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208: BMW X5 No Start After Engine Swap
208: BMW X5 No Start After Engine Swap
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About this episode
A challenging diagnostic case involving a 2012 BMW X5 that wouldn't start after an engine swap is dissected in detail. The host walks through troubleshooting relay control issues linked to the DME (engine control module), uncovering a short to ground caused by a faulty aftermarket ignition coil. Despite initial confusion and multiple code resets, collaboration with BMW experts and thorough testing led to identifying a blown internal fuse in the ISM relay unit. The episode highlights the complexity of modern BMW electrical systems, the importance of proper parts, and the value of expert advice and persistence.
Topics:
bmw x5 engine swap
no start diagnosis
dme relay control
valvetronic system
ignition coil failure
short to ground
ism relay unit
module cloning
voltage drop testing
aftermarket parts issues
Cars:
BMW X5
Today on the show I'm sharing a case study on a 2012 BMW X5 that cranks but does not start after the engine was swapped. The vehicle was purchased from the auction with a blown motor and sat for year before the shop got around to replacing the engine.
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"...to share it with everybody. So this is a 2012 BMW X5. And the shop called me in so they swapped an eng..."
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Hey, what's going on?
Automotive World.
Welcome to another episode of the Automotive Diagnostic Podcast.
My name is Sean Tipping.
I'll be your host once again for today's episode.
Thank you so much for joining me.
I'm going to share another case study where I got my butt kicked, because that's what I want to do on this show as much as possible.
To be clear, I do fix a lot of cars and a lot of them are not that hard.
A lot of them end up being real easy stuff.
But I'm doing an increasing volume of diagnostics and with that, just by law of averages, you're going to get some that challenge, you can kick your butt, and those are the ones I want to talk about on the podcast.
So if you listen to this and you're like, wow, sean's also getting his butt kicked on cars it's not every day, all the time, but it is becoming more frequent because I'm seeing more vehicles and this is one of them and again want to share it with everybody.
So this is a 2012 BMW X5.
And the shop called me in so they swapped an engine over on this thing.
Now they did buy this from the auction.
It's a used car lot.
They're doing this as a resale deal, but they swapped the engine over and after they swap the engine over, it won't start Cranks, but doesn't start.
Okay, and there's a ton of reasons why this could happen A lot of things that could have been overlooked or missed, and we don't know.
Did this thing run beforehand or not?
But they know it doesn't run now and they want me to diagnose why it's not starting so they can get it going.
Okay, cool, now let's service it off, or I'll definitely come in and do that.
They did mention that the old engine, because I asked them why they replaced it.
The old engine was mechanically severely damaged Right, had detonated inside for one reason or another.
Okay, cool, but we still don't know if it ran beforehand or not.
But it doesn't run now, so let's look into it.
To this they also mentioned that it sat for a year plus before they did anything with it.
Okay, and that's important to know too, because it could just be bad gas, right, who you know might have been sitting for a long time could have got water in the fuel tank if it was outside.
Things were exposed as possible too.
These are things that I'm going to ask and get as much information as possible before I jump in to a vehicle like this.
So I'm going to start with a full system scan see what's going on with this thing, and the relevant code that I had out of this thing was a 3719.
That's the code I got out of the tool that I was reading it with.
First.
There's another reference for this code 1f0514, or a P10E3.
If you've dealt with BMW codes, I think it definitely depends on the tool you're using and the service information you're using, what code descriptor you're going to use.
But anyways, the definition for this particular code and this is the important part it says Valtronic supply voltage, short circuit to ground or open.
So this is power supply to the Valtronic, which is the motor that's going to move the camshaft, the eccentric for the camshaft to change the depth of the intake valves.
On this thing and the way that this works is the DME, which is the engine control module for BMW.
So if you hear me say DME in this episode I mean engine control module.
It's got a grounder relay which is in a separate unit called the ISM over it's under the hood and the cowling on the passenger side area it's going to ground a relay.
That relay is going to provide power back to the ISM, back to the valve tronic motor, but then also there is a feed back to the DME, right.
So the output side of this relay also feeds back into the DME and DME is going to watch that.
