Lock cylinder is spinning in the door..

[IslandS62]

Went to leave the office and after a soft dull sound, my passenger door lock simply spins in the door. Electric actuator seems ok, but it won't lock or unlock with the key. Anyone had this happen?
What was the repair? I'd like to know before I tear open the door panel to take a look.

[Bigsur1997]

Yes, I still have the problem because BMW qouted me $600 to fix it. I just use the keyless entry. Wish I could tell you how to fix it

[IslandS62]

I was afraid of that. I don't have keyless entry on this car, but at least it is on the passenger side and not the driver.

[cngizbleevng]

My similar problem was fixed under CPO warranty, so it only cost me $50. They had to take apart the door panel and replace some parts.

[rjcoston]

Ferris did a write up on this.

http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum...highlight=lock

[IslandS62]

Thanks! I have already gotten that far, I have removed the panel and have the door lock and handle out and on my desk as we speak. About 25 minutes with Bentley manual...not too bad. I found a brass piston and spring, and the T shaped plate....no sign of little balls

If I stick the little piston and spring back in (it only goes in one way) and replace the "T" plate and hold it with my finger it seems to work normally with a key, but the plate is under tension and won't hold in place. I am going to try and come up with a kludge to hold it on and see if that works.

Its' good to know that for $200 worst case I can get a new door handle. The labor to diy is not too bad at all.

[IslandS62]

And two hours later, its FIXED!!

If you can recover all the parts, all you need to do is reassemble and then restore tension to the "T" plate that falls out. All I did was hold the lock together with a locking plier and hit it several times with a screwdriver and hammer...the spring is not that strong, so just score the metal. I have it together again, and it works perfectly. I'll post a pic of the fix in a few minutes.

No special tools needed to disassemble. To unscrew the lock cylinder retaining ring I used a set of large needle nose pliers.

[ken_vs_ryu]

Lower the protein intake?

[IslandS62]

So here is the solution I came up with. Its not pretty but it works, no $40 kit, no trips to the dealer...in and out in 2 hours or so. I found the two ball bearing folks are talking about, the grease in the lock retained them and they never fell out.

[cngizbleevng]

So you essentially crimped the edges around the T plate. That's good to know, in case this happens again to me. BTW, when the dealership fixed my lock, for some reason they replaced my chrome covered black door handle (the outside one), with a regular chrome handle. I don't know if they dinged it up or what, but now I can't go back to black if I wanted to.

[2rsq24]

And to add one more thing to this post in case any of you are still wrestling with this (I've had to do both my locks twice). If you lose that little spring, good luck finding one that small at a hardware store. My wife actually came up with the solution....use the spring that's inside those ballpoint pens (the ones you have to click to retract the point). Skinnier the pen, skinnier the spring. The one I used was actually still a hair too big, but a slight ream of the hole in that block and it fit perfectly.