[urfault]

I know this topic has been done to death. "It cant be done!" But here I am having another crack at it, but from a different angle.

First up just want to give a massive thank you to the following posts, the details given there in their attempt has helped massively!
https://www.1erforum.de/threads/mult...-m140i.260091/
https://f87.bimmerpost.com/forums/sh....php?t=1723947

Before I go into my approach, I will give some insight into what stopped the referenced posts. Nothing really worked properly/at all, and before they attempted to go any deeper one major issue stopped them from doing anything else. The main hurdle is that the centre console POWER button (DSC, Steering and Power, OG ones have DSC, Sport/Sport+, and comfort), is wired directly into the DME (A211*1B Pin 48). Everyone has theorised that as this is not an "M" DME it will not be able to make sense of this input if it were wired and the entire system would be half functional at best.

This may or may not be the case. Both DME's are MEVD172G so it may just magically accept the input, but more than likely this needs to be configured on a firmware level. Which we cannot do. However, the DME must also be able to change drive modes via CAN/FLEX, as when the M1/M2 buttons are pressed the drive mode changes and this is done via the HU. Now it is incredibly unlikely that the centre console buttons act as a "translator" to turn can/flex signals from the vehicle into an analog signal to go over this single wire, especially since the centre console buttons done have any twisted pair cables running into them.

So this isn't a huge turn off for me, its something that if I am correct, can be resolved with an emulator type of device at worst.


So this is where I'm currently at. Having used the resources from those forums along with some investigation of my own. I have a car that currently doesn't work properly, surprise. I have the M drive profiles in Idrive, but settings there do not save.

All of the settings from the referenced posts have been set on the respective modules, ICM, FEM, KOMBI, and HU. One thing I noticed is that after coding the ICM (all required settings for the centre console buttons and FDS/FES set) the sport/comfort buttons do not work anymore, which is expected as they have been disabled in the FDL. But when I fire up ista and explore the ECU functions, it allows me to read the "state" of the DSC, Sport, and comfort buttons. Surprisingly ISTA still listed sport and comfort, rather than the M specific buttons like steering, and it was still able to read the state of these buttons when pushed.

So even though the FDL level settings match a vehicle with Mdrive, on a firmware level the car still says "no you're an AG variant". This may be the reason as to why settings aren't saved in the IDrive.

I did wonder if its related to the missing DME, but this doesnt make sense. If you unplug the DME from an M car, you can still utilise the IDrive UI as per normal.

So this is my plan. I am going to start on the ICM as its the module with the least FDL changes between an OG and COMP and see how it goes.
I am going to perform an ISTEP upgrade on the module using an FA from an M2 competition. This will load the actual M2c firmware, unfortunately some vehicle settings (Like engine variant and a few other settings related to the DSC and GHAS) will also be flashed, this causes encoding errors in the GHAS and DSC. But these can be changed back manually via FDL coding.

If this process works out I will code the GHAS, DSC, and EPS all so they are on comp ISTEP, but with the critical variant information left the same as the OG. This is important as the DME will spit out information related to torque based on the engine variant. Since we cant change the DME engine variant, these modules will have to be changed back to match the OG.

It's a lot like when a GTS flash is done on the EGS on the OG M2, it changes the module to a different firmware which doesnt work correctly since its looking for stuff that isn't there. The symptom of "C" on the KOMBI instead of "D" is a reference to its drive mode.

If this process works correctly, then once my competition KOMBI, gear selector, centre console buttons, and drivelogic button arrive. I will be able to continue this method to at the minimum have working M buttons for the steering, DSC, and transmission. The engine may or may not respond but that will be the last issue to tackle.

Going to perform the istep change on the ICM tomorrow, will post an update with the results. I'm expecting ISTA to show the updated functions and that will confirm to me if I'm going in the right direction!

[urfault]

Alright so I did some playing around today and have found out some things.

My hunch was wrong about the ISTEP upgrade being the key, both the M2C, M2, and F80/82 share the same swfl for the DSC, ICM, GHAS, and EPS so that's not going to be any help. The good news is that means there are no physical or wiring differences between any of them.

