Transmission Gear Slipping Problems of BMW 545

BMW 545 owners have reported 3 problems related to transmission gear slipping (under the power train category). The most recently reported issues are listed below.

1 Transmission Gear Slipping problem of the 2004 BMW 545

Failure Date: 09/18/2015

This transmission is slipping aggressively. It happens on up-shift 1-2 and downshift 2-1. It happens like 4 to 5 times in a week. Also sometimes I get a big slam on both up-shift and downshift. . . When this happens, the transmission malfunction error message pops up and reduces my movement to safe-mode, unless I shut the engine off and restart the engine. If you take time to go on BMW forums and blogs, everyone complain about this issue with this 5 series. . . Please do something. . The passenger airbag restraint error pops up even when someone is not seating on the passenger side. . This needs to be looked into. . Almost every BMW owner has this passenger issue. . .

See all problems of the 2004 BMW 545 🔎.

2 Transmission Gear Slipping problem of the 2004 BMW 545

Failure Date: 09/03/2014

I purchased this vehicle thinking that it would be a safe car for my family and friends. The transmission seems to be slipping and an excessively harsh 2-1 downshift occurs when decelerating to a stop. Also, transmission "bangs" into gear when accelerating from a full or a "rolling" stop. This occurred several times on a daily basis. One time in specific I was driving with my 4 year old niece and it caused her to become alarmed as well as injure her neck. Please let me know what can be done, the dealership is saying that they will charge me an ridiculous amount of money to upgrade the software for the transmission. I strongly feel that this should be a "no charge" repair or fix seeing that no car should behave in this manner. Please let me know what can be done, as I am no longer driving the car and taking the bus in fear of causing any injury to my loved ones.

3 Transmission Gear Slipping problem of the 2004 BMW 545

Failure Date: 11/19/2012

Transmission jerks and slips. When coming to a stop, the car slams into gear. This could cause a major accident if this occurred during wet or icy road conditions due to breaking traction from wheels and road surface. This is a major concern and after doing some research, thousands of 5 series BMW's have this problem. The result is a defective mechatronics which costs between $5000-$8000 to fix and not covered by BMW or under warranty.


Other Common Power Train related problems of BMW 545

Problem Category Number of Problems
Power Train problems
13
Transmission Gear Slipping problems
3
Automatic Transmission problems
2
Manual Transmission problems
1
Transmission Gear Indicator problems
1


545 Service Bulletins
545 Defect Investigations