One morning I went to the car, turned her on and the light wouldn't go off, for some reason it decided to fail. After some reading on-line I discovered this is a common problem on the E46 where the wheel speed speed sensor can trigger the DSC light due to failing, or being dirty.
Seemed like a pretty straight forward task, so started looking for a replacement.
1st stop was ebay, and £20 later we have a new sensor.
I've taken some pictures below to outline the task in hand.
2) Jack the car up enough to put on axle stands
3) Soak the bolt in WD-40 or similar. Bear in mind the bolt holding the sensor in has been there for donkeys!
4)Remove the wheel
5)Here is the sensor in situ with the bolt removed.
Here is the offending bolt, please note it is a hex bolt, so ensure you use the correct size as it can easily lose it's head!
The sensor was stuck firmly in the hub. No amount of persuasion would move it. So the hammer came out to support the cause.
In the end, the sensor broke off inside the hole, which wasn't a bad thing, as it was being replaced anyway. I just had to ensure the sensor left no bits behind in the hub, as this cold cause problems even when the new one is fitted.
So after all of the wheel speed sensor is removed it was then the task of fitting the new one. I must admit I thought this would be the easier side of the task... How wrong was I!?
The new sensor I had seemed to be too large for the hole. Even after light sanding of the hole it didn't want to go in at all. I assumed it was the right sensor as they all seemed to be standard. I even sanded down the sensor unit itself to try to aid it. This still didn't work.
So back to the internet to see if there WERE in fact different units. After some research it appears there are two types. Although the sizes of them seem vague.
On the RealOEM site it states the following:
Up to September 2000 it is part number 34521164651
From September 2000 there are two part numbers. The left hand unit is 34526752681, and the right hand unit is 34526752682.
My car being a 2000 reg model really didn't help matters!
I figured due to it being an eBay item there could be some confusion, so off to GSF to get the right one!
So with a new speed sensor in hand I thought it would be straight forwards. This was still incorrect and the new speed sensor was still too big.
I decided to tap it in with a light hammer. It started to go in which was a good sign. So I bolted it in and hoped the light would go off after a while.
This didn't happen, so I thought the light would need re-setting. I went to the garage to have this done and it still stayed on.
The mechanic tried taking out the sensor I'd fitted but it wouldn't come out.
This unit too broke off in the hole.
After much effort on the mechanics behalf, the old eBay sensor I had was fitted. He had to grind a hell of a lot of rust from the hole in the hub to get it to fit nicely.
Once fitted the light was re-set and we're back to having a functioning DSC system once again.
