(Confused) Hydraulic roof motor disconnect

I can't manually take my top down whether the red ring is pushed in or pulled out and turned. Is it possible that the hydraulic motor disconnect is... well... disconnected?

My 2003 Z4 roof has worked flawlessly for the two years I've had the car. This morning it took a bit of wiggling, then went down, but went back up fine when I got to work. After work, it disconnects from the windshield and windows lower, but does not fully retract. Red blinking with the button held in, not yellow.

After some searching, I found out about the disconnect in the trunk and thought I'd try using the roof manually for a bit. When I checked the trunk, the ring was pulled out completely, which seems to be the "manual" position. Again, the roof has always worked up until now. I pushed it in and tried the roof with no change to operation. I pulled the ring out and twisted it - expecting "manual" mode, but in that position I'm not able to lower the top by hand.

Thanks for any input,

-Stu

PS - haven't checked the drains, yet, since I can't get the top down... but, seems as though this is a motor failure. I didn't see anything that indicated clearing the drains would make the motor work again.

When you pull the red hoop it pushes a valve button in on the pump. The valve is brass i n a steel housing, so the chances are that the valve has fused. Only a spay of lubricant and a tap with a hammer will free it and to do that you'll need to get the pump out of its location.

A bad design really that after the primary method fails 10+ years on, the backup method also seizes as its never been used .

You ideally need to extract it, service it and then relocate it to the boot

Thanks so much for the detailed response! Looks like I'll try to fix that while I'm in replacing the motor.

Number5 response is very helpful, this thread and photo should be stickied.

I had exactly the same issue of the brass push valve button being stuck, searched on various forums but no photos or information about this valve sticking, only generic forum responses "relocate your motor to the boot" which is absolute fuch-all waste of time responses. After trying to turn it like a bolt with vice-grips the brass valve loosened and I was able to pull it out along with the spring inside.