And that's kind of where this code comes from.
As much as I can surmise, is it saying that the output side of this relay that the DME controls is either shorted or ground or open.
And that's the code that keeps popping up.
I can clear it.
Come right back and I'm not 100% sure if this will keep it from starting, but I mean it's important part of the motor and maybe I should pause here and just say I'm working as much as I can to learn BMW, but I'm still a newbie in the grand scheme of things.
So for some of you out there listening that you work on these things all the time.
You might be screaming at certain points in this podcast saying, well, yeah, it's obvious, why didn't you check this?
Of course it was this right, I would say it's infrequent at best.
When I get these and more and more as time goes on, I am getting more experienced with the systems and with the terminology and how things drive on these cars, but it's not an everyday occurrence for me.
So some of these things are a bit foreign and I have to work my way through it.
So just want to put that out there.
But anyways, I don't know if power not being on this output circuit but this relay for the valve tronic system is going to keep it from starting or not.
But it's my only code in my DME and it's the only thing I have to go with, so I'm going to at least check it out and see what's going on.
Right, you have an issue.
Let's follow it.
Let's find out what's happening.
So verify, there is no power on this circuit.
Okay, got my test light, put it on there.
It's not there?
Okay, well, we'll follow that and figure out why, because that's what the DME is upset about.
I'm upset about it too.
So the next step is.
Is the DME actually grounding this relay right?
The relay is supposed to provide power to the circuit.
It's not.
Why not?
Now, I should say this ISM unit, this little encased black assembly which has relays inside of it that are not serviceable.
It also has fuses inside of it that are not technically serviceable, unless you're real aggressive with a razor blade or some sort of cutting device and you take this thing apart.
But you can't just pop the fuses and relays out of this.
It's one black sealed unit, but anyways, one of the circuits into it is a ground control from the DME to turn on this relay.
So I don't have power out of it.
But do I have control to this relay?
So I checked that I don't have control to the relay and the DME is supposed to be provided in ground here.
So what am I going to do?
I'm going to ground it and see what happens.
So I ground this relay, I jump a ground to it and I get power out of the relay.
So, from what I can tell, the DME is not doing its job.
All right, simple enough.
Now I am testing at the ISM.
So my next question is okay, well, they just put a motor in this thing.
What are the odds?
Maybe there's an open circuit or something like that.
Let's go to the DME, which is not also the easiest thing to do on this X5.
The DME is like tucked under and literally kind of inside of the intake manifold.
If you've ever worked on one of these things, like seriously, if you unbolt the DME, you have a hole in your intake manifold, but it's tucked up underneath.
You can get to this particular connector somewhat easily though that has the control wire for this relay.
So I do, I get there and I'm doing the same test I did over at the ISM, right, is the DME grounding it?
And it's not.
There is no ground, but I can ground it at the DME and the relay still activates and still sends power to this valetronic unit.
So I know that the circuit is capable of grounding it, but for whatever reason, the DME is not actually doing its job and I say, okay, well, if this is my problem, let me ground this relay and then see what happens.
What meaning does the vehicle start now or does something different happen?
Do I get a different code once I get past this problem?
Well, the first thing that I did, before I even attempted to crank this thing.
I was like clear the code out.
I just wanted to see what will come back.
Now I get a different code set this time and it's very similar in nature.
But what it says instead of the valve tronic supply voltage it says Ignition and fuel injection relay supply voltage short to ground or open.
And this is now a hard code, right.
So I've grounded the Control side for the valve tronic relay.
It's sending power to where it's supposed to.
But now we get a code for the ignition and fuel injection relay.
Now if you look at the diagram on this thing, that relays also in the ISM.
It's right next to it and the circuits are right next to each other for the control to separate control wires, to separate relays, but different circuits.
Now these circuits are gonna go out, they're gonna feed fuel injection components, ignition coils and also back to the DME.
And Part of the reason the DME is setting these particular codes is it's really upset about the output side of these relays, based on what I'm seeing.
So now I'm gonna check that relay right, I've already been in both of these areas.
They're both exposed.
