[Berzerker]

Before I take this to the dealer, not sure if anyone has any suggestions on what to fix look at:

Seems like my "Assist Plus" feature (the under 40mph completely hands off) has stopped working. Almost immediately when activating the system, it shuts itself off and gives me a "reduced driver assist" warning, the system then can be activated again, but the same thing happens once I try and go into the Assist Plus feature.

I was briefly able to get into the control message section before the warning disappeared and noticed the affected system was "Steering Assist" which is odd to me since the steering assistance feature works just fine above 40 and actually below 40 as well if I keep my hand on the wheel. As soon as I take my hand off, the system errors out.

I did replace the paddles with some knockoff magnetic clicky ones from Amazon, but not sure if it started before or after this. I've since replaced the paddles back to the stock ones. As they work off resistance drop across the circuit and are not actually provided power, I can't imagine this causing the issue, especially when the steering assist works just fine above 40 or with my hand on the wheel while the system is active. Though the battery was disconnected while doing the replacement, could there be a step here that requires re-calibration or some other electronic function?

I'm betting I have to take this one in, but just wanted to have anyone brainstorm anything here if they've experienced this or have any quick suggestions to try (I have run the gamut of basic stuff, iDrive reset, etc.)

[Berzerker]

Update on this: Seems the hand sensor has failed, code shows that communication to it is dead. Not sure how it works in a failed state with my hands on the wheel, but oh well.

Dealer ordered a new part and will be installed later this week.

[Needsdecaf]

Weird. Thanks for the info!

[Berzerker]

Originally Posted by Needsdecaf

Weird. Thanks for the info!

Yep very. I have a feeling it has to do with the third-party paddles.

They work a bit differently than I was expecting. Being a 2-pin connector, I figured they were closing either a "downshift" or "upshift" circuit that's read by a chip somewhere. They actually work by increasing resistance across an existing circuit, which is read as either an upshift or a downshift depending on the voltage drop. The QA + use of magnets may have caused an anomaly in the circuit which caused the sensor to fail.

100% pure speculation, it may not even be the same circuit or chip, but it's the only thing I can think of. I'm also not 100% certain (but fairly sure) it was working after I swapped the paddles.

Oh well, install is friday!

[Needsdecaf]

Originally Posted by Berzerker

Yep very. I have a feeling it has to do with the third-party paddles.

They work a bit differently than I was expecting. Being a 2-pin connector, I figured they were closing either a "downshift" or "upshift" circuit that's read by a chip somewhere. They actually work by increasing resistance across an existing circuit, which is read as either an upshift or a downshift depending on the voltage drop. The QA + use of magnets may have caused an anomaly in the circuit which caused the sensor to fail.

100% pure speculation, it may not even be the same circuit or chip, but it's the only thing I can think of. I'm also not 100% certain (but fairly sure) it was working after I swapped the paddles.

Oh well, install is friday!

Did you swap paddles back before you brought it in?

[Berzerker]

Originally Posted by Needsdecaf

Did you swap paddles back before you brought it in?

I did, but the sensor was failed at that point, so they just read the code and filed it as "replace bad part under warranty"

[forcefed]

Dealer didn't notice the puncture holes on the back of the steering wheel?

[Berzerker]

Originally Posted by forcefed

Dealer didn't notice the puncture holes on the back of the steering wheel?

Maybe not, but they have no way of proving anything I did caused the issue, so they probably just didn't bother. It's also such a cheap/easy part to replace, BMW will pay for it and approved the warranty repair, so they don't really care.

[Berzerker]

Update: It failed again, took it back in and BMW directed an entire steering wheel replacement, expected in Wednesday so we'll see if that fixes it.

[Needsdecaf]

Had you swapped the paddles back?

[Berzerker]

Originally Posted by Needsdecaf

Had you swapped the paddles back?

I did that before I brought it in the first time.

[Needsdecaf]

Originally Posted by Berzerker

I did that before I brought it in the first time.

Sorry, poorly worded my question. Did you leave the stock paddles in after the first fix? Or did you put the aftermarket ones back in?

[Berzerker]

Originally Posted by Needsdecaf

Sorry, poorly worded my question. Did you leave the stock paddles in after the first fix? Or did you put the aftermarket ones back in?

Ah I see. Nope I've had the stock paddles on ever since.

What's odd is it's been working today after getting the car back while waiting on parts to arrive lol. But I guess it did for a bit the first time too and they probably cleared all the codes again.

[SwankPeRFection]

Something’s probably causing a code to set in the system or a dependent subset of it. When that happens, it won’t work until the system retests the failed component again during drive cycles to see if it passes and if it does on subsequent passes, it self-clears and reenables the system. If it’s an intermittent failure and they read codes and cleared them before you picked it up, then it’ll work until the error trips again. Without a proper CANBUS scanner, you won’t know what’s going on and what to look for yourself or even if an active code is present when it’s not working and if it’s all clear when it starts working again.

