Lots of weird electrical issues

[djacinto]

Hey folks,

Got an interesting one for you. I’ve posted multiple times on different issues but now I think they’re all connected. Today we had a lot of rain and as my girlfriend was leaving in the 1, she said the wipers weren’t working.

She comes back and takes my other car and I saw 2 codes for wipers blocked and relay level 1.

Additionally, we’ve been having this issue where on startup, the gauge cluster flickers back and forth. Not like a twinkle to a dwindle, it’s more of an on off sort of thing. At first I thought this might be the light rain sensor as maybe a faulty one would cause both of those problems.

But then the trunk wouldn’t open. Tried the button by the door, the key fob and checked the valet lock to no avail. And then the ac panel stopped working. The ac panel I’ve seen happen before where it’s popped a fuse and so I replaced it. Replaced it again today and it turned on but when I went back to it a couple hours later, it popped again!

So, I go into ista and I see that all the ecu’s show red, but I can go into the frm and jbe to trigger components. Testing the wipers, they don’t work but I do hear the relay clicking. I was able to open the trunk by triggering it in ista.

I tried resetting the module but it comes up with a data interruption error but frm allows me to flash the lights so that makes me think the jbe must be going bad

Hopefully I can get some advice here. Going to buy a used one to do some more diagnosis but any help is greatly appreciated!

[jwolf]

Have you check the connector on the FRM? Not hard to access.

[djacinto]

View post on imgur.com

[brake-fade]

Have you tested your battery? I've seen really strange things with low voltage.

[ShocknAwe]

Battery and grounds would be where I would start.

Multiple systems with issues.

[djacinto]

Battery is within 2-3 years old. It does drain faster than I’d like so I’ve considered ibs or even alternator too for drain

[djacinto]

Alright well quick update. Replaced the wiper relay with a temporary one from smp. Wipers work. Since both the relay and the ac fuse have popped or stopped working, the short is seeming to be more apparent.

I still have no trunk access from the button or fob, though like I mentioned on ista I can trigger it as a component

[PICKARD]

looking for some help here..

i store my 09 128i every winter (live in canada) and this year i found a dead battery in which wouldnt hold a charge. i decided to buy aftermarket as i'm cheap. fully charged the new napa battery which i confirmed to be equivalent to the stock battery specs. within 6 hrs of this being installed, it was down to 7volts and would not start the car. with 0 issues in the past, i re-charged said battery and it happened again. While confirming with an undersized marine battery, this same thing happened overnight leaving it connected. i can only imagine i have a leak to ground somewhere consuming the battery in a very short time period. basically looking for some pointers where to begin diagnosing this.

i am an electrician, (lazy electrician) so i will begin by checking total current going to ground from the battery but from there my head goes to pulling every fuse separately to track down which component is drawing power..

any thoughts or pointers are greatly appreciated!!