so today i was in irvine, and my fiance was picking someone up from LAX....she called to say that the car was shaking while at idle in traffic, off and on, and that the car was having trouble accelerating from a stop...i told her to turn the AC off, and asked if there were any lights on...there were none...
she tried to keep going, and at the next stop, the car wouldnt start moving again, no matter how much throttle was used...the engine also died a few times, and then a light went on....the ! with a jagged circle around it (the auto trans fault light, indicating that it was going into emergency limp home mode).....

so she parked the car in a parking lot, and i drove up there to get it towed (dont worry we got a flat-bed truck)...AAA came in handy and we got it towed like 50 miles for free

when we were unloading it at our bmw mechanics shop, we tried starting it....this time the engine died right away...the next time it didnt start at all

so here is the info on the car

2001 330xi
106,000 miles (the extended warranty just expired!!!)

anyone know what could be wrong? our mechanic said either the actual trans, or the transmission computer...which is what i was thinking too.....i just wanted to get some ideas from other people who might have experienced this...

thanks for reading

i once had that problem too

i just turned the car off and turned it back on and it worked perfectly fine


what is or was prolly wrong with it the electric automatic controls in the cars computer prolly got fucked up and need to be reset

dont they get reset when you cycle the ignition? or no

bump.....anyone know what could be wrong????

It was the intake cam sensor on my car.

I have replace a mass air flow sensor and forgot to plug it in and when I went to test drive it the trans program light came on and went into limp home mode. The MAF is on the can bus and when its unplugged it brings the bus system down casuing the problems. once plugged back in and faults cleared it ran perfectly fine. So you could have a faulty MAF (unlikely but possible)

did you guys get the auto trans warning light?

i had this same problem once. it was the TPS. worth looking into. you can verify with a meter

throttle position sensor? is that what it stands for?
thanks for the input

is there any reason why my bmw tech says its either the auto trans or the auto trans computer? both of which are a lot of $$

the tps sends signal to the CPU and is tied into the tranny too. I would check it out with the meter against the values in the bentley. Also check cps. Also unplug the battery for awhile

yea when i left the MAF unplugged the trans program light came on.

turns out it was the fuel filter going out...if anyone cares

That's good to know. Was it the original fuel filter?

glad it worked out and thanks for posting the resolution. many people dont take the time to do that.

fuel filter? or fuel pump....?

That happened to us nathen. It was f'd vanos in our case though.

How much did it cost to get fixed, and was it pricey?

turns out it was the fuel filter going out...if anyone cares
ahhhh that'll do it.



i had this issue, too... turned out to be a cam sensor, though. (as mentioned above by someone else).