Why does my Oil light turn off with ignition II engine off?

[nextelbuddy]

So back in April or March I parked my car in the garage and proceeded to pull out my carbon air box setup and sell it for a spur of the moment thought on turbocharging my car.

It has been sitting since then briefly turned on and off just to wire in some accessories calibrate my wideband sensor etc... But it actually hasn't been started at all.

I've also in that time period drained the oil completely, left it empty so that I could drill and tap more oil pan for a return line. Oil pans been cleaned out no metal shavings, I flush the oil pan out with cheap oil filled it back up also with motul 10w60

So I got everything buttoned up wired back in DME is back in...

I'm going to be road tuning tomorrow turbo kits all installed ready to go.

I go to turn the ignition on and the battery light and the oil light both come on the oil light flashes yellow red then turns off and I could have sworn that the battery light and the oil light both stay on until you start the engine.

initially I thought my battery light was the culprit because it was showing without the oil light but I confirmed with a buddy of mine that on ignition two without starting the engine battery light stays on and the oil light flashes yellow and red on his and it stays on until he starts the engine.



So I need to figure out now what's wrong with the oil light.

Wonder if anybody has any ideas or things I can try.

[George Hill]

Shawn,
You have a different DME in the car than before, correct? Is your oil pressure sensor wired to the cluster? IIRC the early cars had the sensor hardwired to the cluster and the later cars got the signal over CAN.

And yes it should be red until a few seconds (or so) after starting.

[heinzboehmer]

IIRC the early cars had the sensor hardwired to the cluster and the later cars got the signal over CAN.

Isn't that the alternator light?

[nextelbuddy]

Shawn,
You have a different DME in the car than before, correct? Is your oil pressure sensor wired to the cluster? IIRC the early cars had the sensor hardwired to the cluster and the later cars got the signal over CAN.

And yes it should be red until a few seconds (or so) after starting.

George, I had the csl software on mss54hp dme but my alternator and oil sensors are canbus since my ZHP was canbus for those sensors. My cluster is also set for oil level canbus and alternator as well.

I looked at some old videos of my cluster and both alternator and oil level both came on and both turned off in ignition 2 with out starting the engine.

So now I'm trying to figure out why alternator light is staying on in ignition II when it used to turn off with oil level level.

So basically oil level is doing what it used to but alternator is staying in.

Is there a difference between direct wire and canbus which would yield different results for what the lights do in the cluster in ignition II?


The difference for me is before i was running csl software and now I'm running stock mss54hp software

[Arith2]

George, I had the csl software on mss54hp dme but my alternator and oil sensors are canbus since my ZHP was canbus for those sensors. My cluster is also set for oil level canbus and alternator as well.

I looked at some old videos of my cluster and both alternator and oil level both came on and both turned off in ignition 2 with out starting the engine.

So now I'm trying to figure out why alternator light is staying on in ignition II when it used to turn off with oil level level.

So basically oil level is doing what it used to but alternator is staying in.

Is there a difference between direct wire and canbus which would yield different results for what the lights do in the cluster in ignition II?


The difference for me is before i was running csl software and now I'm running stock mss54hp software

If it's CANBUS it's going through a module which can be programmed. If it's direct, only four things can be wrong, ground, power, pressure sensor, or the red light. Your oil pressure light should be on when there's no oil pressure. I have an 06 and it stays on until I start the car. The red oil light is just a dumb switch that opens at like 5 psi or something.

[George Hill]

George, I had the csl software on mss54hp dme but my alternator and oil sensors are canbus since my ZHP was canbus for those sensors. My cluster is also set for oil level canbus and alternator as well.

I looked at some old videos of my cluster and both alternator and oil level both came on and both turned off in ignition 2 with out starting the engine.

So now I'm trying to figure out why alternator light is staying on in ignition II when it used to turn off with oil level level.

So basically oil level is doing what it used to but alternator is staying in.

Is there a difference between direct wire and canbus which would yield different results for what the lights do in the cluster in ignition II?


The difference for me is before i was running csl software and now I'm running stock mss54hp software

I'm not an expert on all of the differences in coding and production variances so I always just hardwire those items if the donor came that way on my swaps.

But the bulb check function is the clusters logic. The lights operating as warning lights are functions of the actual sensor/DME output. Whenever I have seen the light come on, then go off before the car is started it's because it's either no coded correctly to function over CAN or because the wiring wasn't added during the swap.

The oil pressure switch closes at .5bar so anything under that and the light should be on.

The alternator light is powered through the cluster and grounded by the DME whenever the alternator is not charging so it should be on with the engine off as well.

[nextelbuddy]

I'm not an expert on all of the differences in coding and production variances so I always just hardwire those items if the donor came that way on my swaps.

But the bulb check function is the clusters logic. The lights operating as warning lights are functions of the actual sensor/DME output. Whenever I have seen the light come on, then go off before the car is started it's because it's either no coded correctly to function over CAN or because the wiring wasn't added during the swap.

The oil pressure switch closes at .5bar so anything under that and the light should be on.