I updated the ICM istep to F020-24-11-520 and FA coded it with an FA I created using the M2C Vehicle type, with the production date 11/17 (My OG is 03/17) and as expected that worked correctly taking all the settings from an M2 competition.
I then got the error: E06C43 "Signal (Warning object coordination status, 0x21F) Invalid, transmitter DSC/ICM"

So after that I also performed an ISTEP upgrade on the DSC. Sure enough the error went away and didn't return. Even with the ICM having the engine variant different to the rest of the car. Interesting.

I then FA coded the DSC with the M2C FA and again no issues.

So this is where I'm currently at, I believe the way we can achieve this is via FA coding the DSC, EPS, ICM, GHAS, HU*, and the Kombi*

Changing the istep version will be required for the EGS. I will likely just jump straight into the M4 GTS firmware.

Notes HU: In the facelift there were a few changes to the HU with the main one being the addition of a touch screen. These settings will need to be manually coded back via FDL coding.

Notes Kombi: It will not work with the pre-lci kombi. It will need an LCI Competition kombi, this will then have the istep with the competition FA installed, then FA coded with the competition FA.

Now Just flat FA coding every module may not be the best approach, but what it will do is allow me to download the cafd from the module (once coded to M2C) and compare it with the original, so I can get every specific FDL setting change that is required.

At the moment we will need the following:
M2C Kombi
M2C GWS
M2C Drivelogic button (Wiring required)
M2C Centre console buttons (Wiring Required)

Once I have these I will include photos about wiring, and how to virginise the cluster and code it. Then I am going to perform an ISTEP upgrade on any module we plan to touch/code (and their dependencies if any). Finally I will code all the modules with the M2C FA and see what works and what doesn't.

At that point everything in the car says "I'm a competition" except the DME, but again in any other M car you can physically remove the DME and the UI will still allow for changes to be made to your M preferences.

Once that is complete I will see what functionality we actually have on the vehicle, and compare the cafd files from the OG and M2C. Then we will have a full list of required FDL changes to make in all the modules.

Finally once I get to that stage I will look into making the DME integrate with it. There is a chance it will just magically work (Over CAN/FLEX anyways), but likely for the POWER button wiring it into A211*1B pin 48 will yield nothing. The good news is that if the DME is controllable via CAN/FLEX using the M1/M2 buttons and their presets, a simple CAN emulator will just need to take the POWER button input and then spit out the next appropriate CANbit to change the drive mode.

Parts are up to a few weeks away from arriving (for the kombi), but likely I will update this thread as each part arrives and I tinker with it.

[urfault]

No parts have arrived yet but I played around with the M1/M2 buttons and have some news.

Based on the forum posts I was following I blindly trusted them when they said all that was needed was a set of knock off M1/M2 buttons for the original steering wheel. Where you remove the blank plates and install them.

Since I didn’t have the button faces yet but wanted to confirm this theory, I removed the steering wheel buttons and popped off the cover.

Then I coded the FEM with:
FEM_BODY> 3140 PfLinSteeringWheel> LIN_VARIANTE_MFL> "SLD_DCC_M_Drive"

Fired up ISTA and called up the ECU FUNCTIONS for the FEM, read the state of the left steering wheel block. Pressed where the M1/M2 buttons would be and nothing happened. Ran around the FDL settings for the FEM like a mad man wondering if there was actually another setting.

Then I began to think, what if this steering wheel button set isn’t the same electrically as one that has buttons. Bingo!

I pulled the buttons out of our F85 X5M, and plugged them in. Sure enough when I call up the ECU functions it now reads:
“ACC distance button Actuated” for M1
“Changeover button pressed” for M2


Now ISTA’s functions don’t actually outline what the coding is behind the car, because just to check my sanity I ran the same test on the X5M.
“Button to increase distance operated” for M1
“Button to decrease distance operated” for M2

Also to confirm my theory about the sports and eco buttons I read the button state of the ICM on the X5M and the Steering button is labelled ECO, with the damper control labelled Sport/Sport+.

