[Tallicia]

So, this might save others considerable headache, or just having to ask a neighbor for a tow home from a couple miles away.

My DCT decided to stay stuck in park upon startup. I had just driven it a few miles, parked, picked up groceries for 15-20 mins, then came out to head home and got a nasty message that indicated driving was possible, but acceleration would be limited.

But I could not shift into reverse or drive. I was stuck in park. So I look under the car, just very little A/C water. No catastrophic explosion or signs of a meteor hitting the transmission.

A few weeks ago, I replaced the valvetronic motor and eccentric shaft, torque and MPG were very good again. I replaced the oil filter housing gasket and walnut blasted the intake ports and valves a couple weeks after and she was becoming very frisky again. And last night I had just replaced the alternator pulley, the 2 deflector pulleys, tensioner with pulleys and serpentine belt. The test drive last night had her purring and squirming with each wiggle of the of my toe and we were very happy. Very very happy indeed.

So, WTF!? I just drove here, everything is running great, the engine is smooth and eager, and all I'm getting is Transmission malfunction!? and I'm stuck and my milk and eggs are not liking this snotty bmw attitude one bit!


So my neighbor arrives, and my neo chrome tow hook becomes functional, not ornamental. I drop the top and we begin the trek home, albeit with less of a fun factor than it should have been. The tow straw actually untied literally just as we were coming to the last turn before the cul de sac and I was able to coast right up to about the sidewalk in the driveway, but no way going to make it up fully. And there's no way we were gonna push it in a garage spot. It's more steep than it looks, just trust me.

We talked briefly about installing some lag bolts and ring to cord pull it in, or winch. I didn't want him to hold up his breakfast with his wife and needed some time to decompress, investigate and think. So begged him to go and I'll see what I can determine.

Well I pull the cabin filter cowl checking for a wire that might have melted or something!? Pull the intake, plastic over the head, and notice the oil pressure sensor plug is waving, "Hi, Good morning, How are you?" right at me. I stare in disbelief. I think If the ECU thinks there is not enough oil pressure, or a bad signal, why not stop the car from generating load..... so let's see if this is it.

So I plug it in, plug the intake sensor back in and start her up. transmission is now happy to go into drive..... reverse... drive... park... drive.. SMFH.

So I slowly drive in to the garage.

I was able to clear all the transmission and engine codes with a Carly bluetooth adapter I had in the glovebox.

Then I reassembled all the bits I took off, when I should have just taken off the one slip and pop plastic cover on the front of the engine and looked for the loose oil pressure sensor wire.


This is probably worth cross posting to many of the DCT / N55 ( or N5x ) areas. But clearly some sensors can have wide reaching impact thanks to various cross ECU logic, that we should all have access to.

Now why have no single indication that this was disconnected until about 5 - 15 miles of driving and then decide to program ECUs to render the car immobilized!? from a protection stand point, ok, but use the damn info system and show what the heck is actually going on!


Also engaging the emergency Neutral when Park is stuck for towing is so absurdly difficult. more so when frantically watching eggs and milk go to waste...

So I must have started and stopped the car two dozen times gone for 4-5 test drives, filled up with E85 mix, covered somewhere around 15 - 25 miles even, and not one indication it was unplugged. I'll check my google maps tracking maybe and see.



TL;DR - Oil Pressure Sensors if disconnected will eventually eliminate the DCT from engaging reverse or drive.

:there's not an emoji or smilie that appropriately captures this: :not even close: