Change of roof motor Z4

[Roy D.]

Greetings from Norway. I have problem with my roof on my 2006 Z4, It’s not working when I push the button. So I decide to check the hydraulic motor thru the trunk. So after some google and Youtube I start the dissembling. Finally after some brutality I got the top of the motorhousing off. And as expected the motorhousing was full of rusty water. And it’s now the real trouble is starting. I can’t drag the motor long enough into the trunk, because the cables goes under the lower part of the motorhousing. As I read there is some tie wraps that hold the house. After hours with dragging and twisting I can’t get it loose. I tried from the trunk and from the cabin. It's so frustrating! Do I need the take out the lower part of the housing? Is it possible to push the cable sideways under the housing? Have someone change the motor without dragging it all the way to the trunk? Please see pictures under, which shows how long I can drag it out. I also used an endoscope (really bad picture quality) There is a white clips in the front of the housing (nearest cabin), Do I need to break this clips? All tips are grateful

 

[colb]

Take a look at this Youtube video

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPhwOO654JA

The problem you have encountered is that the lower plastic motor housing is still being held in the cavity by a plastic zip tie. This needs breaking so the lower half of the container can be fully extracted and pulled back into the boot, once free the pipes should come out of their guides and allow the unit to be pulled back into the boot.

 

[Zont]

Greetings from Norway. I have problem with my roof on my 2006 Z4, It’s not working when I push the button. So I decide to check the hydraulic motor thru the trunk. So after some google and Youtube I start the dissembling. Finally after some brutality I got the top of the motorhousing off. And as expected the motorhousing was full of rusty water. And it’s now the real trouble is starting. I can’t drag the motor long enough into the trunk, because the cables goes under the lower part of the motorhousing. As I read there is some tie wraps that hold the house. After hours with dragging and twisting I can’t get it loose. I tried from the trunk and from the cabin. It's so frustrating! Do I need the take out the lower part of the housing? Is it possible to push the cable sideways under the housing? Have someone change the motor without dragging it all the way to the trunk? Please see pictures under, which shows how long I can drag it out. I also used an endoscope (really bad picture quality) There is a white clips in the front of the housing (nearest cabin), Do I need to break this clips? All tips are grateful

Place your motor back in the housing as this will give you more room to get your hand behind. You do not need to break the clips in your clips image as the hydraulic lines can be pulled out from them with a little force. As colb has said above, there is a small cable tie that needs to be cut at the back of the housing (you can see this in the video above at 3 min 18 seconds) I used a small hack saw blade to cut mine. There is also another small cable tie behind the lower part of the motor housing to the right (if looking from rear), which is attached to one of the hydraulic lines and one of the fabric covered cables. Finally there is an additional cable tie at the the bottom of housing that holds all the hydraulic lines to the lower housing. You only need to cut/break the at the back of the housing first (3 min 18 seconds in the video) and this will give enough leaverage to lift the lower housing and to cut the others.