Based on all this I don’t think I need steering wheel buttons out of an M car, just any BMW that has the buttons populated will work. Now this won’t have the M1/M2 button faces but I’ve already spent the money on the knock off ones so I can save some on the buttons. If I were to do it again I’d just get a set out of an M car to keep the OEM look but is what it is.

[samsamdar]

Dude you’re the goat for this. Here’s to hoping you get this figured out! Btw, I’ve messed around with some M2C coding on my LCI N55. From my understanding, all the M2C parameters work the same on the n55 variant of the lci cluster. I’ve also seen n55 parameters working just fine on the s55 variant. Not sure if helpful, but I believe both variants of the lci cluster should be able to work with this endeavor!

[urfault]

Cheers Mate! Think i'm on the right path but time will tell.

I was thinking that tbh. But I know that the LCI and Comp KOMBI's have different HWEL version, I think this is related to the tacho going up to 8K on the comp, so a different firmware is required. So I cant flash the M2 Competition ISTEP to it.

Unsure if the standard firmware on the LCI supports all of the M displays and features, so I didn't want to take that risk when ordering it.

Once I have my Comp KOMBI and determine the correct FDL settings, you should definitely give it a go and see if it works!

[urfault]

As with any start to the Uni semester, I'm procrastinating about doing work.

So decided to do some wiring. I have run the cables for the drive logic button so once it arrives I can chuck it in. I do not expect it to work until we get the GWS but again I wanted to burn some time.

This is the wiring diagram for the M2c/F80/F82 gear selector. It is identical to the OG except for pin number 1, which connects to the drive logic button.



This is the diagram for the centre console buttons, now I have not made any changes to these buttons but I used this harness to tap into the ambient lighting wire. Once I receive my M2c buttons I will make any changes I need to, to this area.



First thing I did was dig into my "Auto Sparky" box, I had a spare door harness out of an F10 that I salvaged some wires and a connector from.

It was the 4 pin connector for the window control. Using a razor blade I shaved it down to a 3 pin to fit in the drivelogic plug.
I found a brown wire for the ground, a red/grey for the ambient lighting, and a green/white for the signal. Would match the diagrams perfectly if the signal was solid green but doesn't stress me.

The pinout for this connector is:
Pin 1: Signal (To GWS pin 1)
Pin 2: Ground
Pin 3: Ambient lighting



Once I got my wires sorted I ripped out the centre trim and gear selector. I hate those ugly wire taps as they take up so much room, but you could definitely use them here. I opted to solder and heatshink all my connections.

I removed the ground cable from the GWS, sliced a small section of the insulation away, then I poked a hole in the copper making a slit. After that I passed the additional ground through it, then wrapped it around, finally soldered. Solid mechanical connection, she ain't going nowhere. You can see my green/white wire pinned into PIN 1 on the GWS below.



Bit of heat shrink to tidy her up and plugged the ground back into PIN 8 on the GWS.



The drive logic functionality is now sorted but to make the button light up when the ambient lighting is turned on I had to tap into the centre console buttons. On the blue connector PIN 4 is listed as 58G which goes to the FEM for ambient lighting. I depinned that and repeated the same steps as the ground cable.



This is how it all looked before I taped the wires together



Finally I plugged everything back together and this is how it looked before I smacked the trim back on. You can see the little black connector poking out at the bottom of the GWS.



And that's it really. Took me about an hour to do and now the only additional wiring that needs to be done for this project is running a pin to the DME for the POWER button. Now I'm not dumb enough to rip this entire interior apart for that unless I know it works, so when the time comes to test that function I'll run the wire out the window to the DME haha.

Unfortunately, I really have run out of things to do on this project without having the competition parts. Australia post takes missing its shipping deadlines very seriously and won't be caught making a delivery in a reasonable amount of time.

Back to Uni work for me until next week I guess!

[urfault]

Lots of big updates. I think I'm very close to a working solution!

