Differential has failed

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Davidcliff

Member
It seems after two months of thinking my rear brakes were rubbing and it has been driving me mad,......... the diff has failed.
Original selling dealer collected the car yesterday and left me a nice 118M to play with. At this point I cant fault the dealer they diagnosed the same day , ordered the part and unfortunately its back order from Germany but they think about 7 days . Car is BMW approved warranty thank goodness . 2011 car 36,000 miles and the diff is so bad it has to be replaced ! Lets see what the outcome is in about a week or so but so far dealer has been good and I am pleased there is a proper diagnosis . My local dealer was hopeless they have already seen the car and told me it was normal noise !
 
As a matter of interest, what noises were you getting? I think that my, recently purchased, Z4 sounds very diffy.. almost sounding like a transit van.
 
Roof down not much diff noise really, I was convinced it was brakes rubbing and I still think they are actually. A noise like pads on discs from 20mph-40mph and although they have said diff has failed I still think I have a brake noise . I am told the bearings have a metal coating that can wear off and this is what I am hearing . 36000 miles .........................

Dealer ran up car on a ramp and detected diff failure with significant noise I am told.

But with the roof up, you could hear the diff and actually just thought it was a characteristic of the car, whined when you accelerated hard and whined at speeds over 70mph. I put it down to type of car and windows up and roof up it was a noisy cabin. But I had nothing to compare it to . On reflection there was noise on overrun off throttle coasting down through 70-50mph.
 
Car is back new diff is fitted, actually looks like a different unit to the original I can see a fill and drain plug plus a large amount of metal casing at the bottom I could not see before. dealer also replaced a buckled rear wheel.
Used the car yesterday about 60 miles so far so good its all silent. What I did notice was how quiet it is with roof up now in cabin. Almost as quiet as my saloon car .
 
Well that new diff lasted 1500 miles and failed. Car is back with BMW who have diagnosed failure and are replacing with replacement unit again under warranty . Dealer has been fine no fuss or debate said they tested it , it has failed and will be replaced. Again its back order from Germany so another two weeks without the car I suggest . However its a bit odd isn't it . Diff one 35000 miles, Diff two 1500 miles, and diff three here it comes . How odd is this ?
 
Davidcliff said:
Well that new diff lasted 1500 miles and failed. Car is back with BMW who have diagnosed failure and are replacing with replacement unit again under warranty . Dealer has been fine no fuss or debate said they tested it , it has failed and will be replaced. Again its back order from Germany so another two weeks without the car I suggest . However its a bit odd isn't it . Diff one 35000 miles, Diff two 1500 miles, and diff three here it comes . How odd is this ?
Click to expand...

Odder than a pig in wellies id say but clearly not impossible :D


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The original diff from memory of my 23i didn't have a drain so perhaps the second one was not correct part ?
 
Yes I asked this apparently the replacement diffs are upgraded items and have in and out drains/fills. I am told they are an updated version due to original failures !!
Fellow I took out on test drive yesterday immediately heard the car and said diff sounded poor, the after BMW diagnostics ( ha ha ) they declared it dead. He did say they are filled when delivered and they do not add oil , even he said they would check the next one.
It must have had oil or it would not have lasted 1500 miles in hot Germany two weeks ago .
But is was winning on overrun big time when it got hot .

Lets see what number 3 brings
 
You would think that although they say they are delivered with oil that the fitter would still check the levels after fitting.
 
The diff that has failed must have had oil in , I did 1500 miles on it and it got noisy, but did not fail . A diff with no oil in fails really fast I learnt this one a car my son and I worked on last year . Did not fill the diff and it failed 1 mile from the house .
It must have been built wrongly I guess.
 
Sorry I wasnt saying that the diff didnt have oil in it, what I was saying was that it should still be checked after fitting to make sure.
 
Yes agreed , considering its a part that cost more then £2k its mad they fit and forget.
I am still dubious that the car needs another diff and the original was faulty , what ae the chances of that ?
When I get it back this time I will spend all my time listening to it :)
 
Glad to hear I’m not alone, mine is a 2010 E89 3.0 on 29000 miles. I also had a whine noise from the car about a month ago, took it back to BMW and it was diagnosed with a faulty gearbox. This was replaced with no problems under warranty, car was back in this week for the same noise. They have now told me that the Differential is faulty and are going to replace it, again, no problems under warranty. It’s on back order from Germany, hopefully be in next week.
Thank god for an approved warranty 😀😀😀
 
You can’t assume the car has been correctly filled with oil. My cousin bought a new Caterham 7 and it ran very well for a few thousand miles then the gearbox seized - it had been supplied with an oil free gearbox!
 
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