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E70 Self leveling air suspension fully inflated one side

16K views 15 replies 10 participants last post by  Ms.RUNderful 
#1 · (Edited)
Hey Im new here .. and yes there are plenty of threads on here and other forums that Ive looked through related to the air suspension to see if anyone has had a similar issue but I am yet to find anything relevant. If anyone has had this issue or know of a post that would be helpful please direct me there.

So originally I had the standard problem that everyone has, where the bags would deflate over night and the compressor was making a horrible sound. First the compressor got replaced. The Bags then stayed inflated for longer but still slowly went down. Next up the mechanic replaced the bags on both sides. Picked the car up and everything looked great. However after driving for about 15 minutes on the way home started to notice something odd going on and soon after I got a fault come up on the nav screen which said something like.. level control system failure�.
I knew something was weird so I pulled over and had a look to see what was going on and what I saw was the rear right side air bag and front right wheel looked like they had been jacked up. The rear air bag seemed to be completely inflated and the left side was at normal ride height. I slowly and carefully got the car home.

When I got home I took a picture and sent it to the mechanic. He had no idea what was going on. He is looking into it for me but so far no luck.
The weirdest thing though is when I started up the car next and left it in park it started to go down and I was thinking YES!! But then it kept going and the left side went up and the right side was at normal ride height. I tried to reset everything by disconnecting the battery and leaving it disconnected for about half an hour .. but nothing changed. I drove the car very carefully around the block and then entire time I could hear the compressor going and I could feel the car changing height the entire time acting like a seesaw .. the right side would go up and left down and then the left side up and right down etc...

If anyone has any info they can share on this that would be much appreciated.. If no one can help I will end up taking it to the dealer workshop but obviously want to avoid that if possible. Thanks
 
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#2 ·
Here are some photos of whats going on

IMG-8378

What it looked like when i got home from mechanic on the left side

IMG-8379

What it looked like when i got home from mechanic on the Right side

IMG-8380

Then after restarting the car and letting it sit for a few minutes it goes down on the right and up on the left :tsk:

Full-Size-Render-1

Full-Size-Render

IMG-8387

I put the carly adaptor in and got these codes

Help! :dunno:
 
#5 ·
E70 rear airbag suspension gremlin

Hi Matt,
I assume that you got this fixed? If not, I may have a suggestion. I have been dealing with drooping rear end as well, and had to do some quite severe leak testing after I had new air bags fitted.
I got a new valve block to start with and noticed that the red and blue dots were totally misleading. The new block had a red dot forward whereas the old block had a blue dot. The blue tube goes on the front one and the red tube goes on the rear entry on the valve block, at least that is the way mine was originally.
But your issue sounds to me like the red and blue air pipes are in the wrong holes on the valve block next to the compressor. There are level sensors on each wheel, so when yours is telling you to level it up it appears like it might be pumping up the wrong one. It probably gives up after a while.

If yours are the wrong way around, I'd try that first.
 
#8 · (Edited)
Definitely totaled... Should part out the M-Sport body parts & wheels to me for cheap, as they're not worth much at all... Maybe a few hundred bucks at best...

Why couldn't the 35d have been made in the M-Sport package... So jealous...

Joking aside, not familiar with the rear air suspension workings, but I'd be looking at the level sensors, especially considering the code for the level sensor... It's possible to get the arms on the level sensors flipped around, where it outputs that the suspension is at an implausible suspension height. This is more often reported on non-bagged E70's after suspension work, where the symptom of a flipped around level sensor is that the adaptive bixenon headlights don't properly adjust in the vertical axis.

If you recently did suspension work, check the level sensors. There should be two on the rear axle, one for each side. Could be something as stupid as one of the ball-joints on the sensor popped out, or the arm is flipped around. Either way, the problem is more than likely something to do with the level sensors.
 
#9 ·
So...I will tell my story. I bought my e70 4.8i from an auction not knowing about leaking airbags, burnt relay, and compressor. After realizing that I bought aftermarket parts from eBay. After receiving compressor relay/valve I noticed that where on original is BLUE line port, on new one marked RED port, so I contacted the seller and he confirmed that this is ok, and connect it as it shows on valve. so I changed compressor, valve and airbags, and problem with inflating one side sometimes other side all the way appeared, so I couldnt drive the car. Anyway I had to drive it to mechanic few times and tyre shop, so I ****ed one airbag, ordered new one, ****ed another one ordered new one, and ****ed compressor and ordered new one, so I realized that is better to go to mechanics with compressor turned off after airbags is inflated after starting the car, but my cheap mechanic seems dont know **** about airbags. So all the time trying to find whats wrong, reading this forum and watching youtube, I downloaded ISTAD and decided to find problem my self as I thought is sensors or control unit, which ISTAD will tell me, and ISTA showed no faults in sensors after testing them same with control unit, the only thing that was left was valve, and after your thread and thanks to @drgeoff comment he reminded me about those misleading ports. I swapped them and thats it, my problem gone. At least I have ISTAD now :rofl: :rofl: BTW its still leaks a bit I dont know or it because its aftermarket parts or what but after night it goes like 10mm down :dunno:
 
#11 · (Edited)
Hi guys I'm new to bmw I kishachex x5 e70 and Compressor was going mad today then all of a sudden error message leveling failing. Then rear end flat no lift. Drove home carefully turned coff and on no error sighn no grinding sound but car won't rise. I'm guessing air leak bags pipes ext. Wondering after reading threads in this has the compressor burnt out is it an d. I. Y fix
 
#12 ·
check 10 amp fuse at the back fuse box for relay and 40 amp fuse at the front fuse box for compressor. at least one of them is gone that's why your rear is not lifting. if only 10amp gone you might be lucky and you have to change relay. But if you noticed your rear sagging for a while probaby you will have to change compressor, relay and airbags.
Check fuses first, change them, start the car. if airbags inflates to right height you might be still lucky. measure distance from wheel bottom to arc. Come back few hours later or better even more, measure the distance again so you can see or you have a leak.

If after changing fuses compressor starts working but suddenly stops but airbags havent inflated. Then you check 40 amp fuse again and if its burnt you have to change compressor and probably relay.
 
#13 ·
I***8217;m having similar issues.
Had my diff replaced...seems my suspension was down 50mm each side since.
Compressor doesn***8217;t run...but it***8217;s reasonably new. I pulled it out and bench tested it.
Measured voltage at compressor plug...nothing.
Fuses all seem to be ok.
Which one is the 10a fuse in the rear ?
 
#15 ·
Sagging rear air suspension issue...solved!

Well...I managed to get an old laptop off a mate and load Inpa. I already had the cable...as I bought it a while ago with the intention of connecting to my car.
So...I checked out the suspension and found the different ***8216;modes***8217;.
Shipping, production, garage, energy saving, low tolmode.
It appears ***8216;shipping mode***8217; is active.
So...I tried toggling it off/on.
Didn***8217;t seem to change.
So then I toggled the other modes...and I think it was ***8216;garage mode***8217; that did it...I just came good and the air bags filled up.
So very happy!!! ***55357;***56833;***55357;***56397;
 
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