[jeepzj96]

Hi everyone, I need help..

I have a 2013 535x idrive.

I went to replace my rear brakes and rotors and when I had the passenger side torn apart, my kid got in the car and pulled up on the parking brake button. As you can imagine, I freaked out as I was not expecting the noise to come from the caliper. Once I figured out what was going on it was too late and the piston was pushed all the way out. I got in the car and the dash gave me a Parking Brake Malfunction error.

I figured out how to get the piston back in and seated and I got both sides of pads and rotors replaced, and found out that the brake pedal was soft. I figured that some air got in when the piston was pushed out, so I bled the brakes and now they work great.

Unfortunately, I can't get the parking brake to engage. Every time I try, I get the same error about the A/H error and no sound from either of the brake calipers (pistons), so no parking brake.

Has anyone had to deal with this? How the heck do I fix it without going to the dealer? Is there some way I can reset the parking brake and have the motors reengage?

Thanks everyone.. need to fix this so I can park this job..

-Hubert

[M_Bimmer]

A little vague on the details, but did not read where you used a T45 Torx tip and retracted the e-brake screw shaft.

The e-brake uses a motor to turn a screw shaft to compress, which happened to compress 100% with the accidental switch activation....so now you need to retract the e-brake shaft to 0%, and at 100% you won't get any noise from the motor. (Just use the T45 by hand and don't crank on it at all...it should rotate clockwise easily), but you wouldn't be able to reinstall your new pads on your new rotors, if you haven't retracted the eBrake screw shaft....but this is where you lost me.

You can probably find Youtube videos on other BMW models that show you how to retract the e-brake screw shaft too...

You may also want to perform a brake pad reset on your instrument cluster

Cheers!

[jeepzj96]

Sorry, I should have said that the pad replacement went as normal. I retracted the shaft with the T45 all the way to 0% so I could replace the pads. All of that went with no issues. Basically, I did the following :

- removed the caliper
- removed the old pads
- removed the motor from the caliper (2 screws in back)
- retracted the e-brake all the way to 0% using the torx
- compressed the piston all the way down
- changed the pads
- put it all back together

The problem is after I put it all back together, I can't engage the parking brake. the car drives fine and brakes, but no parking brake.

I am also unable to re-set the pad service on the instrument cluster...I'm thinking this might have something to do with the e-brake, as when I did the front reset I know I had to take the e-brake off.

I guess, to build on this, if the piston extended all the way out, could it have been damaged somehow inside? I doubt it, as it went back in when I turned the shaft with the torx, and it would only go back as much as the torx would allow it (I had to keep on turning the torx as I compressed the piston, which makes sense).

I'm thinking, since I keep on seeing the A/H Malfunction error on the instrument cluster, it means that it can't engage it, but I'm also thinking this is driven by the parking brake malfunction I had when the piston was pushed out all the way. There must be some way to erase that error or clear it from the system?

thanks for your help,

-Hubert

[Cvx5832]

Probably nothing mechanically wrong with it, at least it doesn’t sound like it to me. See if there’s a fault logged that you can clear. Not sure if you have the software to do that.

[jeepzj96]

Well.. I fixed it.. phew.. now the kid can sleep in the house again..

I tried unplugging the battery for 30 min hoping the error would dispensary, NO LUCK.

I did the push parking button in, out sequences.. NO LUCK.

So, I downloaded Rheingold and installed it on my garage laptop, I had the network wire already from a while back, plugged it all in and held my breath.

I managed to connect to the car and get to the "Fault Memory" screen. I scanned the ECU's and damn, there was a lot of stuff there.









I reviewed them and looked at all the recent ones which deal with this brake job
- DSC interface
- EMF transmitter
- DSC:EMF brake cannot be applied mechanically
- etc..etc..

Then I clicked on "Delete fault memory" and crossed my fingers.

After what felt like a lifetime (a good 10 min or so), the 27 errors were gone.

As recommended in the "Show completely" screen for the DSC:EMF error, I pressed the brake and pushed down on the park-brake button down 2 x . After that I pulled it up...and woila.. the sweet sound of parking brake actuator motors buzzing. I repeated this a couple of time, and all functions perfectly.

On the re-test I still have 1 error that comes up for "The slide/tilt sunroof is not normalised", which I will investigate, but at least 1 job is done.



So, the good news is, if this ever happens to you, there is hope.

-Hubert

[TZ]

Great!
It looks like you had a battery fault and need to reinitialize many things. Try the sunroof reinitialization as well.

[jeepzj96]

Ahh...I think you're right. I tried the 1 push on the sun roof button and no go, so I re-initialised the roof and it re-learned the limits and now the 1 touch works. I'll re-scan it again tomorrow and see.

thanks for your help,

-H

[TZ]

Good to hear that!
Check the charge state of the battery with ISTA. Maybe it is time for a new battery.

[Cvx5832]

Good job!

[steven1800]

jeepzj96, great to see your post, I have faced the similar issue here, I am trying to use T45 retract the shaft, but I found the piston is also spin following the shaft, is it normal ?