Other lighting problem on the 2004 BMW 3 Series
1 fire 1 of the 16 reports for this failure mention a crash, a fire, an injury or a death. Those are the owner's words on the complaint form, not a verified finding, and one report can mention more than one.
When other lighting problem gets reported
Owners of the 2004 BMW 3 Series report other lighting problem at a median of 75,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 60,000 miles and a quarter after 90,000 miles, from 9 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 86,000 miles. It is the 2nd most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 45,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 120,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 76,800 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
When the reports scatter this far, the mileage is telling you about how these cars were driven more than about the part itself.
11% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 43,000 miles | 58,000 miles | 75,000 miles | 89,000 miles | 119,800 miles |
Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.
What a percentile can and cannot tell you here
These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.
What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.
Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.
What happens, and what it costs
Of these reports, 1 a fire is mentioned. Owners write their own complaints and the agency does not verify them, so read this as what the reports say happened rather than as a confirmed count.
Putting it right typically runs $120–$1,200 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 3 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2003, at a median of 70,000 miles, and latest on the 2001 at 110,000 miles.
By volume the 2004 is the worst of them, which makes this a problem of this specific year rather than of the model as a whole.
If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.
Tick median reported mileage Solid middle half of reports Faint 10th to 90th percentile Colour how bad the failure is when it happens
What owners wrote
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.
2004 bmw 325i with the factory bi-xenon headlights manufactured by zkw. The lights have extensive damage to the reflective bowls such that the light output is quite dim. This is apparently a weel documented problem with these lights by this manufacturer. No replacement is available other than complete replacement at $1000 per light or retrofitting another type of projector in its place. Bmw refuses to recognize this very common problem. *ln
2004 bmw 325xi sedan; taillight fails intermittently according to dashboard indicator, then failed solid. The wires melted inside the connector to the light housing and melted housing post - no easy way for home repair as this is not just a bad lightbulb. Bmw has service bulletin on repair, but is a pure design defect from the factory. There is no owner-induced problem here. They will not accept responsibility for repairs or recalls. A "google" reveals that this is a widespread issue with bmw 3-series and some 5-series cars. They should be forced to recall these cars for repairs. *tr
Tl* the contact owns a 2004 bmw 330. The contact stated that the plastic reflector bowl used for the headlights were burned and scorched by the heat of the bulbs used on the vehicle. The contact replaced the covering before and within a year, it burned through again. The contact stated that the brand covering that was failing was the zkw brand. The vehicle was not inspected by the dealer or repaired. The failure mileage was unknown and the current mileage was 71,000.
Also reported on the 2004 BMW 3 Series
Headlight failure or clouding
Tail light, brake light or signal failure
Airbag inflator rupture
Other electrical problem
ABS module or sensor failure
Other visibility problem
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 16 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.
Questions this page answers
At what mileage does other lighting problem happen on the 2004 BMW 3 Series?
Across 9 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 75,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 60,000 miles and a quarter after 90,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is other lighting problem on the 2004 BMW 3 Series?
16 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 1.0 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.
What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars
Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed