Unclassified problem on the 2007 BMW M5
Only 5 reports for this mode came with an odometer reading, which is too few for percentiles to mean anything. The page is here because someone linked to it; treat the figures as anecdotes, and see the full report for this year instead.
When unclassified problem gets reported
There are 5 reports of unclassified problem on the 2007 BMW M5, 5 with a mileage attached. That is too few to place the failure on the odometer with any confidence.
It is the 4th most-reported problem on this model year.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| — | — | 50,000 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.
The same failure, every year of the BMW M5
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.
Bmw continues to deny that a manufacturing defect in the passenger seat mat causes the vehicle to disable the passenger side airbag when occupied by an adult. The following recall was issued in 2008 for 2004-2006 model 5-series vehicles with the same exact passenger seat mat. Http://www.bmwusa.com/standard/content/contactus/voluntaryrecall.aspx there are countless claims and videos of the same thing happening to the 2007 models and later. If a seat mat sensor should ever go out, the majority of the time it would be on the driver side since it's the most used. In every case it's the same problem on the passenger seat side. This flaw in the seat mat is extremely dangerous as owners are not willing to pay $1,700 for a new seat mat (which is a new design). They're instead purchasing an override switch sold online (http://www.xenonplanet.com/bmw-airbag-seat-occupancy-sensor-e36-e46-e38-e39-e53-x5-z3) to re-enable the airbag, so they can safely drive with a passenger. The problem with this solution is the car can no longer determine the passengers weight (ie. Children) which could become deadly in the event of an accident. Even bmw…
Tl* the contact owns a 2007 bmw m5. The contact stated that a message flashed on the screen stating that the passenger restraint system was defective. The contact took the vehicle to a dealer for a diagnostic test. The test results showed that a seat mat sensor in the passenger's seat was defective and needed to be replaced. The contact did not have the sensor replaced. The failure mileage was 51,000.
The passenger occupancy seat mat is faulty. Its an known ongoing issue with many many bmw m5 owners, and a huge safety issue! Now the airbags may not deploy properly. Bmw refuses to fix the problem and is over $2000 to fix. They had a recall for the same exact issue but only until mid-2005 models. This issue is going on well past vehicles built in 2005. *tr
Also reported on the 2007 BMW M5
Instrument cluster or gauge failure
Other speed control problem
Other body or interior problem
How far this goes
This page is kept out of search results because 5 reports is not enough to publish percentiles from. It stays reachable because somebody looking at this exact car would rather see the reports than be told there are none.
Complaints are voluntary, so 5 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 unclassified problem happen on the 2007 BMW M5?
Across 5 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 50,000 miles. A quarter were filed before — and a quarter after —. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is unclassified problem on the 2007 BMW M5?
5 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.3 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