[nazali]

OK, so this may well be a problem with other models
I urge you to check.

My previous thread on how "short is short" blew up when my car died.

This is a warning on absolutely mental BMW design. Water and Electrics don't mix, just like gas and fire. So WHY you would design to run cables under or near to overflows is bloody well beyond me.

This is not about bad technology but BAD f888king design. No not bad, shit design.

So, on BOTH sides of the car, there are water runoffs AS should be, my 1 series had them, in FACT my 1 series died the same way when ice damming melted in a hot engine bay, after an ice storm.

I had NOT tied the fact that water run-off caused this issue. I thought about the last time my car died, and it died after a rain storm, and opening the bonnet to check the battery, a whole slew of water came off, on checking battery, it went from 12 to 11 to 10 to well, me running to start the car and it dieing.

The time before that, there was a heavy rain and as I parked the car I slammed the brakes on as I cat got in the way, causing the car and contents to lurch forward, next morning, car died.

The 1st time even though I "think" it was the dashcam, I can't remember if it had rained, So we'll give it the benefit of the doubt.

BASICALLY.............

On the passenger side, there is a run of to what only looks like a bowl, through sediment, it had blocked and it was full.

UNDERNEATH, that point are electrical cables in front, the +ve cables, on the passenger side, same thing a while load of cables and the fileters on the bottom

These look to be designed for drips of water, not sure how they would cope with heavy rain, or car washes. BUT for sure over a year of my car sitting, silt blocked that drain in the bottom.

Causing for all intensive purposes WATER to cascade over cables, live cables and egresses.

THAT my friends is the shittiest thing I have EVER seen in a car in 35 years of wrenching, including that US pony car which exploded in crashes... Well maybe not. My 2 previous Shitboxes NEVER had that kind of arrangement.

NOW you may say that an engine bay is designed for water, a lot of the cables and stuff is sealed etc etc.

YES I will give you that. BUT through hot/cold cycles things break, loosen, this is a new car with 2000km on it and a small cup of water in the engine bay has managed to kill the car not ONCE but twice.

I don't expect a $50k+ car to do that.

"Discharge while stopped" MEANS the car is having a problem, nothing to do with how much you drive. A BMW should NOT die on you because you drive 3 miles a day.

YES warn you, shut down systems, but not bloody well have an all out cardiac arrest.

A new battery, all tests show the battery is fine but it was being shorted out. I WONDER how many people are having this problem and are changing batteries, or putting the car on charge or driving mulitple miles.

When the dealer SA tell's you your 50k car is broken because you dont drive it enough, needs to be b*tch slapped.

IF the car was doing from new, I get it, but how can a car with 3-4 months of no issues, suddenly die, because of NOT driving enough. LISTEN TO YOUR BLOODY CUSTOMER

As part of Pfaff's maintenance they do a fluid check, how long does it take to unblock this drain. They have these cars 100's a week, they MUST know this problem.

If this car was not under warranty, I'd be billed for this crap.

PLEASE dear friends, check your car's and pass this on.

I have changed my driving habbits and am going to over the next week, start putting things back into the car.

Photo's to follow

[nazali]

pics

[nazali]

I'm planning on getting some waxoyl or similar and spraying it in the crevices and cables

[XutvJet]

How are you certain this is the problem? The connections there are of an all weather design and it's not like everything is sitting in water. Again, you tapped into a main part of the wiring harness and connected a device that would put a constant draw on the system AND weren't running a trickle charger when hardly driving the car.

Lastly and more importantly, as the owner of the car, it is your responsibility to maintain and clean it including those drain spouts. I inspect and clean those at at least once a month.

It sounds to me that your actions are most likely the cause of your issues.

I look forward to your constant "stream of consciousness" responses to your own thread.

