What spins in drive and stops in park? Loud noise

[X5Sport]

Ouch!  But at least you now have it back and all will be fine as far as the auto box issues are concerned.

[Steamyrotter]

Thanks for the update.
Will help others out if they search.

That seems a reasonable price and with warranty too.

Glad you've got it sorted.

[Smeeagain]

[quote="Rob5"]
Just incase anyone stumbles across this thread in the future I thought I'd post an update.

It was indeed the torque converter which had failed, broken up and fallen into the gearbox, thus destroying that also. Reconditioned gearbox needed unfortunatly.

May I recommend Suffolk Automatic Transmittions to anyone in the area. They picked the car up and dropped it off, supplied a courtesy car and fitted a recon box for 1695 plus vat. A lot better than some other quotes I got. Very nice friendly guys down there too. Even managed to solve a few other issues I had at the same time. 12 month 12000 mile warranty with it as well so all being well should be ok for a while.
[/quote]

So when you say a recon box do you jean they reconned your actual box or fitted a recon box and took yours off your hands?

[X5Sport]

In the end that was what was done with mine.  Old one out and into the remanufacturing line whilst a replacement unit, plus new mech unit etc went in and the car taken to a Bosch centre to have the "I'm an E53" code blown into the Mech Unit's brain.

There was some damage to the case of mine caused by the oil pump failure as well as the MU, hence getting a different - but identical type - gearbox and brand new MU.

The specialist mine went to did so many BMWs that they carried rebuilt spares on the shelf.  His car park was full of E53s, 5 series, 7 series all with some form of ZF or GM box failure.  It wasn't exactly confidence building with regard to the box itself!!!

[Rob5]

I'm not entirely sure. I presume they had to replace as he initially said he might be able to repair it himself. After he found bits of it had damaged the gearbox, he told me a full recon would be necessary. This is the link to their website which says what they do:

http://suffolktransmissions.co.uk/gearb ... ng/1262658

[Steamyrotter]

The big trouble is the fluid coming back from the torque convertor is used to lubricate the bearings in the gearbox prior to returning to the sump!

So where does 90% of the debris go...........

There are no major filters in that line so that could do it.

The big issues with most gearboxes is the loss of pressure from some form of wear in side.  The pump and valve bodies are the biggest culprits.
It doesn't need much, and we are talking fractions of a mm here...