[Berzerker]

Originally Posted by SwankPeRFection

Something’s probably causing a code to set in the system or a dependent subset of it. When that happens, it won’t work until the system retests the failed component again during drive cycles to see if it passes and if it does on subsequent passes, it self-clears and reenables the system. If it’s an intermittent failure and they read codes and cleared them before you picked it up, then it’ll work until the error trips again. Without a proper CANBUS scanner, you won’t know what’s going on and what to look for yourself or even if an active code is present when it’s not working and if it’s all clear when it starts working again.

Any ideas on how often that's done? Two days in with no issues again now.

[SwankPeRFection]

Originally Posted by Berzerker

Any ideas on how often that's done? Two days in with no issues again now.

So the failure of whatever sensor triggers the issue has to happen first… this is what breaks it all and what is intermittent. Until that happens, the other cycle of the car retesting the sensors for a pass won’t start.

Also, there is a chance that BMW may have coded this system to stay in a failed/inoperative state even if the failure point starts working again if it deals with a safety on the road system. Examples of this are electronically controlled steering rack issues or ABS module issues. It’s a high safety failure point and they want a tech to look at it and reset it before it’s allowed to be operative again. An example of a low criticality system that works on test/retest are emission control systems and something as simple as your keyless sensors in the door handles. Get water in one of those and it fails, it throws an error and may keep all doors from responding to touch… dries out and retests after a few drive cycles and locks unlocks via remote and they all start working again because the system was re-enabled since communication test passed and no more errors were detected via CAN.

[Berzerker]

Originally Posted by SwankPeRFection

So the failure of whatever sensor triggers the issue has to happen first… this is what breaks it all and what is intermittent. Until that happens, the other cycle of the car retesting the sensors for a pass won’t start.

Also, there is a chance that BMW may have coded this system to stay in a failed/inoperative state even if the failure point starts working again if it deals with a safety on the road system. Examples of this are electronically controlled steering rack issues or ABS module issues. It’s a high safety failure point and they want a tech to look at it and reset it before it’s allowed to be operative again. An example of a low criticality system that works on test/retest are emission control systems and something as simple as your keyless sensors in the door handles. Get water in one of those and it fails, it throws an error and may keep all doors from responding to touch… dries out and retests after a few drive cycles and locks unlocks via remote and they all start working again because the system was re-enabled since communication test passed and no more errors were detected via CAN.

Well if they coded it into a failed/inoperative state it shouldn't be working at all, no? Or are you saying the specific thing that failed was coded to stay failed, but that wouldn't preclude the Assist Plus feature from working properly?

[SwankPeRFection]

Originally Posted by Berzerker

Well if they coded it into a failed/inoperative state it shouldn't be working at all, no? Or are you saying the specific thing that failed was coded to stay failed, but that wouldn't preclude the Assist Plus feature from working properly?

No, what I’m saying is they scanned it to see what’s up. Did whatever to diagnose possible issue based on that and ordered parts to replace. Part of the diag steps would have been to clear all active module codes. When they did that, whatever was possibly intermittently (because clearly it’s working now) failing and causing the glitch to happen and set the error and cause the entire system to stop working is continuing to work normally now and the module error codes stayed OK and clear. This is why it’s working now.

Will it remain working? I don’t know… time will tell, but they had to have cleared the codes when they put everything back together again to send you on your way. Had the error tripped again, then it wouldn’t be working and you’d have left with the same symptoms as to when you came in. Make sense now?

[Berzerker]

Originally Posted by SwankPeRFection

No, what I’m saying is they scanned it to see what’s up. Did whatever to diagnose possible issue based on that and ordered parts to replace. Part of the diag steps would have been to clear all active module codes. When they did that, whatever was possibly intermittently (because clearly it’s working now) failing and causing the glitch to happen and set the error and cause the entire system to stop working is continuing to work normally now and the module error codes stayed OK and clear. This is why it’s working now.

Will it remain working? I don’t know… time will tell, but they had to have cleared the codes when they put everything back together again to send you on your way. Had the error tripped again, then it wouldn’t be working and you’d have left with the same symptoms as to when you came in. Make sense now?

So you're just saying it hasn't tripped the failure condition yet again, basically.

Your previous reply read a bit differently than that to me, but it makes sense now.

[MVDsF30]

I have a similar issue with this, however the car tells me to look or pay attention. I'm looking forward, I've taken off my sunglass's and stare forward and still has issues working.

[Berzerker]

Originally Posted by MVDsF30

I have a similar issue with this, however the car tells me to look or pay attention. I'm looking forward, I've taken off my sunglass's and stare forward and still has issues working.

Do you have any screen protector on the screen?

[SwankPeRFection]

Originally Posted by MVDsF30

I have a similar issue with this, however the car tells me to look or pay attention. I'm looking forward, I've taken off my sunglass's and stare forward and still has issues working.

This may sound stupid, but do you have your steering wheel adjusted in such a manner where your eyes are directly blocking inline with the sensors on the dash in front of you? It’s pretty rare, but it’s possible.