[Doctor X]

Will appreciate the support.

So I am now aware that BMW has a extended warrant specifically for the upper/lower grills that stop working.

My lower active grille stays open - I used to hear it try to close after shutting my car off. It had like a clicking sound.

This is limited to 15 YEARS/150,000 MILES.

I went ahead and emailed BMWUSA sending them my VIN to double check that my car qualifies.

So I brought my car into the service department of BMW they told me that they will fix the grills if the failure was not created by an outside force (rock hitting the assembly/debris/blockage etc); and if it was then they will charge me $250 for the repair and the diagnostics. I was asking the service guy if instead of the repair I just want to know what the issue is and he said regardless they have to pay there operators so it's a flat fee of the $250.

Which is somewhat understandable..

From the active grille pdf - it states that performing the vehicle test (vehicle diagnosis) is under a qualifying repair labor code. So I don't know what they service advisor is pushing the $250 so hard just to see whats wrong with my car. I've emailed BMWUSA once again to ask them if checking diagnostics will be covered through this warranty. Those service guys are very schemey..

Something that was bothering me is that in these forums it's been common that the active grills will send a CEL ahead of time.

My car has not sent a CEL - I've posted the faultcodes that my car pops up and someone responded saying that it's active grille realted.

The service advisor also asked if my car sent a CEL and I told him no.

He then went to tell me that most of these problems is DME related with the active grille.

What I'm ultimately skeptical about is if they go ahead and start the diagnostics and look through my DME to see that I've flashed it through BM3 as well as anything related to my bimmercode programming, as well as fullscreen apple carplay-oem supprt. (I'm wondering if there programming will erase all my current data)

Apart of the active grille fix is a software/DME programming.

So I'm wondering if I should flash my car back to factory and lock the DME through BM3 - I'm sure they will still see that parameters were changed. Not sure if this will help anything.

[Joe-BMW33]

I can understand your anxiety about the BM3 flash and your warranty as well as them wiping out your coding. That said, this dealer and service advisor sound like real tools. I think this is your first issue. I bring my car to my trusted dealer and tell them what's wrong and drive away with the loaner. No threats of a $250 diagnostic fee or speculation of road damage.

Honestly, if my grills failed and they noticed a rock chip, my service advisor would tell the tech to ignore it and write it up per the TSB. My car is also Dinan tuned and exhausted and they know it and don't care. My service advisor also knows to not update the software in the car without asking me. Last time in for a new seat sensor pad they wanted to flash the whole car to activate it. Instead they installed it and I activated it myself with the help of the ProTool team.

My point is, this dealer is a bad apple. Take is somewhere else.

[Doctor X]

Originally Posted by Joe-BMW33

I can understand your anxiety about the BM3 flash and your warranty as well as them wiping out your coding. That said, this dealer and service advisor sound like real tools. I think this is your first issue. I bring my car to my trusted dealer and tell them what's wrong and drive away with the loaner. No threats of a $250 diagnostic fee or speculation of road damage.

Honestly, if my grills failed and they noticed a rock chip, my service advisor would tell the tech to ignore it and write it up per the TSB. My car is also Dinan tuned and exhausted and they know it and don't care. My service advisor also knows to not update the software in the car without asking me. Last time in for a new seat sensor pad they wanted to flash the whole car to activate it. Instead they installed it and I activated it myself with the help of the ProTool team.

My point is, this dealer is a bad apple. Take is somewhere else.

Thanks for the feedback.

Damn my dealership is nothing but rats is what it seems like hahahha.

At least I know that there are some good ones out there.

Super frustrating man.

[Joe-BMW33]

Originally Posted by Doctor X

Thanks for the feedback.

Damn my dealership is nothing but rats is what it seems like hahahha.

At least I know that there are some good ones out there.

Super frustrating man.

I hear you. There is nothing more off putting than someone barking out pricing before they even look at something (not limited to cars). That $250 is that dealers policy, not a BMW policy. They are more worried that if you have to pay you won't fix it and they are "out" money. A good dealer will take the long view and treats all customers the same and assumes they will buy another car there or pay for the service. An even better dealer will find a way for you not to pay and have BMW NA pay.

[LogicalApex]

As Joe-BMW33 said it sounds like your dealership is a mess. Hopefully you have another close by…

That said, you’re in CA so technically the Extended Warranty for the active grills doesn’t really matter to you as you always had coverage for 15Y/150K miles. BMW just extended coverage for this part in non-CARB states to match the CARB state coverage period.

But my limited understanding of CARB coverage rules is the CEL has to light up for it to activate? Or it has to fail an inspection. If the light is required. It will light up eventually with the grills failed. My car does a test every start up for them.

https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/tsbs/20...04648-9999.pdf