[kramunda]

I was on a busy highway last week when my collision warning came on, then the entire dashboard went black. There were no cars within 4-5 car lengths. I made it to a red light at an exit and decided I should restart and hope the dashboard came back online. Put the car in park and hit the engine shut off, nothing happened. Tried to shift back to drive, nothing happened. I was completely stuck with no way to shift gears, no hazard lights, and no way to shut down the engine. After a complete fiasco with roadside assistance, I got towed to my dealership (which took forever because the car couldn't shift to neutral), but it was closed. Nobody at BMW roadside, including the master technician, could tell me how to shut off the car. After 4 hours and 5 phone calls, a friend came and pulled the ecu plug. Once service started working on it, they were unable to start the car. They had to unbolt the back seat just to get to the trunk because there was no power for the locks. They ordered a new FEM module (from Germany), and finally got the car to start after it was installed.

Has this happened to anyone else? It's a 2016 228i xDrive.

[Luddy]

I had a very similar issue happen at around 1000 miles but thankfully wasn't on a busy highway. The tow was a fiasco. The first tow truck they sent asked me to take it out of park and I couldn't. So they had to send another truck with dollies. It was a lot of roadside sitting. My car was not stuck running. My dad used to be the service manager at the dealership I go to so I knew the shop foreman pretty well. They had to jack the car up in the parking lot and manually disconnect the parking brake. Then had to remove the rear seats the same as you.

https://www.2addicts.com/forums/show....php?t=1267426

Good news is they replaced the FEM and battery (since the car sat with the tail lights on all holiday weekend) and it hasn't been an issue since. At 25000 miles now. *knock on wood*

It was totally frightening the way it shut down on me though. Let us know how it goes!

I really think this will be a similar faulty FEM and you will be good for years to come. Their are a few other stories about this on the forums but not many.

Edit: I was in a 2016 m235 xdrive

[Xi-Xi]

Originally Posted by kramunda

I was on a busy highway last week when my collision warning came on, then the entire dashboard went black. There were no cars within 4-5 car lengths. I made it to a red light at an exit and decided I should restart and hope the dashboard came back online. Put the car in park and hit the engine shut off, nothing happened. Tried to shift back to drive, nothing happened. I was completely stuck with no way to shift gears, no hazard lights, and no way to shut down the engine. After a complete fiasco with roadside assistance, I got towed to my dealership (which took forever because the car couldn't shift to neutral), but it was closed. Nobody at BMW roadside, including the master technician, could tell me how to shut off the car. After 4 hours and 5 phone calls, a friend came and pulled the ecu plug. Once service started working on it, they were unable to start the car. They had to unbolt the back seat just to get to the trunk because there was no power for the locks. They ordered a new FEM module (from Germany), and finally got the car to start after it was installed.

Has this happened to anyone else? It's a 2016 228i xDrive.

Hasn't happened to mine. But I'm curious how many miles were on the car when this occurred?

[kramunda]

Around 13,600 miles.

[3rdcoast228i]

My 2016 228i is at about 8600 miles. I will report back here if it happens to me.

[Maynard]

I'm in a '16 228ix at about 21k miles, no electrical gremlins, but I also didn't get any option packages which probably makes some diff in the systems.

[Rayscott]

I got a 2016 228ix with 9500 miles with all options except THP. No issues here.

[ramy_who]

Originally Posted by kramunda

I was on a busy highway last week when my collision warning came on, then the entire dashboard went black. There were no cars within 4-5 car lengths. I made it to a red light at an exit and decided I should restart and hope the dashboard came back online. Put the car in park and hit the engine shut off, nothing happened. Tried to shift back to drive, nothing happened. I was completely stuck with no way to shift gears, no hazard lights, and no way to shut down the engine. After a complete fiasco with roadside assistance, I got towed to my dealership (which took forever because the car couldn't shift to neutral), but it was closed. Nobody at BMW roadside, including the master technician, could tell me how to shut off the car. After 4 hours and 5 phone calls, a friend came and pulled the ecu plug. Once service started working on it, they were unable to start the car. They had to unbolt the back seat just to get to the trunk because there was no power for the locks. They ordered a new FEM module (from Germany), and finally got the car to start after it was installed.

Has this happened to anyone else? It's a 2016 228i xDrive.

That's horrifying. I had a friend go through the same thing with his M235 but he wasn't in the car when it all happened. Apparently his car got struck by lightning and when he tried to start it all the electronics didn't work. I'm glad everything worked out in the end for you. Keep us updated if anything happens again.