07 650i Convertible Top Unlocked Alarm Problem

Originally Posted by chitai100

Hi,
I had problem same every one at first but it had changed a other issue after that.
I lives in California and drive 07' 650i CV. Lately, the red light kept blinking sometime either I either hit unlock doors on remote twice (I set unlock 2 doors at once) or left my car on summer sun packing lot. It appeared the fault" CV not lock.." . Usually, I used a tool called Allen wrench in the trunk to slide down (open) the rear window completely. Then pressed the open cv button, the top will open completely and the red light will be gone.
Last week, I had other problem. After I drove mine with CV opened, I parked in my garage for a day. Next day I wanted to close the top and the top only went half way then stopped. I tried to open and close but it just stopped in half way of closing. I ran a test and it appeared the code A6A7 "Saving energy mode in active" This code had never been appeared before.

Does anyone know the code mean and how to reset it?
Thanks
Chi Tai

That sounds like a battery issue? I would trickle charge or have the battery tested. I assume you are not putting the top up with the remote? If so it takes the life out of your battery

That sounds like a battery issue? I would trickle charge or have the battery tested. I assume you are not putting the top up with the remote? If so it takes the life out of your battery

Thanks for reply. I always use the trickle charge to keep maintaning the battery. Also I always to open or close the top with engine running to not drain out the battery. When I do the test, I still left the tickle charge to give additional power while the key inigtion on

weird these tops and electronics fopr them. So many moving parts and peices communicating with others thigns are bound to go wrong. I unfortuantely suggest a dealer visit to plug in and read the code to track the issue

Originally Posted by boesman10

I guess my engineering degree is at last paying dividends

As I've said I've done this now at least 5 times when I ran into the issue and it works right away. The light stops blinking and things are back to normal.

I found it purely by chance - was reading a thread on how to resolve the issue (remove the sensor, use a file to blah blah blah) and figured let me go see if I can find the sensor in my car. And sure enough, when I touched it the blinking light stopped blinking !!!

I sure hope this helps others as well. Can't tell you how disappointed I was to buy the car and a few months later started running into issues where I can't open the trunk, can't close the windows simply because of red blinker.

Cheers.

Brilliant! Well hopefully the dealer solved the problem, but if not then I'll be trying your "old fashioned" method! Ran into this issue twice last week (8 days after buying the car). 30k miles, moderate-warm climate. Dealer came and got the car, performed a service bulletin to realign the sensors and holes where the top attaches. Also found out it needs a new left cowl motor (louder than normal, under warranty) that they ordered from Germany. Will be two weeks before parts come in.

Hi,

Boesman10's solution to the top lock alarm just worked for me. I have had my 650i since February. It is a 2007 and I experienced the top lock alarm approximately 2 months ago and I took it into the dealer to fix it because my windows were locked half open and the trunk would not open. It cost me a little over $500.00 because the dealer stated that the extended warranty did not cover my top. Yesterday my car experienced the same top lock alarm and after reading Boesman10's solution, I tried it. It worked like a dream. No problems since.

Thank You!

DEDroptop

Good afternoon: Boesman10 is a genius and a savior. I have an 05 645 that I drive sparingly since new (35,000 miles now --- another set of issues, regarding battery, from insufficient driving, but that's a different story) that in the last 3 weeks have begun to exhibit the dreaded "top not locked" syndrome --- which I had never heard of til today, which I learned of only when I started to read through this thread --- the flashing red, locked trunk, inability to open or close; I had actually called BMW service to schedule an appointment and asked to speak to the shop foreman and was waiting for a call back. Of course, I am out of warranty. I literally jumped with excitement when I read Boeman10's post and hopes elevated when I saw that his solution worked for DEDroptop. I ran out to the garage not knowing exactly what to do and tried pushing a few of the joints with apparently no change in the flashing red light, feeling very disappointed. I tried running my fingers along the driver's side bar, making sure to touch base with every point, and lo and behold, the light disappeared! Sure enough, not daring to touch the top open/close button, I got out to check the trunk fob and it opened! So, I've decided to forego the dealer appointment, knowing that I at least have a response to the issue that I can live with.
So, kudos to Boesman10, for cutting through this; and thank you!!

Originally Posted by boesman10

I live in FL and with the summer heat kicking in I have had this issue now a few times over the past few months (just got my '07 650i Convertible 5 months ago).
I have read many threads and info from other places, and found a workaround for this issue that I have not seen posted anywhere else (at least it works for me).
I've had this happen to me just this morning again (car was parked in the airport garage for a week, and after taking the red-eye back from San Francisco, I could not open the trunk, and noticed the "red convertible top blinking light" problem - last thing you want at 7am after an overnight flight.

