I have a '95 bmw 325i. After leaving overnight, as the weather gets cooler (live in PA) on startup I get an EEP-2 error across my dash and none of my dash electronics work. My speedometer dial works only. It seems as the weather or the car warms up, upon restart all functions return. Needless to say it never works in winter but I drive it rarly then anyway. My local dealer wants $130 just to put on diagnostics machine then start charging or replacing my dash. Dash was replaced by that dealer 10K miles ago by previous owner. Dealer says (on phone message) he doesn’t know what the error means. I used to write diagnostic code for jets and know somebody wrote that code for some error. That it works fine when warm and dry (kind of like me) makes me think a capacitor or relay is sticking (like every other contact has in this car). The internet crowd hasn’t cracked it and most others have ended up spending $1000 or more to replace. What do you guys think?
I think you have a semiconductor device that’s failing (like a chip or transistor), that’s thermally sensitive, or perhaps a poor solder joint somewhere on the board, that makes good contact only when warm. No idea what the error code means, but I would guess that it’s some kind of “lost communication with computer” error, or possibly that the instrument cluster’s controller failed an internal self-test.
If you’re handy, you could pull the cluster and carefully resolder everything that you could get to. Make sure you press on everything too, and make sure all electrical connectors are seated properly. Unplug/plug them all in several times to scrape any crud off. If it’s all surface-mount components, it probably won’t be easy or feasible to resolder everything.
You might also call around the junkyards and see if you can pick up a used cluster and install it yourself. It should be a lot cheaper than the dealer quote.
Are you certain that “cracking that code” will lead to the resolution of your symptons? Wait a minute your only sympton is the message. Make sure all is well in regards to fluids and tightness with connectors and drive on. If you just have to know what that code means, you are going to have to pay for a recon mission.
great response and thanks but The worst part is - without any dash function (but the speedo.) I don’t know if I’m running out of gas.
Ok this is a bit different,I shoot an email to a Master Tech friend of mine.He has been pulling back a bit with info on new cars but yours is not new so perhaps. These e-36’s have a tremendous loyal following,have you posted on any BMW specific boards. Truthfuly the code looks familar.Keep checking back as this guy is at work,it is 4.30 AZ time.
I am betting on a cluster failure.
The report is a bad coding plug or a bad cluster. Dealer mechanics don’t see these older cars so much anymore. I left BMW in 2002 and a 1995 did not show up so often even then.That is a coding plug in the cluster. e-36’s were a car that we did replace a lot of clusters on back in the day.
You guys are great. What is a coding plug? Does it seem likely I’d have to replace another cluster is 10K miles even though it has been 5 years? Is there anything (as a non mech ) I could try before paying lots of $$$ for another cluster. It just works so well when it works! Thanks again.