i3 Motor/gearbox failure... help!

[ronbot]

Are there any tell-tail signs of this happening before it happens? Or is it a sudden onset?

Whine... the motor will start to make an audible whine that worsens with age. My whining started at 70k miles, and I was informed by BMW that "That is normal for the i3". They lied.

By 94k miles the whine turned into a SCREEEAAMMM... so loud I could barely hear my radio. So I parked it in my garage for the next 11 months while I saved up enough $$, and found used replacement parts...

https://urlisolation.com/browser?ur...&clickId=CC37614D-45BC-4FEF-9222-18BB5F7C3073

 

[ronbot]

Do you have a write up on it, Ron, or was it pretty much plug and play? I’m sure there’s at least some coding to be done

It was "plug & play"... mechanically. I replaced all the mounts and mount-brackets with 2018 parts as well, to eliminate that early i3 issue at the same time.

The motor "OFFSET" value needs to be coded into the EME, so the inverter can properly time the 3-phase drive power at the proper time. Every motor can be different due to manufacturing tolerances. The Offset value is stamped on the outside of the motor, many professional OBD tools can code this in... my private BMW shop did it with their Autel MaxiSys MS909