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Thread: How I Fixed The Gong - by Ian Nicholson

  1. #1
    Join Date
    May 2004
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    Default How I Fixed The Gong - by Ian Nicholson

    the best post on bong/gong/chime issues
    an old time post I just found again

    Hi Everyone,

    Well, my gong didn't work. All the readings of the manual telling me how the gong would warn me of all manner of things left me feeling empty, worthless and alone.

    All my friends on bimmer.info had working gongs - and loved them. For me, the sound of silence announced the Check Control display. I could only look on with weary eyes and wonder what 's song could possibly accompany the sheer poetry of "LIMIT 50Km/h".

    Alas, I was doomed never to hear the dulcet tone of the BMW E34 5 series gong... or was I?

    At once, in a fit of determined outrage I clutched my electric screwdriver and launched myself at the unsuspecting screws that held the panel between the pedals and my steering wheel closely cosseted to the bosom of my Five.

    Each fell and surrendered themselves as dull thuds to the footwell carpet.

    Soon, and with great trepidation, I gently peeled the panel away. Blinking in the dark I reached for the glovebox torch, and in its pearly light I caught a glimpse of my prize. For there, mummified among the soundproof padding in all it's revealed magnificence was... the BMW gong.

    I gently pinched the clips that held it fast in the panel, and plucked the leads such that it dropped as would a ripened fruit into my hands.

    Back inside, I pondered this sonic sarcophagus and laid my plans to reveal its contents. Prising each of the four sprung fasteners in turn, I pushed a strip from some forgotten blister back to hold them back. Teasing the top of the Gong out into the light revealed the marvel of modern electronics that BMW themselves demanded a handsome purse of AU$225 to replace.

    But there, below, was the source of my scourge. A scurrilously cheap 50mm speaker, cunningly deployed when the rest of the world uses 57mm speakers in their computers and the like. The cruelty! A quick continuity check confirmed my fears, this cancerous component was the source of my misery.

    Hunting the malls of the world wide web I found my answer - a 2-inch wide range speaker from Jaycar:

    http://www.jaycar.com.au/

    With my trusty tinsnips, I cut more corners off my speaker than BMW did theirs.

    And lo, the speaker fit, and it was good. Freshly partnered to the ancient circuit board with honest solder I quickly reassembled the unit.

    Rushing back to my eagerly-awaiting Five I inserted the cables and...

    "Bing..." - "LIGHTS ON?"

    A tear sprung in my eye...

    "Bing...!" - "LIGHTS ON?"

    I wanted more. In went the key and the 3.0 litre V8 roared into life! Like a giddy schoolboy I punched the LIMIT button and entered 50km/h.

    Off I flew into the night...

    "Bing...!" - "LIMIT 50Km/h"

    With tears welling in my eyes I could no longer see and had to stop for fear of crashing....

    Now we're together I want us never to be apart. My friends are talking to me once more and now my life is complete... again.




    Fin.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Jul 2005
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    Metuchen NJ USA
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    Default That was a

    very well wriiten tear jerker of a story. Very funny. I'll know how to fix the gong now.

  3. #3
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    croatia, zagreb
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    Default

    hahaha, great story man

  4. #4
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    kIWI LAND(New Zealand)
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    Default

    Awesome read!
    89 535 272,000km auto Euro

  5. #5
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    May 2004
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    Default

    I now tried to repair one of my spare ones, and it really works

    Did someone else try different speakers or where to get others which fit?

  6. #6
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    Just in case someone needs one, EURO 6.98 buy now, worldwide shipping from Germany
    http://cgi.ebay.de/BMW-E32-7er-E34-5...713.m153.l1262

  7. #7
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    Default

    beautiful.

  8. #8
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    Default

    Yesterday I came into the garage and hear the chime constantly making noise, gong, gong, gong. Could not be a weak battery, as I had the battery on the charger and the battery is just 6 months old. Anyway, tested the battery, o.k.
    Switched ignition on ACC, gong stopped. Then came on again.
    Made a test drive, gong came on randomly, sometimes for minutes, sometimes only a few gongs. Came home and at that time the gong was off, switch engine off, gong starts again.
    No warning in the check control. Even with key out of ignition the gong continued.

    So I started checking
    installed different chime, same problem
    installed different cluster, same problem.
    pulled the CCM, even with pulled CCM and no key in ignition the chime continued.
    Chime went off when I pulled the black connector on the chime left hand under dash left side of steering wheel, there are 2 plugs/connectors, 1 x white, 1 x black.
    So I started to study the ETM for a 1989 model E32 http://shark.armchair.mb.ca/~dave/BMW/e32/e32_89.pdf
    On page 7100-25 picture 3 you can see
    X518 connector black, 4-Pin
    X522 connector white, 3-Pin

    X518 black on my car has only 2 wires, 1 x Red-White, 1 x Blue-White.
    X522 has 3 wires on my car
    Removing plug X518 stopped the gong, so I could concentrate of where this one goes in the ETM. X522 is connected with the instrument cluster, X518 with the OBC on board computer, see page 6581-07. And it is also connected always with terminal 30, constant 12V.

    OBC pinout is here and that shows there are the 2 pins for the chime http://www.bmwe34.net/E34main/Upgrade/OBC.htm
    OBC
    pin1: violet/green/yellow, alarm system
    pin10: black/green, starter
    pin6: + from fuse F17
    pin9: + from fuse F20 (red/yellow)
    pin8: + from fuse F1
    pin22: grey/red, light switch
    pin25: yellow/red, turn signal switch
    pin3: white/yellow, diagnostics
    pin16: white/violet, diagnostics
    pin14: white/grey, instrument cluster
    pin7: black/white, instrument cluster
    pin4: ground
    pin5: blue/red/yellow, temp sensor
    pin20: black/red/yellow, pre-ventilation
    pin21: black/white, pre-ventilation
    pin23: violet/white/yellow, alarm system
    pin17: red/grey/yellow, alarm system
    pin26: black/red/yellow, fuel tank level sensor
    pin12: brown/violet, fuel tank level sensor
    pin11: white/black, DME
    pin24: black/violet, DME
    pin19: white/red, chimes
    pin18: white/blue, chimes
    pin15: white/brown, radio
    pin2: blue/brown/yellow, radio

    So I removed the radio to remove the OBC, installed a spare OBC, problem gone!
    Never heard about such a problem before. So if you have a problem with the chime randomly coming on, this info might help.

  9. #9
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    According to one of the electronic specialists on the German E32 forum the cause for the faulty OBC IV could be a dead capacitor.Here the German text + thereafter my brief translation: da sind Elkos drin, Reparieren! Meiner hat mal in der Nacht die Alarmhupe dauer hupen lassen, bis ich die Batterie abgeklemmt hatte.Da war ein Elko gestorben und hat das verursacht.

    there are capacitors inside, repair it! On my E32 once in the middle of the night the alarm horn started and only stopped, after I had disconnected the battery. There was one 'dead' capacitor inside and that was the cause of the trouble.

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