the 13.7-14.7 range but typically around 14.0 volts.
If it does not charge even with a brand new or newly charged battery you won't make it far.

Agree with new2bimmer, interested to hear how it goes. Sorry it happened on road trip, esp one out of the country.

My vote as well.


As the voltage drops the car tries to segregate load to the most essential stuff, triggering more errors.... then finally death.


Friday afternoon too. What a PITA.

Thanks for all the input guys. Unfortunately now I need to figure out how to replace the alternator in Canada during a long weekend [emoji24]. Do you know if the alternators actually go bad or is it just the voltage regulator? I replaced a voltage regular in a Porsche 997 and it fixed the issue. Assuming the process is still the same though.

Does anyone know if need to remove the ac belt to remove the serpentine belt ? I read that I need a special tool to remove and install the ac belt which I just don’t want to deal with right now. Just need to know if it’s possible to remove the serpentine belt enough for me to remove the alternator and I’ll replace the ac belt later when I get back home.

Which year & engine?

2007 BMW X5 3.0si with 4 zone climate control

Vin : 5UXFE43597L018367

No need to completely remove the belt. Disconnect from alternator and let hang. You will need to replace the (4) aluminum screws that attach alternator. If you re-use them they will break. If they break on a running engine you'll have have a real mess.

Great! Thanks so much. Yes I purchased new screws as well

I have a dumb question for the experts here - can the suv technically turn on if the battery is fully charged but there’s no alternator in the car ? I kind of wanted to test and see if my battery is okay (which is seems like it is since I put it on the charger and it said it was fully charged with 13 and something volts. Didn’t want to mess with the electronics tho and haven’t tried it

Your truck was running with w/o an alternator when battery light was on and before the battery was depleted, so it should start and run w/o alternator present. Code(s) will likely be set because DME can't communicate with voltage regulator. On some Bimmers the CAS-DME alignment needs to be re-sync'd after running or attempting to start with an undercharged battery. This is part of the X5's theft prevention system. INPA/ISTA/Foxwell can re-sync if needed.

Hmmm so is It concerning that the charger said my battery was fully charged and then I tried to turn it on with the alternator out of the truck and it didn’t start ?

I would be concerned.
To be clear when you attempt to start, the starter does turn the engine over but it doesn't start?

Yes but now that I think about it - it won’t start because the serpentine belt is off because the alternator is not in. That makes sense right ?

No. That engine should run w/o alternator belt.

Ugh okay. What do you recommend I check next?

Keep your battery on charger. Scan for codes w/BMW capable reader.

Leafsrule, you need to be a bit more specific about what is the current state and what you are trying to do or check.
With the battery charged fully the truck should power up, the engine should turn and start since the alternator only start charging once the engine is actually running.
If the belt is off and the alternator it out I personally would not mess with it. You have the charging cables hanging in the engine bay, the main power cable is hopefully disconnected at the battery or in the engine bay main connection point. In this state the truck will not run.

- Was the battery charged and the alternator diagnosed to be bad after starting the truck?
- Was the alternator taken out then and you are waiting for a new one (in this case you have the cables disconnected and the truck will not run)?

Back to something PV said...if, during a period of low voltage, the CAS has lost sync, it may inhibit starting. I think it will CRANK, but it wont START.


Use these two terms appropriately, they arent the same

It's a fairly common situation where voltage gets too low and EWS loses sync. I dunt know why they let it crank to give you hope that's stupid. My previous cars wouldn't crank when EWS fault, also would light up something on the dash to alert me to the problem.

I just wanted to thank everyone for their invaluable help and almost instantaneous responses as soon as my car broke down. It was a really stressful scenario since I was in a different country and no tools on me. I truly cannot thank this community enough for their support.

It ended up being the alternator. I didn’t want to go this route but I was able to get the alternator remanufactured and it works perfect now. I read a lot about how lot of these places will use cheap Chinese parts and the alternator wouldn’t last more than 15k miles which is fine. I paid $150 cad to get it remanufactured and borrowed my friend tools to put it in.

Once I get back to US - I look into putting a new one in from fcp. Unfortunately it’s pretty pricey at $600 since I have the 4 zone climate control but I’ll cross that bridge later.

Thank you everyone again!! Really appreciate it.

well done.


At least it was in CAD, eh?


;)

On my e53 I used a reman from O'Reilly with lifetime warranty.

I first got bosch and had the chinesium VR fail on the second drive. They let me exchange to valeo model for the price difference of $7 and that one lasted for the duration of that car (killed by deer).

Nice work. Glad you got it sorted relatively painlessly.

Ah, road trip repairs... been there.

Great that you got back on the road... too bad about the Leafs though!

This is the one I got for my N62 4.4i, air-cooled:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/290786378197

Not OE, but the vendor had and has great feedback. I wasn't impressed that the original only lasted ~40k miles. Replacing the VR on the original didn't work.

Both ebay and amazon are known sources of counterfeit products labeled as OEM or some reputable manufacturer. I'm not saying all of them are fake but it is a hit or miss.

True. That is why I pointed out that the seller of the alternator in question has a very high feedback rating.

In any case, I bought the VR I tried prior to getting the new alternator from FCP Euro or ECS Tuning, not eBay.

@haigha the leafs are an extremely sensitive subject … more sensitive than my car breaking down in the middle of Canada [emoji24][emoji24]