I'll make 3 posts and break them into sections:
Centre console buttons
GWS and drivelogic
Kombi and Mdrive

Lets start with the centre console buttons.

After plugging the new buttons in I found that they almost worked normally as the sport/comfort buttons did. Pressing the POWER button changed the drive mode like pressing sport/sport+ does. However, the pressing steering did not have the effect of comfort/eco.

The best part about these buttons is the PDC button. Since my car only had rear PDC sensors it did not have a button inside the car. Which is insanely annoying when I would reverse up to a wall and it couldn't be turned off without turning the car off. Surprisingly the PDC button worked without any coding in the ICM.





The two diagrams above show the M2C vs the M2 wiring for the centre console buttons. In either case PIN 10 on the ICM is for Comfort/ECO or in the M2C it handles the steering control.

Issue is that on the M2C buttons, Pin 8 handles the Comfort/eco/steering input, whilst on the OG M2 its done by Pin 7.

Really easy swap to change the pin on the blue connector from 7 to 8!



Now effectively these buttons are working normally with the OG M2 coding, acting as sport/comfort buttons, with the addition of PDC. Cheap mod that I would do even if I wasn't attempting to retrofit Mdrive!





Next thing I did was FA code the following with my M2C FA.
DSC, EPS, GHAS, ICM, and HU.

Interestingly the GHAS had no FDL changes from the M2 to the M2C
The EPS only had the variant change, (Similar when changing it to M4 GTS)
The DSC did have other changes related to load and engine torque.
ICM also had changes related to engine torque.

Surprisingly, after clearing the codes ista showed all green. So the DSC doesn't care that the DME has a different engine variant listed to the rest of the car. I will need to do more road testing to see if this actually causes an issue or not!

Finally I FA coded the HU. This went fine, except ista showed an error "B7F8CA CID: Version Not Compatible". This is relating to the touch screen, as the M2C FA I'm using is from an LCI year, the car expects a touch screen.
I manually changed these settings back via FDL coding and this error went away.

I will post all the FDL changes once I am finalised with the setup, so that its easy for anyone to replicate!

After performing these changes as expected, the centre buttons no longer work. When pressing the POWER button, an error is stored in ista relating to the incorrect configuration SPORT button. I assume this is because the POWER button runs directly to the DME in the M2C.

At this stage the car still had the OEM OG cluster installed, so I could not see the steering mode on the gauge. But when pressing the button the steering did change! I started the car and just moved the wheel gently left to right, and sure enough, each time I pressed it the wheel got slightly but noticeably heavier.

So we have our first component of Mdrive working successfully!

I then tried to run a wire from the centre console pin 6 to the DME A211*1B Pin 48. Unfortunately, but expectedly the DME did not respond or change modes like the steering did. Bummer but again didn't think it would be that easy.

My current thought process is that if Mdrive works correctly I will likely not need the POWER button as I can just use my presets to control it. But then again I am a perfectionist and if Mdrive works then it will be a simple ESP based microcontroller to spit out the CAN messages based on the button press!

[urfault]

Drivelogic!

For this we required an M2C GWS and the drivelogic buttons.

When purchasing the GWS I found that the M2C has a unique part number. For the RHD vehicle its: 61318072022

Whilst the F80/F82/F83 uses 61317848612.

This confused me since the cars are functionally identical, and the selectors should be physically identical. I decided to risk it since the M4 gear selector was significantly cheaper than the M2C version. (At least in Australia)

Once both parts arrived I jumped straight into installing them. Look over my previous post to see how the wiring was performed. It worked like a charm!



M4 gear selector had no issues working in the car. (Both before and after flashing the transmission), Drivelogic was not functional however before flashing the transmission.

I was feeling lazy so instead of creating a custom FA for an M4 GTS (To get the GTS flash) I used bootmod to install it. (More on an issue i'm facing about this later).

Like with other people on the internet when flashing the M4 GTS tune into an OG M2, the Kombi says C1 instead of D1, and pressing the drivelogic button has no effect on this "C".

