[zachpate]

Hello guys!

I've always wanted to join these forums, but I'm a very busy person, so I never got around to it, I just read when I can. This isn't how I really wanted my first experience on these forums to be like this, but I have a problem with my BMW.

To introduce myself, since I'm joining the forums, I'm 17 years olds, I'm a senior in highschool, and about 5 weeks from graduating and going to college in the fall. I just got a 2007 BMW 328xi with 95,000 miles back in September, and I now have about 96,800.

I've loved my BMW to death, and will never want another brand of vehicle again, and I'm sure you all can agree. But I've recently had some problems, and they kind of go hand and hand.

It only happens one day every 2-3 weeks, and only for the commute to or from school or work from school. It is a high pitched whine, almost sounds like a jet taking off, or just the biggest turbo you can imagine at peak boost. (Lol) On top of that, the idle is very rough while the car is making the whining sound. I've noticed while my car is working perfectly fine, my car idles at around 1000rpms, but during the times it happens, it bounced from 1000rpm to 500(ish)rpm pretty rapidly which causes it to shake the vehicle. But note that this is all just at a red light or just not moving. But while I'm driving during it acting up, (have to go to work to pay for it, and school to learn, of course), the car runs perfectly fine, shy from the whine when I left of the gas. While I'm accelerating, the noise is gone. Then when I get to where I'm going, I park, and panic the whole day, then come out however many hours later, and it's no longer an issue for another couple weeks.


It had been this way until I took it to get serviced. And the problem with this is, I got it used (of course) from Friendship here in my area (large dealership franchise that sells ford and Hyundai among their branches). The car has a 10k mile warranty so me and my parents felt pretty safe with the purchase. I called to get it serviced about a month ago and they were very enthusiastic about making an appointment until I told them it was a BMW. He asked if it was just an oil change or if it was a check engine light as well, and I told him it was both. (The check engine line actually doesn't appear unless it's doing the rough idling and high pitch noise anymore, just at the time it did) He told me that they don't have the equipment to do anything to my vehicle other than an oil change, but they would try.

I took it there, showed them the warranty proof, but wouldn't talk to ME about the problems with the car, they asked my mother because it is in her name until I turn 18 in May. She never drives it, and she's not very interested in cars, she has a new Honda Odyssey (boooooo), and barely knows it's a 6 cylinder. So of course communication was limited between me and the service department due to her having to ask me these questions instead of them asking me.

Anyways, they took my car back for about two hours, and returned it to me and told me something interesting. He told me that the check engine light was due to my gas cap. A few weeks prior to that, I left my car unlocked and a jealous student at my high school took my gas cap, so I went directly after school and purchased an OEM gas cap for the 07 3 series. He said that was the only thing they could find. He managed to turn the light off for headlight (one of the left bulbs went out, so it's like 1/8th of a difference darker than the other.) and I realized once I got home (it was daytime when I left, so I didn't notice) that the bulb wasn't even replaced.

Now the problem is that the rough idle and noise continues to happen once every two or three weeks and now it's worse, the car actually shuts off at low speeds at around 30mph and less. I was taking a right hand turn onto a road that had someone in the other lane trying to turn right out onto the main road, my car turned off in middle of the turn and I come about 1-3 feet from hitting the car because it locked up my steering. It just falls onto it's fake and locked the steering until I put it back into park and start the car again, then I have to take off and keep my rpms high before it shuts up again, rather panicky situation in red light to read light traffic since it isn't a stick shift like my other car,(1998 240sx Kouki). The check engine light is only on right after it does and I'm in drive, as soon as I put it into park and start it, it disappears.

I'm sorry that I had to write an equivalent of a Harry Potter book as my first post, but I'm not sure what to and it seems no one knows what is going on.

I really appreciate you taking the time to read it, and I can't wait to get to know you guys, I've learned a lot from you all already.

Zach.