[nazali]

ok, so I'm not too big too take advise,
although I def think there are 2 things going on

1> above I noted that when I was checking voltages after the deluge of water from the bonnet, sprayed down and flew water from the punchbowl, it all died,

2> I thought I had it, so I begrudgingly, had another look, pics attached. bearing in mind this set-up installation worked TOTALLY fine since July, and the first that it died was in September, maybe cooler weather ?

As you can see from the first pic fuse 146 is standing proud, now I thought that was because there was some kinda fuse adaptor in there ? Or longer prongs or something, when I scanned the car getting home there was NO CODES and everything worked fine, including all systems of the car.

If you look at fuse 100, THAT is sitting normally.

Anyway I pulled the fuses and as you can see how the adaptors work.

Anyone want to say I told you so feel free to, BTW, pulling thoes fuses gave me the same top not latched error messages I was seeing when the car died and came back

when I pulled the fuses I did it with car live (i.e. didn't remove the negative)

Drove around the block, had the batt discharge error, and now it's on the charger

[nazali]

pics

[celsdogg]

every fall and spring I clean those and all other weather strip areas for leaves and debris. it's a pita in this location. I stick a shop vac with a crevice tool in and then shoot an air compressor to dislodge stuff.

[WolfGTI]

So my two cents:

I bought my 2 series new, it lived on the driveway / in the garage depending on weather / time of year. For the first 3 years of it's life I drove it to the tune of almost 20,000 miles per year. Since the pandemic, it has barely done 5,000 miles per year. When I was driving alot, and even with the reduced usage I do not have the issue you are experiencing, but I do clean my drainage gutter 2x a year.

[nazali]

txs guy's. I do admit, that after finding out about blocked gutters in the 1 series, I do do that and was intending on doing that as part of my monthly schedule, but I had forgotten to check on the 2 series, I guess in summer, when I got it, the water in the gutters were evaporating and I was using it a bit more. So maybe that's why the problem only just surfaced.

Have no problem in cleaning them and checking them however.

[nazali]

I actually reached out to the DC installer, and got a reply, there is more, but this is just the bare bones

"As for the fuse not being inserted all the way, we can certainly resolve this, but based on the pictures I can see it was seated and would have been making connection, also that fuse is/was for the ACC (accessory/switched trigger), and not the battery (constant) feed (constant is yellow), so the issues you encountered were not related to this fuse. Obviously though, once we reconnect for you we can insert it in at a flush level as the other fuses (but as mentioned we know the fuse was making contact as the way it was installed previously, the fuse tap (which is the blue "foot" attached to the wire) is slightly larger than the plastic surrounding it, so it makes the fuse fit tighter (but STILL makes connection)."

[High Desert]

It is recommended, by most camera manufacturers install instructions, that the power should be connected, in BMW's, in the trunk rather than be front fuse box. Most fuse boxes have a cover. Was yours taken off because of the fuse tap during install?

[jzeiler4]

Yes not driving far enough will eventually kill your battery. Take for example starting your car consumes 70 Ampere Hours (AH) of energy from the battery. The alternator can restore 30 AH for every three miles you drive the car. After a weeks commute you have consumed 980 AH by starting the car for each trip to and from work. But you have only replaced 420 AH with the alternator. You will eventually kill the battery. Your break even commute would need to be around 8 miles each way. All these are hypothetical numbers but are representative of your issue on commute distance.

[RoundelM3]

Interesting...my 2016 228i convertible has had zero problems with water getting into any areas that could compromise electronics. Same with my 2015 M3. Previous F30, E92, E46, and E88 models I've owned had zero issues as well. One thing I do check regularly under the hood is that the drains are not clogged with leaves/pine needles or other debris.

[nazali]

correct it is in the trunk and there is no fuse cover in the trunk

Originally Posted by High Desert

It is recommended, by most camera manufacturers install instructions, that the power should be connected, in BMW's, in the trunk rather than be front fuse box. Most fuse boxes have a cover. Was yours taken off because of the fuse tap during install?

