Rabbit chewed through a cable

[SD ///M4]

I went to drive my Roadster today. Not my primary car anymore, it sits in the driveway with a cover on it, hooked up to a CTEK battery charger. I took off the cover and then opened the hood to disconnect the charger. Found a live bunny sitting on the middle of the engine. Not sure who was more startled. Then I discovered that he apparently had made a lunch of a cable that probably has something to do with the fuel electronics. You can see where he chewed the entire cable and just left little nibs on the connectors. You can even see where he left some of his fur. Damn you wabbit!

My laptop is down and I'm using my tablet, making research more difficult. Anyone know what cable this is, the p/n, and how much it costs?

https://goo.gl/photos/LqkZemVQi2t3ZdEm8

[SD ///M4]

Crap, can't even post a photo using the mobile app.

[gpraceman]

Sorry to hear that.

The first Z4 that I went to test drive when I was on the hunt (2003 2.5i), I popped the hood and there was a rather large bunny sitting on top of the engine. It didn't look like it had chewed on anything so I was able to test drive it. I certainly would not have bought it without a very good PPI to check for chewed wiring as a rabbit had chewed on the wiring of my wife's Jetta and we did have to replace a couple of wiring harnesses. In the end, I bought a different Z4 (2006 ///M).

There are some ultrasonic devices that are marketed for autos as a rodent repellent that you might want to check out.

[gpraceman]

You can try checking http://realoem.com for that wiring harness.

[wdb]

Let's see if I can post the picture for you.

[StickMon]

I think that's the crank case vent.

[Punisher3.0si]

You should be able to get a pigtail for it

[StickMon]

Maybe cut a pigtail off a donor. It's probably part of the main harness and not sold separately.
If it were me I'd:
1) Grab an Xacto knife
2) A Band-Aid (be careful!)
3) Some 24 AWG wire
4) A soldering iron
5) Some burn cream (dammit!)
6) Some heat shrink
7) More burn cream (seriously?!)
8) Cut the outers back far enough to strike good wire and patch in a section.
9) Cover it all with some 1/4" corrugated loom. No one will ever know.
10) Get some rabbit fence to put around the car.

[WGScales]

In North Carolina it's the damn squirrels.

[Efthreeoh]

Call your insurance company. It's covered under your comprehensive insurance, less deductible. And no, they won't increase your premium.

[SD ///M4]

I ended up taking the car to my independent mechanic. He spliced in a new section between the plug and rest of the cable, the part that had been chewed off, soldered it, wrapped it with electrical tape and then put heat shrink tubing on it. That fixed that problem but the airbag light was on. I discovered two other cable housings that had chew marks on them but no damage to the wires inside, so I wrapped those with electrical tape. Took it back to my mechanic and he found that a wire to the airbag sensor, not readily visible, had been chewed so he fixed that.

The only remaining problem, and this is the problem that started a few months ago. The radio will cut out and the car tries to make an SOS call. BMW Assist has long been expired and my current phone was never paired to the car, so it eventually tmies out and the radio will play for a short time, then the whole process starts all over again.

According to the codes that my mechanic pulled, the SOS switch is bad, although he's not sure that will fix the problem, as it can also be tied to the Bluetooth module. He's pretty sure that this is not related to the chewed cables because of the codes.

Anyone replaced their SOS switch? How difficult was it?

In the middle of all this, my wife had to stop her 335is on the freeway when she got an error message on the nav screen telling that the car had overheated and to pull over immediately. She had told me that the cooling fan was surging, coming on high, then back to normal, I rode with her and agreed that something was not right, so we made an appointment at the dealer later that week, because we have an extended warranty on her car. The night before the appointment, on her way home, is when she had to pull over. We had it flat-bedded to the dealer. They replaced the water pump and also discovered that there was oil leaking from the oil filter housing, so they also fixed that. All covered by the warranty with $50 deductible.

Three BMWs and two of them were in the shop the same week!

[StickMon]

Do this.

[SD ///M4]

Originally Posted by StickMon

Do this.

I went and picked up my car and all lights are off and all codes cleared. The SOS light is still flashing, so I grabbed a plastic pry tool, pried off the switch surround from the rear, unplugged the switch connector, and removed the switch. It doesn't appear to be trying to make an SOS call anymore, but there's still no sound from the audio system. I can change radio stations, it will get the station name, I can switch modes (I have an iPod adapter and dedicated iPod in the car), but no sound, so removing the SOS didn't appear to resolve the audio problem. My mechanic said to disconnect the battery overnight and see if the audio system works after hooking up the battery again. Any other suggestions are welcome.

Thanks for the link. I've ordered the oddments tray from ECS Tuning. That's a great replacement for the now-useless buttons.