I have a BMW 530i with about 13,000 KM on it. Its been a wonderful car and a great car to drive. But my wife just uses it around the neighborhood on short trips to the mall, chapel etc.
Just the other day, it went all crazy with the wiper continuously running, the doors refused to open normally, and the onboard computer stating that the airbags are not functioning and to stop the car and call the BMW dealership ASAP.
We brought it to the dealership and they tell us that the "SAFETY GATEWAY MODULE with part number 65776975682 is defective and needs to be replaced.

Can anyone please help me understand what this part is and what role it plays? The dealership says the part costs US$1212 plus labor etc.

Can anyone also point me to where we can get this part for a better price? Or maybe how we could double check that it really is the module and not some short circuit elsewhere that is causing this?

Pardon the skepticism, but just the other day, the shop that was trying to fix a seatbelt problem for my 89 MB 230CE, insisted that the "Module" was defective. When we swapped left side with right side modules, true enough the defective module didn't make the other side work, but lo and behold when we reswapped them, both worked, but after a day both conked out. By deduction, I figured out it was some dfect in the contacts somewhere and true enough, the defect was in the door switches that triggered the series of events to push the belts forward.

Anyway, to anyone with any experience with this "SAFETY GATEWAY MODULE # 65776975682", PLEASE HELP!!!!

If there have been previous posts regarding similar problems, please point them my way as I'm new in this forum.

Thanks and best regards to all,

Jeb

I'm surprised that it is not a warrantee item. I'd be very aggravated to pay $1200 on a 3 year old car.

Yes, so happens my bimmer was imported from Germany and not bought from a local Philippine dealership. So it is classified as a "Gray Market" unit. Not only are we not entitled to warranties, but they actually want to charge us another US$600 extra on top of the normal labor charges.

I wonder if this is a worldwide policy of BMW.

The SGM is what all of the safety satellites report to via byteflight(fiber optics). The SGM then serves as the gateway to the D-bus. Basically when this goes bad the rest of the car
doesn't know what's happening with the vehicle passive safety systems.

generally a part like that is a dealer only item. I did a few quick google searches and couldn't find any parts-direct places that sell it. It sucks but it looks like you're just gonna have to shell out the $1200

Thanks Guys, I emailed BMW and they asked me for the VIN #> I'm still hoping they would consider this a warranty item, whichever part of the world the car is used.

I also am hoping they will have the sense to ask their dealerships here in the Philippines to remove the "Gray market fee" for imported cars.

That should be a service in return for them having the franchise to sell BMW's here.

Anyway I hope things start moving from here on.

Like the other guy said, the SGM is the main module for the airbag systems, but also serves as a gateway between it, and the other bus networks.

you're not going to be able to get one anywhere else other than the dealer. and it also has to be programmed when installed.