So I did what I've now sucessfully done over the past month when this happened, the the light stops blinking right away, and things are back to normal.

So this is what I do (old school):

There's a bar (not the kind you're thinking about) with an elbow that runs behind the canvas in the back pivot point in the convertible top (forgive me - I don't know the technical terms), but the first pic shows what this looks like on the drivers side. I have drawn the approx location of where this bar lies with a red dot indicating the pivot point where the faulty sensor lies.

All I do when I run into this problem is to apply a little pressue to that pivot point with my hand (as indicated by the red dot in the pic) and the red blinking light stops blinking, and things are back to normal (shown in the second attachhment). I normally push the pivot point down towards the body of the car - not a lot of pressure is needed at all. To quantify, if you press hard enough to break an egg, it's to hard. All it needs is a gentle nudge for the sensor to engage (is my guess).

I'm assuming in my case the problem lies with the sensor on the driver side, because I never had to do this on the passenger side, but it may be that in some cases one will have to do this on the passenger side as opposed to the driver side (as shown in the third attachment).

Let me know if this helps anyone else.

This works fine for me, so I'm not planning on taking the car in for this to be fixed, since it does not look as if the successrate in addressing this is that high (and I can't do without the car for two days, and it's out of warrantee anyway).

Nice but here is what I've found. It's not the pivot point that you need to apply presure to. It's a cable that's near the pivot point. I'm guessing that it needs to hit the right amount of tension to register to the car that the top is fully closed. When I apply a little presure to the cable the red light goes away.

Tstranger27 I can't believe all that! Well, actually I can haha. Such madness!!! I experienced this problem twice last month before the dealer "fixed it" and I was picturing exactly what you described... A bunch of us speeding around in our nearly six figure cars avoiding rain and thunderstorms and parking under overpasses. What a joke! Wish we could make some sort of film and send it to BMW engineers. Such an embarrassment... I'm dreading the day a cold front comes through and my windows randomly go down on the highway.

Hi ,

I used the software that I bought $275 from Bavarian Technic to read code and clear fault code for the sensor halt left top lock (red light blink) then later it showed at Convertible column as A6A7 "Energy Saving Mode Active" that might cause my soft top not to closing down (half way) since then. I asked Technician of Bavarian what code means but he refused to give me any answer . I suggest that better don't buy it or cable because might cause your BMW system go wrong and you might won't have any answer for that caused.

Originally Posted by chitai100

Hi ,

I used the software that I bought $275 from Bavarian Technic to read code and clear fault code for the sensor halt left top lock (red light blink) then later it showed at Convertible column as A6A7 "Energy Saving Mode Active" that might cause my soft top not to closing down (half way) since then. I asked Technician of Bavarian what code means but he refused to give me any answer . I suggest that better don't buy it or cable because might cause your BMW system go wrong and you might won't have any answer for that caused.

The Bavarian Technic package is not causing error codes, it only READS codes or clears them.

Since Bavarian Technic does not generate the codes (BMW does) their documentation states that codes displayed are the same as the factory tool (DIS/GT1) and to refer to BMW factory documentation for more info.

I could not find much info on "Energy Saving Mode Active" but it looks like that error can occur for several different modules in the car.

Thanks Yorgi for those information. I hoped that I could find what the code mean and share with everyone this problem.

This is the best fix ever! Great thinking to search for the sensor and discovering a solution for the dreaded red light!

I found this site to help w this SAME problem!!!......only to find out there are LOTS of u apparently pulling ur hair out too!!! I just started to hav all these conv top problems this week....over & over!!!! So , my fiancé called our local dealership, who informed him (get this!) - that there r 2 decals in the trunk that can never have anything covering them!!!! Well, after practically undoing the entire trunk.....there r no such decals (in MY trunk anyway!) & nothing is in there anyway!!!

I just (2 mos ago) traded in a Mercedes SL500 conv (that had conv top problems too!) for my 1st Beamer.......& sadly.....I'm not a happy customer so far. This is a ridiculous problem for this same car to be having w SO many of us & BMW not able to adequately repair it - in a timely manner!!!!!

Originally Posted by Amissyw

I found this site to help w this SAME problem!!!......only to find out there are LOTS of u apparently pulling ur hair out too!!! I just started to hav all these conv top problems this week....over & over!!!! So , my fiancé called our local dealership, who informed him (get this!) - that there r 2 decals in the trunk that can never have anything covering them!!!! Well, after practically undoing the entire trunk.....there r no such decals (in MY trunk anyway!) & nothing is in there anyway!!!