However, I do suspect that the functionality is working correctly in the background, a lot like the steering button correctly changing the steering mode without the kombi to show which one its in.

This was reinforced after I installed the M2C kombi, no changes had to be made for the drivelogic mode to change and all appears to be working normally!



An issue i was facing after installing the M2C kombi is the gear display shows P, R, N, M1-7 all normally. But when put into drive the gear display disappears entirely, not just the number/letter but the box around them too. No drivelogic is shown either. In Manual mode drivelogic is shown and the gears work normally.



I did find a few forum posts about people having the same issue when using bootmod to flash the GTS tune, so I will create an FA and do it correctly via ESYS to hopefully resolve this issue. I suspect it may even be related to having the OG kombi installed when I did the flash as that did show C1 where the M2C kombi shows blank.

Next part is all operational, I now have an OG M2 that has full drivelogic working with the M4 GTS tune. Even if Mdrive doesnt work I will be incredibly happy with the car as it currently stands. Drivelogic and the M4 GTS tune was the entire reason I went down this path, along with the M2C cluster because its gorgeous!

So if you want to get this working you will need the following
F80/F82/F83/M2C GWS
M2C drivelogic buttons
Wires, pins, and a connector
M2C Kombi
ESYS

If you're based out of the US or the UK this is a fairly cheap retrofit, unfortunately being a KM/h country, the KM kombi's are significantly more expensive used than MPH ones.

[urfault]

The Kombi!

Unfortunately by this point I was running out of time. I will explore this more tomorrow to hopefully get Mdrive functional, but we will see how that goes.

You may have noticed in my previous post the dreaded red tamper dot on the kombi. I discovered these are harder to virginize than I originally thought.

I already had an R270+ ready to go, but I found out mid 2017 BMW changed from using the 35160WT eeprom to using the 35128WT version.
The R270+ cannot read/write this, in fact, no budget tool can. Luckily however, there is an option using the YH35XX programmer, along with the supplied eeprom emulator. By knowledge of this is that the programmer reads the eeprom, then the emulator chip is written this data (with the Vin changed). The emulator chip must be some kind of eeprom or flash memory that has the ability to have the chip id written. Once I receive this I will post an update about virginizing the cluster.

Now even without doing that I fired up esys, loaded up my M2C FA and coded the kombi2. and it works completely normally after doing that. With the exception of the tamper dot, and service reminders.

I didn't get a chance to dive any deeper into this but after coding the module, it had the normal efficiency dynamics, rather than the steering and engine mode shown. I dove into a rabbit hole and eventually found some FDL settings to force these to be shown however its just the icons. The text does not show regarding what state the steering or engine is in. This may just be a brain fart, as a little bit of research shows this may be an option in the idrive to set, and my FDL changes have broken it. I will figure that out tomorrow!




The other concern is that Mdrive still will not populate any settings, it just shows blank regardless of what I set. Unsure of where I went wrong with that as I assumed having the kombi would resolve that issue. It could be something silly like needing to perform an ISTEP upgrade on the HU.

I have been meaning to upgrade the entire car (except the DME as this is running bootmod and EGS as this is running the M4 GTS ISTEP) so depending how my messing around goes I will give that a shot. Really have just been worried about the horror stories of updating the HU taking hours or up to days to complete due to incorrect protocols set.

More to come tomorrow. It may be as simple as not having the M1/M2 buttons installed so I am going to steal those off the F85 X5M we have and see what pushing those does.

[maddoc]

I've always wanted Mdrive in my OG M2.

Now this is all in the a DCT car, what about a 6MT?

[urfault]

Originally Posted by maddoc

I've always wanted Mdrive in my OG M2.

Now this is all in the a DCT car, what about a 6MT?

Shouldn’t be any difference with a Manual car. Assuming I can get Mdrive working correctly! An advantage you have is that theoretically you only need the LCI kombi, Steering buttons, and centre buttons.

I’ve done an ISTEP upgrade on everything except the HU and ATM due to dependencies, once I upgrade the HU I will continue troubleshooting why the Steering and Power displays don’t work. Cheers!