background: car went to body shop to have rear impact damage fixed, no problems before hand even after the damage before the repair.

got car back, battery not charging up properly, drivers side window acting funny (ie tried all night to go up and down on its own w/o a key in the car i found out the next morning when i heard it trying on its dying battery power). dash cluster doesnt work (mileage works, lights work, not gauges).

I replaced the alternator, thats fine now (thanks chris). Window motor is not even in the car anymore, gauges still jump and drop back down periodically and sometimes constantly. Since the alternator was replaced the onboard computer with the outside temperature sensor has went nutty, grounding out to read a constant -34 degrees F.

Voltages are normal, to my knowledge nothing else is acting funny.

Any ideas? or any place that can do an electrical diagnostic for less than $75 an hour?

7/28/2005 4:32:08 PM

Quote :

"car went to body shop to have rear impact damage fixed, no problems before hand even after the damage before the repair."

why are you even bothering to find out what's wrong and fix it? take the damn thing back.

7/28/2005 4:47:45 PM

i did and they refuse that there was anything in the rear that they could have fucked up

7/28/2005 5:04:57 PM

you havent bitched loud/long enough

7/28/2005 5:08:35 PM

try pulling all the fuses and adding them back one at a time, also inspect the parts of the wiring harness in the back. aren't there a bunch back there with the battery?

7/28/2005 5:20:39 PM

theres a few.. but i cant really get to a lot of em without a lot of work

the fuses ive messed with em, havent tried pulling em all and replacing one at a time, thats a thought

7/28/2005 5:57:25 PM

electronics ground wire would be my first guess, find out where the harness ground points are and check that they all have less than a 1 ohm path back to the negative battery post

7/28/2005 6:01:17 PM

^ thats what i think it is too, but isnt that a lot of research/work for someone who doesnt know the wiring of the car at all? lol

7/28/2005 6:02:53 PM

not really, just follow the harness until you find a wire going to ( or not going to) a bolt on the chassis, or check on mitchell and use the wirng diagrams or components locater for the ground points

7/28/2005 6:05:46 PM

Damn G Yates, no good news yet?

7/28/2005 11:32:36 PM

not really :\

7/29/2005 1:21:57 PM

check the wire harness that's is attached to your trunk near the hinge on the drivers side. you'll have to cut the insulation off so be careful not to cut any wires. i've read on bimmerforums.com that over time with the opening and closing of the trunk the wire can start to split and cause all kinds of electrical problems. did they replace the trunk? what all was done during the repair?

i'll see i i can find the link on bf.c

7/29/2005 2:36:17 PM

trunk replaced, trunk itself bent back into shape, bumper replaced, both quarters bentback into shape

7/29/2005 2:38:22 PM

i found the thread. i also posted the first part of it here.

http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum/showthread.php?t=79896

Quote :

"Hey guys. Just letting you guys know to be carefull because I just caught something really bad in my 325is. I was driving one day and then all of a sudden things started to go really wrong. I lost my headlights, I had no interior lights, no dash lights, and no turn signals. MY OBC was going crazy saying all these electircal failures were going on. It was night and all that worked were my foglights to light up the road. I stopped by the dealership I work at and opened up the fuse box and saw about 10 fuses blown. I replaced them all and then they instantly blew out. Then we noticed something interesting, all my lights didn't work, except my tailights. They were still lit up. The mechanics traced all these problems to the wiring harness that goes from the car to the trunk. If you look on the left side, when your trunk lid is up, you see a thing of wires wrapped up in a black covering. We took off the covering and you won't beleive what we found. ALL THE WIRES OVER TIME RUBBED AGAINST EACHOTHER AND THE WIRE COATING RUBBED OFF EVENTUALLY AND ALL THE WIRES WERE TOUCHING EACHOTHER. FROM YEARS OF OPENNING AND CLOSING THE TRUNK, THE WIRES GET WEAK AND SO DOES THE WIRE COATING. Mine was really bad, it went all the way into the car, luckily it stopped before it went deep into the car where I would most definetely not be able to reach it. I RECOMMEND EVERYBODY CHECKING THIS OUT ASAP. SAVE YOURSELF ALOT OF MONEY AND PREPARE AHEAD. I INDIVIDUALLY WRAPPED EACH WIRE IN ELECTIRCAL TAPE. IF THIS HAS HAPPENED TO YOU, POST. I can't be the only one. UPDATE : YOU HAVE TO TAKE OFF THE BLACK PLASTIC COVERING AND THE RUBBER LIKE TUBE TO EXPOSE ALL THE WIRES BEHIND TO BE SURE IF THE WIRES ARE FRAYING. YOU WON'T BE ABLE TO TELL ANYTHING WITHOUT CUTTING THROUGH AND SEEING. It makes sense that when you open and close your trunk that those wires are going to rub against eachother everytime you open and close. (i moved this from deep in the thread to up front.) i posted this a few months ago, but i want to stress the importance of checking this) UPDATE : MY CAR CAUGHT ON FIRE LAST NITE. BE CAREFUL. I CAUGHT IT BEFORE IT CAUSED ANY REAL DAMAGE BUT THE FRAYING HAS BECOME WORSE AND LIVE WIRES BEGAN TO TOUCH EACHOTHER. CHECK EVERY INCH OF THOSE WIRES. IF I DIDN'T NOTICE A FLICKER IN THE LIGHTS AS I WAS WALKING INSIDE, I FEAR MY WHOLE CAR WOULD HAVE WENT UP ALONG WITH MY HOUSE. I AM WRITING A LETTER THE THE NHTSA TO GET A RECALL ON THIS. THIS IS REALLY BAD. ANYONE ELSE WHO HAS SYMPTOMS OF THIS OR SEES SIGNS OF WIRE FRAYING, POST....IT'LL BE MORE BACKING FOR THEM TO DO SOMETHING"

7/29/2005 2:39:28 PM

well i checked a lil of the wiring, didnt pull the whole thing out for inch by inch inspection, but what i saw the wires were still greased up pretty well and didnt have hardly any friction touching each other, when its not about to rain i may pull the whole thing out

[Edited on July 29, 2005 at 2:50 PM. Reason : .]

7/29/2005 2:47:51 PM

it's possible that they damaged the wireing harness when removing the old trunk or while installing the new one. it's also possible that they didn't snap the connector in all the way.

7/29/2005 2:58:20 PM

they "supposedly" checked over everything last time i went and bitched but i dont trust it

7/29/2005 3:02:21 PM