[nazali]

Originally Posted by jzeiler4

Yes not driving far enough will eventually kill your battery. Take for example starting your car consumes 70 Ampere Hours (AH) of energy from the battery. The alternator can restore 30 AH for every three miles you drive the car. After a weeks commute you have consumed 980 AH by starting the car for each trip to and from work. But you have only replaced 420 AH with the alternator. You will eventually kill the battery. Your break even commute would need to be around 8 miles each way. All these are hypothetical numbers but are representative of your issue on commute distance.

THANK YOU this is VERY HELPFULL ^^^^^



Never been explained to me like that, my commute (is 6km one way) (8 miles = 12 km's), need to double my each way
I'm working on making that longer

[nazali]

I think it's true starting the car and idling, doesnt put anything back into the battery only coasting and braking

[albertw]

Originally Posted by jzeiler4

Yes not driving far enough will eventually kill your battery. Take for example starting your car consumes 70 Ampere Hours (AH) of energy from the battery. The alternator can restore 30 AH for every three miles you drive the car. After a weeks commute you have consumed 980 AH by starting the car for each trip to and from work. But you have only replaced 420 AH with the alternator. You will eventually kill the battery. Your break even commute would need to be around 8 miles each way. All these are hypothetical numbers but are representative of your issue on commute distance.

While I don't disagree with your conclusion, I don't understand your numbers. Here's how I would do the calculation:

A starter draws typically less than 200 amps for, say, 5 seconds. That's 200 amps times 5 seconds divided by 3600 seconds per hour equals 0.28 amp hours. Nowhere near 70. Similarly, at 60 miles per hour, three minutes is 0.05 hours. To produce 30 AH of energy in 0.05 hours your alternator would need to produce a current of 600 Amperes!

I suspect the current draw of the computers is mainly what kills the battery, because they are on all the time. Adding starting twice a day just kills it a little sooner. When my car sits for two weeks it takes about 8 hours for my C-TEK charger to top it off. I haven't timed it, but when I make 8 minute low speed trips most days it takes just about as long to fully recharge the battery. (I aim to take a long drive every week when I working on my plane every day, but sometimes I just can't fit it in and I top up the battery even if that doesn't do anything for the water in the oil.)

[jzeiler4]

Originally Posted by albertw

While I don't disagree with your conclusion, I don't understand your numbers. Here's how I would do the calculation:

A starter draws typically less than 200 amps for, say, 5 seconds. That's 200 amps times 5 seconds divided by 3600 seconds per hour equals 0.28 amp hours. Nowhere near 70. Similarly, at 60 miles per hour, three minutes is 0.05 hours. To produce 30 AH of energy in 0.05 hours your alternator would need to produce a current of 600 Amperes!

I was just throwing some guestimates to give him the flavor of not driving very far after a start. Your figures just make the case even stronger.

I fully concur with the rest of your comments on where the "juice" goes. The battery monitor circuit activates every few minutes to check the condition of the battery and is probably the biggest draw on a long sitting car battery.

[XutvJet]

Originally Posted by albertw

I suspect the current draw of the computers is mainly what kills the battery, because they are on all the time. Adding starting twice a day just kills it a little sooner. When my car sits for two weeks it takes about 8 hours for my C-TEK charger to top it off. I haven't timed it, but when I make 8 minute low speed trips most days it takes just about as long to fully recharge the battery. (I aim to take a long drive every week when I working on my plane every day, but sometimes I just can't fit it in and I top up the battery even if that doesn't do anything for the water in the oil.)

^Yep to the above. The stock AGM battery in the M235 is robust, but these cars can put a heavy drain on them even when the car is off and they can take a long to recover during driving and/on a trickle charger.

My car spends its evenings in an insulted garage and I drive approximately 30 miles a day, much of it at constant speeds over 45mph. Even in the summer months when I put the car on a trickle charger once a month, it takes full 12 hours on the C-TEK charger to top it off. In the winter, I put it on the charger two or three times a month and it takes well over 10 hours to fully charge.