The alternator light is powered through the cluster and grounded by the DME whenever the alternator is not charging so it should be on with the engine off as well.

well that makes sense.

I was on the CSL software which wasn't originally programmed to handle Alternator via canbus. Terraphantm did make a change a while ago to the CSL software to accommodate that but i never updated to it so that makes sense why my alternator light would come ON and OFF before the engine started and now on the stock MSS54HP software that does support alternator via canbus the alternator light is staying on with the engine off.

so back to my oil light, it comes on red then yellow then switches off while engine is off but from your explanation it should be remaining ON with engine off if it is coded properly or wired properly so that tells me my oil sensor wiring/coding needs addressing.

its just so weird that i know my oil level was always working as in i old get the light if oil level was low.


I wonder if it has anything with the fact that on the oil filter housing, i moved the oil pressure switch to the empty unused spot so i could put an oil feed block adapter for my turbo in the old oil pressure switch location. I did check and make sure the switch is plugged in.

i take it the oil light in the cluster shows oil LEVEL AND PRESSURE? so oil level warning comes from the oil level sensor in the pan and oil pressure comes from the oil pressure switch but both can display a warning with the same oil light in the cluster right? s if my oil level is canbus but the oil pressure is not wired properly then the light would work from a oil level stand point but not work for oil pressure stand point?

[George Hill]

i take it the oil light in the cluster shows oil LEVEL AND PRESSURE? so oil level warning comes from the oil level sensor in the pan and oil pressure comes from the oil pressure switch but both can display a warning with the same oil light in the cluster right? s if my oil level is canbus but the oil pressure is not wired properly then the light would work from a oil level stand point but not work for oil pressure stand point?

Correct, two different sensors using (technically) two different LEDs (even though they are in the same LED housing) but they light up the same cut-out in the cluster housing.

[nextelbuddy]

Correct, two different sensors using (technically) two different LEDs (even though they are in the same LED housing) but they light up the same cut-out in the cluster housing.

So I went back into my cluster which is a coding index 24 cluster. I had alternator over can bus enabled oil level over can bus enabled but oil pressure over can bus not enabled.

I switched that to enabled flashed it back to the cluster but still the oil light doesn't stay on it turns right back off.

so then I checked both of the smaller engine harness plugs x6011 and the other small four-pin one... I can't remember that connector name and TIS is gone lol

X6011 is the larger 8 pin plug and it looks very similar to an MS-45.1 it only has two wires which are for the starter and some other wire.. and then two additional wires for gear position sensor and TPMS. No alternator, oil level or oil pressure signal wires. and I remember when I did my swap MS-45.1 was virtually identical out of eight pins only two were used.

The other smaller 4-pin plug I know one of the pins is a black and purple wire which is for the EKP fuel pump relay which I'm not using The other three wires I don't know what they are and I can't look up on TIS unfortunately.

I also checked the back of my cluster pin number 13 and it's empty on mine so there's no pin in there

So it's baffling why the system thinks the oil pressure is not wired or working correctly.

[George Hill]

Shawn,
Sorry my memory is not very good when I am not looking straight at something.

But I did check the wiring diagram as per ISTA for a M3 and it shows:
F34 -> X11175 pin #5 KOMBI (GN/BL)
X11175 Pin #13 KOMBI -> X60004 Pin#11 DME (BR/GN)
X60003 Pin #26 DME -> X6231 Oil Pressure switch (BR/GN)

A ZHP is the following as per ISTA:
F34 -> X11175 pin #5 KOMBI (GN/BL)
X11175 Pin #13 KOMBI -> X6011 #3 (BR/GN)
X6011 #3 -> X6231 Oil Pressure switch (BR/GN)

On our swap I would remove that X11175 Pin #13 KOMBI -> X60004 Pin#11 DME (BR/GN) circuit from the M3 donor, cut it to length and wire it from X60004 Pin#11 DME to X6011 #3 if that makes sense.

[nextelbuddy]

Thanks man I appreciate it super fast response while you were typing all that out I went back out and I looked at the pinouts I had saved for the S54 Ike and DME and saw that x60003 has the oil pressure switch sensor reading but then x60004 also has an oil pressure output wire to the cluster and I wasn't utilizing that. So I just ran a wire from x60004 pin 11 to the cluster plug pin 13. used NCS export to change back to oil pressure via CAN bus not active... and now my oil light and alternator light are both on with the engine off.


So pretty much the whole time I have was running before My alternator light wasn't performing properly because I was using CSL software and my oil pressure switch wasn't working properly at all only oil level so I would have never known that my oil pressure was dropping.

I'm glad I caught it now.

I'm just curious which model year m3 cars have oil pressure via CAN bus.

anyways doesn't matter thanks so much for the help man you definitely put me down the right path I appreciate it

[George Hill]

I'm just curious which model year m3 cars have oil pressure via CAN bus.

anyways doesn't matter thanks so much for the help man you definitely put me down the right path I appreciate it

That I couldn't tell you, but I'm sure Terra has the answer, it may be Non-HP vs HP, but I'm not sure.

No problem, I see this all the time with these swaps.