I just (2 mos ago) traded in a Mercedes SL500 conv (that had conv top problems too!) for my 1st Beamer.......& sadly.....I'm not a happy customer so far. This is a ridiculous problem for this same car to be having w SO many of us & BMW not able to adequately repair it - in a timely manner!!!!!

That sucks, been there. Well, almost, I never had someone tell me about a phantom decal. So you have not taken your car in for repair yet? There is a Service Bulletin for the adjustment of the rotation sensor bracket.

As I peruse other forums debating what the next car I may get will be it strikes me that high-end cars in general have a ton of problems that you would not expect. Quality issues are not exclusive to Mercedes...BMW and others seem to have their share of issues also. Sorry, wish I could tell you that you bought a car that would be trouble free, it still may be the case after you get through this but you would be in the minority.

Cai Tai,

I think the "saving energy mode" is when your battery is getting old or weak. The BMWs and Mini Coopers both do the same thing. When the battery is older and the car is parked, it will start turning off anything that causes battery drain to ensure there is enough juice to start the car. For example, it will drop things like radio stations, MPG, TPS sensor data, etc. Both the wife's 2007 Mini Cooper S and my 2007 BMW 650i have done this before and the service advisor told me that the code showing was "saving energy mode" (or very similar to this - paperwork is at home right now).

Were you trying to close the top when the car was not running?

Good luck.

Thanks Kansas Corey,

Your information might help me . I close my top with engine running

I replaced a new battery but the A6A7 "saving energy mode active" fault code still be there. It might cause my soft top close only half way. Please give me an advice
thanks

Originally Posted by chitai100

I replaced a new battery but the A6A7 "saving energy mode active" fault code still be there. It might cause my soft top close only half way. Please give me an advice
thanks

If you are still getting the "energy saving mode" error after a new battery I would check the alternator and check if something is putting a draw on the battery when the car is shut off.

I was so tired of taking it back to the dealer over and over again for that top down problem.

I just had this problem and this fix {pressure on the joint in the roof} worked like a treat. Thank you so much boesman10 !!!

boesman10,
Thank you so much for your post (Boesman10 #120). I have been searching for a solution to this problem for weeks now. I followed your directions (photos) and pressed the sensor located on the drivers side, rear back panel conv.'s top as indicated.
IT WORKS! Congratulations for finding this. Amazing!!!!

I had my car in while under factory warranty for the top unlock problem, after that it still popped up then went away for the last year.

Once again, it has manifested this week. Unfortunately it was when my Wife got in the car to come home from work, I was out of town and got the call "what is wrong with the car". For you married guys you know the routine, it was completely my fault!

Luckily during her drive home with the windows half down the error went away on it's own. Perhaps the jostling of the drive righted my sensor or cable? I checked the car this morning and it was giving the error, I did the "boesman10" push and it went away. I need to teach the Wifey this routine so that she is prepared next time.

Still irritating that we have to worry about using the convertible top! For me it is happening because it got cooler out!!!

TO: TampaMark, chickapea1, dunkirk, RossArmstrong, castercorey, elan72, DEDrop, WineCountry and others...

It's a rainy day in Tampa, FL and I had to use the "boesman10" push (thanks to tampamark for giving the "move" a name) this afternoon, saving me once again from driving with windows down in the rain...so I figured let me log on to see if there were any replies to my original post (have been out of touch for a while)...and great was my surprise to see how many people found value in the post! I'm really thrilled that this "band-aid" is indeed working for others as well.

It's sad to say, but I'm using this method almost once a week. Such a nice car with such a basic flaw.

I'm so good at it now that I can even do the "boesman10" push while driving (DISCLOSURE: I DO NOT RECOMMEND ANYONE DOING THIS).

Even my kids (when sitting in the back) are familiar with the maneuver - they have it down to a science. They are even fighting to get the seat closest to the "boesman10" rub point when getting in the car (at ages 6 and 10 they like to turn off the "red blinking light that causes daddy to use inappropriate words").

Sad to say, but I'll probably pass this on to whomever buys my car one day since I refuse to spend money to get this fixed.

Regards,
--boesman10

Originally Posted by boesman10

...they like to turn off the "red blinking light that causes daddy to use inappropriate words")....

LOL...classic post. Almost as good as your original "boesman10 push" post.

Thanks again for finding this simple fix to a big problem.

Awesome post boesman. Even if you paid to have it fixed it does not ensure it will stick!!!

Thanks again.

Sent from my SCH-I510 using Bimmer