Well the car spent the day at the dealer. They couldn't easily "fix" them so they decided to "reprogram" the car. No luck at the end of the day with that fix, so we will see what tomorrow holds.

 

Odd. Keep us posted gnuse!

 

You'll never guess what happened today, both my license plate lights went out after coming home from work. I'm not kidding, dealer charged me $5.01 each. This issue seems contagious, what are the odds?

I hope they find your problem soon, electrical problems can be worse than mechanical.

 

Although I just put new bulbs in, I would gladly pay $5.01x2 to have my car back.

 

For a moment I thought, "no way I'm having the same issue as you!" I was freaking out man, well until lit back up! I just had my entire footwell module replaced, here's my bad one. These are known for there reliability.

 

I received a call late this afternoon. My car is fixed and it just took "some reprogramming". Two day's worth??? I'm not sure I'm going to ever know what really happened. Maybe when I pick it up I can get a more complete answer. What ever happened to fuses and burned out bulbs!!?? At least this discussion got me to "2nd Gear" under my name.

 

I wanna know what happened since my R56 has this same problem now. I even replaced the whole trim but still have no lights on both...

 

Did you figure out the issue? I have same thing happening.

 

On the R53, corrosion of the bulb holders is very, very common - it's a very, very bad design; I would sandpaper them carefully & check for 12V with a meter.
If you have LEDs, some are polarity-sensitive, try installing them the other way round.

 

The bulb holder was so corroded I replaced the whole hatch handle piece. The latch release button works but the lights still won’t turn on.

 

Hey gnuse,
I just picked up a 12 JCW and I have the sane issue. Can you advise on what the dealer had to do to get the license plate lights to work? I checked the small plug harness and theres no power to the 2 brown wires, presumably, for the lights. But the third wire, presumably, for the hatch has power. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks