BMW x5 towbar problem new 58 plate

lilolill

Have just got off the floor from fainting, Requested a quote from BMW dealer for the installation of a towbar inc electrics, it was £1300.00. On top of that they have now told me that all E70 X5 models require a new larger cooling fan to be installed when towing. This fitted is another £700.00. Surely having factory ordered the car we should be told that a retrofit towbar is going to cost you £2000.00 and not just £600.00 if factory fitted.
Also no where in a bmw x5 manual does it say that the car requires additional extras ( engine part upgrades ) to be able to tow a caravan other than the obvious towbar.Surely this makes the standard car not fit for towing purposes., even though it states towing weights.
Any body else had a similar experience.........

harveybobbles

Spend the £2000 on a propper holiday perhaps? Rather in some !!!!!! caravan park.

lilolill

thanks for the advice, useful !!

Lorian

http://www.x5drivers.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=3244&start=0

There is plenty more info if you google.

withabix

harveybobbles wrote: »

Spend the £2000 on a propper holiday perhaps? Rather in some !!!!!! caravan park.

Learn to spell, perhaps???

(and perhaps you could stop being a complete kn*b whilst you are at it???)

lilolill

tried most the bmw forums, this fan replacement on the E70 version of the car has only just been put on by BMW in the last month. ( so the technician said !!) Still surely you can not suggest that the BMW X5 (E70) is a good towing car only if you are willing to pay an extra £700.00 for the fan upgrade. I am waiting for my BMW dealer to respond. I would like to know whether they should upgrade the fan free of charge as part of the warranty if the existing one is not good enough for towing.

hewhoisnotintheknow

bmw are talking pap, take it to a small tow bar place and ask them, you could fit a fan your self (or a small garage) but i dont think you should need it

lilolill

I have suggested to BMW that i could get a third party towbar fitted for around £500.00, but was then told that i would void the warrenty if i had engine problems caused by overheating due to the excess load caused by towing. This is why they insist that a larger capacity fan is installed, but why then is the current fan not replaced as part of a product recall. I need some advice on where to go next !!!!

hewhoisnotintheknow

sounds pretty pap, i have towed much heavier things with my hdi no problems, using a 2.0 hdi peugeot. The fan rarely comes on when towing, pretty poor if this bloody expensive 4x4 cant cope with it.

Besides just tell them you are towing a trailer (although the type of electrics might be a give away)

500 at a independant still sounds harsh to me

withabix

To be honest, many vehicles require auxiliary fans for towing.

Try posting on www.honestjohn.co.uk Backroom for good info - you will get good answers there.

lilolill

Let me deal with the easy part of your enquiry first. In 1998 the EU issued a Standard and Directive for towbars. I¹m only 95% certain that this applies to your X5 because some 4X4¹s are exempt.
The first point to note here is that being a Directive ALL EU Member States have to accept the Law although in the case of the UK the Directive was added to existing UK Law via the Construction and Use Regulations. All towbars which conform to the Standard (which therefore means all sold in the
UK) are given Block Exemption which means the vehicle manufacturer cannot invalidate any part of the vehicle warranty, although of course they don¹t warranty a towbar they don¹t sell as a genuine part.
So in response to the dealers claim that a non BMW part would invalidate any warranty my response would be Rubbish. I suggest they go away and learn a bit of EU Law. It is a little known fact that few, if any, vehicle manufacturers design, develop or manufacture towbars. In truth they buy in bars from companies like Brink, Boesol and Witter. Almost certainly one part that would be needed for your towbar is made by a company which is rather well know as a manufacturer of parts on sale at your local caravan dealer, but badged as a genuine BMW part.
The electrical connections is a slightly more complex issue. If you have an old fashioned Scotch Lock to main wiring harness electrical connection then I think the manufacturer could get away with claiming that this was an unauthorised fitment and modification and if there were any electrical problems with the car could claim it was because of the unauthorised wiring.
However I would strongly advise against a Scotch Lock type connection anyway. The engine management computer on the X5 is a very clever piece of kit. With the right trailer electrical connections it can even tell you if one of the caravan road lights has failed. I don¹t know how much BMW charge for their Vehicle Specific Wiring but I can bet it will be more than you need to pay. I suspect that if the towbar and wiring were fitted by an independent towbar fitter your BMW dealer wouldn¹t be able to tell that it didn¹t necessarily come from a BMW dealer.
The Witter vehicle specific wiring kit is seen by the car¹s computer as a BMW part and no reprogramming of the computer is needed.
Now let¹s get to specifics. Witter show £214 for a towbar and £140 for a vehicle specific wiring harness. Fitting time for the bar would be about 1 !
2 hours and for the bolt-on towball version (my recommendation) some cutting of the rear bumper is required. Witter quote about one hour to fit the wiring kit. From that you should be able to get a rough idea of how much your bill would be.
The subject of additional cooling is more complex. My advice has always been that manual transmission cars probably don¹t need additional cooling, unless your caravanning is around the French Alpes by minor roads in high summer.
For automatic transmissions you need to keep a careful eye on the vehicle temperature gauge (and there are other clues) and if you see signs that the cooling system can¹t shred heat as quickly as it is generated, then some form of additional cooling system is required.
Unfortunately I¹m reasonably certain that additional cooling systems are not Block Exempt, so to keep your warranty you would have to use the BMW parts.
The question of Fit for Purpose is very interesting. If, at the time you agreed to buy the car, you made it clear either by what you said or by parts you talked about having fitted (the towbar for example) and the dealer failed to point out that additional bits needed to be fitted then you could claim that the vehicle wasn¹t suitable for the purpose intended and ³please can I have my money back.² If an issue like this came to Court the Law is absolutely clear. However far too often a clever lawyer and a consumer¹s inability to prove that the dealer did know he wanted to tow means that the consumer looses.
I think it is worth remembering that right now dealers are really struggling to shift cars, and the last thing they want is a customer prepared to throw their weight around. If I was in your shoes I think I¹d make a Saturday morning grand entrance and in a loud voice ask the dealer how he dare deliberately mislead you about towbars. That he must have known that all towbars are EU block exempt so there was no legal reason why you had to have a BMW part, and deliberately misleading you into thinking that fitting a non-BMW part would invalidate your warranty. You could even point out how much cheaper a genuine Witter part would be.
Dealers hate loud customers in their showrooms when there are other potential customers around.
If you go ahead with buying the car I¹d get a Witter dealer to fit the bar and electrics and perhaps try and frighten the dealer in to fitting the fan kit at a much reduced price. Because you¹ll very obviously know what you are talking about whilst the dealer will probably quickly realise that he doesn¹t you might get away with it. In this instance knowledge might be power.
[FONT=&quot]Let me know how you get on.[/FONT]