Maintenance overdue

[phillynative70]

I took my car to a BMW mechanic cause it was bought from an auction and I wanted to have it "checked out". Now tonight I look in the glove box and find the Owner's manual. Now I see that the service interval display is on red which indicates the maintenance is overdue. Since the mechanic did a diagnostic test on the car, should he had mention that the maintenance is overdue, or some code should've told him this also? All he said is that he would reset the computer because the check engine light wasn't on when I brought it to him, so the codes that came up were stored in the memory. Along with the red light lite for the inspection the "transmission-control module for electronic-hydraulic transmission came on too. And the car stalled and I had to turn it off and re-start it. Am I looking too far into this car "possibly" having problems?

[CirrusSR22]

The service interval display is not much more than a complicated timer. It has no bearing on the car's status or condition, unlike a check engine light. In fact, my car is very well maintained and works perfectly, but the inspection light has been on for years. I'm just too lazy to reset it. As long as the car has been serviced normally (oil changes, coolant changes, etc.) don't worry about it.

Is your transmission light on? I think it's a round gear looking thing.

[phillynative70]

It only came on when the car stalled. Should I go start it again to see if it stalls

[phillynative70]

I forgot to mention that my brother installed a starter and radiator temp sensor

[zboot]

Originally Posted by phillynative70

It only came on when the car stalled. Should I go start it again to see if it stalls

Wait. . .so what are you saying?

How do you know the car needed maintenance when you first bought it if you never saw the light until you just stalled?

BTW, that doesn't make sense. . . the lights should be illuminated when the car is on. So, next time you go and start your car, take a look at the lights. I don't think you're supposed to stall the car to figure out whether it needs service.

[phillynative70]

At the auction site, I was by myself, and it took 2 times for it to start. When I first got the car home my brother looked under the hood. He fixes cars but isn't a licensed mechanic, and it took a couple of tries for it to start. And said it needed a starter, so I got one on-line from a BMW site.

[bullmand]

Given that you don't have a lot of information about the car's history and it's already having issues, it may be a good idea to just take it to a dealership and have them perform Inspection 2. The inspections are usually a fixed price (several hundred dollars) and you don't have to have them fix anything, just tell you what, if anything needs to be replaced. Doing this might save you money and heartache in the long run. Many of the regular maintenance things you've asked about in other threads would also be taken care of during the inspection. There's a list of what they include here.

[zboot]

I'm still confused about the timeline of events.

This is the order in which I think things happened:

1) You buy car at auction.
2) After two tries at getting it started, you manage to get it home.
3) Your brother looked under the hood. And tries to start it a couple times before it finally catches. At some point he stalled the car.
4) Your brother reccommends a new starter which you buy online and install.
5) You take your car to a mechanic for inspection.

I'm assuming you noticed the light around #3. The light should always illuminate the current state of the maintenance time, not just when the car stalled.

Also, that light has nothing to do with diagnostics on the car, it's just a suggestion to the driver. If you get a car serviced and they forget to turn off the light, then you'd have a car that was ok but still saying it's past due for service.

In your first post, you mentioned that: transmission-control module for electronic-hydraulic transmission came on. Did this happen after the mechanic reset the ecus or before? If you remember, he had to clear out the DTCs in memory so that the car would rerun the diagnostics tests and present the current problems. You should expect to see new codes popping up after the mechanic did this.

[phillynative70]

To answer your question about the transmission-control module, it happened after the mechanic put it on the diagnostic, but it hasn't happened since. I'm still taking it to the dealership tomorrow because I have to start the car a couple of times before it would start, maybe it's the single digit weather here in Philly the other day. I will present the problems to the mechanic at the dealership.