I've seen the circuits and now it's setting a circuit for this ignition and fuel injection relay and I mean I'm gonna definitely check this because if this relay is an active, I could really believe that it's gonna prevent the vehicle from starting.
Now.
I don't know why this code wasn't in there to begin with, but it's there now and it's a hard fault.
So I check and I check the control side of this relay first, just based on what I've seen with the valve tronic one, and it does not have a ground, just like the valve tronic one did.
So I do the same thing.
I ground it, I hear the relay click and I checked power.
I Should say I checked power on one circuit.
There are multiple output circuits for this relay.
This is future Sean talking past.
Sean didn't know that there was multiple outputs for this relay or didn't pay attention to the fact there's multiple outputs for this relay.
Anyways, the relay did activate when I grounded it and it did the same thing.
I went over the DME and I grounded it there and the relay activated and Then my code was gone.
The only code that I had at this point was if I did a full key cycle, which I had to do in order to get the vehicle to start, and it did start, but if I key-cycled it.
It then set a Code saying that the control side of the relay was stuck to ground, and of course it was.
I was doing that.
I was forcing both of these control wires To ground in order for both of these relays to activate, because the DME had wasn't doing it for whatever reason.
But after a key cycle this thing started and ran.
Now, I didn't run it for long and that's a really important thing to point out and you'll understand why.
But I didn't run it for long because they just put this engine in here and I didn't know even if it had oil, and I honestly didn't even check that, I was just seeing did it start?
But it did.
It fired up and it ran for a few seconds and then I hit the button, I shut it off and I'm like, okay, well, I'm making some serious progress here.
Right, for whatever reason, these relays aren't being powered up.
Okay, so after that I'm gonna go through and see why isn't the DME Activating these relays?
Like what's preventing it?
What is it seeing or not seeing that it's causing it to?
You know, not ground these relays.
Now, when I had these relays grounded again, the only codes that I get then is a code in DME saying, hey, our control side of these relays is always on ground and and again it was I was doing that.
I would expect those codes to be there, but no other codes, and it starts okay.
So I don't see any other direct problems that exist on this thing.
I think had I run it now, I think had I ran the vehicle for a period of time, I probably would have identified the issue quicker.
But I didn't.
Just because, again, I didn't know that this thing was in a kind of state to run or if they were ready for it to be running.
I assume they got it to that point when they swapped the engine.
But I don't like starting things in shops.
I'll say no for sure that this engine is okay to run, it's got oil in it, it's got all the components bolted to it, so on and so forth.
But anyways, my main focus right now is why is the DME not grounding these two control relays?
What's going on here?
So I go through and basically what I'm looking for is powers and grounds, ignition wakeups, all this other stuff.
I go through, I check all the ones that I can find on a diagram and it has everything.
It's got all the powers.
It's got all the ignition wakeups.
I think honestly I did miss one, but it didn't matter that.
I missed it Again future Sean talking there.
But everything I could find in the moment was there All the grounds, all the powers, everything was there.
It's not grounding these relays.
And I did ask the shop.
I was like I assume you guys swapped over this DME and I was pretty confident that was the case, otherwise there would have been anatheft issues.
They're like yeah, this was the original one that came with the car.
I'm like okay.
I was like well, it's not grounding these relays and I can ground these relays and it starts and I don't see any reason why it isn't grounding the relays.
I think it needs a DME.
I don't know.
We don't know where this car came from, what the condition was beforehand.
Okay, it's that outside, whatever.
But hey, this is what I know, what's going on.
So they're like, okay, cool, can we do a used one?
Sure, can, I'm cloning it for you because I like cloning stuff.
I get excited to do that when I can because you know I buy all the programming equipment.
I want to use it.
And so like, yeah, we can definitely clone that thing for you, I get to use one.
Make sure the part numbers match and we'll get it all cloned up for you.
So we do that.
They get a DME for it from a junkyard, the correct one and everything.
I cloned it over and I actually plugged this thing in myself.
They kind of they had a unbolted intake manifold for this portion, but I plug it in myself and I key it up and I get the exact same thing.
It's not grounding either of these relays with the new one.
