No manual release for neutral as of 4/2010 ...

[Critter7r]

I posted this in response to an old thread in the M-Series section, because it was the only thread I found that even mentioned not being able to get a stalled car out of Park to roll it out of the way ... well, it turns out that BMW intended it that way :

I searched "park" and "neutral" but nobody seems to be having much of an issue with not being able to get the car out of park when the battery dies, or the engine won't crank, as is the situation today here at the shop with 5 or 6 cars that have shown up hydrolocked after our recent flooding.

It seems that BMW has done away with the manual connection in the footwell (a la E65) that allowed a non-running vehicle to be put in neutral since 4/2010 production.

BMW sent a bulletin to dealers telling us to invest in some dollies in order to move vehicles that are locked in Park: "In situations where the vehicle’s electrical system is disabled (e.g., flat battery) and the transmission is locked in the Park position, a suitable caster dolly system (e.g., GoJack®, manufactured by Zondex Corporation) must be used in order to move and/or relocate the vehicle." They then launch into the procedure to manually put the car in neutral which includes putting the car on a hoist and removing underbody panels now that they've done away with the manual release that used to be located inside the vehicle.The problem we've run into is that these cars don't have dead batteries, the have hydrolocked engines, and the car won't go into neutral unless the engine is running, and we don't have enough dollies to put all of them onto. I suppose we could roll them all onto hoists one at a time, put them in neutral and then roll them outside, but why not just keep the manual release?

So keep in mind that if your car was produced after 4/2010, you cannot put the car into neutral without the engine running.

[ChristopherG]

Not so much a decision by BMW as much as ZF Those tranmissions shift completely electronically with no physical linkage.
If you can get power to the computer and the water hasn't completely trashed the electronics there is an override of the shift lock.

[downeaster1]

That's why I hate working on SMG cars. Same situation. However, the newer cars have since changed. There is a release for the FXX cars, but its a pain in the ass to get to because its under the car physically on the transmission.

[Inicent Child]

what is the point for this? Ive ran into the issue of having to put a car in neutral a few times already cant imagine the new cars not having that.

Lol if you jack up one of the rear axles on a car that doesn't have lsd differential, you can technically move it around however you want with a few buddies.

[pizzaman09]

They could do it like an old Honda automatic I saw. It had a key slot next to the shifter that you put your key if you needed to put it in neutral with no power to the car. Simple and it worked. The only flaw in using that in a new BMW would likely be a lack of a key.