Keeping these batteries charged as much as possible greatly increases their life. I'm approaching 6 years on the original battery and its showing no signs of weakness.

For another example, my son's 2015 Subaru Outback 3.6R (formerly my wife's car; bought new) is on it's 3rd battery. Why? Because that generation Outback had far more electronics than the past and Subaru still spec'd a marginally sized CCA lead-acid battery. Even with using a trickle charger, we get about 2 to 3 years out of a battery on that car.

[nazali]

ok.
so what's happened this week,

1> Sunday night I pulled the fuses off the dashcam wiring, put new ones in place all flush.
2> Then I had it on charge for Sunday night & Monday Night, Tuesday Night I took it off charge
3> Was using from Monday and Tuesday, just going to work and back, no shuffling no nothing. 6.8 km's either way
4> Coasting a lot of the way, (see the blue line moving)
5> Yesterday we had a lunch, so I did the following
i> drove 6.8km > work > drove home 6.8km did not switch of engine, drove to restaurant approx 8km > parked > drove back to work about 7km > parked > drove home 6.8km
6> did not put it on charge,
7> It rained like a mother
8> car wouldnt start complained hood not closed, eventually got it started, drove 6.8km to work, I couldnt do anything, as I was late, drove around a few blocks, parked up
9> car would not start, this time gave error that time was 00:00, eventually started, had to endure, top not closed error all the way home.
10> Parked up, put a charger on 14.xx volts

That's where I am at the moment.

I checked under the hood, nothing wet, or pooling water, checked the fuse box under the hood, couldnt find the hood switch to see if it got shorted

I managed to work out a route 15minute (22min's with traffic) drive to work (26km's both way), utilising maybe 10km's of highway, 13km drive one way, so double my drive.

I am at a total loss, I had been doing LESS driving before BMW got there hands on the car and re-flashed it, and the dashcam killed the battery.

Was shuffling the car on and off the drive, going up the road for 1.2km drive, I am dreading winter snow, I can't keep a car on charge daily and not be able to just drive it up the road and do some local drives.

I should need to drive 30km's a day one way.

Driving the car with lights off (DRL's only, no heater, no electronics, no nothing, except iDrive on),
By the way I did NOT get since Sunday or Monday the getting "Electrical discharge while car is stopped error message" yesterday or even today after I drove the car and parked up...

It took all of Sunday and Sunday night for the Ctek to get into the 7th stage *fully charged and on maintainer) and I left it on till Monday morning

[nazali]

***update***

I put the car on charge when I got in approx, about 5 hours ago, the ctek was stuck on step 3 or 4 difficult to tell,bulk/absorbtion, and I wasn't really paying too much attention to it.

The reason I was out, because it was hammering it down with rain and I had meant to cover the windscreen "gulley" with an ice sheet thing,

So low and behold after I covered it, it jumped straight to 7 float fully charged,

ow remember I said EVERY TIME I had an issue was after rain, and when it wasn;t on charge and the last time it was taking AGES to charge and it wasn't charging fully.

Now this is time number 4, yesterday, (or in the night it had rained. 2 days pervious not on charge no rain started up.

I'm planning tomorrow on clearing the garage and parking the car in the garage away from the elements. I wanna see if this helps. at least I can put the charger on anyway.

I'm also planning on having BMW look at it again, but I'm taking it to a different dealer, depending on what happens or what they find, I may insist on replacing the battery (I remember someone saying that it might be the dashcam has killed/damaged the battery) and flashing the car BACK to the software it had, they may not be able to reflash it back, but luckily I have the versions of software it had and is now..

May charge me, don't care, I can't live with a car that's doing this.

[aerobod]

From the pictures you posted, the wiring seems to be more exposed than it is in my car. I’m wondering if you have had damage to the wiring caused by mice or other vermin?