I've had an issue with my passenger door window for a while - when opening and closing the door, the window doesn't do the automatic inch up when closing the door, and inch down when opening the door. I checked the reset procedures and gave it try, but no change. Driver's side works fine.

I'm thinking it's due to a defective switch that tells the BCM that the door is open/closed. I noticed my dome light doesn't turn on when I open the passenger door either.

I'm pretty sure the switch is in the door lock assembly. Any one have experience with this?

 

Following, I have a similar issue. Mine moves but not as much as it should anymore…

 

Does your dome light turn on when you open the door too?

If your dome light turns on and the window still moves even just a little, my guess is your problem is different from mine. If you haven't already, take a look at your window regulator. I've seen a plastic part on the cable that tends to break. The window will still go up and down, but it makes the motor work a lot harder.

 

Looked up the wiring diagram for the door lock, and the switch I suspect is bad is the one between pins 5 and 6 on connector x742. First thing I'm going to check is if grounding pin 6 manually turns on the dome light and/or makes the window do it's inch up/down. If so, looks like I'll have to replace the whole door lock assembly to fix it. It doesn't look like it can be taken apart without destroying it.

 

Mine does move. The back of the window moves more then the front, near the A pillar.

That’s on the drivers side.

I’ll have to check my log…replaced the regulator I think

sounds like your issue is electrical though. Diff issues for sure

 

Small update. I hooked up INPA and was able to pull up the status of all of the body control switches. Sure enough, opening the passenger door did not register at all.

The cheapest I've been able to find a new actuator is $150, so before I spend that kind of money to fix this, I'm going to attempt to find the micro switch on my actuator. This actuator is already a replacement itself, installed 10 years ago, and since it still locks and unlocks fine, I'd like to keep it in service if possible.

Some BMW owners have had success cleaning a similar microswitch on their door lock actuators:
https://www.bimmerforums.com/forum/s...p-down-feature

It will be a few weeks before I have time to look at it, but will update again then.

 

Finally had a chance to do some more troubleshooting on this today. Took the lock out and found the microswitch. It's the button with the green around it near the bottom of the lock. When the door is closed, the plastic lever pushes the button in, which opens the circuit. When you open the door, the switch moves up which actually closes the circuit alerting the BCM that the door is open.



First I checked continuity on pins 5 & 6 on the door lock for the microswitch in both positions. The readings were what they should be, the circuit was closed only with the button up. I even plugged this passenger door lock into the driver's side door wiring connector. Sure enough, it worked normally turning the dome light on when I manually moved the latch to open and closed positions.

Next, verified that pin 5 on the wiring harness was getting grounded. It is. So, the problem is definitely not with the door lock. There appears to be an issue with either the wire running to the BCM, or the BCM itself. So, that's the next thing I'll be checking..

 

I had a similar problem. Mine turned out to be related to a defective battery that eventually died on me. As soon as I replaced the battery the issue with the windows fixed itself.

 

Interesting. Just replaced my battery about half a year ago, so not likely it's what's causing it for me. Did you have any other symptoms besides the window not inching up?

 

Nope, I didn't even realize the battery was an issue until I came out and the car wouldn't start. It was still under warranty and when I took it to the dealer I mentioned the window issue that had started a few weeks earlier and he said it was likely related. Turns out, it was.

 

My old battery died in a similar way, just wouldn't start one day. I did notice cranking got a little slower in the weeks leading up to it. I guess its possible the new battery isn't good.

Were both your windows not doing the inch thing, or just one?

 

Both, though the driver's door seemed more impacted.

 

I thought I had narrowed this down to a bad BC1 module. Picked up one from a salvage yard today mainly for testing purposes because I knew my remotes wouldn't work with it without coding. After plugging it in there was no change with window inch down.

So, I did some more line tracing and discovered the microswitch was going to pin 22 of the door jamb connector, but according to the wiring diagrams it should be in pin 10 there. That's when I remembered....I swapped this door out with a door from a facelift MINI (the old door was starting to rust at the bottom edge). It didn't occur to me at the time that that's when the inch down stopped working. Since the lock and window was still working after I swapped it, I assumed all of the wiring must have stayed the same, but this is not the case!

I cross referenced the wiring diagrams for pre facelift and facelift MINIs and found they swapped pins 9,10, and 11 with 21, 22, 23 on the facelift MINIs passenger door jamb connector. I didn't realize it, but this meant my rear view mirror wasn't working either. So I swapped those pins in the connector and everything is back to normal again.

So, watch out, if you happen to replace a door on a pre-facelift with a facelift door, the wiring is different and you'll either need to swap in your pre-facelift wiring or change some of the pins on the facelift door to make it work with a pre-facelift.

 

Hot dang! Good to hear u got it