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      08-28-2012, 07:32 PM   #12
The HACK
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Kgolf31 View Post
How can a sensor go bad like this then after it's gone in for replacement 3 times and within the same year period it magically goes bad again?
I don't know, but back in the late E36 and early E46 era, they made some changes to the sensor design to alleviate the problem. From what I understood, the contacts were changed from copper to gold to prevent the corrosive effect certain gasoline detergent has. My friend with the E46 325iT that has had multiple sensor failures before 50,000 miles gave up and started to clean the contacts of his sensor on a regular basis as part of his "maintenance" plan and so far, it's worked out pretty well for him.

The high rate of failure could be related to the Cali-Crap-Gas we're forced to use here too. I was never given a real explanation as to why they fail at such a high rate, only that the gold plated sensors should last much longer than the copper plated contacts.
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