Its a 2006 E61 520d Today the amber warning for the steering lock being on came on on the dash with the message about it possibly not starting on the centre display. The steering lock comes off fine, the car starts and drives. I charged the battery his afternoon but it doesn't appear to have changed anything. Is there a common fault with this and any potential solutions? This light has flashed up a few times over the years and always gone off when I have wiggled the wheel but not today.
Don't know if it could be related but I think i have a wheel bearing with a little play on the front left.
I fitted an ELV emulator - so hopefully the fault count wont keep increasing and end up in a no start situation. It hasnt cleared the dash warning though so I still think i will need to get the counter reset. I am going to order a K+ DCAN lead and copy of ISTA as this will come in handy for other stuff anyway.
Hi, I don’t know if this is of any relevance, but around 2006 BMW’s had a problem with electric aided steering. My Z4 experienced a locked column, complete with dash warning,which was replaced under warranty.
Having read around, it seems that the CAS logs faults with the ELV. Once the fault counter reaches a certain number (don't know what that is) it triggers the warning i have. If it continues and reaches a higher limit, I think it locks out and prevents a start. I think its an anti theft mechanism amd assumes the elv has been fiddled with. Whether the faults occur over ten minutes (I.e. someone IS trying to disable the elv) or 20 years doesn't seem to factor in the count. My elv has certainly failed to release a few times over the years but a wiggle of the wheel and all is good. It's obviously done that one too many times. I'll get some proper diagnostics sorted and reset the counter and see where we get to. I shouldn't have any further faults with the emulator fitted.
