[E92Carrera]

Originally Posted by darkcloud

This thread is dedicated to all the whiners of e90post. Why? I'm sick and tired of reading all the posts about "my car broke, I'll never buy a BMW again! horrible experience with my dealer! car sucks, my breaks squeak!, etc" Scroll down the general section, theres one said post 8 out of 10 posts of someone bitching.

Let's say this once....

EVERY CAR HAS PROBLEMS, WE/I DON'T CARE HOW MUCH MONEY YOU SPENT. You think cuz you bought a BMW the entire company is going to wire your ass with gold leaf toilet paper? Shut up. I know people are just venting but damn, some of you are plain sissies. Claiming to never buy a BMW again cuz of some stupid ass issue or whatever? Get over yourself.

End thread/rant

+1

[n5160u]

One thing we should all remember is that modern automobles rely heavily on electronics for everything from smog and engine control to how the power windows behave. As you start adding features to the basic design the complexity of the electronic systems grows. Luxury cars because of their nature are much more likely to suffer from this than others. In an effort to reduce the sheer numbers of wires running all over the car most designs switched to using high speed serial data buss communications between control modules rather than depending on an individual wire for each switched function, with some models including BMW and Mercedes adding fiber-optic data paths as well.
The addition of data communication between control modules replacing individual switched functions with dedicated wires should have greatly reduced the number of physical wiring problems that could appear but any advantage that scheme might have offered was offset by the addition of additional "software" controlled features like power retention and memory settings along with stuff like pinch protection on powered openings that suddenly became expected standard equipment features. Those of you who replaced their headlight switches to gain the additional rear fog light function should have noticed that the headlight switch on an E9x does not switch power directly to the lights like the older switches but is in reality a serial data encoder with the actual power switching being handled by a control module controlled by software that adds all of those extra features like the welcome lighting, burned out lamp detection and delayed shutoff timing. This added electronics also means a headlight that does not light can be caused by a lot more than just a burned out bulb because of all the additional electronics between the switch and lamp and a failed connection on the data buss may cause several unrelated items to fail at once.

Its a simple fact of life that most electronics will fail within the first 72 hours of continious operation if they are going to fail at all. This means that until the electronic item has exceeded 72 hours of running time i.e. a xenon headlight running for 72 total hours, a simple manufacturing defect may be expected to show up within that time frame and by extension any item that has run for more than that 72 hour period will likely make it to the end of its lifetime design margin without any additional failures.

For this reason most "mission critical" electronic items like hospital life support, aircraft avionics and other systems where total reliability is required are generally subjected to a burn in cycle where each componet is run or exercised on a test bench for that 72 hour period before it is released and tagged as working. This type of quality assurance is extremly costly and is not part of any program for consumer goods like cars. Some companies may select random samples from each production batch of componets or finished products for accelerated testing to stay ahead of any new problems that might creep into componets supplied by OEM suppliers, but for most of the world the burn in phase of operation is handled by you, the consumer and the product warranty is expected to be your protection from items that fail early.

[shipill]

I'll never buy a BMW again

[Bulldog 6]

Originally Posted by n5160u

One thing we should all remember is that modern automobles rely heavily on electronics for everything from smog and engine control to how the power windows behave. As you start adding features to the basic design the complexity of the electronic systems grows. Luxury cars because of their nature are much more likely to suffer from this than others. In an effort to reduce the sheer numbers of wires running all over the car most designs switched to using high speed serial data buss communications between control modules rather than depending on an individual wire for each switched function, with some models including BMW and Mercedes adding fiber-optic data paths as well.
The addition of data communication between control modules replacing individual switched functions with dedicated wires should have greatly reduced the number of physical wiring problems that could appear but any advantage that scheme might have offered was offset by the addition of additional "software" controlled features like power retention and memory settings along with stuff like pinch protection on powered openings that suddenly became expected standard equipment features. Those of you who replaced their headlight switches to gain the additional rear fog light function should have noticed that the headlight switch on an E9x does not switch power directly to the lights like the older switches but is in reality a serial data encoder with the actual power switching being handled by a control module controlled by software that adds all of those extra features like the welcome lighting, burned out lamp detection and delayed shutoff timing. This added electronics also means a headlight that does not light can be caused by a lot more than just a burned out bulb because of all the additional electronics between the switch and lamp and a failed connection on the data buss may cause several unrelated items to fail at once.

Its a simple fact of life that most electronics will fail within the first 72 hours of continious operation if they are going to fail at all. This means that until the electronic item has exceeded 72 hours of running time i.e. a xenon headlight running for 72 total hours, a simple manufacturing defect may be expected to show up within that time frame and by extension any item that has run for more than that 72 hour period will likely make it to the end of its lifetime design margin without any additional failures.

For this reason most "mission critical" electronic items like hospital life support, aircraft avionics and other systems where total reliability is required are generally subjected to a burn in cycle where each componet is run or exercised on a test bench for that 72 hour period before it is released and tagged as working. This type of quality assurance is extremly costly and is not part of any program for consumer goods like cars. Some companies may select random samples from each production batch of componets or finished products for accelerated testing to stay ahead of any new problems that might creep into componets supplied by OEM suppliers, but for most of the world the burn in phase of operation is handled by you, the consumer and the product warranty is expected to be your protection from items that fail early.

Cliff notes please

[darkcloud]

Why was this thread moved? This isn't an OT discussion. This is people bitching primarily about their BMW's and maintenance issues.

[DreDre]

without reading all of the insanely long rants, I'd say that this thread is justified and shold not be shot down. I dont think it is a thread by a fan boy who is sick of haters, I think it is a thread by a logical poster sick of people who are fan boys that got disillusioned when their car showed some imperfection. Disgruntled fan boy = :sad0147:

[Kiemyster]

Originally Posted by DreDre

without reading all of the insanely long rants, I'd say that this thread is justified and shold not be shot down. I dont think it is a thread by a fan boy who is sick of haters, I think it is a thread by a logical poster sick of people who are fan boys that got disillusioned when their car showed some imperfection. Disgruntled fan boy = :sad0147:

perfect explanation. but im as bad as a BMW fanboy gets. i just understand that no car is perfect, and im a TRUE fanboy, no matter what problems ill get with my car, you can be assured the next car i get is a bmw.

i like to think: im getting all these problems in my bmw, imagine what it would be like if i got a ford!

[gonzo]

Hmmm.
Doesn't complaining about complaining just = more complaining.

[homeslice]

Sad thread to be honest. No happy bmw owner should take the time to make this thread. Go out and drive your perfect car and stfu.

Simple no?

If you didnt like the rant threads...why read them? Worried that your cars rep is on the line?