And so I'm you know I'm immediately thinking back to my Volvo If you listen to this, the episode of the Volvo where I cloned over a problem into another used module.
I'm like, maybe I did that on this one, so that's possible.
And I actually called Fonsil and he said, yeah, that's possible, but it's really not likely.
I'm like, yeah, it's really not likely, but at this point I really wasn't sure what else it could be.
I go back over, I retest all of my tests, right, I verify that the problem is the problem that I'm seeing.
We're not grounding these relays, but I can ground them at the DME.
They activate, they send power where they're supposed to, or so I think I didn't start it at this point because they had the intake manifold off.
Again, had I run this thing for a while, probably would have picked out the problem a lot sooner.
Check my powers and grounds to the DME again to make sure I'm not missing anything.
Again, everything checks out the way it's supposed to.
I even checked the case of the DME to make sure it had a ground.
It was all there.
And at this point I was like, hey guys, I got to do some research, I got to reach out to some people because I'm kind of at a dead end.
I don't know what else would keep this DME from counting these relays, but two different circuits.
I'm not deciding, I'm not going to do it.
So that was the point where actually I called Fonzlo, was talking to him about it on my ride home and he suggested calling Justin Morgan.
And I don't like to bug Justin because I'm sure there's a million people every day.
They call him on BMW stuff.
So I don't want to be one million and one if I can help it.
But he is the guy.
He's the guy if you want to know BMW stuff.
But I decided to reach out to Justin and see, you know, hey, can you give me some pointers or tips here and he was extremely helpful and give me a lot of really good information and what to check and some things that he's seen on these very commonly relating this issue.
I said, okay, well, this is the obviously really good information.
I will check all this stuff.
And it was with control circuits and voltage drop on the control circuits that has some potential problems.
And he listed a number of other things and it was actually funny because the last thing that he listed ended up being the problem.
I can share that immediately, but he did mention the exact thing that was wrong.
It was just the very last thing that he mentioned in his list of things that could cause this and he described the circuit to me a little bit and sent me some service info and, again, really, really helpful.
So I want to give big shout out to Justin for taking the time to send me information and share that with me.
That's huge.
I really really appreciate that and again I'm just going to say it again, so sorry, for everybody has teared again.
You know, make friends with people because you're going to need them at one point or another or it's going to make your life a lot easier at one point or another, because they can point you in the right direction.
Even if they don't give you the answer, they will point you in the right direction.
They will help you or even connect you with the right person, right?
That's, that's the thing, so, all right.
So, anyways, I'm going to go back to the thing next day.
I'm going to solve this freaking car with all this information that I've got now.
So I go through and I check some of the things he's talking about.
Really, look at the voltage drop on the control circuits between the DME and this ISM.
All right, those all seem to be good.
The other thing that I did was I really looked closely at all of the output circuits, and particularly for the ignition and injection relay circuits, right, because the valve tronic I think there was only one coming out of this relay, this ISM, but for the ignition relay one, there was two of them and for one of them I didn't have power coming out of there and I don't think I had
checked all of the output circuits for this relay.
I thought I did, and maybe I did at one point, I'm not sure, but at this point I'm checking all of them, I'm looking at all of them, I've grounded these relays right.
Again, I'm grounding the relays, I'm forcing them to close their contacts and send power out on where they're supposed to, but one of the output circuits does not have any power right, but the input of the relay does, and the output of another leg of the relay does, but one doesn't.
So I'm like, oh okay, well, it's inside of this ISM, right.
And I look and there's a fuse internal to this ISM.
I'm like, well, maybe this fuse is popped right.
Well, let me try providing power to this circuit.
Well, I do this.
I do this with a jumper wire and I've mentioned before I like to live on the edge.
My jumper wire is not fused, but when I connected this thing to the output circuit of this relay, it popped, it cracked.
You could see an arc from my alligator clip to the output of this circuit, which I immediately took it away.
I'm like that's not normal, that's that's a problem.
Like we have a potential fuse blown inside of this ISM and when I touch the output of this thing, like there's some serious current going through this, it's like I connected it from one side of the battery to the other.
Like, okay, well, I think I'm onto something.
So I power up my test light, I touch it to this wire and it is brightly lit, meaning I've got a straight shot to ground, just like my jumper wire was kind of telling me, like okay, so I have a short to ground on this circuit.
Now I'll fill you in on one of the last thing that Justin had told me.
He's like try unplugging the coils one at a time and see if the DME comes back and does what it's supposed to do.
And if you follow the current path or the output path of this, this circuit that had a short to ground and had a fuse blown in the ISM, it goes to the ignition coils and I thought I actually disconnected the connector.
The very back connector on the DME has the output circuits for the coils.
When I unplug that, my test light at the output side of the relay at the ISM turned off, basically meaning there's no more short to ground, right?
So the short's not in the DME, the short is through the DME but out on this leg of the circuit going to the coils.
Now I just have to figure out which coil right.
So then I pull up this connector and I have my powered up test light and I touch all of the coil wires until one lights up and then I use my you know the pinouts and diagram and cylinder number five, I pull the coil out and I'll put a picture in the Facebook group.
This thing was just all melted to hell.
Okay, now this is a brand new China eBay coil that somebody had put in this thing.
They all were, the whole thing was all China eBay coils.
I don't know if the shop did this or where they got the motor from, did this, but it was the cheapest one possible.
Now the question was was the driver in the old DME failed?
That causes things short?
Yeah, maybe, but I'm willing to bet this is like some sort of you know Chineseium, real, just junk, cheapest part that they could find that they threw into this thing and it shorted internally, melted down, shorted the ground, caused a short to ground on the output circuit of this relay which caused the DME to shut down.
Now, why did it shut down the valve tronic relay?
I don't know.
Is that some sort of default?
I'm not entirely sure.
I don't have an answer for that.
Maybe some of the BMW guys can tell me that for sure.
Why didn't the ignition injection relay circuit code pop up initially for me.
Why did it take fixing the valve tronic to get that one to show up?
I don't know.
I don't know the logic of the DME.
Maybe a BMW guy can explain that to me as well.
But what I think I understand a little bit more clearly is that the code that it was setting, when it said short to ground or open circuit, it really meant that hey, there could be a short to ground and you need to check for that.
And I didn't.
I did not check for short to ground.
I overlooked that the relay circuit for the ignition injection relay had multiple outputs.
And when I ran this thing, I think had I run it for ran it for a little while longer, I would have noticed, hey, there's a really bad miss.
Now would I have picked up on it and realized it was my problem?
Given that they just put an engine in this thing, I probably am like, yeah, you probably got a dead hole, you probably go fix that or, you know, put some plugs in it, right?
I don't know that I would have picked it out, but it would have been a giveaway at that point because that coil and whichever other ones used that power output were not functional.
But I also wonder when did the fuse pop?
Was it popped the whole time?
Did I pop it while I was forcing the relay to close?
A lot of variables on this one that I don't quite have the answers for, but I do know the solution.
Right, we put a coil in it.
We ended up the shop ended up replacing that ISM because, like I said, you can take a razor blade and cut this thing open, but the fuses are not serviceable in a normal sense and they decided to leave the clone DME in there.
I told them I was like there's a chance.
The driver in the old one took it out, although I don't think that's what happened.
They're like that's fine, we already got it cloned over, we're going to leave that one in there.
It did start, it did run, they got it out of their shop.
They were happy.
But that was a struggle.
I made a bad call.
As far as I'm concerned, I made a bad call.
I overlooked something and I want to share that with everybody.
So if there's some real, genuine BMW gurus out there and I know there are, and obviously I was describing people I talked to love to hear your input, your perspective on that, maybe how you would have approached it how you approached it in the past, how you identify something like that, because I definitely missed what I needed to see based on the scenario, based on what I had going on.
In the future I'll understand this one a little bit better, so it's worth getting my ass kicked on this one, but hey, that's why I want to share it with you.
Thanks again for listening.
Really appreciate it.
I hope everyone out there is doing well, making some money with that out of the way.
Let's get out there and start fixing the world, one card at a time.
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